Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 23, 1994 TAG: 9404250169
SECTION: NATL/INTL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
WASHINGTON - Sam Nang Nhem, a 21-year-old Cambodian American and father of a 4-month-old baby, went out for a picnic last summer and never finished it.
Nhem was barbecuing meat with a friend outside the housing project in his home of Fall River, Mass., when a gang of white toughs began calling them ``gooks.''
Nhem and his friend, Sophy Soeng, went inside. But when they emerged an hour later, the youths jumped them and beat them savagely. Soeng survived the attack, but Nhem died two days later from severe brain injuries.
The grisly attack was just one of 335 racially motivated crimes of violence against Asian-Americans last year - nearly one a day - reported in a study released Friday by the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium.
And that's just the tip of the iceberg, according to the study, which claims that much more violence against Asian-Americans goes unreported.
``The main point we're making is that this is not the whole story,'' said Philip Tajitsu Nash, the consortium's director. ``Part of this report is an indictment of law enforcement authorities who aren't following these cases and aren't taking them seriously.''
Nash said local law enforcement officials are failing to provide the FBI with the data called for under the 1990 federal hate crimes statistics law. The FBI's latest report on hate crimes is based on 1992 figures supplied by cities where just 53 percent of the Asian-American population lives.
- Hearst Newspapers
U.S. may institute grain import quotas
WASHINGTON - The United States moved to limit imports of Canadian wheat and barley Friday, with quotas expected to be imposed July 1 unless the two countries resolve their farm trade dispute.
The administration did not announce the quota levels, nor the amount of proposed tariffs to discourage Canadian imports of wheat and barley above those quotas.
The 90-day schedule for implementation will allow the two sides - the world's largest trading partners - time to settle the dispute, which also involves dairy, eggs, poultry and other commodities. But no new talks have been announced.
The United States is ``still fully prepared to negotiate a solution to the agricultural problems of both countries in way that recognizes the needs of each side,'' said U.S. Trade Representative Mickey Kantor.
- Associated Press
FDA confiscates contaminated drugs
WASHINGTON - Two drugs sold over the counter without Food and Drug Administration approval were found to be dangerously contaminated with germs and have been confiscated by federal agents.
The FDA said Friday that batches of Latero-Flora and Flora-Balance, both manufactured by Bio-Genesis Inc. of San Marcos, Calif., were found to contain bacteria that could cause fatal infections in people who have weakened immune systems as the result of cancer, AIDS or organ transplants.
People who might have bought the drugs were warned by the FDA not to take any of the medicine in the liquid form.
An FDA spokesperson said the drugs and some company records about their distribution were seized at the Bio-Genesis office in San Marcos and at the company's San Bernardino, Calif., manufacturing plant.
Both of the seized drugs were promoted by Bio-Genesis to aid ``in resolving many immuno-suppressed conditions,'' the FDA said. The company claimed the drugs would improve symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome, hay fever, athlete's foot and tonsillitis.
- Associated Press
by CNB