Today's Story Line:

February 9, 2000

Understaffed and underequipped, UN police are facing the worst ethnic violence since NATO forces took control of Kosovo last year. Part of the problem: European nations have not supplied promised money and manpower.

Shades of Stalin? Some Russians see a return of repression as Russia's acting president, Vladimir Putin, clamps down on critics.

Croatia's new president isn't likely to be sending any more cash and arms to Bosnia's Croats.

Dotcom art blossoms in China as a new form of expression.

Quote of note: "The Internet is ... bringing new freedoms to people in the West, and the same process is now sweeping across China." - a Beijing artist

David Clark Scott World editor

REPORTERS ON THE JOB..

*WINDOWS 2000: The Monitor's Moscow bureau has had some mysterious visitors lately. Thieves? Spies? On one occasion, staff arrived in the morning to find the windows wide open to Moscow's sub-freezing cold, and several computer files rifled. It's not clear why the nocturnal visitor(s) left the chilly calling card. But one theory, says bureau chief Judith Matloff,

is that they may have been dutifully following orders to "look inside the computers, and open Windows" - as in Microsoft.

FOLLOW-UP OF A MONITOR STORY...

*TURKISH HEADSCARF UNTIED: Turkey's first member of parliament to wear a headscarf into the legislative chamber has been undone by the courts. As reported June 22, 1999, Islamist parliamentarian Merve Kavakci's garb was seen as a challenge to Turkey's strict separation of church and state. On Tuesday, Ms. Kavakci lost her appeal of a decision by the cabinet to strip her of her Turkish citizenship. The loss of her citizenship effectively prevents her from serving in parliament.

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