U.S. RAPS CHINA ON PIRACY

Unable to resolve an increasingly bitter dispute with China over intellectual property rights, President Clinton plans to impose new tariffs on about $1 billion worth of Chinese imports. On Saturday, U.S. Trade Representative Mickey Kantor will release a list of Chinese goods to be targeted, White House officials say. The hard-hitting action follows months of acrimonious back-and-forth on the rampant piracy of U.S. computer software, motion pictures, videos, sound recordings and periodicals in China -- something U.S. businesses say costs them hundreds of millions of dollars in fees annually. TIME Washington correspondent Adam Zagorin says "the U.S. move is a ratcheting up of American pressure -- in effect a continuation of the process -- rather than a major new crisis point." China won't feel the pinch for at least two to three weeks because the sanctions don't apply to "goods already in transit from China on the high seas," Zagorin says.