2 - The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, February 9, 2005 NATION/WORLD Rice addresses NEWS IN BRIEF U.S. foreign policy in Europe PARIS (AP) - Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice told European intel- lectuals yesterday "it is time to turn away from the disagreements of the past" that stem from the U.S. inva- sion of Iraq. Rice was giving an address on U.S. for- eignpolicy in Europe, Iraq, the Middle East and elsewhere to an audience of French students and intellectuals. She chose Paris because France is a seat of recent criticism of the U.S.-led war in Iraq and of President Bush's diplomacy in general. In excerpts from her address at Paris's Science Politique, Rice said: "America stands ready to work with Europe on our common agenda and Europe must stand ready to work with America." "After all, history will surely judge us not by our old disagreements, but by our new achievements," she said. Science Politique, known in France as Science Po, is a school of political science that has been at the center of recent debate over America's reach and power. Some 500 students and intellec- tuals were attending, and Rice was to take questions from the audience. "Time and again in our shared his- tory, Americans and Europeans have enjoyed our greatest successes, for our- selves and for others, when we refuse to accept an unacceptable status quo but instead put our values to work for the cause of freedom," Rice said. She said: "America has every- thing to gain" from having a stronger Europe as a partner. "It is time to turn away from the disagreements of the past," Rice said. "It is time to open a new chapter in our relationship, and a new chapter in our alliance." Earlier in Rome, Rice said she is optimistic about the chances for Israel and the Palestinians to reach accom- modation, in part because of a new thirst for peace throughout the Middle East. She cautioned that "there is still a long road ahead." "There seems to be a will in the Middle East because people want to live in a different kind of Middle East," Rice said. She commented after a meeting with Italian Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini in which they discussed Iraq, the Middle East other issues. Their meeting came hours before Israeli and Palestinian leaders declared that their people would stop all mili- tary or violent activity, pledging to break the four-year cycle of bloodshed and get peace talks back on track. Suicide bomber kills 21 people in Iraq A suicide bomber blew himself up in the middle of a crowd of army recruits yester- day, killing 21 people in the deadliest attack in Baghdad since last week's election and highlighting a recent shift by insurgents to use human bombs instead of cars. Insurgents are strapping explosives on the bodies of volunteers to penetrate the network of blast walls, checkpoints and other security measures designed to block vehicle bombs. Several such attackers tried to disrupt voting in Baghdad on election day but were unable to get into polling stations. On Monday, a suicide bomber walked into a crowd of Iraqi policemen in the northern city of Mosul and detonated explosives, killing 12 of them. Iraqi authorities initially said the Baghdad recruiting center was attacked by mortar fire, but witnesses reported only a single explosion, and the U.S. military said the blast was caused by a suicide bomber on foot. Attacks have steadily risen since the Jan. 30 elections, when a massive U.S. and Iraqi security operation prevented insurgents from disrupting the vote. Those mea- sures, including a ban on most private vehicles, closing the borders and an extended curfew, were relaxed soon afterward. I I BANDA ACEH, Indonesia U.N. needs more money for tsunami aid U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, left, shakes hands with Italian Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini at the end of a joint media conference at Rome's Villa Madama yesterday. Congress may limit corporate lawsuits WASHINGTON (AP) - Congress is close to making it easier for corpora- tions to dodge many of the class-action lawsuits that businesses say are bank- rupting them while rewarding lawyers and doing little to help victims. The measure, headed for a vote this week in the Senate and probably next week in the House, would be the first fulfillment of one of President Bush's priorities for his second term. But a frag- ile compromise could come unglued if senators make changes in the bill, such as giving federal judges a little more discretion to keep lawsuits alive. "If the Senate passes any amendment, then they are jeopardizing" it, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) said yesterday. Opponents of the legislation say it would only hurt average citizens and let big business escape multimillion-dollar judgments for wrongdoing. But Bush, echoing business leaders' complaints, says a judicial system that lets lawyers look for friendly forums in state courts for "junk lawsuits" is tilted against corporate defendants. "Justice is distorted, and our economy is held back, by irresponsible class actions," he said in his State of the Union speech last week. In Mississippi, Bankston Drug Store was named in hundreds of suits in which users of the diet drug fen-phen claimed it gave them heart and lung problems. The pharmacy was sued so the lawsuit could be heard in Missis- sippi, said Hilda Bankston, the phar- macy's former owner. She ended up having to sell the only pharmacy in Jefferson County after the lawsuits started and her pharmacist hus- band died of a heart attack. "There are too many small business people who worked too hard for greedy attorneys to just use us for their purposes," she said in a telephone interview yesterday. Just by threatening a class-action suit - in which one person or a small group represents the interests of an entire class of people in court - lawyers often win quick, easy settlements, making more money for themselves than the victims they're representing, bill supporters say. Marty Preston of Wisconsin Dells, Wis., recalled finding herself a plaintiff in a class-action suit accusing BancBos- ton of holding too much of their custom- ers' money in escrow. The suit before a Looking Sor a :ummer internihip? state court in Mobile, Ala., was settled and Preston said her share of the settle- ment was a little more than $4, but the lawyers handling the case shared $8 million in fees, including $80 taken from her escrow account to pay them. "People who I never heard from, never knew who they were, and certain- ly never contacted me personally just deftly picked my pocket," she said in a telephone interview yesterday. The legislation Bush supports would move many class-action suits with plaintiffs from several different states into federal court, where critics say judges have sent them back to state courts, because applying the various applicable state laws was too unman- ageable. Critics say that would effec- tively end multistate class-action suits because state courts would be prohib- ited from hearing them. "The effect of this legislation as it stands now is to virtually guarantee that all large class-action lawsuits will be dismissed," said Sen. Jeff Bin- gaman (D-N.M.). That would disappoint Shelly Toli- ver. When she hit a bad financial stretch a few years ago, her $17,000 car was repossessed and auctioned off. After- ward, she was shocked when she got a letter from Credit Acceptance Corp. saying she still owed $10,000 because the company did not make enough money at the auction. Toliver said she and other people in the same situation got together and sued the Detroit-based company in Con- necticut, and got their debt wiped out and a little money in a settlement. "I wonder where I would be if I had not been allowed to bring my case in the Connecticut court system," she said in a statement Monday. Bingaman - with support from some Republicans, including Judi- ciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania - wants the Senate this week to change the bill to let a federal judge decide to pick one state law and apply it to the case if multiple states' laws would make the case unmanageable. "If we don't fix it, consumers will have lost one of their only means of redress when they have been wronged by a corporation," Bingaman said. DeLay said such a change in the bill's language would be a dealbreaker Under the compromise legislation, class-action suits would be heard in state court if the primary defendant and more than one-third of the plaintiffs are from the same state. But if fewer than one-third of the plaintiffs are from the same state as the primary defendant, the case would go to federal court. At least $5 million would have to be at stake for a federal court to hear a class-action suit. The bill also would limit lawyers' fees in so-called coupon settlements - when plaintiffs get discounts on prod- ucts instead of financial settlements - by linking the fees to the redemp- tions rate of the coupon or the actual hours spent working on a case. The United Nations said governments have only given a fraction of the money they pledged for tsunami aid and warned that more cash is needed to fund long- term reconstruction efforts. In Sri Lanka, corruption allegations continued to ham- per relief operations yesterday. The global body was also considering moving its base in Indonesia's worst-hit Aceh province because of security concerns. Al-Qaida linked suicide bombers have targeted Westerners in Indonesia three times in the past three years. Estimates of the number of people killed by the Dec. 26 tsunami that struck 11 nations ranged from about 162,000 to 178,000 - most of them in Indonesia. Another 26,000 to 142,000 are missing, but officials say it's too early to add them to the toll with bodies still being found. Indonesia said yesterday it had found 1,055 more corpses, raising the country's confirmed death toll to at least 115,756. The State Department said 18 U.S. citizens died in the disaster and that 15 others are presumed dead. Ten perished in Thailand and eight in Sri Lanka, said Adam Ereli, the deputy spokesman. Of the 15 presumed dead, 14 were in Thailand and one was in Sri Lanka. Scientists given right to clone human embryos The British government yesterday gave the creator of Dolly the Sheep a license to clone human embryos for medical research into the cause of motor neuron disease. Ian Wilmut, who led the team that created Dolly at Scotland's Roslin Institute in 1996, and motor neuron expert Christopher Shaw of the Institute of Psychiatry in London, plan to clone embyros to study how nerve cells go awry to cause the disease. The experiments do not involve creating cloned babies. It is the second such license approved since Britain became the first country to legalize research cloning in 2001. The first was granted in August to a team that hopes to use cloning to create insulin-producing cells that could be transplanted into diabetics. WASHI INTON 1.7 milon issing out on $2 billon in tax refunds About 1.7 million people are missing out on more than $2 billion in refunds for taxes they paid three years ago. Many of them just never filed returns. It's not too late - but the window to claim the money closes in nine weeks. "As soon as you send us your tax return, you'll get your money," Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Mark Everson said yesterday. "But if you don't file, you won't get anything." Taxpayers must act by April 15 to claim a refund for taxes paid in 2001, under laws that make the money the property of the U.S. Treasury after sitting unclaimed for three years. - Compiled from Daily wire reports I I I + www. michigandaily.com The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967) is published Monday through Friday during the fall and winter terms by students at the University of Michigan. One copy is available free of charge to all readers. Additional copies may be picked up at the Daily's office for $2. Subscriptions for fall term, starting in September, via U.S. mail are $110. Winter term (January through April) is $115, yearlong (September through April) is $195. University affiliates are subject to a reduced subscription rate. 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