World Scene

SAUDI ARABIA

Al Qaeda ideologue killed in clash

RIYADH -- A firebrand cleric who issued religious decrees for an al Qaeda-linked terrorist group was killed yesterday during a car chase and shootout with police that also killed a policeman.

Abdullah Muhammad Rashid al-Roshoud, thought to be the chief ideologue for al Qaeda in the region, died in the clash in the al-Quds neighborhood in eastern Riyadh, a security official said.

A former high school professor of Islamic studies, al-Roshoud was known for writing statements on Islamic Internet sites and issuing fatwas, or religious edicts, justifying terrorist attacks against the Saudi government and foreign influences in the kingdom.

CAMBODIA

Parties sign accord to share power

PHNOM PENH -- Cambodia's two main political parties signed an accord yesterday to share power, ending 11 months of political paralysis that had been delaying the country's World Trade Organization bid and efforts to try Khmer Rouge suspects.

The agreement keeps Prime Minister Hun Sen at the helm of this impoverished Southeast Asian nation, after his reconciliation with royalist leader Prince Norodom Ranariddh.

PHILIPPINES

Arroyo vows reforms in new term

CEBU CITY -- Gloria Macapagal Arroyo began a new six-year term as president of the Philippines yesterday, promising to drive through tough economic reforms that aim to benefit millions of the country's poor at the expense of the wealthy elite.

Mrs. Arroyo, a 57-year-old economist, pledged to crack down on the corruption that dogs the country and called on the opposition to bury the hatchet.

BURMA

Suu Kyi to be able to contest elections

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Burma's detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi will be allowed to run in elections, the Indonesian foreign minister said yesterday, quoting his Burmese counterpart.

The comments came at a meeting of foreign ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in Jakarta. Burma's treatment of Mrs. Suu Kyi, the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner, is threatening to overshadow the summit and is testing the 10-member grouping's core policy of noninterference in one another's internal affairs.