(CNN) -- Austrian politician Joerg Haider, a champion of the far-right who drew criticism for perceived pro-Nazi comments, died in a car accident Saturday, Austrian police said. He was 58.

The woman driving the car that Haider passed called for help and rescue teams were on the scene immediately, said Johann Melischneg of the Carinthia state police.

Haider suffered head and chest injuries, police said. He was taken to the hospital but was dead on arrival, Melischneg said.

Police said it is too early to say what caused the accident, but that Haider appeared to have been traveling at a high rate of speed.

"For us it's like the end of the world," Haider spokesman Stefan Petzner told the Austria Press Agency.

Haider was governor of the southern Austrian state of Carinthia and chief of the BZO party (Alliance for the Future of Austria).

He had been en route to Baerental in the Black Forest, where his family was going to celebrate his mother's 90th birthday over the weekend, the APA reported.

"With his death, the republic loses a great politician," said Heinz-Christian Strache, head of the Freedom Party, told the APA.

Austrian President Heinz Fischer told Austrian broadcaster ORF that Haider's death is "inconceivable" and a "human tragedy."

Haider was the former leader of the conservative Freedom Party. His first stint lasted from 1986 to 1989, and he was elected again in 1992.

A politician who projected youth and style, Haider appealed to many working-class Austrians, promising to cut their taxes and give money to those with children. Some older Austrians responded to his demands for strict law and order.

But he drew widespread criticism for his anti-immigrant stance and remarks considered anti-Semitic, and in 1991 he publicly praised Nazi Germany's employment policy.

During a parliamentary debate, Haider said, "An orderly employment policy was carried out in the Third Reich, which the government in Vienna cannot manage."

Asked in 2000 about the statement, Haider told CNN the quote was taken from a long speech and that he never praised the Third Reich.

"I apologize (for making) such statements, which hinder me (fulfilling) my obligations for the people," Haider told CNN. He called the statement a mistake and publicly denounced Nazism.

Haider continued to draw attention for his controversial remarks, however. They included an address to veterans of the Waffen S.S., Adolf Hitler's elite soldiers, in which he praised their character.

The address created an uproar after it was broadcast on German television. Haider said he had been speaking to elderly citizens of Carinthia who included some former Waffen S.S. members.

Despite the controversy, Haider said he was not racist: "You will not find any anti-Semitic position in our party program, and you will not find any anti-Semitic speech or statement by me."

The policies of the Freedom Party drew international attention during the 1999 elections. Party campaign posters urged voters to stop the flood of immigration and used the word "over-foreignization," the same word used by Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels in 1933 to criticize what he called Jewish influence in Germany.

Haider told CNN he favored restricting immigration simply because of Austria's small size, but that he wanted to keep an open border for refugees.

It was his family background, Haider said, that kept singling him out for criticism.

Haider's parents were activists in the Nazi Party long before Austrian-born Hitler annexed Austria to Germany in 1938. Haider's father, Robert, volunteered for the S.A., the notorious brown shirts who terrorized Jews and others before the war. He then served in the German army.

His biographer, Melanie Sully, said Haider felt a strong sense of loyalty to his parents and those in the war generation.

"He feels that what they sacrificed after the war in rebuilding Austria in very difficult circumstances needs to be honored and that they weren't all criminals," Sully told CNN in 2000.

Under Haider's leadership, the Freedom Party made a strong showing in the 1999 elections, winning 27 percent of the vote and shaking up the traditional two-party system that had ruled Austria since World War II.

After months of negotiations, however, the two main parties could not agree on terms to form a government together, so the Freedom Party was invited to share power.

Haider retired as party leader after that but remained governor of Carinthia.

In 2005, Haider formed the BZO party, taking with him a number of Freedom Party lawmakers. Haider was credited with helping the BZO make significant gains in last month's general elections alongside the Freedom Party, though Austria's two largest parties, the Social Democrats and the People's Party, came out on top.

The vote reflected reflected public dissatisfaction with the two largest parties as well as support for the social populism, anti-European Union and anti-immigrant rhetoric of the BZO and Freedom Party.

LONDON, England (AP) -- Britain's Ministry of Defence says a disk which a tabloid said carries personal details of some 100,000 serving British military personnel is missing.

The military acknowledged a report in The Sun newspaper that contractor EDS lost track of a portable hard drive.

But it said it could not comment on the claim that it contained names, addresses, passport numbers and driver's license information of service personnel along with data on 600,000 potential recruits.

A ministry spokesman said Friday: "We don't know what's on it, and we don't even know if there's anything on it." The spokesman spoke anonymously in line with military policy.

A government mandated data security review was unable to account for the disk, according to EDS UK, the British subsidiary of Plano, Texas-based EDS.

(CNN) -- Former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari has won the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced Friday.

Former Finland President Martii Ahtisaari twice worked to find a solution in Kosovo.

"Ahtisaari is an outstanding international mediator," said Ole Danbolt Mjoes, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

"Through his untiring efforts and good results, he has shown what role mediation of various kinds can play in the resolution of international conflicts."

The committee cited Ahtisaari's "significant" part in establishing Namibia's independence and his "central" role in solving the question of the Indonesian province of Aceh in 2005. Watch as Finland celebrates the announcement »

Ahtisaari twice worked to find a solution in Kosovo -- first in 1999 and again between 2005 and 2007. He also worked with others this year to find a peaceful solution to the problems in Iraq, the committee said.

Ahtisaari and his group, Crisis Management Initiative, also contributed to resolving other conflicts in Northern Ireland, Central Asia, and the Horn of Africa, the committee said.

"The Norwegian Nobel Committee wishes to express the hope that others may be inspired by his efforts and his achievements," Mjoes said.

The committee awards the peace prize annually according to guidelines laid down in the will of its founder, Alfred Nobel. He specified the prize should go to whoever "shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."

The prestigious prize includes a medal, a personal diploma, and 10 million Swedish crowns ($1.4 million) in prize money.

Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore shared last year's prize with the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change.

The committee plans to award the prize to Ahtisaari on December 10 at Oslo City Hall in Norway.

The peace prize is one of five Nobel prizes awarded annually. The others -- for physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, and literature -- were announced this week and will be awarded in Stockholm, Sweden later this year

LONDON, England (CNN) -- You can almost picture it now: Paris Hilton swallowed up by a tight-fitting futuristic designer space suit -- one hand waving at the on-flight camera, the other clasping a Dior "space traveler" handbag.

Tighter fit: Massachusetts Insititute of Technology researchers are working on a new, sleeker space suit.

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Oh yes, with the age of space tourism upon us, space fashion looks set to become the next step into this infinite world of adventure.

One factor certain to drive the fashion-crazy towards space concepts is the super-wealthy space tourists (reportedly paying a minimum price of $200,000 per seat) who are set to make trips into orbit an everyday occurrence for those with deep pockets.

And space-inspired fashion is already making cosmic waves in the design world.

Earlier this year a space fashion show was held in Yokohama, Japan and featured at the Japan Aerospace 2008 exhibition.

Last year Louis Vuitton held an exhibition at the Espace Louis Vuitton in Paris titled "The Temptation of Space" which included an installation by legendary French designer Philippe Starck.

That show followed two international space fashion shows in Japan and the U.S.

David Jankowski, president and founder of DestinySpace, one of the organizations actively involved in the world of apparel for the final frontier, said space fashion is more than just a fad.

"Space fashion is important and will be in the next generation of space suits. I don't know how much we will see at the beginning because simpler versions of space attire are going to be what people are interested in," he said. "But there will be some sense of fashion involved. I would like something futuristic if I was going up into space."

Jankowski said the organizer of the space fashion shows, Misuzu Onuki, had gone to great lengths to prepare the shows, and they had attracted massive amounts of interest.

Forecasting that space travelers would soon become fashion-conscious, Jankowski likened the situation to the beginnings of commercial air travel.

"Women had certain dresses and jackets to wear just for flying in the airplane. Back then it was this brand new experience and you had to dress for it."

And there is no doubt space fashion is being taken seriously.

DestinySpace and a similar company called Rocketplane are looking at forming a space fashion organization with other partners, while the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is looking at a new slim-fit space suit. NASA also is looking to design a new "Constellation" suit especially for space travelers.

Jankowski said the space fashion shows were important for a variety of reasons.

"The event got people to start thinking about space tourism. The whole reason behind the show was to get people thinking about it and make it something that everyone can participate in."

While space travel may be inaccessible to many, a fashion show is something the average person can participate in, he said.

The shows had produced a variety of results, Jankowski said.

"Some of those I can see being worn in space, but others just weren't practical. Some of the bigger gowns were 'space-inspired fashion,' but people need to be comfortable and free in space, so I'm not sure they would work."

So where will the line between fashion and practicality fall?

Jeff Feige of U.S. space suit designers Orbital Outfitters felt there would be a move towards fashion-oriented space suit design in the next few years.

"I think we will see a move towards thinking about the fashion side of things, but at the same time people still want something that works," he said. "At the end of the day it's survival equipment, so how can you make that look good? You just do the best you can."

A company related to Orbital Outfitters, Global Effects, has made space suits for many major space-related movies, including "Apollo 13" and "Armageddon." "If you name the space film, we have probably made the suits for it," Feige said, reeling off a list.

He felt the focus of space fashion will become more concentrated on real space hardware, rather than just space-inspired fashion.

In terms of design changes, Feige said a move towards a slimmer suit was inevitable. "What we have started doing is making them less baggy when they're not in use."

However, with standard suits designed using "mechanical counter-pressure," where the wearer was literally in a bag full of gas, Feige was still unsure about how the MIT technology would develop.

"MIT's suit uses the material to push on you. That works well for the arms and legs, but wherever you have non-uniform parts of the body, it's not so good," he said.

He said there were some production issues facing all space suit-making projects. "The technology is not so hard, it's how to make lots of them and how to make them more cheaply."

Still, Feige was confident that more space travelers would mean more demand, more companies, more technological breakthroughs and eventually more fashionable suits

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The United States on Saturday removed North Korea from its list of states that sponsor terrorism, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

McCormack said the United States and North Korea had reached agreement "on an number of important verification measures" of North Korea's nuclear program.

These include participation by all members of the Six Party Talks, the role of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency, access to all of North Korea's nuclear facilities and what procedures would be used in the verification process.

"Every element of verification that we sought is included in this package," McCormack said at a news conference.

A senior State Department official said earlier that President Bush made the decision Friday night to remove North Korea from the terrorism list. Watch how North Korea escaped the terror list »

The official said verification of North Korea's statements about its nuclear program will start right away, and the North Koreans will immediately reverse actions they have taken in recent weeks to restart their reactor and reprocessing facilities that produce plutonium for nuclear weapons.

The North Koreans are expected to make a separate announcement Saturday, McCormack said.

McCormack said Japan had agreed to formalizing the agreement at the Six-Party level, although the issue of North Korea's abduction of Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s has not yet been addressed.

President Bush spoke Saturday morning with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, telling him that the United States "will never forget the abduction of Japanese citizens by the North Koreans," White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said.

"We will continue to strongly support Japan's position on the abduction issue and will urge North Korea to take immediate steps to implement the commitments it made this summer as part the agreement reached with Japan," he said.

North Korea was added to the list of state sponsors of terrorism in 1988, the fourth country to be added. Cuba, Syria, Sudan and Iran remain on the list.

Countries designated as state sponsors of terrorism are subject to limitations on foreign aid, a ban on defense exports and sales, restrictions on exports of "dual use" items -- those that could be used for defense or non-defense purposes -- and a variety of financial and other restrictions.

In recent weeks, North Korea objected to the way the United States and its allies were proposing to verify that North Korea was revealing all its nuclear secrets.

The question of removing North Korea from the terror list had been under intense deliberations in the Bush administration over the past several days, since the U.S. point man in the negotiations, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, had returned from talks in North Korea.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had talked by phone to her counterparts in China, Japan and South Korea, and according to a spokesman on Friday, she expected to talk to Russia's foreign minister in coming days.

Speculation had been rising in Washington that the Bush administration would decide to "de-list" North Korea, despite fierce opposition from some of Bush's fellow Republicans.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Florida, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, issued a strongly critical statement after Saturday's announcement.

"While I am not surprised by today's decision, I am profoundly disappointed," she said.

"Given the regime's decision to restart its plutonium reactor at Yongbyon and actions barring access to the site by inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, it is clear that North Korea has no intention of meeting its commitment to end its nuclear program."

Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain put out a statement Friday opposing taking North Korea off the terrorism list.

"I have previously said that I would not support the easing of sanctions [against] North Korea unless the United States is able to fully verify the nuclear declaration Pyongyang submitted on June 26," McCain said. "It is not clear that the latest verification arrangement will enable us to do so."

McCain's Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama, had a more positive view, calling North Korea's agreement to the verification measures "a modest step forward." But, he said, any failure on Pyongyang's part to follow through with its side of the agreement must be met with swift action.

"President Bush's decision to remove North Korea from the list of state sponsors of terrorism is an appropriate response, as long as there is a clear understanding that if North Korea fails to follow through there will be immediate consequences," Obama said.

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (AP) -- Thousands of people greeted the founder of Aceh's separatist rebel movement Saturday upon his return to the Indonesian province following three decades in exile and a civil war that left thousands dead.

Hasan di Tiro's homecoming came a day after former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari won the 2008 Nobel Peace Prize in part for helping negotiate an end to fighting between the Indonesian government and Free Aceh Movement rebels.

Supporters cheered and waved as the 83-year-old di Tiro arrived from Sweden and was taken by motorcade to the heart of the provincial capital, where he was to meet the governor and former rebels before traveling to his home village.

"Di Tiro's visit will add to our commitment to building peace and developing our province," said Aceh Vice Governor Muhamad Nazar.

The former rebel leader left Aceh soon after the 1976 war began and led the now-dissolved separatist group, known as GAM, from exile in Sweden, where he now holds citizenship. He is to return to Sweden next week.

Aceh, an oil- and gas-rich province of 4 million people on Sumatra island's northern tip, had experienced almost constant warfare for more than 140 years, with at least 15,000 people killed in the last round of fighting.

Many of those who died were civilians caught up in army sweeps of remote villages.

Efforts to end the fighting gained momentum after a massive earthquake and tsunami struck on December 26, 2004, leaving at least 156,000 of the province's people dead or missing and a half million others homeless.

As part of the 2005 peace deal, the rebels gave up their long-held demand for independence and handed over all of their weapons. In exchange, the government allowed them to participate in local politics.

Neither side wanted to add to the suffering of the tsunami.

Di Tiro is the grandson of resistance leader Cik di Tiro, a national hero who was killed in combat against occupying Dutch troops in 1891

BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) -- NATO defense ministers Friday authorized their troops in Afghanistan to attack drug barons blamed for pumping up to $100 million a year into the coffers of resurgent Taliban fighters.

File image of British and U.S. troops searching for drugs and weapons in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan.

"With regard to counter-narcotics ... ISAF can act in concert with the Afghans against facilities and facilitators supporting the insurgency," NATO spokesman James Appathurai said, referring to the NATO force.

The United States had been pushing for NATO's 50,000 troops to take on a counter-narcotics role to hit back at the Taliban, whose increasing attacks have cast doubt on the prospects of a Western military victory in Afghanistan.

However, Germany, Spain and others were wary and their doubts led to NATO imposing conditions on the anti-drug mandate for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

Troops will only be able to act against drug facilities if authorized by their own governments; only drug producers deemed to be supporting the insurgency will be targeted; and the operation must be designed to be temporary -- lasting only until the Afghan security forces are deemed able to take on the task.

NATO defense ministers will review the success of the mission when they next meet February in Poland. Despite the limitations, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates welcomed the NATO move.

"Secretary Gates is extremely pleased that, after two days of thoughtful discussion, NATO has decided to allow ISAF forces to take on the drug traffickers who are fueling the insurgency, destabilizing Afghanistan and killing our troops," said Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell.

Germany and Spain agreed to the anti-drug mission after an appeal for help from Afghanistan's defense minister.

"We've asked NATO to please support us, support our effort in destroying the labs and also the interdiction of the drugs and the chemical precursors that are coming from outside the country for making heroin," Gen. Abdul Rahim Wardak told reporters after meeting his NATO counterparts Thursday.

Afghanistan supplies 90 percent of the world's heroin, a trade worth billions of dollars.

Until now, responsibility for dealing with the problem has lain with the Afghan police, but NATO commanders believe the fledgling force cannot cope with the problem. They say the time has come for NATO to move against the drug barons.

Some allies were concerned that a counter-narcotics campaign could spark a backlash against their troops, even if, as NATO commanders insist, the campaign will not target farmers who depend on growing opium poppies for a living.

They also feared that widening the mission could over-stretch the hard-pressed troops and undermine NATO's long-term goal of handing more responsibility to Afghan forces.

NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer on Thursday stressed the need for action.

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A car bomb exploded Friday in an outdoor market in southern Baghdad, killing at least 12 civilians and wounding 22, an Interior Ministry official said.

Women and children were among the casualties from the explosion in the Shiite enclave in the Dora neighborhood, the official said.

In a separate incident Friday, an improvised explosive device killed four Iraqis and wounded 18 during an attack against an Iraqi Police mounted patrol in Mosul, north of Baghdad, according to a written statement from the Multi-National Division-North. Two Iraqi policemen were wounded.

This means that France, a major global arms vendor and once a key supplier to Saddam Hussein, is maneuvering its way back into a lucrative military market that the United States has dominated since the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

The French and Iraqi officials say French merchandise currently on offer includes helicopters and spare parts for weaponry that France sold back in the 1980s.

Jawad Bashara, spokesman for the Iraqi Embassy in France, said Friday that it's not about "replacing the Americans, or rejecting them."

He said a delegation is expected in France in the next two weeks to "finalize" a contract for 30 helicopters

PUERTO SAN CARLOS, Mexico (AP) -- Norbert closed in on Mexico's southern Baja California Peninsula Saturday as powerful Category 2 hurricane, as hotels warned tourists to stay away from beaches and fishermen hauled boats from the water.

Paula Lucero Aviles set out with six children and four other adults in a small fishing boat late Friday when they got a cell phone call warning them to return to the Mexican port city of San Carlos, where the skies had already turned dark.

"We turned back because they warned us bad weather was coming," Aviles said. "We would have been risking our lives. It is coming on strong."

A hurricane warning was issued for the west coast of Baja California from Puerto San Andresito to Agua Blanca. The government also issued hurricane warnings along the coast of the border state of Sonora and on the east coast of the Baja peninsula from near La Paz north to Loreto.

Norbert is expected to sweep across Baja on Saturday, cross the Gulf of California and then head toward the Mexican mainland.

As of 8 a.m. EDT (noon GMT), the hurricane's center was located about 80 miles (130 kilometers) south of Cabo San Lazaro, Mexico, and was moving north-northeast at 15 mph (24 kph).

The storm's remnants were expected to dump more rain on water-logged West Texas, where authorities were preparing for more flooding.

State and local officials plan to activate an emergency operations center Monday in Presidio, where an earthen levee is struggling to hold back the swollen Rio Grande.

The Governor of Baja California Sur state, Narciso Agundez, said officials here are "very worried."

Under overcast skies in Baja California, fishermen hauled their boats onto beaches in La Paz, a port town on the peninsula's eastern coast. Yellow flags on beaches warned people to stay out of the water.

Eli and Claudia Tubia, on vacation from Texarkana, Texas, took a cruise Wednesday night despite the coming storm, but their hotel in resort-dotted Cabo San Lucas was already storing outdoor furniture and paintings.

"They kind of cleared out the beach, and the restaurants that they have on the beach, they took all the furnishings away," Eli Tubia said.

Meanwhile in southern Mexico, Tropical Storm Odile was approaching the resort of Acapulco, but was expected to remain offshore.

The government extended a tropical storm warning from Lagunas de Chacahua westward past Acapulco and Zihuatanejo to Punta San Telmo, as Odile moved parallel to the Pacific coast with winds of about 65 mph (100 kph).

Odile was located about 50 miles (80 kilometers) west-southwest of Acapulco, and was moving northwest at about 14 mph (22 kph). Odile could become a hurricane, and a small deviation in its path could bring the storm inland, the hurricane center said.

Forecasters said Odile would sweep close to land on Saturday and could dump as much as 8 inches (20 centimeters) of rain, threatening dangerous mudslides.

Odile has already caused flooding in Acapulco and forced officials to cancel classes at local schools.

Civil defense officials in the southern state of Guerrero, where Acapulco is located, urged about 10,000 people living along river banks or other dangerous areas to evacuate.

(CNN) -- Maoist insurgents killed a dozen soldiers and two civilians during an ambush in southeastern Peru, the military said Friday.

The military blamed "narco-terrorists" of the Shining Path for the attack Thursday night in Tayacaja province as the soldiers were returning by truck to their counterterrorism base in Cochabamba Grande.

The region is where most of the country's coca leaf and cocaine are produced.

"At the height of the place named Sajona Curve, terrorists detonated an explosive charge under a civilian truck carrying villagers, and immediately fired with long-range weapons on all vehicles," the military said in a statement.

"The military reacted immediately, engaging in a clash that lasted several hours," the statement said. "This unfortunate act shows that the narco-terrorist organization Sendero Luminoso [Shining Path] is continuing in its bloodthirsty actions ... without discriminating among women and children."

The Shining Path and the smaller Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement are blamed for the deaths of thousands of Peruvians.

The rebels have been targets of a fierce government crackdown in the mountainous region of Peru.

The story

About 100 migrants from Somalia are missing and feared drowned in the treacherous waters off the coast of Yemen after smugglers forced them overboard, Yemeni officials and the U.N. refugee agency said on Friday.

So far, 30 bodies have been found washed up on the shore of the Gulf of Aden on Friday and were buried immediately, a Yemeni security official said.

The waters off the Horn of Africa and Yemen have become some of the most lawless in the world, plagued by Somali piracy -- notably the recent hijacking of a Ukrainian vessel with a cargo of heavy weapons. Read full article »

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GENEVA (AP) -- -- The U.N. health agency says it is investigating a mystery disease that killed three people in the South African city of Johannesburg.

The World Health Organization says the disease appears to be a form of hemorrhagic fever.

It says tests have proved negative for Ebola, Lassa fever, Rift Valley fever, Marburg fever and other main types of hemorrhagic fever.

WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl says the first death on Sept. 13 was a tour guide who had fallen ill in Zambia before being evacuated to South Africa. Two further deaths on Sept. 30 and Oct. 4. involved a paramedic and a nurse who treated the woman.

Hartl said Friday that 121 people are being monitored and WHO hopes to receive further test results by Sunday