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[March 13, 2006]

Kyodo news summary -6-+

(Japan Economic Newswire Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)TOKYO, March 13_(Kyodo) _ ---------- Indonesia court stiffens sentence of ex-E. Timor militia leader

JAKARTA - Indonesia's Supreme Court on Monday overturned a high court ruling that had halved the prison term for a former pro-Jakarta East Timor militia leader convicted of gross human rights violations in 1999 and restored the original 10-year term set by a lower court.


Supreme Judge Masyur Effendi said the five-member judicial panel of the top court rejected a Jakarta High Court ruling that had reduced by five years the jail term for Eurico Guterres, saying he has been "proven guilty of committing human rights violations" and mitigation of the sentence "did not reflect justice."

---------- Reforms promoted at public colleges

TOKYO - Unique reforms have been undertaken at seven public universities since they were turned into independent administrative entities, with a non-Japanese national appointed as president of Yokohama City University and student evaluation systems introduced at six schools, an education ministry survey showed Monday.

Yokohama City University appointed Bruce Stronach, a U.S. citizen, as president, while Akita International University appointed Australian Gregory Clark as vice president, according to the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.

---------- Int'l conservation body urges Indonesia to stop capturing elephants

JAKARTA - An international conservation organization called on Indonesia on Monday to stop capturing and translocating homeless Sumatran elephants in a Sumatra province, saying the methods a government agency uses to capture them have caused a high level of deaths among the endangered animals.

WWF said recent captures in Sumatra's Riau Province have caused "a very high incidence of death" as many elephants die during and immediately after the capture process.

---------- Operators of Chinese, Korean schools in Japan call for tax breaks

TOKYO - Operators of Chinese and Korean schools in Tokyo and Kanagawa prefectures on Monday called for preferential tax treatment for donations to their schools, claiming that only providing such treatment to European and American international schools in Japan is discriminatory.

Tokyo Chosen Gakuen and Kanagawa Chosen Gakuen, both of which provide education for Koreans in Japan, and Yokohama Yamate Chinese School filed a petition with the Japan Federation of Bar Associations to correct the tax practice.

---------- Japan sets up 2 teams to pressure N. Korea over abductions

TOKYO - A Japanese government task force addressing North Korea's abductions of Japanese citizens decided Monday to set up two elite teams to map out ways to increase pressure on Pyongyang to help resolve the issue.

The teams are expected to consider law enforcement measures that would serve to put pressure on North Korea before the ultimate step of imposing economic sanctions, Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said.

---------- China drafts regulation to ban sale of organs, accept brain death

BEIJING - China has drafted what would be its first regulation on human organ transplants, banning the sale of organs and introducing a set of medical standards on brain death, official media reported Monday.

The draft regulation is now open to advice and suggestions from medical experts before being submitted to the State Council for final approval, according to the China Daily.

---------- No. of quake insurance contracts tops 10 mil. at end of Dec.

TOKYO - The cumulative number of earthquake insurance policies sold by property and casualty insurance companies in Japan topped 10 million for the first time at the end of last December, reflecting a series of serious quakes in recent years, an industry body said Monday.

Totaling some 10.03 million, the number of insurance contracts increased in all 47 prefectures at an average rate of 11.1 percent over a year earlier, with Saga Prefecture posting the steepest gain of 50.1 percent in the wake of a big earthquake that hit the northern part of the Kyushu region in March 2005, the Non-Life Insurance Rating Organization said.

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