Word: maldivians
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There was no shortage of winners as the Olympics loudspeakers began playing national anthems last week: Fu Mingxia, the poised Chinese diver who was not even born when El Loco began hitting home runs for Cuba; the Maldivian swimmer who became the first in his country's Olympic history not to finish last (in part because that position was already occupied by another Maldivian swimmer...
...apparent target was President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, 50, member of a well-known Maldivian family who was re-elected in September to a third five- year term. The rebels literally had the government on the run: Gayoom and several Cabinet members fled from house to house to avoid capture during the 18-hour invasion...
Nearly all the invaders were believed to be former Tamil separatist guerrillas from Sri Lanka, apparently in the pay of Maldivian elements hostile to Gayoom. The President issued pleas for military intervention from India and the U.S. as well as Britain, which held Maldives as a protectorate from 1887 until 1965. Following an emergency Cabinet meeting, Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi dispatched some 1,600 troops to restore order in Male and commanded navy warships to head toward Maldivian waters. Paratroopers arrived less than twelve hours later, landing aboard two Soviet-built IL-76 transport aircraft at the national airport...
...invaders left at least 30 dead, most of them civilians, and nearly 100 injured. According to Foreign Minister Fathulla Jameel, several eyewitnesses identified as the leader of the band a once prominent Maldivian businessman named Abdulla Lutefi, who currently operates a farm near the Sri Lankan capital of Colombo. Several years ago, Lutefi was arrested for entering Maldives with a firearm, apparently in an attempt to overthrow Ibrahim Nasir, Gayoom's predecessor as President. Both Sri Lankan and Maldivian authorities suspect that Lutefi may have hired the Tamil mercenaries, many of whom have become increasingly inactive since India sent army...
...fugitives. Leading U.S. authorities on a long and costly chase across the globe, Friedland finally landed on the island of Male, in the Maldives archipelago off the coast of India. There he was the flashy proprietor of a chain of upscale scuba-diving boutiques until his recent arrest by Maldivian authorities...