Storm strengthens across Caribbean

Tropical Storm Noel formed over the Caribbean Sunday, and forecasters warned the slow-moving system could send flash floods rushing over deforested hills in Haiti before it heads on to Cuba.

The strengthening storm poses a serious threat to impoverished Haiti, which is still recovering from floods that killed at least 37 and sent more than 4,000 people to shelters earlier this month.

Noel, the 14th named storm of the Atlantic season, had sustained winds of about 60 mph, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami. The outer bands of the tropical system were dumping heavy rains over the island of Hispaniola late Sunday.

A tropical-storm warning was issued for the entire Haitian coastline and parts of the Dominican Republic's southern coast.

New Delhi

27,000 poor reach capital in protest

An estimated 27,000 impoverished Indians arrived in the national capital on Sunday, ending a monthlong march to draw attention to the plight of those dispossessed of their land by economic development.

The protesters marched in long, orderly lines to central New Delhi, where they plan to hold a massive protest today.

The demonstrators marched some 185 miles from the central city of Gwalior, where many say they were forced from their land to make way for government-backed economic projects.

Police reported Sunday that four people died in eastern India after clashes between farmers and government supporters over proposed land seizures to create an industrial zone.

Kiev, Ukraine

Stalin purge victims' remains reburied

Ukraine reburied nearly 2,000 victims of Stalinist repression, paying its respects to those gunned down by the Soviet secret police before World War II and dumped into a mass grave, organizers said Sunday.

The remains of 1,998 victims, including 474 believed to be ethnic Poles, as well as 29 Red Army soldiers, were laid to rest Saturday, said Vitaly Kozakevych, secretary of a commission for commemorating victims of political repression.

The mass executions of those branded "enemies of the people" were carried out between 1937 and 1941 by Stalin's secret police in the village of Bykivnya on the outskirts of Kiev.

Up to 30,000 people are believed to have been killed and hidden in mass graves here.

However, historians and rights activists have been able to locate and rebury only some 10,000 victims. Soviet authorities are believed to have destroyed the remains of the rest, Kozakevych said.

Also

Migrants drown: At least 15 migrants drowned off the Italian coast in two incidents, including the disintegration of a boat that spilled more than 100 people into rough seas, reports said Sunday.

Marine dispute: Japanese patrol vessels fired water cannon Sunday at a boat carrying Chinese activists protesting Japan's claims to five disputed islets territory in the East China Sea, the activists' group said.

Seattle Times news services