April 29, 2003

Hitachi Ltd returned to profitability in year ended March 31, earning 27.9 billion yen ($232.2 million) after losing record 484 billion yen last year; expects profit to fall 82 percent this year and sales to decline 2 percent; Mitsubishi Electric Corp lost 11.8 billion yen last year, one-seventh of size of previous year's loss; expects to earn 5 billion yen in current year (S)

Political gathering of 300 Iraqis from most parts of country and most religious and ethnic factions, sponsored by United States and Britain, decides to call national conference in month's time to select postwar transitional government for Iraq; national conference is to decide whether Iraq wil adopt leadership council or single head of state; Zalmay Khalilzad, Bush administration envoy, is co-chairman of meeting, held in Baghdad; members of Shiite clerical groups are present, as are members of Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, group with strong ties to Iran that boycotted earlier meeting in Nasiriya; several miles from conference hall, several thousand protesters affiliated with Shiite theological college in Najaf denounce meeting as unrepresentative of religious Shiism; security for Baghdad gathering is extraordinarily tight, partly because large-scale demonstrations are expected to mark Saddam Hussein's 66th birthday; in Tikrit and nearby Awja, Hussein's hometown, demonstrations that members of his family called for are thwarted by stepped-up presence of American troops; two nights earlier, pro-Hussein demonstration in Tikrit left one Iraq man injured and three Iraqi cars crushed by American tanks (M)

Statoil, Norway's largest oil and gas producer, reported that net income rose 20 percent increase on the first quarter, to 3.59 billion Norwegian kroner ($508 million). High oil prices and increased output were offset partly by a weak dollar exchange rate and lower gas prices. For the period, Norsk Hydro, which ranks second in Norway to Statoil, earned 2.48 billion kroner ($351 million), an increase of 16 percent. Christine Whitehouse (NYT)

News analysis: approaches of former mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Mayor Michael Bloomberg, both of whom faced huge deficits, discussed; Giuliani's rhetoric was tough, but when he left office he was accused of being too generous toward labor, giving pay increases that outpaced inflation while securing little in productivity gains; Bloomberg, who exhibited friendliness toward unions, is now locked in testy stalemate in contract talks, as he seeks concessions on benefits and threatens layoffs; photo (M)

Tampa Bay Lightning defeats New Jersey Devils, 4-3; Devils lead second-round playoff series, 2-1; photos (M)