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NATO

• Hungarian fighter pilots will receive their flight training in Canada under a deal signed Monday in Budapest. Beginning next year, 20 Hungarian pilots will take part annually in a two-year NATO training course, a joint project between the Canadian Air Force and Bombardier Aerospace, a private firm. The deal was signed by Lajos Fodor, commander in chief of the Hungarian armed forces, and his Canadian counterpart, Gen. Raymond R. Henault, following 10 months of negotiations. The course involves basic training on turboprop and jet trainer aircraft, advanced tactical training and an 11-week language program.(AP 251247 Mar 02 GMT)

• The United States urged its NATO allies on Monday to boost their collective planning for responding to civil emergencies in the light of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington. Joe Allbaugh, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, briefed ambassadors of the 19-nation alliance on the key lessons in handling the aftermath of the suicide airliner attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. One priority was to convince the European allies of the reality of the threat of terrorist or weapons of mass destruction attacks to their own countries, Allbaugh said. "It can happen literally anywhere," he told reporters. "The only way we're going to be able to whip this is to deal with it collectively." Allbaugh said NATO would conduct a first joint civil emergency exercise with Russia in September involving the response to a chemical weapons attack. (Reuters 1710 250302 Mar 02 GMT)

BALKANS

• One person was killed in Macedonia (sic) late on Monday in a fierce gunbattle suspected to involve rival ethnic Albanian guerrilla factions from a disbanded rebel force, diplomats said. Five others were wounded. "We only know that one person was killed and that five are wounded," a Western diplomat told Reuters. NATO troops from the Western alliance’s "Amber Fox" peace mission were immediately deployed to assess the situation. "It’s an inner-Albanian dispute. But we still don’t know the reason," a NATO official said. Witnesses said that the local headquarters of the now disbanded NLA appeared to have been a target. A senior Macedonian (sic) government official said no state forces were involved in the shoot-out, as they are not present in the area, where ethnic Albanians dominate the population.(Reuters 0045 260302 Mar 02 GMT)

• German Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping arrived Monday in Macedonia (sic) to persuade officials here that Germany remains committed to head the NATO mission in this Balkan country. "Although it is a burden for us, we stand ready to continue our leading role in NATO's mission until June 26^th" when the NATO mandate expires, Scharping said Monday. However, he also urged Macedonian (sic) leaders to "work to create conditions for restoring peace and stability." Scharping spent the one-day visit meeting with President Boris Trajkovski, Macedonian (sic) Defense Minister Vlado Popovski and German troops. He was to depart for Kosovo later Monday and continue to Bosnia on Tuesday. Popovski said he had asked Scharping for help in seeking an extension of the mission. "We shall need something similar until the end of the year," he said, adding Macedonia (sic) would accept either NATO or the EU as leaders of a mission.(AP 251540 Mar 02 GMT)

ISAF

• Suspected al-Qaida and Taliban fighters had planned to kill international peacekeepers by setting off car bombs in Afghanistan’s capital, authorities said Monday. Six cars were rigged with booby-traps to be detonated near peacekeeper security patrols, according to Flight Lt. Tony Marshall, a spokesman for the security force. The vehicles were placed under surveillance, but no arrests have been made, he said. However, the international security force chose to make the plot public after a French captain revealed details of it to French journalists, peacekeeper officials said. "We were aware of these vehicles ... where these vehicles were being kept and what the intentions were of these groups," Marshall said. "If there had been any move to actually use these vehicles in any way, in the matter that I've just described," peacekeepers would have acted, he added.(AP 251857 Mar 02 GMT)

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