JUNE 5, 2000 VOL. 155 NO. 22

Milestones
BY PENNY CAMPBELL

DIED. JEAN-PIERRE RAM- PAL, 78, French flautist whose virtuoso career performing with orchestras around the world was credited with restoring the flute's popularity to the levels it had enjoyed in the 18th century; in Paris. Rampal, whose name became synonymous with his solid gold flute, was best known for his renderings of the Baroque giants, though his repertoire also included jazz and Asian offerings.

DIED. MAHMOUD ZUBI, 62, former Syrian Prime Minister who resigned in March and was awaiting trial on corruption charges; in Damascus. Zubi shot himself in the head one week after the government froze his assets pending the outcome of his trial. Prime Minister for less than two years, Zubi was expelled from the ruling Baath Party last month after an internal investigation found there had been "irregularities and abuses" during his tenure.

DIED. SIR JOHN GIELGUD, 96, one of Britain's greatest classical actors who deployed his famous tenor voice in theater roles ranging from Shakespeare to Harold Pinter and in screen portrayals of quintessential Englishmen; near Aylesbury, west of London. Gielgud's 1929 rendition of Hamlet is still considered one of modern theater's finest performances. Knighted in 1953, he won--among numerous other accolades--an Academy Award for his role as Dudley Moore's long-suffering butler in the 1981 comedy Arthur.

DIED. DAME BARBARA CARTLAND, 98, British doyenne of the romantic novel whose stories featuring virginal heroines, handsome heroes and fairy-tale endings made her the world's best-selling living author; in Hatfield, England. Renowned for her trademark pink chiffon and her prolific if formulaic output, Cartland won fans around the globe, selling 650 million copies of her more than 600 books. Raised in an upper-class but penurious family, Cartland worked as a newspaper gossip columnist before publishing her first novel in 1925. She became step-grandmother to Princess Diana upon her daughter's second marriage and was made a Dame of the British Empire in 1991.

APPOINTED. LEE HAN DONG, 65, as Prime Minister of South Korea, replacing Park Tae Joon, who resigned last week after being implicated in a tax-evasion case; in Seoul. The appointment of Lee, head of the minority United Liberal Democrats, is part of President Kim Dae Jung's effort to secure a working majority in parliament following the April election.

BANNED. CHANG HUI-MEI, 26, Taiwan's top pop performer (known by her diminutive A-mei), from China for singing the island's national anthem at the inauguration of President Chen Shui-bian; by Beijing. Television advertisements and billboards featuring A-mei, who is wildly popular in China, have been pulled, including a multimillion dollar Coca-Cola advertising campaign. She may also face a three-year ban on performing live.

Eulogy
Some people will say that Kurt Schork 's death in an obscure war was senseless. And of course they are right: if only he had not taken that last turn or, better yet, not been there at all. But Kurt, one of two journalists killed last week by Sierra Leone rebels, died doing what he wanted to do. He was perhaps the finest war correspondent of his generation. Because he worked for a wire service and his byline rarely appeared in print, almost no one had heard of him. Yet everyone reading this tribute also read his articles. Those of us who went into war zones usually found Kurt waiting for us, casual yet intense, bearded in later years, his wire-rim glasses perched above an energetic smile, sardonic yet engaged. I would take him aside to find out what was really happening. He always knew more than the United Nations and the diplomats. Unlike many great war correspondents, he seemed oblivious to the lures of fame; when I asked him why he stayed with Reuters, he said, "They let me do what interests me." Kurt believed that if he could tell the "civilized" world what was going on in the most remote parts of the planet, then the world would do something. Bosnia proved him right. He took enormous risks to make a difference. If only he had taken a different turn. --By Richard Holbrooke, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations

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