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Study CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 The study also found that as the election date got closer, interest in the election increased. Thalhimer said that most TV stations begin their election coverage around Labor Day and cover it all through the fall. He said most news sta tions bum out the week before the election, the moment when they need to begin heavy coverage. Thalhimer said one suggestion would be to cut back on the amount of coverage early, and 1 then really “pour it on” about a week before the election. Adam Schaffer, a second-year advertising student, said that if the Internet is going to change, it has to be now, while it is still rela U V CiJ lie vv . “If we can influence it to give people more information on poli tics like they are trying to do, I think later on maybe well have a better government overall because of this,” he said. Thalhimer will present the full study at the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation in Las Vegas on April 7. The study was done in partner ship with the Annenberg School of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Part of Thalhimer’s visit was also to tour Newsplex, a national center for media convergence that opened in Columbia in November. The lecture was part of an en dowment that the South Carolina Broadcasters Association estab lished five years ago. Charles Bierbauer, dean of the College of Mass Communication and Information Studies, said that the addition of Newsplex to the school is attractive to national journal ists. “It is one of the pluses of having Newsplex; people want to see it; they want to understand what it can do,” he said. “That’s where we think Newsplex has a lot of poten tial.” This is not the first lecture that the school is sponsoring. In September, Thomas Friedman, a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the New York Times, will speak at the Roger Center. “A lot of good things are hap pening with us right now,” said Randy Covington, director of ad vancement for the College of Mass Communications and Information Studies. Comments on this story?E-mail gamecockudesk@hotma i l. com N. Korean interception of U.S. reconnaissance raises nuclear tension BY CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA THE ASSOCIATED l'RESS SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA - After North Korean fighter jets intercepted a U.S. reconnais sance plane, the communist country said Tuesday the threat of armed confrontation on the Korean Peninsula was growing because of what it called U.S. ag gression. North Korea did not comment on the interception of the plane. Its state-run media instead crit icized annual U.S.-South Korean military exercises that began Tuesday, saying they were preparation for an attack. The exercise, named Foal Eagle, ends April 2. “This Foal Eagle exercise is escalatingthe danger of armed _ clashes on the Korean Peninsula,” said Minju Joson, a North Korean newspaper. “If the eagle swoops down on us, a nuclear war will break out and it is clear that the whole Korean nation will not escape nuclear holocaust,” said the re port, which was monitored by South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. North Korea routinely con demns such exercises, but the belligerent rhetoric and the in terception of the American plane come amid fears the North could make nuclear bombs with in mnnthQ U.S. military officials say the annual maneuver is “defense oriented” and is not related to the nuclear dispute. Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said four North Korean fighter jets had ap proached the U.S. plane over the Sea of Japan on Sunday, coming as close as 50 feet. One used its radar to identify the plane as a target, but there was no hostile fire, he said. Davis said it was the first such incident since 1969, when a North Korean plane shot down a U.S. Navy EC-121 surveillance plane, killing all 31 Americans aboard. In Washington, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said President Bush “believes that the issue of North Korea can be handled diplomatically.” “This is a matter that we will protest and we’re talking to our allies abqut best manner to do that,” Fleischer said, adding that “North Korea continues to en gage in provocative, and now reckless actions. And North Korea engages in these actions as a way of saying, pay me. That will-not happen.” In a commentary, North Korea’s Minju Joson described Bush as “a political illiterate and a shameless impostor who has dull senses of the times.” The newspaper also appealed to South Koreans, who host 37,000 U.S. soldiers on their soil, to join North Korea in resisting the United States. The interception of the U.S. plane appeared to be part of an effort to pressure the United States into negotiations on chief North Korean aims: a nonag gression treaty and economic aid. “The reckless move is a sig nal to the United States at a time when Washington pays little at tention to North Korea’s repeat ed demand for direct dialogue,” said Lee Suk-soo, a military studies professor at the National Defense College in Seoul. North Korea on Tuesday reit erated its demand for a nonag gression pact, saying through Radio Pyongyang that it was “to remove an unreasonable U.S. threat, not to gain something.” The radio was monitored by Yonhap. Washington, which is prepar ing for a possible war against Iraq, says it will not be black . mailed into concessions and that North Korea’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons are a multilat eral issue. The U.N. Security Council is exDected to debate the matter. North Korea test-fired a mis sile into the sea off its east coast on the eve of South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun’s in auguration last week. On Feb. 20, a North Korean MiG-19 warplane crossed over the South’s western sea border, but retreated after South Korean jets flew to the area. Last week, U.S. officials said North Korea had restarted a nu clear reactor that is at the cen ter of a suspected weapons pro gram. The reactor could yield enough plutonium for an atomic bomb in about a year, experts say. North Kofea, which has warned a U.S. attack on its nucle ar facilities at Yongbyon would trigger war, could also decide to reactivate a reprocessing facility near the reactor. Such a move could allow it to make several nu clear bombs within months, ac cording to defense analysts. ♦ KOREA, SEE PAGE 5 Annan says war must be last resort and calls destruction of missiles ‘positive’ BY DAFNA LINZER THE ASSOCIATED PRESS UNITED NATIONS - With the United States moving toward a vote next week to approve mili tary action against Iraq, Secretary-General Kofi Annan declared Tuesday that war must be a last resort and called Baghdad’s missile destruction “a positive development.” Russia’s Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, hardening Moscow’s op position to quick military action, indicated Russia may use its veto against the U.S.-backed resolu tion. Speaking at a news conference in London, Ivanov said “it is un likely” that Russia or any perma nent Security Council member with veto power would abstain. “There are certain issues where it is desirable there should be no abstentions among the Security Council members be cause these are serious issues,” Ivanov said. Earlier, Ivanov told the BBC that “Russia is hardly likely to abstain.” Asked if that meant ve toing the resolution, he did not answer directly. me united States still doesn t have the nine “yes” votes need ed to win approval of the resolu tion, according to supporters and opponents, and many undecided council members are looking for a compromise. Even if it gets nine votes, it needs to avoid a veto by Russia, France or China, who all favor continuing inspec tions at least into July. U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte was asked whether the United States would with draw the resolution if it didn’t have the votes to pass it. “We haven’t crossed that bridge,” he said. “We believe that support should be there. We are not facing that kind of situation but we will cross the bridge when we come to it.” Top inspectors Hans Blix and Mohamed ElBaradei will be giv ing their next progress report to the Security Council on Friday on Iraq’s cooperation with U.N. inspections. The 15 council members will then have to make a judgment on the U.S.-backed resolution, which is co-sponsored by Britain and Spain, Annan said. “The inspectors have to report the facts, and as I’ve indicated this is a positive development,” he said of Baghdad’s start on the destruction of its A1 Samoud 2 Missiles. French Ambassador Jean Marc de La Sabliere told a closed council meeting Tuesday that Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin will attend Friday’s meeting, a French diplomat said. France has been in the forefront jof the opposition to war against Iraq and de Villepin’s attendance is likely to bring foreign minis ters from other council nations to New York. But Annan said war is “a hu man catastrophe” that should only be considered when all pos sibilities for “peaceful settlement have been exhausted.” A U.S. official speaking on con dition of anonymity said “all in dications are that the vote would be next week.” As one of the sponsors of the resolution, along with Britain and Spain, the United States can call for a vote at any time. Most council diplomats pre dicted a vote on March 13, six months after President Bush went to the United Nations seek ing international support for the disarmament of Iraq. The president’s call to action on Sept. 12 was quickly followed by an Iraqi decision to allow weapons inspectors to return af ter nearly four years. It also spurred the council to adopt unanimously a U.S.-drafted res olution in November that called on Iraq to disarm and cooperate with inspectors. The United States, Britain and Spain believe Iraq failed the tests laid out in that resolution. Their new proposed resolution would give them Security Council au thorization to disarm Iraq through force. But the majority of the council is wary of the U.S.-driven position and two separate groups are searching for alternatives to war. France, backed by Russia, Germany and China, has sug gested beefing up the inspections regime and extending its work at least through July 1. “War can and should be avoid ed,” China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan said, echoing the wording of the joint statement issued during Ivanov’s visit to Beijing. However, Kong added, “Iraq should implement the U.N. reso lutions strictly, fully and consci entiously. It should not possess weapons of mass destruction.” Iran, which fought an eight year war with Iraq during the 1980s, called Tuesday for U.N.-su pervised elections in neighbor ing Iraq and urged the divided Iraqi opposition to reconcile with President Saddam Hussein as part of a plan aimed at averting a U.S.-led war. “We believe this is the only way for a peaceful change of govern ment in Iraq, which will prevent the breakout of a war in the re gion,” Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said, according to Iran’s official news agency. Annan said free elections were not part of the issue at hand. “Elections (are) something that is in the future of any reform process. But I’m not sure that we are there yet,” he said. Chile and other Security Council members spent several hours late Monday listening to a Canadian compromise proposal that would set a series of benchmarks Iraq would have to meet by the end of the month, when the council would then decide whether Iraq had com plied. Cristian Maquieira, the deputy Chilean ambassador, said Canada’s proposal was “a positive step but we are far still from getting a docu ment.” The Canadian ideas were re jected last week by Washington as well as by France, Russia and Germany. _I PHOTOBY JOHNNY HAYNES/THE GAMECOCK Mark Thalhimer advises TV news stations to keep it simple when creating an Interactive Web site. He discussed the results of a study about peoples’ interest In politics and the Internet. ' r 1226 fttufletan Street W*d* ttw CmrnM A*m» W<.Wr*if Most college students meet their I soul motes on compus. Don't let o bod hairstyle ruin your fate. For an appointment, call 254-1507 before it's too late.