11.   Balza last month broke two decades of official silence, admitting that the army tortured and killed leftists and political dissidents.

12.   Breaking official silence, lawmakers in southern China lashed out Thursday at managers of a failed state investment trust, accusing them of wasting public money.

13.   But it meets a wall of official silence at the seat of power, six years after the Muslim insurgency began.

14.   Despite the official silence on the matter until Wednesday, every national newspaper and radio station in Guatemala reported the kidnapping.

15.   Despite the official silence, Chinese leaders and foreign policy wonks are worried about whether the rapprochement Clinton and President Jiang Zemin engineered is imperiled.

16.   He said he decided to end decades of official silence on the Rosenberg case.

17.   His remarks were a major departure from official French silence on Algeria.

18.   Now, the official silence has been broken with the frank admission that the army tortured and killed leftists and political dissidents two decades ago.

19.   Palestinian school children burned American flags and stoned Israeli soldiers on Thursday to protest the U.S. airstrikes against Iraq, but the Palestinian Authority maintained official silence.

20.   The American military maintained official silence Monday, including to the Red Cross, about the reported detention of nine Iranians at the U.S. Army-run stockade here.