President Bill Clinton had earlier expressed his deepest sorrow regret and sympathy to the survivors

President Bill Clinton had earlier expressed his “deepest sorrow, regret and sympathy” to the survivors and the victims’ families. However, his statement fell short of the full-dress apology.The Pentagon investigation also cited mitigating circumstances. “US troops were young, undertrained and unprepared for the battle tactics of the North Korean forces,” Mr Cohen said. And he doubted that the full truth, or an exact death toll would ever be known.In a US-South Korean statement of Mutual Understanding, the Koreans reported an “unverified number of 248 civilians killed, injured or missing”.The American report said the number was much lower, and said an aerial reconnaissance picture taken in August 1950, less than two weeks after the 26 July killings, showed no signs of human remains or mass graves.

Witnesses quoted by AP had spoken of soldiers fleeing an ambush in panic.. President-elect George Bush moved swiftly to nominate a new Labor Secretary yesterday, naming Elaine Chao, a former deputy transport secretary in his father’s administration, as his new choice. President-elect George Bush moved swiftly to nominate a new Labor Secretary yesterday, naming Elaine Chao, a former deputy transport secretary in his father’s administration, as his new choice.
Ms Chao takes the place of Linda Chavez, who asked for her nomination to be withdrawn earlier this week after she admitted she had harboured an illegal immigrant in her home.Mr Bush also named another of his father’s former officials, Robert Zoellick, as Trade Representative. Mr Zoellick, whose advisory role in the Bush campaign cost him his job as head of a Washington foreign policy think-tank, was assistant to James Baker when he was Secretary of State under President Reagan, and undersecretary of state for economic affairs under Mr Bush Snr.The announcement ended a dispute within the transition team over whether the job would retain its cabinet status. It had been reported that Mr Bush intended to downgrade the post and make Don Evans, the longtime confidant he has nominated for Commerce Secretary, responsible for all trade matters.

Opponents of such a change, however, argued that downgrading would send out the message that trade was not a priority for Mr Bush.Introducing Ms Chao, who is the second person of Asian origin to be appointed to his Cabinet – Norman Mineta, a Democrat of Japanese origin, was named as Transport Secretary – Mr Bush said: “She has strong executive talent, great compassion and a commitment to helping people build better lives.”The Bush team also mobilised the Republican Party for what could be the toughest nomination – that of the proposed Attorney General, John Ashcroft, a staunch conservative whom Democrats have vowed to oppose. The Republican Party chairman, Don Nickles, has sent out a round robin to party members, in which he accused Democrats of “engaging in the politics of personal destruction”.. President Bill Clinton said the United States has new information about a Navy fighter pilot shot down over Iraq during the 1991 Persian Gulf War that indicates he survived the crash “and that he might be alive.”

President Bill Clinton said the United States has new information about a Navy fighter pilot shot down over Iraq during the 1991 Persian Gulf War that indicates he survived the crash “and that he might be alive.”
Clinton commented Thursday in a CBS Radio interview in which he was asked about the Navy’s announcement that it has changed the status of Lt Cmdr Michael Speicher from killed in action to missing. Speicher was shot down in an F-18 fighter from the carrier USS Saratoga on the opening night of the war.Clinton said the information about Speicher’s case “makes us believe that at least he survived his crash .. and that he might be alive.” He said U.S. officials have begun trying to determine whether Speicher is alive, and “if he is, where he is and how we can get him out.”"Since he was a uniform service person, he’s clearly entitled to be released, and we’re going to do everything we can to get him out,” Clinton said.

The president cautioned, however, that he did not want the change in Speicher’s status to “raise false hopes.”Clinton’s comments went far beyond the Navy’s statement, which was brief and did not mention the possibility that Speicher could be alive. One day after it notified Speicher’s family of the decision to change his status to MIA, the Navy said Thursday that “additional information and analysis” led Navy Secretary Richard Danzig to reverse earlier determinations that Speicher had died.The Navy did not explain what new information it had obtained. As recently as 1996 it had reaffirmed a 1991 “finding of death.”Pentagon officials who spoke on condition of anonymity said Danzig acted because of substantial evidence that Speicher may not have died in the crash.Iraq has never accounted for him.One official said the State Department sent a new diplomatic note to Baghdad demanding that the Iraqi government tell all it knows about Speicher’s fate.”We don’t have a response from Baghdad,” Philip Reeker, a State Department spokesman, said Thursday.He said similar U.S. notes would be sent Iraqi representatives at the United Nations in New York and in Geneva.”We do believe that the Iraqis hold additional information that could help resolve the case of Commander Speicher, and they are obligated to provide that information to us,” Reeker said.Speicher, of Jacksonville, Florida, went missing when his Navy F-18 Hornet was shot down on Jan 16, 1991, in an air-to-air battle with an Iraqi fighter.

He was the first American lost in the war and the last still unaccounted for.Upon announcing the loss of Speicher that night, Dick Cheney, defense secretary at the time, told a news conference he was dead. A short time later the Pentagon changed his status to missing in action.On May 22, 1991, the Navy approved the official “finding of death.” That action changed his official status from missing to killed in action.In May 1994 – more than three years after Speicher went missing – Pentagon officials indicated in a secret memorandum that a U.S. spy satellite had photographed a “manmade symbol” at the crash site earlier that year. Some military officers said they interpreted the symbol as a sign that the Navy pilot might have survived the crash.A plan was devised in 1994 to conduct a covert operation into Iraq to search the crash site for clues to Speicher’s fate, but it was scrapped in December 1994 by Army Gen.