PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) – The government said it foiled an attempt by rebel army officers Sunday to overthrow Lt. Gen. Prosper Avril. U.S. officials said loyal soldiers apparently rescued Avril as he was being driven away to be deported.

A government communique read over state-run television said “certain officers besieged” the palace “and attempted to overthrow the government.”

Anti-apartheid leaders to visit

WASHINGTON (AP) – Three South African anti-aparthied leaders will arrive in Washington next month to sound out the new administration on its position toward South Africa and to reinvigorate efforts for U.S. sanctions against the white minority Pretoria government, organizers announced Sunday.

They said Archbishop Desmond Tutu, winner of the Nobel Peace prize, the Rev. Allan Boesak and the Rev. Beryers Naude have asked for a meeting with President Bush. Tutu is black, Boesak mixed-race and Naude white.

Captain of Exxon tanker

VALDEZ, Alaska (AP) – The captain of the Exxon Valdez admitted drinking on board the tanker before it rammed a reef, investigators allege.

When the first investigator on the scene of the nation’s worst-ever oil spill boarded the vessel and asked Capt. Joseph Hazelwood what the problem was, he replied, “I think you’re looking at it,” according to court documents.

Amoco safety violations

WHITING, Ind. (AP) – Amoco Oil Co. Faces $17,300 in fines for safety violations discovered after an explosion killed three employees last October, state safety officials said.

Dave Kneesssy, a deputy commissioner with the Indiana Occupational Safety and Health Administration in Indianapolis, said the state cited Amoco for 27 serious violations and 31 non-serious violations. The fines ranged from $400 to $1,000.

$2.5 million reward

LONDON (AP) – A Pan Am pilot whose wife was killed in the explosion of Pan Am Flight 103 called for a $2.5 million reward to catch the bombers and pledged the first $100,000, a newspaper reported Sunday.

The Sunday Telegraph quoted pilot Bruce Smith, whose British wife Ingrid was aboard Flight 103, as saying if Iran’s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini can raise a multimillion-dollar reward for the assassination of British author Salman Rushdie, “then we can do the same for the monsters who murdered our families.”

Fish infected with herpes

CHICAGO (AP) – A mysterious herpes virus has wiped out stocks in several Midwestern fish hatcheries and threatens to halve the Lake Michigan trout catch in several years unless biologists can curb its spread, officials say.

Fish recovered from the lake have not shown signs of the disease and while larger fish aren’t at risk, as many as 98 percent of very young trout will die if exposed to the virus, said Rodney Horner, an Illinois state fish pathologist and chairman of the Great Lakes Fish Disease Control Committee.

Private education vouchers

CHICAGO (AP) – Parochial school educators and administrators joined Sunday in support of legislation to create a voucher system to pay for some private education costs.

But the program asks for the entire $100 million in new revenues in Gov. Jim Thompson’s budget in the general distribution aid category, part of which normally pays for cost-of-living pay increases for teachers.

SIU house fire causes death

CARBONDALE, Ill (AP) – Officials continued their investigation Sunday into the cause of a house fire in which a 20-year-old Southern Illinois University student was killed while trying to help others escape.

Assistant Fire Chief John Manis said between 10 and 12 people, about half of them visitors, were in the two-story home when the fire broke out early Saturday morning.

‘Papa Cocaine’ sentenced

ROME (AP) – A man dubbed “Papa Cocaine” by the Italian media has been sentenced to five years under house arrest and fined nearly $9,000 for giving cocaine to his girlfriend’s 4-year-old son, news reports said.

Antonio Lancia, 38, was found guilty Saturday of administering drugs to a minor, personal injury and abuse. The court ordered him confined to his house and fined $3,700. It also ordered him to pay court costs of $1,480 and another $3,700 to the woman and her son.