In Review : THE YEAR GONE BY : Hope for war’s end was raised, dashed in Bosnia; Israelis, Arabs struggled to make peace; Mexico was buffeted by uprising, assassinations, and black South Africans cast their first, joyous votes . . .

EUROPE Hope Flickers in Bosnia: While 1994 began with a few glimmers of hope for the Balkans, they quickly proved illusory and, month after month, the war that has taken at least 200,000 lives continued its deadly trampling of peoples, principles and alliances.

When an artillery shell smashed into a crowded public market in Sarajevo on Feb. 5, killing 68 people, it spurred an outraged world into action. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization vowed to launch air strikes to rid the mountains around Sarajevo of the Serbs’ tanks, guns and rocket launchers, which had been savaging the Bosnian capital since April, 1992. NATO and the United Nations got the rebels to withdraw most of their heavy weapons from an “exclusion zone” by a Feb. 21 deadline. A week later, in the first combat action in NATO’s 44-year history, alliance pilots shot down four Serbian warplanes that were attacking a Bosnian factory.

The dramatic drop in shelling of Sarajevo allowed a brief but inspiring respite for a population that had spent much of the previous two years cowering in cellars. Outdoor cafes appeared and shops reopened. Buoyed by those successes, mediators managed to persuade Croats and Muslims to reconcile after a yearlong war within the war.

But by early April, the Serbs were using the artillery withdrawn from Sarajevo to attack Gorazde, another U.N.-designated “safe area.” The rebels also began to redeploy tanks and guns in the Sarajevo exclusion zone, believing that NATO’s threats were no longer serious.

Summer saw a volley of offensives and counteroffensives as mediators with the five-nation Contact Group grafted a new peace plan from the scraps of earlier failed proposals. The government reluctantly approved it, while the Serbs rejected the territorial split as too little, too late.

The sporadic battles saw no major shifts in territorial holdings until a surprise breakout in October by the government forces, who recaptured more than 100 square miles in northwest Bosnia-Herzegovina. But the victory was short-lived. Bosnian Serb gunmen rolled back the government troops well beyond the pre-offensive borders. They took hundreds of U.N. peacekeepers hostage and deployed surface-to-air missile systems to deter even symbolic patrols by alliance aircraft. Calls to withdraw the 24,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping force were followed by the quick realization that even calling it quits was beyond the U.N. force’s power.

On Nov. 27, U.S. Defense Secretary William J. Perry said the Bosnian government had “no prospects” for recovering its territory, thus joining Britain, France and Russia in effectively declaring that the Serbs had won.

At year’s end, former President Jimmy Carter succeeded in coaxing a four-month cease-fire from the Serbs and the Bosnian government. But with the memory of so many failed cease-fires before them, Bosnia and the world were skeptical that the warring parties had truly embarked on the road to peace.

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Guns Fall Silent in Ulster: After 25 years of conflict, the Irish Republican Army on Aug. 31 announced an end to its guerrilla campaign to wrest Northern Ireland from British rule. Protestant paramilitary groups followed suit a few weeks later. For the first time since 1969, a fragile peace settled over the Emerald Isle’s six northern counties, known as Ulster. Though many issues--including the future government of Northern Ireland--remain unsettled, prospects are the best in years for a settlement to a problem that has spawned cycles of violence since the 17th Century.

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Tremors in Italy: Italy was shaken by a political earthquake in 1994. But it seems to have solved nothing. Scandal-scarred Establishment parties that had controlled the country since World War II were humiliated in March general elections; Silvio Berlusconi, a billionaire media tycoon making his political debut, was swept to power in May at the head of a right-wing coalition government. Trouble began almost immediately, and before year’s end, Berlusconi had resigned. A persistent conflict of interest between the good of the state and the best personal interests of a man whose Fininvest companies do $7-billion a year worth of business unsettled Berlusconi’s foes--and some of his allies. Berlusconi’s austere budget for 1995 sparked worker outrage with its proposed pension cuts. There were repeated strikes and millions poured into the streets. In July, amid judicial investigations of institutional corruption that have implicated more than 3,000 business people, politicians and public officials, Berlusconi tried to end preventive detention with a decree; he had to withdraw it in the face of popular protest. There began a disastrous feud between Berlusconi and the magistrates, culminating in the December resignation of lead Magistrate Antonio Di Pietro, Italy’s most respected public figure. Berlusconi himself was called in, in December, for interrogation about alleged Fininvest payoffs and his government began to splinter. Berlusconi wants the president to call new elections, in which he hopes to be reelected, but that seems unlikely.

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Man of a Difficult Year: Time magazine named Pope John Paul II its Man of the Year but, for the aging pontiff, it was a difficult year. John Paul, 74, broke his right leg in a bathroom fall in April. He had surgery to replace part of his shattered femur and in August went off for his traditional week of mountain walking in northern Italy. In a September visit to Croatia he looked awful, barely mobile, triggering widespread concern about his health and speculation about his successor. A trip to the United States planned for October was canceled. The Pope skipped some Vatican appointments as well, but snapped back: He went to Sicily in November in good spirits, though still fragile, and then quickly confirmed a grueling Asian swing beginning Jan. 11. And his book, “Crossing the Threshold of Hope,” became an international bestseller.

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Tough Times for Royals: 1994 was another rough year for Britain’s Royal Family, with much of the damage seemingly self-inflicted through the media. The Prince of Wales and his estranged wife, Princess Diana, continued their public breakup, which was recounted in four revealing books. Perhaps most damaging to Diana was “Princess in Love,” a semi-fictionalized account of her purported love affair with a cavalry officer. Charles took his story to television, but didn’t help his case when, questioned about his faithfulness, he admitted infidelity instead of offering a royal “no comment.” Through it all, the queen bore up stoically.

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Brought in From the Cold: Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, the terrorist known as Carlos the Jackal, was arrested in Sudan after more than 20 years on the run and extradited to France. Carlos was blamed for some of the most audacious terror attacks of the 1970s, including the 1975 kidnaping of 11 OPEC oil ministers in Vienna and the 1976 hijacking of an Air France jet to Uganda. Though governments worldwide hailed his capture, some said it would do little to stem terrorism around the world, since he is believed to have been long inactive. One expert called him a “terrorist emeritus.” He remains in jail in France, awaiting trial.

FORMER SOVIET UNION

Hard Road in Russia: Alexander I. Solzhenitsyn, Russia’s best-known living author, ended his 20-year exile and took up the role of prophet of gloom in his homeland, championing the powerless and berating the authorities for mismanaging a promised transition from communism to democracy. The 75-year-old writer flew from the United States to Russia’s Far East in May and began an eight-week rail trek to rediscover his country. “Nobody expected that the way out of communism would be painless, but nobody expected it would be so painful,” he declared.

Both the government and the people struggled to come to terms with the new order. President Boris N. Yeltsin’s decision to invade the breakaway region of Chechnya, launching the first war on Russian territory since the Soviet Union’s collapse, eroded his already shaky support among legislators and the public.

The transition to a market economy continued to be a struggle. “Black Tuesday,” Oct. 11, saw the ruble plunge from 3,081 to the dollar to 3,926, its worst one-day beating on the post-Communist currency market. After the government barely survived a parliamentary vote of no confidence, Yeltsin replaced his entire economic team with a mix of conservatives and free-marketeers, raising doubts about his commitment to market reforms.

The new private enterprise also wasn’t immune to financial shocks: In July, MMM, a “pyramid” investment firm that used income from new investors to buy back shares from earlier ones at ever-rising prices, bilked millions of their savings when its share prices collapsed. MMM President Sergei Mavrodi was arrested for tax evasion, released to run for office and elected to Parliament--on a promise to voters to restore the value of their shares. His Oct. 30 victory gave him immunity from criminal prosecution.

Russia withdrew the last of its troops from Germany and the Baltics, ending half a century of occupation by a once-mighty army, now ideologically vanquished and economically broken.

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Deadly Nuclear Legacy: Police in Munich, Germany, seized more than 10 ounces of deadly plutonium in a suitcase flown from Moscow, setting off alarms in the West about the disarray of Russia’s nuclear Establishment, which lacks a full inventory of its weapons-grade uranium and plutonium. It was the largest seizure of weapons-grade nuclear contraband ever reported, but not the only seizure of the year. Russian officials insisted that “not a single gram” of plutonium was missing but agreed to cooperate with German police to control smuggling. Not all the nuclear news was bad. Ukraine closed a Cold War chapter Nov. 16 by agreeing to join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and surrender nuclear weapons forever.

MIDEAST

Tears in Fabric of Peace: On paper, the nations of the Middle East made major progress toward peace in 1994. In May, the Palestinians were granted self-rule over the Gaza Strip and the West Bank town of Jericho, ending nearly three decades of Israeli military occupation. Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat returned triumphantly to Gaza in July after 27 years in exile. On Oct. 26, Jordan became the second Arab nation to sign a peace treaty with Israel.

But the toll was high, as opponents of peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors wrote their rejection in blood. About 30 Palestinians died at the hands of an Israeli settler as they knelt in prayer in Hebron; 13 people were killed in Afula and Hadera by bombs planted by Islamic radicals; 22 died in a bus bombing in Tel Aviv in October, also blamed on Islamic militants, and at least 14 died in a clash between Islamic militants and the new Palestinian police.

The next step toward permanent accommodation proved harder to take. Palestinian elections, scheduled for July, were delayed once and then again as Palestinians and Israelis wrangled over the timing of Israeli troop redeployments out of Palestinian towns and villages in the West Bank.

In accepting the Nobel Peace Prize, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and PLO leader Arafat acknowledged that the reality of peace has yet to live up to its promises. The three did not receive the prize, Arafat said, “to crown an endeavor that we have completed but rather to encourage us to continue on a road that we have started. . . .”

One of the first fruits of the new peace was a Middle East economic summit in Casablanca, Morocco, which for the first time gathered political leaders and business people from Israel and the Arab world to discuss the economic opportunities of peace.

But the process continued to go forward in fits and starts. After optimistic expectations that Syria would sign a peace treaty with Israel by the end of the year, the negotiations fell apart in a deadlock over the timing and extent of any Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights. After President Clinton toured the region in October, the talks were resumed but again seemed to lead nowhere, and the new year dawned in a stalemate.

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Gulf War II Aborted: A new crisis in the Persian Gulf was triggered in early October when leading elements of two Iraqi army divisions were reported to have advanced to within 20 miles of the Kuwaiti frontier. The United States and other nations rushed military reinforcements to Kuwait and the Gulf. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, unlike before, backed down. The move had clearly been an exercise in muscle-flexing, an effort to win relief from U.N. economic sanctions. A month later, Iraq for the first time officially recognized Kuwait as a sovereign state and accepted its borders, abandoning a decades-old territorial claim. That wasn’t good enough to win a lifting of the sanctions, but they will be reviewed again this year. There is a growing international consensus--absent the United States and Britain--to begin providing relief to the war- and sanctions-ravaged nation.

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Bad to Worse in Algeria: The situation in Algeria went from a nagging conflict between Islamic fundamentalists and the government into near-civil war, with some estimates of deaths approaching 20,000 to 30,000. Armed Islamic groups now control whole regions of the country, especially at night. Secular intellectuals, journalists and foreigners continue to bear the brunt of their violent attacks. The government made a tentative step toward dialogue with the militants, releasing to house arrest two Islamic Salvation Front leaders, but abandoned the effort late in the year, sparking an even higher level of violence by the militants. The year of violence was capped late in December, when Armed Islamic Group militants hijacked an Air France jetliner in Algiers, killed three passengers, then had the plane flown to Marseilles, where French commandos stormed it and killed the four terrorists. It marked the first time that Algeria’s turmoil had spilled onto French soil and promised to draw France even further into the conflict.

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Deadly Split in Yemen: A civil war in Yemen pitted the historically socialist south against the north for the first time since the 1990 unification of the country. Chaos and destruction spread throughout the nation on the tip of the Arabian peninsula from April 27 until July 7, when the forces of “unity and legality” of the north entered the southern capital of Aden. Some sources say the war cost 50,000 casualties. Though the war is ended, the political dispute is not. Prices of most commodities have increased 100% to 500% since the end of the war; the value of the riyal has dropped to almost a third of its original value against the dollar. Most predict that Yemen will be heard from again in 1995.

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Keeping Down the Numbers: Nearly 180 nations joined in a U.N.-sponsored International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo to adopt a plan to limit the world’s numbers. The Roman Catholic Church was unsuccessful in its bid to block a resolution calling for such items such as teen sex education and good medical care for abortion patients. The main focus of the conference was a commitment to team family planning with enhanced economic development and create programs to empower women in the belief that women with education and jobs will have fewer children.

LATIN AMERICA

Mexico’s Roller Coaster: For Mexico, 1994 was one of the most turbulent years in its modern history. It opened with the machine-gun fire of an Indian and peasant uprising and closed with financial disarray and a falling currency. In between, the nation endured two political assassinations and elected yet another president from the Institutional Revolutionary Party, but with the smallest mandate in 65 years of PRI rule.

A year that was expected to be a celebration of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which went into effect Jan. 1, instead brought one shock after another. As 1994 dawned, an indigenous rebel force calling itself the Zapatista National Liberation Army took over the major cities in the southern state of Chiapas. Two weeks of fighting left nearly 150 dead. The Zapatistas retreated to hide-outs in the jungle and the government declared a unilateral cease-fire. That cease-fire held, even after the rebels threatened to take up arms again in December.

With the promise of a new era of democratic reform, Ernesto Zedillo won Mexico’s hardest fought presidential election in seven decades. Despite isolated cases of fraud, the polls were considered the cleanest in modern Mexican history. The 42-year-old Yale-educated economist, who rose from a shoeshine boy in Mexicali to president of the republic, vowed to continue radical free-market reforms, redistribute the wealth and separate the government from the party for the first time since 1929.

Two assassinations shook Mexicans’ already tenuous faith in their leaders. Luis Donaldo Colosio, 44, the ruling party presidential candidate, died from a single gunshot at a March 23 campaign rally in Tijuana. Police immediately arrested the gunman, Mario Aburto Martinez, who was later sentenced to 42 years in prison. But most Mexicans suspect a conspiracy involving drug kingpins and powerful politicians, and an inquiry has yielded more questions than answers.

The assassination of the second-ranking ruling party official outside a downtown Mexico City hotel Sept. 24 again spread fear, anger and insecurity. Again, police wrestled the gunman to the ground, but, again, conspiracy theories abounded. The investigation into the assassination of PRI Secretary General Francisco Ruiz Massieu was placed in the hands of his brother, Mario, the deputy attorney general. But after a two-month investigation, Mario Ruiz Massieu resigned in disgust, charging senior ruling party officials with obstructing justice in what he concluded was a wide-ranging conspiracy to kill his brother and then cover up the crime.

Mexicans saw the year go out as tumultuously as it came in, with new threats from the Zapatistas and a 30% drop in the value of the peso and a fear of worse economic times ahead.

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Terror in Argentina: For the second time in two years, terrorist bombers hit a Jewish target in Argentina, this time killing 87 people and destroying the headquarters of Argentina’s two main Jewish community centers July 18. Little apparent progress has been made in efforts to bring the bombers to justice. Eighteen people were detained for questioning, but 16 were released for lack of evidence. Carlos Alberto Telleldin, the only one still held, sold the mini-van used in the bombing. A second man remains under indictment, charged with conspiracy. Federal Judge Juan Jose Galeano issued international warrants for the arrest of four Iranian diplomats, but the Argentine Supreme Court invalidated the warrants, ruling that Galeano had not presented enough evidence. Iran, which denied any connection to the bombing, has been linked previously to terrorist attacks by Hezbollah, a fundamentalist Muslim terrorist organization. Argentine Jewish community leader Ruben Beraja, who had access to Galeano’s 5,000-page case file, said evidence against Hezbollah or associated terrorists is conclusive. “There is no room for doubt that the attack came from that sector,” he said.

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Double Victory in Brazil: Fernando Henrique Cardoso scored a double victory with an economic stabilization plan that slowed inflation in Brazil and got him elected president. The stabilization plan, begun while Cardozo was finance minister, included tight controls on spending and a new currency, the real. Inflation, racing at stunning monthly rates of more than 40% during the first half of 1994, plummeted to an average of less than 2.5% a month the last five months. Credited with taming the beast, Cardoso came from behind to beat socialist Luis Inacio (Lula) da Silva by a wide margin on Oct. 3. Before taking office Jan. 1, Cardoso announced a multi-party Cabinet designed to ensure strong political support for his goal of putting Brazil’s long-troubled economy, Latin America’s largest, on course.

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Guatemala Peace Falters: In the first real breakthrough in negotiations in years of civil war, the government of President Ramiro de Leon Carpio and leftist guerrillas signed a landmark human rights agreement March 29 in Mexico City. The government agreed to allow United Nations monitors into Guatemala for the first time. Activists hoped the international presence would mark an improvement in Guatemala’s human rights record, one of the worst in the hemisphere. But by the year’s end, the U.N. mission seemed weakened, and violence in Guatemala, political and criminal, was surging.

CARIBBEAN

Triumphant Return to Haiti: Tens of thousands of Haitians waved tree branches, danced in the streets and chanted praise for democracy as President Jean-Bertrand Aristide returned in triumph Oct. 15, three years after he was ousted in a military coup. Surrounded by U.S. combat troops and speaking from behind bulletproof glass, Aristide appealed for nonviolence and promised justice in place of revenge. The eleventh-hour compromise that returned Aristide to office came with a U.S. invasion force already on the way. A three-man delegation led by former President Jimmy Carter persuaded Haiti’s brutal military rulers to step down in a deal that handed Clinton the clearest foreign policy victory of his Administration. More than 20,000 American troops landed in peace in the Caribbean island nation, paving the way for the return of Aristide and the U.S. troops’ replacement in 1995 by a U.N. force.

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Crisis for Castro and Clinton: Cubans dissatisfied with life on their Communist island took to the sea in near-record numbers, putting both Cuban President Fidel Castro and U.S President Bill Clinton on the spot. In a reversal of 28 years of U.S. policy, Clinton quit granting Cubans automatic entry to the United States and set up a cordon to intercept the refugees crammed into inner tubes, homemade rafts and anything else that would float. About 10,000 were taken to camps in Panama and more than 20,000 more were taken back to Cuba, to the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, where most remain in makeshift tent camps.

CANADA

Two Nations? Quebec voters threw Canada’s future as a nation into doubt in September when they granted a parliamentary majority to the separatist Parti Quebecois and its leader, Jacques Parizeau. The Parti Quebecois finished only 0.4% ahead of the second-place Liberal Party in the popular vote but still snared 77 of 125 seats in Parliament. Parizeau, now Quebec premier, pressed ahead with his plan to win independence for the mainly French-speaking province. He announced a series of public forums to be followed by a referendum, perhaps in the spring of 1995. The separatists intend to declare independence if they win the referendum. Prime Minister Jean Chretien, a stout defender of Canadian unity, has refused to say how he would respond to a majority “yes” vote.

ASIA

Changing of the Guard: Kim Il Sung, leader of one of the world’s last two Communist nations, died July 8 at age 82 in North Korea of an apparent heart attack. Kim’s death prompted fears of a destabilizing power struggle and interrupted talks between Pyongyang and Washington aimed at stopping North Korea’s nuclear development program. But U.S. and North Korean negotiators formally reached a nuclear agreement Oct. 21, defusing an 18-month crisis. Washington agreed to arrange for two nuclear facilities to provide fuel, and Pyongyang pledged eventually to give up its weapons program. The agreement threatened to unravel in December, when a U.S. helicopter strayed into Korean airspace and apparently was shot down, killing one of two airmen aboard. After nearly two weeks and several bursts of rhetoric, North Korea released surviving pilot Chief Warrant Officer Bobby Hall and the remains of his co-pilot.

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Doing Business in Vietnam: The United States on Feb. 4 ended a trade embargo against Vietnam that had been in force since the war ended in 1975. U.S. businesses flocked to the capital, Hanoi, and to Ho Chi Minh City in the former South Vietnam in hopes of drumming up business among the country’s 65 million people. First in was Pepsico, which started distribution the day the embargo was lifted.

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Musical Chairs in Japan: National politics was turned upside-down when historical rivals, the Liberal Democrats and the Socialists, joined hands to form a ruling coalition government with the New Party Harbinger. The coalition elected Socialist Chairman Tomiichi Murayama prime minister June 29, and he quickly reversed decades of party policy on issues ranging from the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty to nuclear power.

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Rocky Road on Trade: Japan’s trade relations with the United States went through a number of ups and downs. Weeks after the breakdown of trade talks at a February summit between Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa and President Clinton, Washington reinstituted the “Super 301” provisions of U.S. trade law, which provide for retaliatory action against countries that unfairly keep American goods out of their markets. Tensions were dramatically eased Oct. 1 when the two nations reached a series of agreements that Washington said would crack open lucrative Japanese markets in several major industries.

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Paramount but Fragile: Looking extremely frail and leaning on his daughters’ arms for support, Chinese paramount leader Deng Xiaoping appeared briefly at a Shanghai hotel Feb. 9, on the eve of the Chinese Lunar New Year. It was the last time the Chinese leader appeared in public in 1994, prompting yearlong speculation on his deteriorating condition.

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Echoes of Tian An Men: Wang Juntao, 35, blamed by the Chinese government for being one of the “black hands” behind the 1989 democracy movement, was released from prison April 23 on “medical” grounds and allowed to travel to the United States. The other “black hand”--liberal scholar Chen Ziming--was released May 13, also on medical parole. But China’s most famous political prisoner, Wei Jingsheng, who had been released in September, 1993, after 14 years in prison, was detained again April 1 and remained in custody at year’s end. In a victory for Chinese lobbying efforts, President Clinton announced formal renewal of most-favored-nation trading status for China on May 26 and “de-linked” the process from human rights. But at year’s end, an all-out trade war loomed after the United States threatened to slap punitive tariffs on a wide range of Chinese goods unless China does more to prevent commercial piracy of U.S. products.

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War in Afghanistan: In the capital of Kabul, 1994 dawned with the heaviest fighting in six months, as troops loyal to President Burhanuddin Rabbani did battle with fighters loyal to Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. It was the beginning of a year of appalling suffering for the people of Afghanistan’s main city as the Muslim factions that vanquished the Communists ruthlessly fought among themselves for power, with civilians often the victims. As 1994 wore on, much of Kabul was pounded into rubble and at least a third of its 1.5 million residents fled.

AFRICA

New Day in South Africa: After three centuries of colonialism, four decades of brutal white rule and four nail-biting years of negotiations and violence, South Africa finally ended apartheid and joined the community of nations. In unexpectedly peaceful April elections, millions of black voters lined up for hours to cast ballots. Soon after, the first all-race Parliament chose Nelson Mandela, who spent 27 years as a political prisoner, as head of a coalition government committed to political freedom, equal rights and racial reconciliation.

The months before the vote saw a terrifying rise in political bloodshed; more than 500 people were killed in March alone. But the violence plummeted after the government declared a state of emergency in Natal province and, more important, when Zulu Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi finally agreed to participate in the elections.

Despite repeated threats of civil war, the Afrikaner right wing essentially collapsed as a credible threat after mounting a disastrous invasion of the former homeland of Bophuthatswana. A final series of pre-election bombings proved to be the right’s death rattle when police quickly arrested scores of white supremacists on charges of murder and terrorism.

The new government has sought to implement an ambitious five-year development program. Although few tangible improvements have yet appeared, there is little cause for concern. Labor unrest, a mutiny by former ANC guerrillas, resistance by the civil service and other problems have proved to be teething problems, not major crises. Foreign investment has been disappointing but is growing. Mandela remains wildly popular, and his government is steadily creating the structures of democratic government and stability reigns.

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Killing Fields in Rwanda: It was a terrible genocide. At least 500,000 Rwandans, mostly minority Tutsis, were systematically slaughtered by members of the rival Hutu tribe after the dictatorial Hutu president was killed April 6 in a still-unexplained plane crash. The genocidal campaign ended in July when a Tutsi-dominated guerrilla army took control of this Central African nation. But the dying didn’t. More than 1 million terrified Hutus fled the advancing rebel army, mostly surging across the border into Zaire. The sudden exodus overwhelmed world humanitarian organizations. Then, a cholera epidemic cut like a scythe, leaving thousands dead each day along the roads and in the squalid camps. An estimated 50,000 refugees ultimately died, and thousands of children were orphaned. Although the world still spends $1 million a day to house and feed the Hutu refugees, the camps are now under the control of the same Hutu leaders who led the genocide.

INTERNATIONAL TRADE

Goodby to GATT: Founding members of the World Trade Organization popped the champagne cork a few days early as envoys of the four major trading powers--the United States, the European Union, Canada and Japan--handed over documents confirming their ratification of the international treaty that went into effect Sunday. The WTO is the successor organization to GATT, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and is the result of seven years of negotiations.

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Three Ayes, One Nay for EU: Electorates in Finland, Sweden and Austria voted to join the European Union, while Norwegians turned down the invitation for the second time in just over two decades. Despite Norway’s “no,” the results ensured a new northern accent to the movement for political and economic unity in Europe and set the stage for what many believe is Western Europe’s greatest challenge: integrating the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe.

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Hands Across the Hemisphere: At a summit meeting Dec. 9-11 in Miami, Latin America, the Caribbean, the United States and Canada agreed to negotiate the world’s largest free-trade zone, stretching from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego. The negotiations are to be finished by 2005. At the close of the gathering of 34 national leaders, the United States, Canada and Mexico formally invited Chile to join the North American Free Trade Agreement.