11.   The offensive came amidst pledges by the new government to solve the Kurdish problem via non-military means.

12.   The offensive came less than two days after government troops were overrun by another rebel faction in the central Afghan town of Bamiyan.

13.   The offensive came three years after Rangoon declared a unilateral cease-fire to convince the dozen or so ethnic minority insurgencies to lay down their arms.

14.   The reported offensives come after a cease-fire accord was signed Friday at U.N.-mediated talks in Turkmenistan, another former Soviet republic in Central Asia.

15.   The offensive came after Russian President Boris Yeltsin rejected the latest offer by rebel Chechen President Dzhokhar Dudayev to negotiate an end to the Chechnya crisis.

16.   The offensive came amid increasing international efforts to end the fighting between the Tutsi rebels and government troops.

17.   The Moslem community, for its part, expressed regret that the offensive had not come sooner.

18.   The offensive came a day after UN-sponsored peace talks ended in Islamabad without making any significant progress.

19.   The Chinese verbal offensive came even as Taipei seemed to be backing down on its plan to send Lee to the games to raise its international profile.

20.   The diplomatic offensive came ahead of elections next month, a key step to returning the region to Croatian control which must take place before January next year.