------- Index of Articles

NUCLEAR
Navy Stonewalling
Sub Incident Erodes Trust in Japan Chief and the U.S.
In Japan, Waiting for the Captain to Appear
Arabs Condemn U.S. Attack on Iraq
Japanese Town Demands Apology for Sub Collision
Civilian Says Submarine Took Precautions
Robots Scan Japanese Ship Wreckage
U.S. and British Jets Strike Air-Defense Centers in Iraq
U.S.-China Ties in the Balance
U.N. Reports Traces of Plutonium in Kosovo
U.N. team: Uranium in Kosovo poses no risk
Swiss find scant plutonium traces in Balkans
Kosovo Bombs Safe, U.N. Says
Air Strikes in Iraq
No Choice but to Strike
Iraq Air Strike Effective
Israel Supports Attack on Iraq
Iraq Threatens Retaliation for Western Attacks
BLAIR POISED TO SAY YES TO MISSILE DEFENCE FEB 23?
Moscow offers missile shield to Europe
MISSILE TESTS
Launches send message:
Russia tests missiles, criticizes U.S. plans
Russian test missiles send warning to Bush
U.S. Faults Russian Nuclear Fuel Shipment
US claims Russia broke atomic proliferation regime
Microbes may be corroding casings of monitor wells
Antelopes Take Over N.M. Range
Auditor Knocks Nuke Security
Long Island Utility Will Seek Surcharge to Cover Fuel Costs
Utah firms take great efforts to avoid Superfund stigma
Toxic Utah: Firms take pains to avoid polluter list
Top Utah polluters on EPA list

MILITARY
Bush Gives Mexico Backing on Drive Against Narcotics
U.S., British Bomb Iraq
U.N. Envoy Fears Palestinian Financial Collapse
U.S. Is Set to Assail China on Rights at U.N.
The World Stage, Act I
Cadet at VMI is pregnant, school says

OTHER
Test Case on Property Rights Challenges Wetland Curbs
Clinton Did Not Consult C.I.A. Chief on Pardon, Official Says
In Spy Hunt, Peru Wants U.S. to Make a Better Effort
Terrorism in Equador Takes Its Toll on Families in Oregon
Six charged in Britain under anti-terrorism act

ACTIVISTS
BACKING FOR EX-OFFICIAL
Psychiatric Abuse by China Reported in Repressing Sect

-
-------- NUCLEAR

Navy Stonewalling

February 17, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/opinion/17SAT4.html

More than a week after an American nuclear attack submarine accidentally sank a Japanese fishing boat near Hawaii, the Navy is still suppressing information about the incident. That is a misguided strategy that ill serves the American people and the Navy itself.

The names of all 16 civilian visitors in the control room of the submarine Greeneville at the time of the accident will eventually come out, as will more information about why a periscope check and sonar soundings by the crew failed to detect the approaching Japanese vessel. But by treating these legitimate public concerns as if they were official secrets, the Navy complicates the challenge of mollifying an understandably aggrieved Japan.

The refusal to provide names and other information about the civilians on board the Greeneville is emblematic of the Navy's clumsy handling of the incident. It was not until several days after the accident that the Navy finally acknowledged that some of these civilians had been working the ship's controls at the time of the rapid ascent. But when the Navy's chief spokesman, Rear Adm. Stephen Pietropaoli, was asked whether the civilians could have contributed to the accident, he curtly replied that "only people who don't understand how submarines work" would suggest such a connection.

Two days later the Navy ordered submarine commanders to keep civilians away from control panels and prohibited practicing rapid climbs to the surface when civilians were on board. The Navy often invites civilians on its vessels during training maneuvers to cultivate public support. President Bush has rightly ordered a review of this practice to make sure that safety is not compromised.

Other questions still need answering. It is not yet clear whether the Greeneville was within a publicly marked training area when it performed the surfacing maneuver. Nor has it been explained why the submarine's periscope failed to detect the Japanese fishing boat or whether using the Greeneville's more sensitive active sonar system might have prevented the accident. Additional information on these issues can help avoid future tragedies.

Separate investigations now being conducted by the National Transportation Safety Board and the Navy will fill in some of the missing data. But that will take time. Meanwhile it is imperative for the Navy to stop dodging legitimate questions and share what it already knows.

---

Sub Incident Erodes Trust in Japan Chief and the U.S.

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By STEPHANIE STROM
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/continuous/18JAPA.html

TOKYO, Feb. 17 - Tempers have flared with the news that civilian visitors were at the controls of the nuclear submarine that caused a Japanese boat to sink last week off Hawaii, leaving nine people missing and presumed dead.

"Although the United States says it is doing its best in the investigation, we cannot trust that claim," said an editorial in Friday's Ehime Shimbun, the local paper in the home region of the four students aboard the vessel.

The Japanese irritation coincides with the faltering standing of Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, and experts say that because of his political and personal troubles, worsened by the loss of lives, he may not survive another month in the job.

As for the accident at sea, Foreign Minister Yohei Kono called Secretary of State Colin L. Powell to demand more information about precisely what the civilians aboard the submarine Greeneville were doing at the controls last week and to ask why American officials had not told Japan that the civilians were taking part in the maneuvers.

The Japanese press and senior officials have challenged the practice of having civilians aboard a military vessel during an exercise. Interviews in which John M. Hall and Todd Thoman, two of the 16 civilians aboard, said they had been at control positions when the submarine was making its ascent as part of an outing for donors to the Missouri Memorial Association have played repeatedly on Japanese television.

"It's outrageous," Toshitsugu Saito, director general of Japan's Defense Agency, said at a news conference. The American Navy "is slack."

Heated reaction has been slow to emerge here. The news media have covered the American side extensively and matter-of-factly, praising the United States for its prompt apology and President Bush for calling for a silent prayer for its victims.

But Japanese patience has evidently begun to wear thin. Suspicions have been raised among a people who are all too accustomed to bureaucratic stalling and coverups, said Aiji Tanaka, a political science professor at Waseda University.

"In the beginning, the U. S. Navy said the civilians on board had no relationship to the accident," he said. "But then the National Transportation Safety Board started investigating, some slightly different information was released and now, we find out that some of the civilians actually had their hands on the controls. Bit by bit, day after day, revelations are made in a way that is very, very similar to various Japanese political and bureaucratic scandals."

The episode has distracted the press from the fast-mounting woes of gaffe-prone Prime Minister Mori, whose first response to news of the Ehime Maru's fate was apparently to ask his secretary whether it was all right to continue his golf game.

Not only did he continue his game for about two hours after he received word of the collision, but he also apparently did not list his membership at the course where he was playing as one of his assets nor did he report it to tax authorities as a gift, although the membership seemingly qualifies as both.

Mr. Mori and his office have insisted that he does not really "own" the membership and thus need not declare it, but even his political allies have had difficulty accepting those explanations.

On Friday, Makoto Koga, secretary general of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, declared the membership "inappropriate," and speculation swirled that the party's largest faction, headed by a former prime minister, Ryutaro Hashimoto, was angling for Mr. Mori's resignation. "It looks like the Hashimoto faction is about to throw out a net to catch Mori like a rabbit," said Takao Toshikawa, a well-known political expert. "I think the possibility of the prime minister's resignation is very high, possibly next month."

The party will hold its annual convention on March 13, and many speculate that Mr. Mori will be forced to resign then. Falling stock prices and two major scandals, coupled with Mr. Mori's plummeting popularity, long ago convinced the party's elders that they cannot risk going into the July election for the Upper House with Mr. Mori still in office.

They had hoped, however, to keep him in office until just before the voting, replacing him at the last minute with someone more popular.

The ruling party's most important coalition partner, the Komei party, has stepped up its demands for Mr. Mori's replacement. But this is a challenge for the ruling party. Burgeoning scandals have tainted Mr. Hashimoto and Mr. Kono, leaving political analysts betting on Junichiro Koizumi, a Mori supporter who has a knack for appearing to buck the status quo while in fact supporting it wholeheartedly. Single, dapper and prone to quixotic ventures with public appeal, he is considered the Liberal Democrats' best weapon against sour public sentiment.

---

In Japan, Waiting for the Captain to Appear

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By SHIN'YA FUJIWARA
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/opinion/17FUJI.html

TOKYO -- Before I began writing this piece, I asked a friend of mine in the United States to send me information about how the collision between an American submarine and a training ship chartered by a Japanese high school was being reported. Based on what my friend sent, I have to admit to a strange feeling. I noticed references to the collision as occurring "off Pearl Harbor." In Japan, the news media described the site as "off Hawaii."

This difference in emphasis may be minor. But it does suggest that in America the injury and loss of life are being placed, by some, in a political, military or historical context that, from a Japanese perspective, is beside the point. The sinking of the Ehime Maru does have great political resonance here, but it is of a different kind.

In my country, the public has become more inward-looking after the collapse of the asset-inflated economy and the subsequent years of economic stagnation. As we look inward at our longstanding institutions, what we see is sordid. We see case after case of bribery involving politicians and bureaucrats, the sale of fraudulent products by big companies, medical mishaps and their concealment at hospitals, improper investigations and subsequent coverups by police departments, and so on. This year, government prosecutors have contributed their own corruption scandals. The distrust felt by ordinary citizens toward the state and toward each other has reached a pinnacle.

Recently we read the tragic story of two young men who lost their lives striving to help a drunken passenger who had fallen onto the tracks of a Tokyo railway station. A Japanese public that has become devoid of emotions reacted excessively to this brave act, as if it were seeking salvation.

The collision between the Greeneville, a nuclear attack submarine, and the Ehime Maru occurred as the Japanese public was thirsting for heroes, perhaps - or for a sense of public honor, of personal, human connection between those in power and those without it. In this respect, the nonappearance of the commander of the Greeneville - his failure to meet the families of the victims to express his feelings of apology and mourning - is shocking, even incomprehensible to a people whose culture stresses decorum and form. Such decorum is not merely "formal" in the American sense; it is the shape in which common humanity finds expression.

Two civilians who were in the control room at the time of the accident were interviewed by an American television network to find out what had happened. They demonstrated their own sense of conscience as individual Americans - a saving grace amid the sense of distrust felt by the Japanese toward the United States. Perhaps there is an American practice of not allowing those directly involved in such military incidents to appear before the public.

As the incident unfolded in Hawaii, the United States Marine Corps in Okinawa refused to turn over a serviceman suspected in several arson attacks last month. (The marine was finally turned over to local authorities yesterday.) These two events may seem unrelated. But from here, they appeared to be intimately linked. The responsible person was unavailable, absent from the public drama.

This is not a question of anti-American feeling, exactly, because the missing persons, so to speak, of greatest concern here are Japanese: the leaders and institutions who seem to have abandoned their ties to the daily lives of our people. In my opinion, the fierce criticism of Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori's decision to continue playing golf even after hearing about the Ehime Maru collision is a result of immense frustration at this abandonment of both decorum and responsibility. Unlike the commander of the Greeneville, Mr. Mori cannot hide. To a degree, he is a scapegoat, since the commander is not available for public admonition, and Mr. Mori is left to do the American's work. At the same time, both men have shown this capacity to go missing when they are needed, leaving us alone again in our grief and frustration.

Shin'ya Fujiwara, a Japanese writer and photographer, is a winner of the Mainichi Arts Award.

---

Arabs Condemn U.S. Attack on Iraq

February 17, 2001
Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Iraq-Reax.html

AMMAN, Jordan (AP) -- Key U.S. allies in the Middle East and Europe on Saturday fiercely denounced U.S.-British raids on Iraq, with even countries who rallied behind the drive to oust Iraqi troops from Kuwait 10 years ago saying it was time Washington reconsider its policies.

Egypt led strong Arab opposition in the wake of Friday's strikes on targets around Baghdad, the most serious allied attack on Iraq in two years, and the assault also drew condemnation from two NATO allies, France and Turkey.

The raid was ``a serious negative step that we cannot accept, nor understand its reasons, which run counter to Iraq's safety and sovereignty,'' Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa said in a statement released by his office Saturday.

Moussa said the strikes risked undermining attempts to resume U.N. inspections of suspected Iraqi weapons sites after a halt of more than two years and to move toward lifting sanctions that are hurting ordinary Iraqis.

Ten years after the Persian Gulf War, he said, it was time to review measures against Iraq -- noting a round of meetings between U.N. and Iraqi leaders, scheduled for Feb. 26-27.

Those talks are to address the stalemate over U.N. sanctions imposed after the Kuwaiti invasion and Iraq's refusal to allow U.N. weapons inspectors back into the country.

The weapons inspectors left in December 1998, just ahead of allied airstrikes launched to punish Iraq for blocking inspections. U.N. sanctions that have crippled Iraq's economy cannot be lifted until the inspectors certify that the country's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons have been destroyed.

Friday's raids struck air defense sites north and south of Baghdad in what the Pentagon said was an operation to damage Iraq's improving capabilities to target U.S. and British planes patrolling a no-fly zone in southern Iraq. Two people were killed in the raids, Iraqi media said.

But the first military operation ordered by President Bush angered many in the region, even among allies like Egypt that contributed troops to the U.S.-led coalition that ended Iraq's occupation of Kuwait in February 1991.

The Saudi government, which has been criticized at home for allowing its territory to be used as a staging ground for allied attacks on Iraq, had no official comment on the strikes. It was not clear whether the warplanes took off from or flew over Saudi territory, and a senior Saudi official contacted by The Associated Press said his country was not previously informed of the strikes.

But on the Saudi streets, the reaction was angry. Businessman Abdul-Aziz Mohammed al-Rafidi said, ``Bush has uncovered his ugly face and all the hate and spite he has for the Arabs.''

Turkey, a member of NATO that allows its air bases to be used by allied planes patrolling a northern no-fly zone in Iraq, showed dismay over the assault.

``It is sad that a need was felt to resort to such an action against Iraq and that civilians as well as military targets were harmed,'' Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said, calling on Washington to ``review the Iraq problem.''

France, also a NATO member, and Russia have become increasingly critical of attempts to isolate Iraq or use force against it.

In Paris, the Foreign Ministry said it had ``often expressed our incomprehension and our discomfort in regard to the repeated airstrikes carried out by American and British aviation.''

Russian Foreign Ministry official Alexander Sultanov said during a visit to Syria Saturday that the airstrikes ``would never yield any positive results.'' China and Cuba also condemned the raid.

Still, Britain said more strikes could follow if necessary.

``Operations such as the one last night would not be needed if Saddam stopped attacking us,'' Prime Minister Tony Blair said. ``But as long as he does, I will continue to take the steps necessary to protect our forces and to prevent Saddam from once again wreaking havoc, suffering and death.''

In the Arab world, where frustration has been running high over deadlocked Middle East peace talks, popular calls have echoed in support of Iraq.

Under such pressure, Arab governments intensified contacts with Iraq. Iraq was welcomed in Egypt last year at the first full Arab summit in four years -- such gatherings had been impossible earlier because of the divisions created by Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. Arab governments also have hosted high-ranking Iraqi officials and sent flights to Baghdad. Egypt and Syria recently signed free trade accords with Iraq.

Many Arabs portrayed Friday's missile strike as an attempt to punish their governments for reaching out to Iraq and trying to divert attention from the faltering attempt to make peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

In the West Bank town of Ramallah, about 200 Palestinians took to the streets late Friday after word of the airstrikes spread. Demonstrators waved Iraqi flags and posters of Saddam while chanting ``Death to America'' and ``Long live Iraq.'' Other small support rallies were staged in the West Bank towns of Bethlehem and Tulkarem.

In the Jordanian capital, Amman, more than 200 political activists demonstrated Saturday outside the Iraqi Embassy in Amman under heavy rain, shouting ``Long Live Saddam'' as they burned the American flag.

Jordan, one of the Arab countries with the closest ties to Iraq, ``never condones the use of military force against Iraq,'' said Jordanian Foreign Minister Abdul-Illah Khatib.

---

Japanese Town Demands Apology for Sub Collision

February 17, 2001
Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Japan-Submarine-Collision.html

UWAJIMA, Japan (AP) -- Officials in Uwajima on Saturday demanded a direct apology from the U.S. military and support for the victims of a collision between a U.S. submarine and a fishing boat owned by a local high school.

With the U.S. Navy announcing the wreckage of the Ehime Maru had been found on the ocean floor off Hawaii, relatives of the victims wanted the ship raised, hoping for more information about the accident and the fate of nine people still missing.

Navy officials said Saturday that a remote-controlled deep-diving vehicle had located the wreckage of the 190-foot Japanese vessel under 2,033 feet of water. But it remained unclear whether victims' bodies were trapped within its walls.

``It's the first step toward the raising of the ship, although there will be many other things that have to be taken care of,'' Ehime Governor Moriyuki Kato said.

He said the news would be ``a huge relief'' for bereaved family members.

The USS Greeneville, practicing a quick surfacing maneuver on Feb. 9, smashed into the Ehime Maru, which was carrying high school students on a fisheries training mission, and sent it to the bottom of the sea.

Of the 35 people aboard, 26 were rescued. Four students from the school here remained among the nine people missing Saturday, despite an intense, weeklong search.

``The United States has informed Japan that they have found the ship, in one piece, lying parallel to the ocean floor,'' Kazuhiko Koshikawa, a spokesman for Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, said late Saturday.

Outside a convenience store in this small town -- the Ehime Maru's home port -- office worker Chiharu Shinoto said of the discovery, ``It's really good news for the families ... I hope the investigation will continue and the cause of the accident is explained clearly.'' Disappointed and exhausted after the unsuccessful search for their loved ones, two family members -- the father of 17-year-old student Takeshi Taniguchi, and an aunt of crew member Toshimichi Furuya -- returned here late Saturday.

Their faces drawn, the two landed in Matsuyama airport -- the nearest airport to the town -- and hurried to a bus, only nodding briefly to local officials who greeted them at the airport.

Another three family members of missing students were scheduled to arrive in Japan Sunday night.

Uwajima's 25-member municipal assembly unanimously adopted a resolution Saturday calling for a direct apology for the accident, full disclosure of its causes, and medical and psychological support for the victims and their families.

It did not specify who should make the apology.

Officials said the resolution was to be passed on to the provincial government and then handed over to the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo.

Anger over the accident has not waned, and several newspapers published editorials critical of the U.S. military's handling of it.

``It's been already one week and we don't hear even a word of apology from the captain of the submarine,'' said the Mainichi, a major Japanese newspaper.

U.S. regional Consul-General Robert Ludan visited Ehime state Gov. Moriyuki Kato on Friday to apologize -- the first U.S. official to visit the state and issue a public apology.

In a statement Friday, Ludan said, ``The president has apologized to the Japanese people, I have apologized to the Japanese people, the secretary of defense has apologized and also the secretary of state.''

``I don't know how the U.S. government and the people of the United States can more adequately express their regrets and deepest apologies,'' he added.

Anger has been particularly strong in Uwajima, however, over the piecemeal release of information -- particularly over the role of civilian visitors to the sub, some of whom were at controls during the surfacing maneuver.

``With a civilian witness who went on the record, what was going on inside the submarine has been slowly emerging,'' said a commentary in the local Ehime newspaper. ``The U.S. military has denied the direct link between the civilians and the accident, but we refuse to accept it.''

A preliminary report by the U.S. military was expected in the next few days, according to Pentagon officials.

Ludan went Saturday to the local high school in Uwajima and met the school's principal and students, who demanded that the U.S. government recover the ship and make better efforts to disclose information from the search for missing people.

After fierce protests from the victims' families and the government, the U.S. Coast Guard said it would continue the search indefinitely, reversing an earlier decision to end it.

---

Civilian Says Submarine Took Precautions

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By CHRISTOPHER DREW
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/national/17HAWA.html?pagewanted=all

A Texas oilman who was aboard the submarine Greeneville said yesterday that its officers made six sweeps with the periscope at two slightly different depths but saw no other ships less than 10 minutes before it surfaced and slammed into a Japanese fishing trawler.

The businessman, John M. Hall, was one of two civilians who handled some of the submarine's controls at the start of the surfacing rill that caused the accident on Feb. 9. The Greeneville shot to the surface, crashing into and sinking the Ehime Maru, a 190-foot Japanese fishing trawler. Nine people on the trawler, including four Japanese students, are missing and presumed dead.

Mr. Hall's comments, made during a telephone interview, show that the Greeneville's captain, Lt. Cmdr. Scott Waddle, did more to check the area for other ships than had been known. But as Navy and other safety investigators search for what went wrong, submarine experts said the comments left them even more baffled how the crew could have failed to detect a trawler so close by.

As soon as the periscope was raised, Mr. Hall said, a submarine officer made two 360-degree rotations and indicated that the area was clear. Commander Waddle then rotated the scope twice before giving orders to raise the submarine, and thus the height of the periscope, by two feet, Mr. Hall said. He said the commander looked through the twirling scope two more times.

Retired submarine officers say that a scope provides greater visibility - and the ability to see greater distances - the higher it is raised.

The height of the periscope is key because the Navy has said the seas were choppy, with swells as tall as six feet. Mr. Hall said he did not now how far the scope rose above the sea.

Retired submarine officers say that in training exercises, a periscope would normally be raised about four to six feet above the seas. But some say that in choppy conditions and when visibility was difficult, it would be more prudent to extend the scope as high as 20 to 30 feet above the seas.

Mr. Hall said that he and some of the 15 other civilians watched a black-and-white monitor that displayed the periscope's view. Asked what he saw during the six searches, he responded: "Nothing but gray."

Mr. Hall, who first discussed the accident on NBC's "Today" show on Thursday, said that 10 minutes later, when the submarine shuddered with the force of the collision, Commander Waddle was so surprised that he asked, "What the hell was that?"

In yesterday's interview, Mr. Hall also provided more details about how the civilians had arranged the submarine ride and about the haunting confusion following the accident.

Mr. Hall said that as the trawler's passengers spilled into the sea in life rafts, the submarine officers did not know at first if they were Japanese or Chinese and asked if any civilian spoke either language and could help the crews communicate.

Later, he said, an officer announced over the submarine's intercom that all 35 people on the trawler had been saved, promoting cheers among the civilians, who had been sent to wait in the torpedo room.

About 10 minutes later, Mr. Hall said, the officer took back that assessment, saying that "we have only 26 accounted for." Then, Mr. Hall said, some women in his group "began crying, and the despair set in."

Mr. Hall also said he disagreed with criticism in Japan that the submarine crew did not do enough to try to save the trawler's passengers. He said a diver was prepared to exit a hatch toward the rear of the submarine, but that the sea swells made it too dangerous to open the hatch.

At that point, the submarine's crew did not realize anyone from the trawler was missing, Mr. Hall said. The Greeneville officers, he said, also feared that if the hatch was opened, so much water could flood in that it would harm the submarine.

Mr. Hall, 52, has said he was the civilian who pulled a switch that set off the emergency surfacing operation. He said a crew member put his hands over Mr. Hall's to make sure the switch was engaged.

Navy officials have said that a second civilian, also under close supervision, held a wheel that helped guide the submarine's ascent.

In Tokyo, Japan's defense minister, Toshitsugu Saito, said it was "outrageous" that civilians were at the controls of the submarine.

Japan's foreign minister, Yohei Kono, called Secretary of State Colin L. Powell to demand more information about what the civilians were doing at the time of the incident. And Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld met yesterday at the Pentagon with a Japanese envoy to discuss Japan's concerns about the accident.

Navy officials have insisted that the civilians did nothing to contribute to the accident. The Navy has long taken civilians, as well as government officials and journalists, on such outings to build support. But Navy officials said yesterday they would no longer conduct emergency surfacing drills with civilians on board or let them sit at controls.

Mr. Hall said he did not see any sign that the visitors distracted the officers from their jobs. He said the sub had been at sea for more than six hours before the accident, and most civilians had already taken turns operating the levers that control the submarine's depth and direction.

When he passed through the sonar room earlier in the day, he said, the operators were tracking five vessels. But Mr. Hall said he did not know if they ever detected the trawler.

Mr. Hall, an energy-industry consultant, served as a Marine in Vietnam. He said he had lobbied for nearly a year to get a ride on a submarine, which, he said, he viewed as the "opportunity of a lifetime."

He said he met retired Admiral Richard C. Macke, who suggested the civilians for the Greeneville cruise, last spring while they were both involved in a golf tournament to raise money for restoration work on the U.S.S. Missouri, the World War II battleship on which the Japanese surrendered in 1945.

Mr. Hall was then the chief executive of Fossil Bay Resources Ltd., an oil and gas company in Texas that paid $7,500 to the U.S.S. Missouri Memorial Association in Honolulu to be a sponsor of the golf tournament.

Earlier this week, Admiral Thomas Fargo, the commander of the Pacific Fleet, told several congressmen that most civilians on the Greeneville were donors to the Missouri restoration fund. But Mr. Hall said that was incorrect. He said he believed only one couple on board, Michael and Susan Nolan of Honolulu, had given money to the memorial.

He said the others were "just a social group that we put together."

Mr. Hall's wife, Leigh Ann, was on board, as was another former Fossil Bay executive, Todd Thoman and his wife, Deanda. Mr. Hall would not identify any others in the group.

He said that none of the civilians were politically active or had any business ties to Admiral Macke.

"When a hell of an opportunity like this comes up to go on a submarine, you get a group together," he said. "It's just that simple."

---

Robots Scan Japanese Ship Wreckage

February 17, 2001
New York Times
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/17WIRE-SUB.html

HONOLULU (AP) -- The wreckage of the Japanese ship Ehime Maru sits ``almost upright'' on the ocean floor 2,033 feet below the surface where it was struck by a U.S. submarine more than a week ago, the Navy said Saturday.

The 190-foot fishing vessel was located by a deep-sea robot late Friday night. None of the nine people still missing was seen in the wreckage.

Whether the Ehime Maru is in a condition that would allow it to be raised intact could not be determined, said Jon Yoshishige, a spokesman for the U.S. Pacific Fleet.

Anguished family members and the Japanese government have called for the the ship's recovery, an operation experts say would be difficult and expensive.

Shizuko Kimura, younger sister of crew member Toshimichi Furuya, said all she wants is for the United States to recover the bodies of the four high school boys, two teachers and three crewmen still missing.

``My brother is at the bottom with the Ehime Maru,'' she cried loudly at a news conference held Friday by family members. ``I'm not asking you to bring him back alive. So please bring back my brother's body to us.

``Promise us. Give us hope!''

``It's your responsibility as human beings,'' said Masumi Terata, mother of 17-year-old Yusuke Terata. ``If your blood is red, you'll understand our pain and sorrow.''

The USS Greeneville, a 360-foot nuclear-powered submarine, was on a one-day mission Feb. 9 with 16 civilians aboard as part of a community relations program. Two civilians at key control positions were supervised by Greeneville crew when the submarine performed an emergency surfacing drill, the Navy has said.

As the 6,900-ton submarine surfaced, its rudder superstructure knifed through the hull of the 500-ton Ehime Maru, which sank within minutes.

The Navy's preliminary report on the accident said the maneuver was performed only because the civilians were on board, Honolulu television station KITV reported, quoting unnamed sources.

The report is being reviewed by Pacific Fleet Commander Adm. Thomas Fargo and was expected to be released in the next few days after consultation with the Japanese government, Pentagon officials said.

The Navy barred civilians from submarines during such drills until the investigation is completed.

The relatives who spoke Saturday in Honolulu released a list of 31 questions they want the United States to answer, including who was steering the submarine and why the Greeneville crew did not ``do their best'' to assist survivors immediately after the sinking.

Navy officials have said rough seas prevented the submarine from taking the 26 survivors onboard. Within an hour, the Coast Guard rescued the surviving students, teachers and crew.

The Coast Guard extended its search for bodies at least through the holiday weekend. On Friday it added two cutters, a helicopter and a avy plane to the sole Navy cruiser that had been searching the day before.

The remote-controlled, deep-diving vehicle, the Super Scorpio II, began searching Friday, using sonar and two video cameras to view the wreckage.

The cameras are scanning the Ehime Maru to determine its condition, Yoshshige said. A larger remote submersible, Deep Drone, was to be lowered later Saturday from the Navy salvage vessel, USS Salvor.

The Navy does not plan to release the underwater video, Yoshishige said.

Relatives of the missing said it's not enough.

In Uwajima, the southwest Japanese town where the fisheries school was located, its municipal assembly called for a direct apology for the accident, full disclosure of its causes, and medical and psychological support for the victims and their families.

Anger over the accident has not waned, and several newspapers published editorials critical of the U.S. military's handling of it.

``It's been already one week and we don't hear even a word of apology from the captain of the submarine,'' said the Mainichi, a major Japanese newspaper.

U.S. regional Consul-General Robert Ludan visited Ehime state on Friday to apologize -- the first U.S. official to visit the state and issue a public apology.

Seishiro Eto, Japan's senior vice minister for foreign affairs, was to arrive in Honolulu Saturday afternoon en route back to Tokyo after meeting with U.S. officials in Washington. Eto was to meet with the families of the missing and take a helicopter tour of the crash site.

---

U.S. and British Jets Strike Air-Defense Centers in Iraq

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By JAMES DAO with STEVEN LEE MYERS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17IRAQ.html?pagewanted=all

WASHINGTON, Feb. 16 - The United States and Britain staged air strikes against radar stations and air defense command centers in Iraq today, including targets around Baghdad, in what President Bush called a necessary response to Iraqi provocation.

The raid - carried out by more than three dozen aircraft shortly after night fell in Baghdad - represented an escalation of the long-running, low-level skirmishes between American and British jets and Iraqi forces. The strikes were the first in two years against Iraqi targets north of the no-flight zone over southern Iraq, which American andBritish planes have patrolled since 1992.

American military commanders in the region requested the strikes - which Mr. Bush approved on Thursday - because Iraqi air defense stations had become increasingly aggressive and effective in targeting the patrols over the zone, officials said.

"We will continue to enforce the no-fly zones," Mr. Bush said today during an appearance with President Vicente Fox in San Cristóbal, Mexico. "The no-fly zones are enforced on a daily basis. It is a part of a strategy, and until that strategy is changed, if it is changed at all, we will continue to enforce the no-fly zones."

The strike aircraft had as their targets five separate sites that included as many as 20 radars and command centers.

Mr. Bush and his aides described the raid as routine, saying the United States and Britain were simply responding to Iraqi provocations, as they have repeatedly in the last two years. Since Mr. Bush took office on Jan. 20, American and British jets have struck argets in the southern zone three other times, most recently on Tuesday. They also attacked one in the smaller zone over northern Iraq.

Striking outside the declared zones, however, required commanders to seek explicit approval from Mr. Bush, forcing him to decide whether to authorize a more aggressive military action only weeks into his term. Administration and defense officials said the strikes came before Mr. Bush's national security team had been able to formulate its own comprehensive policy toward Iraq.

But with the Iraqi actions intensifying, they had little choice, they said, underscoring the extent to which President Saddam Hussein can still dictate the agenda of American presidents, a decade after Mr. Bush's father organized the coalition that drove Iraqi occupying forces out of Kuwait.

President Clinton was also confronted by aggressive Iraqi air defenses, and beginning on his second day in office, he oversaw repeated military strikes against Iraq.

In the last six weeks, Iraqi forces have fired antiaircraft artillery at American and British aircraft 51 times and, more significantly, launched more dangerous surface- to-air missiles on 14 occasions, according to the Pentagon. Although none of those attacks succeeded in hitting any of the allied jets, commanders were concerned enough to seek permission to widen their retaliation. Officials said they believed that the firings were a deliberate attempt by Mr. Hussein to test the new administration's resolve.

Officials said today's attack was not the beginning of a sustained assault against the Iraqis, but they left the door open to additional strikes if Iraq continued aggressive behavior.

Air Force F-15's and F-16's, joined by British Tornadoes, carried out the attack from air fields in Kuwait, while Navy F-18's attacked from the American aircraft carrier the Harry S. Truman in the Persian Gulf. American officials said all of the aircraft had returned safely. In all, there were 24 strike jets - 18 American and 6 British - as well as support aircraft.

Iraqi television said numerous civilians had been wounded in the attacks, which began shortly after 12:30 p.m. Eastern time. But Pentagon officials said they had no evidence of civilian casualties, asserting that the five targets were all in relatively secluded areas - and had been chosen for that reason.

The strikes were far below the scale of the last major attack against Iraq, which occurred in December 1998. In that case, American and British forces carried out four nights of air and missile strikes against more than 100 targets to punish Mr. Hussein's government for ending cooperation with international weapons inspectors. Those targets included missile and chemical production installations, as well as military headquarters and air defenses.

Since then, Iraqi air defense forces have routinely fired on the American and British patrols over the zones in what has amounted at times to a low- grade war, though an entirely one- sided one. The strikes today were comparable in scale to the larger of those periodic strikes, but were significant because the targets were outside the declared no-flight zones.

Pentagon officials said the American and British jets had attacked five sets of targets in all, including four outside the zone and a fifth inside it. The targets included radar installations within a few miles of the heart of Baghdad, as well as radar or command centers at Taji, Suwaira and Taqaddum, the officials said. The fifth target, in the southern zone, was a command center near Numaniya.

All of the installations, the officials said, were involved in the recent escalation. "They thought they were tucked just over the 33nd and were safe," a defense official said, referring to those targets north of the parallel. "They thought they could act with impunity."

While Mr. Bush played down the significance of the strikes, he also suggested that, so far, his policy toward Iraq would remain largely unchanged from President Clinton's.

"Saddam Hussein has got to understand we expect him to conform to the agreement that he signed after Desert Storm," Mr. Bush said. He referred to the cease-fire agreements negotiated by his father's administration at the end of the Persian Gulf war, which required Iraq to recognize Kuwait, make reparations and abandon its programs to build nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, as well as long-range missiles.

He also made it clear that under his administration, the United States and Britain would continue to enforce the no-flight zones over the north and south. Those zones - and the repeated strikes on Iraqi targets - have come under increasing diplomatic criticism.

"We will continue to enforce the no-fly zone until the world is told otherwise," Mr. Bush said.

Within an hour of leaving their bases, the warplanes dropped precision-guided bombs and other weapons that were aimed at the five locations of Iraqi radars and command centers. Though Pentagon officials declined to offer more specifics about the weapons, they said no cruise missiles had been used in the attack.

Pentagon officials said they would not be able to determine whether the bombs had hit their targets at least until after sunrise in Iraq. But they said early indications were that all the weapons had worked "properly," maintaining their signals with guidance systems until impact.

"All the initial looks say it looks pretty good," said Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, a Pentagon spokesman.

United States commanders requested the attack because the pilots who patrol the southern no-flight zone had reported increasing evidence that the Iraqis had become more sophisticated and accurate in detecting and targeting American and British warplanes, Pentagon officials said.

"Three months ago, they weren't seeing us," a senior Pentagon official said. "But suddenly, they were. Something was different."

The improvements in the Iraqi air defenses are not the result of new radar systems; they continue to use equipment that is 30 to 40 years old, Pentagon officials said. But the Iraqis seem to have acquired better communications equipment and software to link their radar sites, and also appear to have employed more sophisticated strategies for using that equipment, the officials said.

Given those improvements, they said, it would have just been a matter of time before a United States or British plane was shot out of the sky.

"It reached the point where it was obvious to our forces that they had to conduct operations to safeguard those pilots and aircraft," Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold of the Marine Corps, director of operations for the Joint Staff, said during a briefing at the Pentagon today. "As a matter of fact, it's essentially a self-defense measure in conducting the operation."

American military officials said the Iraqis also appeared to have improved their air defenses along a northern no-flight zone above the 36th parallel that is also patrolled by American and British planes. But the officials said the Iraqis had been less provocative in those northern regions.

The attack was generally well received by members of Congress. "This was a very important signal to Iraq that we won't stand for violations at the no-fly zone, putting our pilots at risk," said Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson, a Republican from Texas. "I approve of the president's action in standing up for America."

Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said, "Today's action implementing this policy was an appropriate response to the increased threat from the Iraqi air defense system reported by our pilots."

But one Congressional aide said there was surprise that some senior Congressional leaders had not been informed of the attack before it was staged.

-------- china

U.S.-China Ties in the Balance

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Washington Post
By Steven Mufson
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A17378-2001Feb16?language=printer

The State Department is likely to recommend that the United States sponsor a United Nations resolution condemning China's human rights record, a State Department official said yesterday, offering the first glimpse of the administration's stance toward China.

Though Secretary of State Colin L. Powell has not yet sent a recommendation to President Bush, administration officials said there is broad "consensus" within the State Department on supporting the resolution at the annual meeting of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva next month.

It remains unclear how vigorously the administration will push the human rights measure. Despite the sponsorship of the United States in the past, such resolutions have failed after vigorous Chinese lobbying. Many human rights organizations believe the Clinton administration did not throw its full weight behind the resolutions.

Coupled with the selection of key national security policymakers in the past two weeks, forceful support for the resolution would send an early signal that the Bush administration will take a harder line toward China than either the Clinton or first Bush White House did.

Bush has tapped for senior posts at the State Department, Defense Department and National Security Council people who want to reorient U.S. policy by voicing stronger support for Taiwan, pushing ahead with theater and national missile defenses over Beijing's vehement objections, and stressing relations with Japan as a counterbalance to China's influence in Asia. Some have described China as a potential military threat to the United States in Asia and have called for tighter limits on the sale of technology to Beijing.

"This is a group that on balance would feel that one should be fairly muscular or tough in dealing with China," said Kenneth Lieberthal, senior director for Asia in President Bill Clinton's National Security Council.

Experts on China said it is unclear whether the new appointees will prevail over another wing in the Republican Party -- long symbolized by former president George Bush -- that favors free trade and political engagement with Beijing and pays greater heed to Chinese political sensitivities.

But with a U.S. decision looming on arms sales to Taiwan, officials in Beijing are concerned enough about a possible shift in U.S. policy that they dispatched three former Chinese ambassadors to Washington this week for talks. The three stopped first in San Francisco to see former secretary of state George Shultz and then in Houston to see the elder Bush. In addition, a senior Chinese leader, former foreign minister Qian Qichen, has "invited himself" to Washington for talks in March, one U.S. official said.

The new administration includes a military planner who has focused on conflicts in Asia, three people who signed a letter backing unambiguous support for Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack, and two people who served on the Cox Committee, which in 1999 alleged that espionage and technology transfers had aided China's military and threatened American interests.

In April, the administration will decide whether to approve Taiwan's request to buy Aegis destroyers, a potential link to U.S. theater missile defense systems. Chinese officials have repeatedly warned that the Aegis sale to Taiwan would be "disastrous" for U.S.-China relations and would violate agreements made in the 1970s barring military ties between Taiwan and the United States.

More broadly, the administration must decide how to deal with China while pushing ahead with theater and national missile defense systems that Beijing opposes.

Elements of U.S. policy toward China have remained constant since relations were reestablished in the 1970s. The United States has recognized the Communist government in Beijing, has accepted that Taiwan and the mainland are part of an ill-defined "one China," has sold Taiwan enough military equipment to defend itself, has drawn Beijing into international organizations and treaties, and has promoted trade and investment in China.

"The basics of U.S. policy toward China are pretty well established. It's a matter of degree and individual decisions, not overall policy reviews," said one defense official.

But key Bush administration officials have a markedly tougher tone on China.

"I tend to think relations with China are better served when we put them in the proper perspective," one Bush policymaker said in an interview about a year ago. "It is not yet a democracy, it is not yet stable, and its entire people are repressed by those with their faces in the trough." He accused China's military of "undergoing an enormous buildup similar to the Soviets' in the 1950s."

The new roster includes Vice President Cheney's chief of staff and national security adviser, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who was general counsel to the Cox Committee, a panel chaired by Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Calif.).

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has assigned the Pentagon's strategic review to Andrew Marshall, who believes that the United States must be better prepared for a possible war in Asia and has drawn up hypothetical scenarios for war with China.

Paul D. Wolfowitz, deputy defense secretary-designate, and Richard Armitage, the nominee for deputy secretary of state, joined 21 other conservatives in 1999 in recommending that the United States "declare unambiguously that it will come to Taiwan's defense in the event of an attack or a blockade." Earlier, a "strategic ambiguity" policy was designed to leave both sides guessing about any U.S. intervention and thus deter Beijing from attacking and self-governing Taipei from declaring formal independence.

"Taiwan has become a democracy, and that's inconvenient for some," Armitage said at an Asia Society meeting last year. "We look at Taiwan not as a problem but as an opportunity to show that democracy counts."

One possible goal for U.S. policymakers is getting China to move away the M9 and M11 missiles that are stationed within range of Taiwan. A senior Defense Department official said that if China learns how to make the missiles more accurate, it would alter the strategic balance and justify new arms for Taiwan.

Two question marks in the new Bush team are Powell and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, neither of whom has much experience dealing with China.

"A strategic partner China is not, but neither is China our inevitable and implacable foe," Powell said in his Senate confirmation hearing. "China is a competitor, a potential regional rival, but also a trading partner willing to cooperate in areas where our strategic interests overlap." He advocated "enmeshing" China "in the rule of law, by exposing them to the powerful forces of a free enterprise system and democracy, so they can see that this is the proper direction in which to move."

Trade is another area that might soon roil relations with China. Though the Clinton administration signed a market access agreement that paved the way for China's entry into the World Trade Organization, China has yet to join the WTO and bring the agreement into force.

National missile defense plans also loom large. Some administration officials want to include China in negotiations on arms control and missile defense. But others see China, which has been modernizing its two dozen nuclear weapons, as a rogue state, not a cooperative power.

"I tend to believe that it is not a good thing for a country to seek to destroy 20 percent of America," one newly appointed official said a year ago. "Do I have some understanding of why they do it? Yeah, but I don't have to like it."


-------- depleted uranium

U.N. Reports Traces of Plutonium in Kosovo

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/17KOSO.html

GENEVA, Feb. 16 - The United Nations Environment Program said today that researchers had found minute traces of plutonium at several sites in Kosovo but said they posed no health risk.

"This is so small that there is no additional health risk," said Max Keller, who led research at the A. C. Laboratory for Nuclear and Chemical Warfare in Spiez, Switzerland. He compared the traces found to a couple of pounds of sugar dissolved in a mountain lake.

The report follows an outcry over the possible risks to soldiers and civilians from possibly contaminated armor-piercing ammunition that was used by NATO in the Balkans.

The agency inspected sites in Kosovo in November together with the International Atomic Energy Agency, collecting 340 samples from soil, water and vegetation and from buildings and Yugoslav Army vehicles.

The report said both the Spiez laboratory and the Swedish Radiation Protection Institute had found traces of plutonium 239/240 in four of the samples. In January the agency announced that it had also found traces of enriched uranium, U-236.

"These newest findings about the composition of the depleted uranium only lead to a minor change in the overall radiological situation and should therefore not cause any immediate alarm," said the agency's executive director, Klaus Töpfler.

--------

U.N. team: Uranium in Kosovo poses no risk

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Philadelphia Inquirer
News in Brief
http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/02/17/national/BITS17.htm

Rounds of depleted uranium fired by NATO warplanes in Kosovo two years ago contained deadly plutonium, but at "very low" levels that pose no health risks, the U.N. Environment Program said yesterday in Geneva, Switzerland. The U.N. team is trying to determine whether any danger could be associated with the leftovers from the 1999 NATO bombing campaign against Serb forces.

-------

Swiss find scant plutonium traces in Balkans

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Environmental News Network
http://www.enn.com/news/wire-stories/2001/02/02172001/reu_du_41998.asp

A Swiss laboratory has found only minute traces of plutonium in NATO depleted uranium weapons used by NATO-led forces in the Balkans, Swiss radio reported this week.

"It is already clear that only extremely small, if any, traces of plutonium were found in the shells and shell fragments that were checked, and these in no way pose a potential health risk, according to scientists," the radio reported.

The possible danger of contamination from armour and other targets hit by cheap and highly-effective shells tipped with depleted uranium during the Gulf War - and more recently in southern Serbia - has caused an outcry in some Western states. Britain and the United have insisted the risks are minimal.

Swiss defence ministry spokesman Oswald Sigg told the radio: "We will release the detailed findings of the Spiez (weapons lab) plutonium investigation this week, but we can already confirm the same trend that the German investigation found."

He was referring to reports that Germany's GSF research lab had also found no traces of highly toxic plutonium in NATO ammunition used in the Balkans.

Last month Switzerland ordered the lab to check DU weapons samples from Kosovo for plutonium amid concern - played down by defence experts - that the munitions may have posed health risks to peacekeepers, aid workers and civilians in areas of the Balkans where NATO used them to blast Serb tanks. The United Nations' Environmental Programme sent a mission to Kosovo earlier this month as the storm broke in Europe over reports that foreign troops who served in the Balkans and the Gulf over the past decade may have been exposed to contaminated sites that could cause cancer.

The 14 experts collected 340 samples of soil, water and vegetation, conducted smear tests on buildings and destroyed Yugoslav army vehicles, and found remnants of DU ammunition at eight of the 11 sites they visited.

UNEP is working with the World Health Organisation and the International Agency for Research on Cancer to try to determine exactly what risks soldiers and civilians run from DU weapons.

UNEP had asked the Spiez lab to check the samples for enriched uranium, and it found traces of uranium 236, created during processing in nuclear power plants.

But UNEP has said the traces were so small that the weapons containing it would have been no more dangerous than purely DU arms.

-------

Kosovo Bombs Safe, U.N. Says

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A17704-2001Feb16?language=printer

GENEVA -- Rounds of depleted uranium fired by NATO warplanes in Kosovo two years ago contained deadly plutonium, but at "very low" levels that posed no health risks, U.N. officials said yesterday.

Laboratories in Switzerland and Sweden found "traces" of plutonium on four spent rounds of ammunition collected by a U.N. team in November, the U.N. Environment Program said.

"The amount of plutonium found in the depleted uranium penetrators is very low and does not have any significant impact on their overall radioactivity," the U.N. statement said. The U.N. team is trying to determine whether any danger is associated with the munitions left over from the 1999 NATO bombing campaign against Serb-led Yugoslav forces.

Earlier yesterday, the Swiss Defense Ministry released results showing the findings of about one part plutonium per billion parts of depleted uranium. "The plutonium found so far thus poses no additional risk," the ministry said.

Depleted-uranium ammunition has come under intense scrutiny because of fears it caused leukemia in some NATO peacekeepers who served in the Balkans. Depleted uranium, a heavy, dense metal usually left over from making fuel for nuclear reactors, is used for some ammunition because it can penetrate tanks and other armored vehicles.

-------- iraq

Air Strikes in Iraq

February 17, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/opinion/17SAT1.html

The first American military operation authorized by George W. Bush unfolded yesterday in the skies near Baghdad, the same arena where his father's last actions as commander in chief took place eight years ago. Yesterday's attack by two dozen American and British warplanes on five air defense installations near the Iraqi capital was justified as a response to intensified targeting of allied planes patrolling the "no-flight" zone over southern Iraq.

It also sent a timely signal to Saddam Hussein that the Bush administration, which includes several of the men who commanded the Persian Gulf war, will not shy away from using force to contain any new Iraqi military threat. But air strikes are no substitute for the coherent new policy the administration must soon come up with to rescue crumbling United Nations sanctions and revitalize efforts to halt Iraq's development of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.

The United States and Britain imposed the southern "no-flight" zone a decade ago to protect local Shiites and to make it harder for Mr. Hussein to send troops toward the Kuwait border again. Throughout the intervening years, Washington and London have periodically used air strikes against radar, antiaircraft and command sites to protect the pilots patrolling the zones. Those strikes had tapered off somewhat last year, as the American election campaign led the Clinton administration to try to avoid new military confrontations with Iraq.

Yesterday's raids, the first to hit the Baghdad area in more than two years, show that this lull is now over.The strikes were carefully planned, and approved by President Bush. The attacks overshadowed Mr. Bush's inaugural trip out of the country, a one-day visit to Mexico, where he met with Vicente Fox, the new president.

But the more important Iraq challenge awaiting the Bush administration is to rebuild a regional and international coalition for enforcing a strict arms embargo against Baghdad. When Secretary of State Colin Powell travels to Middle East capitals next week, he will be trying to convince Arab and Muslim leaders there that America's main interest is to deny weapons to Saddam Hussein, not to inflict further economic and military punishment on the Iraqi people.

---

No Choice but to Strike

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By ANTHONY H. CORDESMAN
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/opinion/17CORD.html

WASHINGTON -- Yesterday's air strikes against Iraq were a necessary, if not vital, part of United States strategy in dealing with Iraq and the Persian Gulf. It was not American saber rattling. It was Saddam Hussein who had stepped up Iraqi air defense activity, and who had tried to create a new kind of trap for American and British aircraft. President Bush may have chosen to react with an unambiguous message, but it was Mr. Hussein who provoked the strikes.

America cannot afford to show any weakness in dealing with Mr. Hussein, and it will almost certainly have to follow these strikes with strikes in the future. This is not simply a matter of enforcing the no-fly zones or protecting the United States and British aircraft that enforce them. It is part of a broader strategy of military containment that ensures that Iraq remains militarily weak, does not actively threaten its neighbors and understands it cannot openly manufacture and deploy weapons of mass destruction.

There are many reasons why such military containment is necessary. The most important reasons are strategic. The Persian Gulf has two-thirds of the world's proven oil reserves and is the key source of oil exports. We cannot be indecisive in dealing with the region's most threatening dictator.

Furthermore, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are just as vulnerable to Iraqi aggression as they were in 1990, and Mr. Hussein's sons are still claiming that Kuwait should be a province of Iraq. If it were not for the American presence in the Gulf, Iraq could invade Kuwait just as quickly as it did a decade earlier.

There are tactical reasons for containment as well. Mr. Hussein is doing his best to convince the Arab world that he can be the military champion of the Palestinian cause, that he is the leader of the one government that openly challenges Israel's closest ally. At the same time, he, his sons and his closest associates continue to try to intimidate friendly regimes like King Abdullah's in Jordan and to heap verbal abuse on the leaders of important moderate states like Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

If Mr. Hussein created a successful military sanctuary in the no-fly zones, this would be seen as a symbol of his growing strength. If he then succeeded in shooting down an American or British plane, it would be seen as an Iraqi triumph.

Unfortunately, we have no real alternatives to military containment. America can talk about backing Iraqi opposition groups outside the country, but most such groups are hopelessly weak and divided and have little support in Iraq. Nor do they have Saudi, Kuwaiti or Turkish support. The groups that do conduct some military operations inside Iraq are Iranian- backed Shiite groups whose goals scarcely coincide with American interests. Covert operations to help create or support an internal Iraqi opposition may be an option, but is one that will take years to put in place.

Sanctions against Iraqi military forces can be made more effective. We have broad support in the Arab world. Iraq has not had any significant arms imports for more than a decade. Economic and energy sanctions, however, are playing out their course. We cannot hope to get broad support to strengthen them, and Mr. Hussein already has all of the revenues he needs to pay off his military and security forces and Iraq's elite. Economic sanctions now largely hurt the average Iraqi, not the regime.

More broadly, we have no real hope of conducting serious inspections for weapons of mass destruction. There have been no such inspections in nearly three years, and Iraq has almost certainly created many cell-like operations to develop and make missiles, as well as chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Even a strong inspection program could only partially constrain Iraq's efforts. A strong military shield is the only way to keep Iraq from rebuilding large-scale capabilities to develop such weapons.

Is military containment a frustrating strategy? Of course. So, however, was four decades of containment of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact. They are gone, and without a massive war or any invasions. If we are strong and persevere, Saddam Hussein's regime will inevitably face the same fate.

Anthony H. Cordesman, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, is the author of "Iraq and the War of Sanctions."

---

Iraq Air Strike Effective

February 17, 2001
Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-US-Iraq.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The joint U.S.-British air strike against Iraq, described by President Bush as routine, was the biggest blow against Saddam Hussein's military in more than two years and involved two dozen attack planes armed with precision-guided missiles, Pentagon officials say.

``A routine mission was conducted to enforce the 'no-fly' zone'' over southern Iraq, Bush said Friday. ``It was a mission about which I was informed and I authorized. But I repeat, it's a routine mission.''

It was the first military action ordered by the new president, who inherited an Iraq policy that has evolved from the 1991 Persian Gulf War that his father carried out to evict the Iraqi army from Kuwait. A key part of that policy is enforcement of no-fly zones over northern and southern Iraq -- a mission that has taxed the U.S. military while also taking a heavy toll on Iraq's extensive air defenses.

Iraq does not accept the legitimacy of the no-fly zones. The official Iraqi News Agency said two people died and 20 were injured in Friday's attack.

Bush was in Mexico meeting with President Vicente Fox at the time the missiles were launched at about 12:30 p.m. EST. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Bush gave the go-ahead on Thursday.

At the Pentagon, Marine Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called the strike a ``self-defense measure'' initiated by the commander of U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf. The number of U.S. and British attack planes involved -- 24 -- was much larger than in previous missions over northern and southern Iraq in recent years.

Dozens of support aircraft also were involved, including electronic jamming and radar control planes.

Bush's approval was required, Newbold said, because the mission was not the usual small-scale attack that U.S. and British pilots have carried out almost routinely inside the no-fly zones. It was the first strike at targets outside the southern flight-restriction zone since December 1998, officials said.

The Pentagon said five targets were struck, including long-range surveillance radars and associated facilities that Iraq has used more frequently over the past six weeks to coordinate its defenses against U.S. and British patrols. The radars allow Iraq to make better use of its surface-to-air missiles.

The U.S. Central Command said Iraq recently increased its use of anti-aircraft artillery and surface-to-air missiles, with more than 60 incidents since Jan. 1. It gave no figures for previous periods.

Asked whether the attack was a signal to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein that the new administration would take more frequent and more forceful military action, Bush said, ``Saddam Hussein has got to understand that we expect him to conform to the agreement that he signed'' after the 1991 Gulf War.

Iraq has not followed the requirements set down in cease-fire resolutions that were designed to ensure it not develop long-range ballistic missiles or nuclear weapons.

Bush said Saddam and his nation must not try to acquire or build weapons of mass destruction. ``If we catch him doing so, we'll take appropriate action,'' the president said. Friday's attack, however, appeared largely unrelated to Iraq's bomb-building ambitions but rather a new chapter in the long-running battle over no-fly zones.

The United States, with British and French support, established the southern zone as a means of preventing Iraqi forces from attacking Shiite rebels. The northern zone was meant to protect minority Kurds, whose uprising after the Gulf War was crushed by the Iraqi army.

``We will enforce the no-fly zone, both south and north,'' Bush said. ``Our intention is to make sure the world is as peaceful as possible.''

Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, told reporters traveling with Bush in Mexico that the administration was continuing the Clinton administration's policy of striking at Iraqi air defenses.

``There isn't any change in policy,'' she said.

In addition to land-based Air Force F-15E Strike Eagles and Navy F/A-18 Hornets from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman in the Persian Gulf, there were many other command, control and other support planes involved in Friday's action, Pentagon officials said. They declined to provide full details.

In London, Defense Secretary Geoffrey Hoon called the attacks a ``proportionate response'' to an increased threat to patrolling aircraft and said Saturday that Britain and the United States were prepared to strike again if necessary.

``We have been involved in the past because of Iraq's aggression against Kuwait -- a perfectly lawful neighbor -- and obviously we must always have regard to the threat that Saddam Hussein's regime poses to the region,'' he told the British Broadcasting Corp.

---

Israel Supports Attack on Iraq

February 17, 2001
Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Israel-Palestinians-Iraq.html

JERUSALEM (AP) -- Israel said it had no security worries from U.S.-British air raids against Iraq. Palestinians, meanwhile, burned American flags Saturday in solidarity with Baghdad, and the militant group Hamas called for an Arab stand against the West.

Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh said there was no worry of a flare-up in violence in the Persian Gulf after the allied warplanes struck Iraqi air defense sites around Baghdad on Friday.

``We don't need to be concerned about the events overnight,'' Sneh told Israel radio. ``This doesn't mean that we should disregard Iraq, which is a growing threat.''

Hussein is exploiting the absence of international inspections to build chemical, biological and probably nuclear weapons, Sneh said. He said Israel had had no advance notification of the raids.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld updated outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak about the situation in Iraq by telephone Saturday, Barak's office said. The two officials agreed to be in contact regarding any developments.

The attack on Baghdad sparked demonstrations of support for Iraq in the Palestinian areas. In the West Bank town of Ramallah, about 200 Palestinians took to the streets late Friday after word of the U.S. airstrike spread.

Demonstrators waved Iraqi flags and posters of Saddam Hussein and chanted ``Death to America'' and ``Long live Iraq.''

In the West Bank city of Nablus, about 1,500 protesters burned American and Israeli flags, as well as pictures of President Bush.

Muawia al-Masri, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, urged Arab leaders not to welcome Secretary of State Colin Powell in his visit to the Middle East later this month.

``Once again, the United States showed its real face as an enemy not only of the Iraqi people but all the Arab nations,'' al-Masri told the crowd.

The anti-Israeli group Hamas urged Arab nations to unite against the United States and Britain.

``We call upon our Arab and Islamic nations to move forward in order to put an end to these aggressions,'' a leaflet issued by Hamas said.

About a dozen Palestinians demonstrated outside the U.S. consulate in east Jerusalem, holding signs accusing the United States and Britain of murder.

Other rallies were staged in the West Bank towns of Bethlehem and Tulkarem.

---

Iraq Threatens Retaliation for Western Attacks

February 17, 2001
Reuters
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-iraq-le.html?pagewanted=all

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq vowed revenge on Saturday for U.S. and British air strikes near Baghdad it said killed two civilians, while Russia and China led a chorus of international concern over raids seen as threatening Middle East stability.

Western planes were back over Iraq on Saturday morning within hours of their attack near the capital on Friday, according to Baghdad's official news agency, in what appeared to be their first resumption of air patrols in a no-fly zone in southern Iraq.

``At 9:53 local time on February 17, 2001, enemy warplanes violated our space coming from Kuwait and flew over the provinces of Basra, Dhiqar and Meisan,'' the Iraqi News Agency (INA) quoted a military spokesman as saying.

A British Defense Ministry spokesman in London could not immediately confirm the report.

President Saddam Hussein and his top aides discussed plans for military retaliation in the event of a repeat of Friday's Western air attack, the first major raid against Iraq by new U.S. President George W. Bush.

INA said Saddam discussed the ``American aggression and the military measures and plans that should be taken to retaliate against America and those who render facilities to it in case the aggression is repeated.''

The agency said Saddam ordered the formation of 21 military divisions consisting of Iraqis who volunteered to fight with Palestinians in their uprising against the Israelis that began last September.

France, a member of the Gulf War coalition that ended Iraq's 1990-91 occupation of Kuwait, said it wanted an explanation for the first Western air strike near Baghdad in over two years, adding such assaults hindered efforts to solve the Iraq problem.

The Arab League said the assault had broken international law and would stoke anger across the Arab world.

Turkey reproached NATO-ally Washington for not informing it beforehand and said it hoped the raids would not be repeated. Syria and radical Palestinian groups also condemned the attacks and Gulf Arab Qatar said they were regrettable.

A Spanish foreign affairs spokesman said that at no stage had Spain and other European allies been informed of the raid.

U.S. ally Israel expressed understanding of the strike, saying the country that fired dozens of Scud missiles at the Jewish state in the Gulf War still posed a threat.

Prime Minister Tony Blair said Britain was ready to authorize further action against Iraq if Baghdad continued to attack British aircrews patrolling no-fly zones.

Baghdad's official press reacted furiously to the attacks.

``The Americans' and Britons' new, savage crime will not pass unpunished and without decisive retaliation,'' the official Qadissiya newspaper said in a front-page editorial.

``We will teach the new American administration and the Zionist entity (Israel) lessons on Jihad (holy war) and steadfastness,'' it said.

Several hundred Iraqis and Palestinians living in Iraq marched in Baghdad streets protesting against the raids.

``We will fight them in the air, on land and sea and their aggression will achieve nothing but failure,'' said an official statement after a meeting of Iraqi leaders chaired by Saddam.

IRAQ ALSO BLAMES KUWAIT, SAUDI ARABIA

The statement also blamed Kuwait and Saudi Arabia for providing bases for coalition forces in the region.

The demonstrators cursed the United States, Britain and Israel and burned an Israeli flag.

``We are here to say to all the world we are ready to fight the enemy everywhere,'' Fadhil Mahmoud, a shopkeeper, said. ``The attack is unjustifiable and their justification was very silly,'' said Ali Hawi, a soldier at Baghdad's Bab al-Sharji flea market.

The Iraqi Health Ministry announced that two Iraqi civilians had been killed and more than 20 others wounded in the raids.

The United States said its planes attacked Iraqi radar systems. U.S. officials said 24 U.S. and British planes struck five Iraqi military targets five to 20 milesfrom Baghdad using various long-range precision-guided weapons.

Bush said he would take ``appropriate action'' if Saddam made weapons of mass destruction.

One of the reported victims was an 18-year-old woman and television pictures showed a man, apparently in his 30s, who was reported to have died in the attack. The Iraqi news agency named the dead as Aliah Atshan Abdullah and Khalil Hameed Alwash.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said the attacks proved that Washington and London relied on force in a policy that ``worsens an already explosive situation in the Middle East and the Gulf.''

President Vladimir Putin said air strikes did nothing to settle the situation around Iraq and urged any action taken against it to be sanctioned by the United Nations.

China urged the United States and Britain to stop attacks on Iraq immediately. India said the raids hurt only innocents. Iranian radio slammed the strikes, accusing Bush of trying to pick up where his father left off and overthrow Saddam.

HOUSES, SHOPS DAMAGED

The French Foreign Ministry said it had often expressed its incomprehension and disquiet at previous U.S.-British raids and Friday's strike would cause more damaging tensions.

France fought with its Western allies in the Gulf War and afterwards helped impose no-fly zones to protect opposition groups in the north and south of Iraq. But France has increasingly distanced itself from U.S.-British policy on Baghdad and its planes no longer help enforce the zones.

Iraqi television showed houses and shops in an area in Baghdad it said was damaged by the strikes. Reporters for Western media based in Baghdad have not yet been allowed to visit the targeted locations.

U.S. and British warplanes patrolling the zones have often attacked targets in the south and north since Baghdad started to challenge the aircraft in December 1998.

The United States and Britain launched four days of bombing in 1998 to punish Iraq for not cooperating with U.N. inspectors charged with eliminating its weapons of mass destruction.

-------- missile defense

BLAIR POISED TO SAY YES TO MISSILE DEFENCE FEB 23? - WRITE NO TO HIM NOW

Sat, 17 Feb 2001

From: "FoE Sydney - Nuclear Campaign" <nonukes@foesyd.org.au> To: <abolition-caucus@egroups.com>; <NucNews@egroups.com>; <abolition-europe@vlberlin.comlink.de>; <abolition-usa@lists.xmission.com>; <ozpeace@egroups.com>; <ausinuke@egroups.com>; <active-list@lists.urg.org.au>; <leftlink@vicnet.net.au>; <globenet@egroups.com> Sent: Friday, February 16, 2001 9:19 PM Subject: BLAIR POISED TO SAY YES TO MISSILE DEFENCE FEB 23? - WRITE NO TO HIM NOW

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE AS WIDELY AS POSSIBLE - Urgent action required.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair Poised to say 'YES' to National Missile defence: Only 4/5 days left to tell him 'NO'.

Dear All,

The article below speaks for itself. Your urgent action would be helpful.

If you want to make a point to Blair concerning Missile Defence you have 4/5 days to do it in.

A sample letter is enclosed below, (after the short newsitem) with Blair's fax number at the top. (+44-207-925-0918)

A letter prepared by yhe British-American Security Information Council (BASIC) to all European MPs, MEP, and governments is also included. You may want to use that too.

You may wish to copy your letter by email to the whole of the British Parliament. If you want to do that the list of emails is below, right at the end. (Some of them do bounce, so be prepared for that)

Do please take action on this it is urgent.

AMERICAN MISSILES HEADING BACK TO BRITAIN Daily Mail Friday, February 16th EXCLUSIVE By David Hughes Political Editor

Blair backs Son of Star Wars

IN a move bound to provoke massive controversy, Tony Blair is set to allow American missiles back on to British soil. The decision will ignite the most savage row within the Labour Party and cause deep anger in Europe. It is expected to be agreed in principle when the Prime Minister meets the new President, George W Bush, in Washington next week.

Mr Blair is ready to defy critics and tell Mr Bush the U.S. can count on British support for the controversial 'Son of Star Wars' anti-missile strategy.

1) SUGGESTED LETTER TO TONY BLAIR

Send this if you are outside the US, especially if you are in the UK - Please customise it creatively

To: Prime Minister Tony Blair, +44-207-925-0918

Re: Please Convey Opposition to Missile Defence Scheme

Dear Tony Blair,

I am writing to you in view of your forthcoming visit to President Bush on Feb 23-24.

I am appalled to hear that you may actually be considering agreeing to the use of UK facilities for the NMD/'Star Wars' program.

Your government should not be considering any such thing.

I urge you to express as strongly as possible the opposition of the UK to any NMD system, and to refuse use of the Menwith Hill and Fylingdales facilities and any other UK facilities for this purpose.

The deployment of NMD and TMD (Theater Missile defence) will have serious implications for the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Russia and China have made it clear that they will increase their own nuclear offensive capabilities in order to counter NMD. This will set back attempts to reduce nuclear weapons severely and may lead to another nuclear arms race. Serious developments in this direction are already taking place. China has additional concerns over the possible use of theatre missile defence in Taiwan.

In addition, the deployment of NMD will either completely destroy or fundamentally weaken the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, seen internationally as the cornerstone of international arms control. This will have serious consequences for maintaining and strengthening other international agreements such as Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).

NMD has been opposed by a wide range of organisations and groups, ranging from 354 major NGOs representing millions of people worldwide, to 50 of the US Nobel prize-winners in physics, to generals and church congregations. It has also been opposed by every major international grouping represented in the UN General Assembly.

For all of these reasons, I urge you to use all the diplomatic influence at your disposal, particularly in your forthcoming visit, to impress upon the incoming Bush administration the UK's opposition to the NMD system.

I also urge you to make clear to the Bush administration that your government will refuse to cooperate in any way with the NMD scheme, and that the use of The SBIRS facility at Menwith Hill,Fylingdales, and other UK facilities will not be permitted for it.

NMD is a scheme that is unlikely ever to work, against a threat that may never materialize and that, in any case, is better dealt with in other ways. It will cost billions better spent elsewhere, and will make further progress toward the total and unequivocal elimination of nuclear weapons - an objective to which the United States as well as all other governments are committed - much more difficult, if not impossible.

I therefore urge you to impress on the US government the importance of not proceeding with NMD, but rather of proceeding with the Bush administrations other major committments in nuclear arms control , namely deep cuts in warhead numbers, and of reductions in alert status of strategic weapons systems.

(Signed)

(Your name)

2)Letter Local MPs, Councillors and Representatives

(From Mark Bromley of BASIC)

This letter is designed to be sent to your local MP, Councillor or Senator, asking them to demand that your national government expresses its opposition to NMD to the Bush administration. It is only designed as a template so please alter it as much as you want (I apologize for only providing an English version). To: MP, Councillor, Senator,

Re: Pressure Government to Convey Opposition to Missile Defence Scheme

Dear MP, Councillor, Senator:

I am writing to express my dismay at US President George W. Bush's desire to proceed with the development of an enlarged version of the Pentagon's proposed National Missile Defence (NMD) network. NMD is an ill-conceived and highly destabilising response to the dangers posed by nuclear weapons. Its development will undermine not only the security of the United States, but that of Europe and the world as a whole.

I therefore urge you to insist that the UK Government make clear to the Bush administration that it is opposed to NMD, and will not participate in the scheme.

Washington claims the proposed NMD system is designed to protect the United States against a possible nuclear attack by a 'state of concern' or an accidental launch by either China or Russia. The threat of accidental missile launch, and the proliferation of nuclear technology, are real dangers which the United States, along with the rest of the world, is right to be concerned about. However, the only way these threats can be effectively countered is through the pursuit of multilateral disarmament and internationally applied arms control agreements. The development of an NMD system will seriously destabilise these efforts.

Russia and China have made it clear that they will increase their own nuclear offensive capabilities, and maintain or raise their alert status in order to counter NMD and ensure strategic parity with the United States. This will increase the risk of accidental launch, undermine attempts to reduce nuclear weapons, and possibly lead to a new global nuclear arms race. As the United States has acknowledged, if China increases its arsenal, it could well lead to nuclear build-ups in India and then Pakistan.

The deployment of NMD will either completely destroy or fundamentally weaken the Anti- Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, seen internationally as the cornerstone of international arms control. This would have serious consequences for maintaining and strengthening other international agreements such as Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Without these agreements in place, the number of nuclear capable countries could increase dramatically.

Even the most ambitious NMD advocate acknowledges that there will be no deployable system for at least six years, yet the detrimental effects of the US desire to build a system are being felt already. The Conference on Disarmament is paralysed over the issue of NMD, while plans to export missile technology, as part of the various Theatre Missile Defence (TMD) programmes under proposal, could well signal the death knell of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR).

The United States is attempting to project an air of inevitability over the question of NMD deployment, and to further coerce allied governments with the promise of a European Missile Defence system. But the immaturity of the necessary technology means that deployment of any kind of system is many years away. In addition, the cost of European participation in a missile defence system would be astronomical, a burden which the United States is unlikely to want to share.

With deployment so far away, and active participation a politically unlikely prospect, the truth is that European governments have an excellent opportunity to sway the US decision-making process.

For the United Kingdom:

The United States has made it clear that participation by the United Kingdom is crucial for plans for NMD system currently under consideration. Two sites on UK territory, the US bases at Fylingdales and Menwith Hill, would be required for NMD to work. If the United Kingdom were to make clear that it would oppose the use of these sites in an NMD system, it would have a sizeable diplomatic fallout. However, it might well lead the United States to seriously reconsider its plans.

For Denmark and Greenland:

The support Denmark and Greenland is essential the current US NMD proposals. The US Air Force Base in Thule, Greenland, is currently part of the network of early warning radars the Pentagon wishes to upgrade for use in the NMD system. Thule is also named as a location for one of the future NMD X-Band radars, designed to track incoming missiles and guide interceptors to their targets. Without the use of Thule, the currently planned NMD architecture would not work, as the United States would be unable to intercept missile attacks from Iraq and the Middle East.

The support of the people and governments of Europe is vitally important to US plans to develop a NMD system. Aside from the diplomatic need to maintain good relations with its European allies, the United States also needs to maintain unity within NATO. If sustained opposition to NMD is voiced across Europe, the United States will be forced to listen.

NMD is a scheme that is unlikely ever to work against a threat which is better dealt with in other ways. It will cost billions better spent elsewhere, and will make further progress toward the total and unequivocal elimination of nuclear weapons - an objective to which the United States as well as all other governments are committed - much more difficult, if not impossible.

It is vital that the new administration in Washington is made to understand that Europe is opposed to NMD and will not allow its territory to be a part of the system. I therefore urge you to demand that the Government oppose NMD, and helps to persuade the Bush administration to focus its efforts on the vital objectives of deep reductions in warhead numbers, and reductions in the alert status of weapons, to which it is committed.

(Signed)

(Your name)

You may wish to send your letter by email to the entire British parliament.

If you do, here is the list of UK parliamentary emails.

ainsworthr@parliament.uk, allanr@parliament.co.uk, alleng@parliament.uk, andersonj@parliament.uk, arbuthnotj@parliament.uk, armstrongh@parliament.uk, armstrongh@parliament.uk, paddyashdown@cix.compulink.co.uk, athertonc@parliament.uk, atkinsc@parliament.uk, bayleyh@parliament.co.uk, bellm@parliament.uk, bells@parliament.uk, bercowj@parliament.uk, berryr@parliament.co.uk, blairt@parliament.uk, boatengp@parliament.co.uk, borrowd@parliament.uk, bottomleyp@parliament.uk, bottomleyv@parliament.uk, braket@parliament.uk, brazierj@parliament.uk, browng@parliament.uk, buckk@parliament.co.uk, burdenr@parliament.uk, campbella@parliament.uk, nefifelibdem@cix.compulink.co.uk, anne.campbell.mp@dial.pipex.com, catonm@parliament.uk, chaytord@parliament.uk, eastleighldp@cix.co.uk, churchj@parliament.uk, michael.clapham@geo2.poptel.org.uk, clarkd@parliament.uk, clarkm@parliament.uk, clarket@parliament.uk, clellandd@parliament.uk, collinst@parliament.uk, connartym@parliament.uk, cookf@parliament.uk, coopery@parliament.uk, corbettr@parliament.uk, corstonj@parliament.uk, westonlibdems@cix.co.uk, crausbyd@parliament.uk, cunninghamj@parliament.uk, rcmp.perth@snp.org.uk, daveye@parliament.uk, daviesg@parliament.uk, dawsonh@parliament.uk, denhamj@parliament.uk, drewd@parliament.uk, eaglea@parliament.uk, eaglem@parliament.uk, ribblevalley@dial.pipex.com, faberd@parliament.uk, fallonm@parliament.uk, flintc@parliament.uk, flynnp@parliament.uk, follettb@parliament.uk, forsythec@parliament.uk, donfostermp@cix.co.uk, fraserc@parliament.uk, galbraiths@parliament.uk, garniere@parliament.uk, georgeb@parliament.uk, gerrardn@parliament.uk, goldingl@parliament.uk, greenwayj@parliament.uk, griffithsj@parliament.uk, ngriffithsmp@dial.pipex.com, John gummerj@parliament.uk, gunnellj@parliament.uk, hallp@parliament.uk, hamiltonf@parliament.uk, harmanh@parliament.uk, healeyj@parliament.uk, david@wells.tory.org.uk, hewittp@parliament.uk, hoeyk@parliament.uk, hoodj@parliament.uk, hopep@parliament.uk, hopkinsk@parliament.uk, howellsk@parliament.uk, hughesb@parliament.uk, hughesk@parliament.uk, huttonj@parliament.uk, iddonb@parliament.uk, ingrama@parliament.uk, bernard.jenkin@northessex.tory.org.uk, jonesl@parliament.uk, nigeljonesmp@cix.co.uk, keebles@parliament.uk, alank@patrol.iway.co.uk, kellyr@parliament.uk, kennedyj@parliament.uk, kidneyd@parliament.uk, rthontomking@msn.com, kinghamt@parliament.uk, archykirkwood@cix.compulink.co.uk, ladymans@parliament.uk, 105277.3653@compuserve.com, lawrencej@parliament.uk, levittt@parliament.uk, lewisj@parliament.uk, lidingtond@parliament.uk, lilleyp@parliament.uk, lockd@parliament.uk, loughtont@parliament.uk, lovea@parliament.uk, mccaffertyc@parliament.uk, macdonaldc@parliament.uk, mcfallj@parliament.uk, bobmaclennan@cix.compulink.co.uk, mcnultyt@parliament.uk, macshaned@parliament.uk, mactaggartf@parliament.uk, mcwaltert@parliament.uk, mahona@parliament.uk, mallaberj@parliament.uk, maplesj@parliament.uk, matesm@parliament.uk, maxtonj@parliament.uk, arlene.mccarthy@geo2.poptel.org.uk, alan.meale@geo2.poptel.org.uk, michaela@parliament.uk, andrew.miller@geo2.poptel.org.uk, moffattl@parliament.uk, moranm@parliament.uk, morgana@parliament.uk, morleye@parliament.uk, morleye@parliament.uk, mudieg@parliament.uk, murphyj@parliament.uk, murphyj@parliament.uk, normana@parliament.uk, organd@parliament.uk, paisleyi@parliament.uk, paisleyi@parliament.uk, pendryt@parliament.uk, popeg@parliament.uk, prenticeb@parliament.uk, primarolod@parliament.uk, quinnl@parliament.uk, seabeckaj@parliament.uk, newburyldp@cix.compulink.co.uk, rowea@parliament.uk, royf@parliament.uk, russellb@parliament.uk, asmp.peterhead@snp.org.uk, salterm@parliament.uk, savidgem@parliament.uk, sawfordp@parliament.uk, sayeedj@parliament.uk, sheermanb@parliament.uk, sheldonr@parliament.uk, simpsona@parliament.uk, simpsonk@parliament.uk, smithr@parliament.uk, spellarj@parliament.uk, starkeyp@parliament.uk, pcrrn@bigfoot.com, stewartd@parliament.uk, stewarti@parliament.uk, stoateh@parliament.uk, swayned@parliament.uk, agent@poole.tory.org.uk, taylorjm@parliament.uk, taylorm@parliament.uk, thomasgr@parliament.uk, 100746.2456@compuserve.com, toddm@parliament.uk, tredinnickd@parliament.uk, trimbled@parliament.uk, truswellp@parliament.uk, turnerg@parliament.uk, paultylermp@cix.compulink.co.uk, vazk@parliament.uk, paultylermp@cix.compulink.co.uk, walterr@parliament.uk, wardc@parliament.uk, welsha@parliament.uk, whiteb@parliament.uk, whitneyr@parliament.uk, williamsb@parliament.uk, wilshired@parliament.uk, wintertonr@parliament.uk, wisea@parliament.uk, woodm@parliament.uk, wyattd@parliament.uk

Websites where you can get more information on letters to send to world leaders:

The abolition 2000 website is: http://www.abolition2000.org/action/saynotostarwars.html

The letter on the BASIC website is: <http://www.basicint.org/NMDpage.htm#Debate in European Governments>

An online petition to stop star- wars is to be found at: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/Jules/

John Hallam Friends of the Earth Sydney, 17 Lord Street, Newtown, NSW, Australia, 2042 Fax (61)(2)9517-3902 ph (61)(2)9517-3903 nonukes@foesyd.org.au http://homepages.tig.com.au/~foesyd

--------

Moscow offers missile shield to Europe

Saturday, February 17, 2001
The Hindu
By Vladimir Radyuhin
http://www.indiaserver.com/thehindu/2001/02/17/stories/03170002.htm

MOSCOW, FEB. 16. Russia will try to convince NATO that its non- strategic missile defence proposal can protect Europe better than the U.S. plan of building a strategic national missile shield.

Gen. Leonid Ivashov, head of the Russian Defence Ministry's international cooperation department, told a press conference in Moscow that details of the Russian plan for a compact and inexpensive missile shield for Europe would be handed over to the NATO Secretary-General, Mr. George Robertson, when he visits Russia next week.

Gen. Ivashov said the Russian plan calls for ``a special mobile, non-strategic missile-defence force'' that can be deployed near a potential aggressor. Such a force would be far cheaper and simpler to build than Washington's ``Star Wars'' shield, he said. Deploying a mobile anti-missile force near a potential aggressor would be a move of last resort, if political and diplomatic efforts failed to defuse the threat.

The NATO chief has already said he will be seeking details of the Russian proposal during his forthcoming visit to Moscow on Feb. 19-21.

Gen. Ivashov dismissed as ``fairy tales'' Washington's protestations that its National Missile Defence (NMD) was to protect the U.S. against a missile threat from ``rogue states'', such as North Korea or Iran.

``If the U.S. builds an NMD this will be above all against the strategic arsenals of Russia and China,'' the Russian General said.

He claimed the U.S. offer of deploying its missile umbrella over Europe was aimed draining European states financially so that they cannot pursue their own defence programmes such as setting up an armed force separate from NATO.

Gen. Ivashov denied reports that Russia had moved its tactical nuclear missiles to its Western border in Kaliningrad, but did not rule out this option if NATO grants membership to the former Soviet Baltic states.

``We regard the further Eastward advance of NATO as a threat to our security,'' he said. ``In this case, even NATO's tactical weapons will become strategic as far as we are concerned. We reserve the right to take adequate steps to protect our national security if NATO pushes further to the East,'' Gen. Ivashov said.

-------- russia

MISSILE TESTS

February 17, 2001
New York Times
World Briefing
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17BRIE.html?pagewanted=all

RUSSIA: Russia test-fired two intercontinental ballistic missiles with dummy warheads, one from a submarine in the Barents Sea and the other from the Plesetsk testing grounds. Both landed on the Kamchatka Peninsula, a military spokesman said. The spokesmen said the tests were intended to prove the continuing reliability and accuracy of Russia's nuclear deterrent forces, but some political analysts suggested that the tests also sent a political message that Moscow intends to oppose any deployment of an American missile shield. Patrick E. Tyler (NYT)

-------

Launches send message:
Russian strategic arsenal is in shape

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
THE BOSTON GLOBE
By DAVID FILIPOV
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/national/miss171.shtml

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/02/17/MN145630.DTL

MOSCOW -- Russia yesterday test-fired land, air and sea-launched nuclear-capable missiles, adding some Cold War-style punch to an increasingly heated verbal battle between Moscow and Washington over nuclear weapons and missile defense.

The rare, near-simultaneous launches from a land-based silo in northwest Russia, a nuclear-powered submarine in the Barents Sea and a bomber were probably part of a coordinated exercise, military and diplomatic analysts said, and almost certainly were planned well in advance.

The Russian Navy and the Strategic Rocket Forces announced launches within minutes of each other. Two hours later, the Russian Air Force said a TU-95 bomber had also fired a strategic missile.

The message the exercises conveyed -- that Russia is keeping its strategic arsenal in shape -- came just after the Bush administration stepped up its rhetoric in its dispute with Moscow over missile defense and hours before Washington launched an attack on Iraqi radar installations.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has said that Russia was "part of the problem" by helping "rogue states" such as Libya, Iran and North Korea acquire missile technology.

Washington hopes to meet the potential threat of missile attacks from so-called rogue states with a $60 billion National Missile Defense shield.

Moscow angrily responded that it was meeting its obligations under international treaties to prevent the transfer of weapons technology. A senior Russian general accused the United States of "anti-Russian propaganda" to justify the deployment of a missile-defense system.

The general, Leonty Ivashov, dismissed U.S. claims that a defense system would be intended to stop only small numbers of missiles fired from Iran or North Korea. Instead, Ivashov told reporters, the U.S. initiative was aimed at giving the United States a strategic advantage over China and Russia, something he said would lead to "a new arms race."

A significant part of that race could involve the Topol, the advanced, highly mobile land-based missile Russia fired from a launch pad in Plesetsk, in northwest Russia, to a target the military said it successfully hit on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Pacific, 4,200 miles to the east.

The Russian military has said it could respond to the deployment of NMD by refitting the single-warhead Topol with multiple warheads, making it harder for a missile defense to defeat.

Most of Russia's other long-range missiles have either passed their service lifetimes or are set to be dismantled under the START-II strategic arms reduction treaty, which both Russia and the United States have ratified but which has not gone into effect.

Moscow says missile defense would wreck the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, which it sees as the basis for all subsequent nuclear disarmament deals, including START-II. Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, due to meet Secretary of State Colin Powell next week in Cairo for the first high-level talks between Moscow and the Bush administration, has said he hopes for "constructive dialogue" on the issue of missile defense.

But the Bush administration has repeatedly said it is prepared to deploy the National Missile Defense shield regardless of Russia's views.

This has led Russian politicians of all stripes to suspect the United States of building support for missile defense in its allegations that Moscow is violating proliferation treaties.

"If the U.S. suspects Russia of violations they should raise the question, and not destroy the cornerstone of arms control," said Alexei Arbatov, a Russian legislator from the liberal Yabloko party.

Russia's protests have been accompanied by some actions that have raised tensions abroad.

On Wednesday, nuclear-capable Russian bombers conducted exercises near Norway and Japan, forcing those countries' air forces to scramble. Japan later said Russian warplanes had briefly entered Japanese air space, but Moscow denied that.

---

Russia tests missiles, criticizes U.S. plans

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Philadelphia Inquirer
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/02/17/national/RUSSIA17.htm

MOSCOW - Firing from the sea, air and land, Russia launched an array of missile tests yesterday that underlined the strength of its armed forces amid increased tension with the United States over missile defense.

The tests came as a top Defense Ministry official accused the Bush administration of engaging in anti-Russian rhetoric and basing its proposal for a missile-defense system on "pure fantasy."

The Russian armed forces launched a Topol intercontinental ballistic missile from the Plesetsk base in northwestern Russia and a ballistic missile of unspecified type from a submarine in the Barents Sea, off Russia's north coast. Both hit their targets in a test range on the Kamchatka peninsula, about 4,200 miles away in Russia's far east, officials said.

Later yesterday, news reports said air force bombers had test-fired one strategic and two tactical missiles in southern Russia.

The Topol, which has been in service since the mid-1980s, and an advanced version called the Topol-M are expected to be the backbone of Russia's missile forces in the coming years. Many of Russia's other missiles are either past their service dates or will have to be dismantled under the START II treaty, which Russia and the United States have ratified but which has not taken effect.

The Topol-class missile currently carries just a single warhead, but the Strategic Missile Force commander, Gen. Vladimir Yakovlev, has said the missiles could be fitted with multiple warheads if the United States goes ahead with a proposal to create a national missile-defense system.

The tests demonstrate that "Russian strategic forces are capable of overcoming any antimissile defense, be it a currently existing one or a potential one," the military's first deputy chief of staff, Gen. Valery Manilov, said yesterday, according to the Interfax news agency.

Fitting the Topol with multiple warheads would increase its effectiveness against the proposed U.S. missile-defense system. The Bush administration says such a system is necessary to protect against potential attacks by small countries believed to be developing nuclear missiles.

Russia vehemently opposes the plan, which would require amending the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which bans national missile-defense systems.

Yesterday, Col. Gen. Leonid Ivashov, head of the Defense Ministry's international cooperation department, denounced the U.S. proposal and said its enactment would touch off a new arms race. He said talk of the necessity to develop a national missile-defense system was "pure fantasy."

Ivashov also said Russia would present specific proposals for an alternative to the U.S. system when NATO's secretary-general, Lord Robertson, visited Russia next week.

---

Russian test missiles send warning to Bush

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Nation & World :
Seattle Times
Los Angeles Times
By Robyn Dixon
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/display?slug=russmissile17&date=20010217

MOSCOW - Russia test-launched two ballistic missiles yesterday, sending a warning to the Bush administration even as Moscow and Washington are feeling out their new relationship.

The tests came amid bitter Russian opposition to U.S. plans for a national missile-defense system and rhetoric from both nations' top military and security officials.

The strident tone has at times recalled the Cold War, and Russian officials warn the missile shield may trigger a new arms race - including missiles in space. Analysts agree, however, that Russia can't afford such a race.

Under President Vladimir Putin, Russia has sought a speedy reduction in nuclear missiles, mainly because of its difficulties in paying for its decaying military machine.

Putin has called for a U.S.-Russia agreement to reduce each side's nuclear warheads from 6,000 to less than 1,500. Under the START II arms-control agreement, which has been ratified but not implemented, each side has to cut back to between 3,000 and 3,500 warheads by 2007.

Yesterday's missile launches came as officials on both sides gear up for the nations' first top-level meeting since President Bush took office. Secretary of State Colin Powell will meet Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov in Cairo next weekend.

The test launches - from a silo in Plesetsk in northern Russia and a nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea - underscored Russian opposition to the missile shield.

Col. Gen. Valery Manilov, first deputy chief of the armed forces' general staff, said the tests proved that Russia was capable of thwarting any missile shield.

Gen. Leonid Ivashov, the chief of the Defense Ministry's international cooperation department, warned yesterday that if the U.S. builds a missile shield, "we shall find an adequate reply."

Tensions grew Wednesday after Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld accused Moscow of being "part of the problem" of weapons proliferation.

He claimed the Russian government ignored companies selling military technology to Iran, North Korea and India that could be used to develop nuclear weapons. Russian generals denied the claims.

Dmitri Trenin, a military analyst with the Carnegie Moscow Center think tank, said Russia launched the missiles to show the Bush administration it could not ignore Russian concerns.

"A lot of people in Russia - especially among the top brass and in state security bodies - feel angry and embittered over the fact that people in the new U.S. administration act and talk as if they have already discarded Russia. There are things that are even worse than enmity and hostility. There is oblivion, and there is being ignored," Trenin said.

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U.S. Faults Russian Nuclear Fuel Shipment

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Reuters
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A17722-2001Feb16?language=printer

Russia has shipped nuclear fuel to the Tarapur power reactors in India in violation of its obligations as a member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the United States said yesterday.

The shipment raises serious questions about Russia's commitment to preventing nuclear proliferation, the State Department said in a statement. The department added that this will be an important item on the Bush administration's agenda for talks with Russia.

The United States regrets the shipment and calls on Russia to cancel its supply arrangement with India, the statement added.

The statement said that as a member of the 39-nation supply group, Russia is committed not to cooperate with the nuclear program of any country where the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) does not supervise comprehensive safeguards on all the country's nuclear facilities. The Tarapur reactors near Bombay are under IAEA safeguards. But some other Indian nuclear facilities are not, and the country is pursuing a nuclear weapons program.

The statement said that at a meeting in December, an overwhelming majority of the members of the Nuclear Suppliers Group said they were concerned about Russian plans to ship the nuclear fuel to India.

"We join other nuclear suppliers in calling on Russia to cancel this supply arrangement and live up to its nonproliferation obligations," it said.

"Russia's disregard of its Nuclear Suppliers Group commitments, together with its sensitive nuclear assistance to Iran, raises serious questions about Russia's support for the goal of preventing nuclear proliferation," it added.

"Russia's provision of sensitive technologies will be an important item on the U.S.-Russian agenda of the Bush administration," the statement said.

-------- treaties

US claims Russia broke atomic proliferation regime

Sat, 17 Feb 2001
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-17feb2001-48.htm

The United States has accused Russia of breaking an international regime designed to limit atomic proliferation by shipping nuclear fuels to India.

State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said it was regrettable that Russia had shipped nuclear fuel to the Tarapur power reactors in India in violation of Russia's non-proliferation commitments.

He said Russia had shipped low enriched uranium fuel to India in violation of an agreement among the 39-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group which requires countries to have International Atomic Energy Agency standards on nuclear facilities.

Mr. Reeker said India did not have such safeguards on all of its facilities and was pursuing a nuclear weapons program.

He said Russia's help to India and what he said was its "sensitive nuclear assistance" to Iran, raised "serious questions" about Russia's support for the goal of preventing nuclear proliferation.

-------- u.s. nuc facilities

-------- kentucky

Microbes may be corroding casings of monitor wells
Stations check water outside Paducah plant

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Louisville Courier-Journal
By JAMES MALONE,
http://www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2001/02/17/ky_well.html

PADUCAH, Ky. -- A new report suggests that "microbial agents" are responsible for severe corrosion that has eaten through stainless-steel casings on wells that monitor water quality around the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant.

The corrosion on the 1/16th-inch casings at 19 groundwater-monitoring wells around landfills outside the plant's north fence was found near where radioactive "black ooze" was seen seeping up from the ground about 16 months ago.

Energy Department officials dismissed the ooze as "roofing materials." And officials say the corrosion is not related to groundwater contamination from decades of secret work with nuclear and other hazardous materials at the 1,800-acre nuclear fuel production complex.

Instead, they say the bacteria create enzymes which, combined with a mild chemical reaction, eats away the metal.

At various times in its history, the Paducah plant has used powerful acids to recover and dissolve metals. But no studies have linked acids to the corrosion.

In a report sent to the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection this week, Bechtel Jacobs, the cleanup contractor at Paducah, said the wells should be abandoned and replaced.

The contractor also recommended that "further use of metal casings" in monitoring wells be discontinued in favor of plastic. Last fall, the Energy Department abandoned three of the wells due to the corrosion.

Water drawn from the pipes of the 19 compliance wells is sampled to assure that permit limits aren't exceeded. Consultants said the corrosion found was severe enough to "compromise the validity of the data gathered from them."

Primarily, the wells monitored the spread of an underground plume of trichlorethylene, a toxic solvent, and radioactive technetium 99, an isotope. Both substances leaked from the site for decades.

State officials last summer were skeptical of the microbe theory and asked for further study, which resulted in the report sent this week.

State environmental regulators said yesterday that they had just received the 150-page report and would study it. "We've concerns with the results from the casings that were affected," said Mark York, a department spokesman.

Greg Cook, a spokesman for Bechtel Jacobs, said the corrosion "could occur in anybody's well." He attributed the problem to "soil conditions we have here in Paducah."

There does not appear to be a health concern involved with the corrosion. Since 1988, when solvents and radioactive isotopes were found during sampling, residents around the plant have been provided free municipal water service by the government.

The 19 wells are 50 to 100 feet deep and were installed by an Energy Department contractor in the early 1990s. Cook said there was no suggestion of "an installation error."

But the report said that corrosion seen in one well casing "is probably a consequence of stagnant water being trapped alongside the well casing during installation" and that a seal apparently was not intact.

The type of steel used in some of the well casings at Paducah is called 316 stainless, one of the metal's more durable alloys with a blend of iron, chromium and nickel.

Harold Smith, a Louisville metallurgist, said microbial corrosion and pitting, though unusual, can occur in certain environments, such as sewers or swampy areas. "It is possible to have an environment that will attack" steel, he said. "It is not totally impervious."

Cook said the government will have to pay to have replacement wells installed, with the total cost possibly reaching $1.5 million.

-------- new mexico

Antelopes Take Over N.M. Range

February 17, 2001
Associated Press
By CHRIS ROBERTS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Prolific-Oryx.html

WHITE SANDS MISSILE RANGE, N.M. (AP) -- Game managers were simply looking for a good trophy animal for hunters in this empty quarter of southern New Mexico. What they got was an exotic ntelope from Africa so at home in the desert that it is multiplying like rabbits.

The original handful of oryx, a native of Africa's Kalahari desert, introduced to the Chihuahuan desert in 1969 has grown to roughly 3,000 animals, even though hunters are allowed to kill more and more each year.

And although the missile test range sprawls across 2 million acres, the oryx are migrating beyond its boundaries, crossing highways and grazing on private land where they compete with cattle for forage. They have been spotted on the runways at Holloman Air Force Base in Alamogordo, where F-117 stealth fighters are based.

Early studies grossly underestimated the oryx's ability to thrive, and assumed they would stay concentrated in an area considered ``empty.''

But now, researchers say that if the animals were left undisturbed, they would spread throughout southern New Mexico.

``And in Texas and Mexico,'' added Steve Henry, wildlife administrator for the New Mexico Game and Fish Department.

``We know so very little about oryx,'' acknowledged Patrick Morrow, a missile range wildlife biologist.

To find the best formula for controlling the burgeoning population, missile range researchers have begun a $350,000, four-year study of the animals' haunts and habits.

The state Game and Fish Department first issued hunting permits for oryx in 1974. Hunters took more than 700 animals in the 1999-2000 season and about 1,000 will be culled this season.

But increasing the number of permits is costly for the department because wildlife managers must spend time with each hunting party. The weapons tested at White Sands make it a dangerous place, and at least one visitor has been killed by picking up unexploded ordnance. Public access is highly restricted, and hunters must follow safety rules and stay within strict boundaries.

The oryx have thrived because much of the Chihuahuan vegetation is similar to what grows in the Kalahari.

And while mule deer and desert bighorn sheep populations dwindled because of drought from 1992 to 1996, oryx thrived.

Oryx use nearly every molecule of water stored in the plants they eat, meaning they don't require streams or springs. And they have a capillary system above their palate that acts like a radiator to keep their brains from baking in the heat.

They also have few natural predators in New Mexico. Although a mountain lion occasionally will kill an oryx, their ranges rarely overlap since the cats prowl the peaks and the oryx graze in the grasslands below.

And since they weigh an average of 400 pounds and have horns more than 3 1/2 feet long, oryx can ably defend themselves. Morrow said the oryx is reputed to be the only hoofed animal ever to kill an African lion.

On top of all that, females reach sexual maturity at 1 1/2 and the are nearly always pregnant. The White Sands environment is so suited to the oryx that twin births have been observed, which is unusual in their native Kalahari, said Doug Burkett, a wildlife range specialist with Mevatec, a missile range contractor.

The new study aims to find a strategy that will maintain the population at 800 to 1,200 and keep it within the boundaries of the missile range. It also will examine the animals' effect on other species -- including those that are threatened or endangered.

Experts said hunting will continue to be the main tool to control the oryx population, and there is no shortage of hunters willing to help.

Morrow said the wildlife department receives up to 30 applicants for every oryx permit it issues, at a cost of $1,500 for a nonresident and $100 for a resident.

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Auditor Knocks Nuke Security

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Albuquerque Journal
By Jennifer McKee
http://www.abqjournal.com/news/254438news02-17-01.htm

SANTA FE - The nation's plutonium is far from secure, according to a fiery letter sent to the U.S. Department of Energy and many in Congress this week from a firm hired to double-check security at Los Alamos National Laboratory and other nuclear sites.

Officials at both the Department of Energy and its Los Alamos lab decried the letter and questioned the credibility of its author - Ronald Timm, president of RETA Security of Lemont, Ill., a company that also sells security systems.

Timm's letter, sent Monday, said that accidental "nuclear detonation or explosion" or the possible theft of "special nuclear materials" is possible and has been outlined in several earlier studies. The special nuclear materials are principally the radioactive ingredients needed to make a nuclear bomb, such as plutonium. The letter also says the DOE has minimized similar warnings and has failed to fix problems for years.

"The tone of Mr. Timm's letter speaks volumes about its credibility," said James Rickman, a lab spokesman. "The laboratory has multiple, robust security measures in place that are more than adequate to protect special nuclear materials from all credible threats."

Joe Davis, a DOE spokesman in Washington, D.C., said Timm earlier sent a similar letter to the department's investigative arm and that all his concerns were checked out.

"We're going to conduct a review of the letter to make sure there's nothing new," Davis said. "We believe most of these matters have been addressed."

The letter was addressed to new Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and forwarded to 19 members of Congress, an official with the General Accounting Office, two high-ranking DOE officials and a government watchdog group, the Project on Government Oversight. U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., was among those the letter was addressed to while Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and Rep. Tom Udall, D-N.M., were not.

According to the letter, Timm alerted the DOE to his concerns earlier, but the department responded with an inadequate investigation that "minimized the problem."

"Terrorists have a ready supply of Special Nuclear Materials already existing and available within our borders," the letter reads. "The DOE has avoided addressing this serious fact for the past eight years."

The letter specifically mentioned Los Alamos National Lab and the defunct nuclear weapon factory at Rocky Flats, Colo.

Timm told the Journal that the DOE usually fixes its security problems when someone points them out but does nothing to upgrade the bureaucratic sluggishness and lack of accountability that creates the security problems in the first place.

"If (DOE efforts) at fixing things had been successful, we wouldn't be at risk anymore," he said. "The department has been reactive."

In addition to auditing DOE sites, RETA security also sells security systems - including a "sticky foam" designed to foil would-be intruders - and has audited security systems for more than 200 schools in Illinois.

Since 1997, RETA has been hired to review the so-called site plans every part of the DOE complex writes every year, Timm said. The plans outline what sensitive materials the places keep and how they're stored, transported and might be defended. Timm's job is to make sure the sites are telling the truth and living up to the department's own standards.

Los Alamos is not, Timm said.

"It's been a litany of problems," he said, declining to offer details. "That site is almost comic, although tragedy would probably be a better word for it."

He suggests the DOE "lock down" or cease all work with nuclear materials until it has a better handle on its security.

But according to Steven Aftergood, head of the Project on Government Secrecy for the Federation of American Scientists, the public may not know whom to believe in this disagreement. Obviously, DOE and Los Alamos officials want to put the best spin on the situation they can, he said. But Timm, who relies on DOE contracts to make a living, has a reason to put his own spin on things.

"He's a security consultant who has an interest in increasing the flow of dollars," Aftergood said.

Still, if Timm's allegations are true, Aftergood said, then the nation's nuclear situation is "a little troubling."

-------- new york

Long Island Utility Will Seek Surcharge to Cover Fuel Costs

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By MICHAEL COOPER
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/nyregion/17LIPA.html

GARDEN CITY, N.Y., Feb. 16 - The chairman of the Long Island Power Authority called today for a temporary 5.8 percent surcharge on the electric bills of its 1.06 million customers to help offset the rising costs of oil and natural gas.

The call for the surcharge, which would add $4.69 to the average customer's monthly bill for a year, put the chairman, Richard M. Kessel, in a political danger zone.

The utility was born after outrage over high electric rates led New York State to take over its predecessor, the Long Island Lighting Company.

But Mr. Kessel said that "exorbitant increases" in fuel costs necessitated action. In 2000, he said, the authority spent $296 million more than it had budgeted for the natural gas and oil needed to generate electricity and on electricity bought from outside sources.

The proposal drew immediate condemnation from critics. The authority had pledged to keep rates low as a condition of its creation and any rise is seen by some as betrayal.

"I think it is outrageous for LIPA to come back to ratepayers at this time to ask for more money," said Gordian Raacke, the executive director of the Citizens Advisory Panel, a watchdog group the monitors the authority.

Mr. Kessel said he had no choice. "Obviously, I wish we didn't have to do any surcharge," he said, "but not to do anything would create future financial problems."

He said that unlike many other utilities, which have raised rates in response to skyrocketing fuel costs, LIPA would not pass on the entire $296 million cost to its customers.

He said he would ask the authority's board of trustees to waive its current rules, which call for passing the full extra fuel cost on to consumers.

Under the proposal, the surcharge would provide $125.6 million of the money spent on higher fuel costs while the power authority would absorb the remaining $170.4 million by altering its debt-payment schedule on the never-opened Shoreham nuclear power plant. If the full cost were passed on to ratepayers, Mr. Kessel said, the monthly surcharge would be 13 percent, or $11.05 a month.

But Mr. Raacke said the difference between a surcharge and a rate increase was just semantics. He pointed to a provision of the agreement that created the power authority that prohibited it from raising rates by more than 2.5 percent without state approval.

"They should put in an application with the Public Service Commission," Mr. Raacke said.

But Mr. Kessel said that the authority had a separate provision calling for the imposition of a temporary surcharge to cover the costs of rising fuel and purchased power costs and that the surcharge did not require the commission's approval.

He distributed a budget memorandum, prepared by a consultant to the Citizens Advisory Panel in December, that criticized the authority for its reluctance to pass on increased costs to customers. The report warned that a failure to pass on the costs could force the authority to go into more debt to cover its operating costs.

Mr. Raacke said that the panel did not accept the report's conclusions.

The proposed surcharge would be in effect for a year, to cover the rise in fuel costs in 2000.

But with costs expected to keep rising this year, Mr. Kessel said that a second yearlong surcharge could be needed next year.

Mr. Kessel said that the authority would hold three public hearings on the proposal and then present it to trustees.

If adopted, he said, the surcharge could begin appearing on electric bills by the end of March or the beginning of April.

-------- utah

Utah firms take great efforts to avoid Superfund stigma

February 17, 2001
Deseret News
By Donna Kemp Spangler and Jerry D. Spangler
http://www.deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,250011742,00.html

At the old Salt Lake Gun Club on Redwood Road, workers are sifting through tons of mud and muck trying to remove countless lead BBs left over from millions of shotgun blasts.

It's a tedious task, said Bill Rees, an environmental scientist who is overseeing the cleanup for the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ). "It's like trying to find a needle in the haystack."

But the property owner, Crete Carrier Corp. of Lincoln, Neb., has voluntarily agreed to clean up the pellets that have contaminated the dirt with lead. The company likes that approach, saying the state's voluntary cleanup program is a far cry from a federal Superfund listing.

"A Superfund site carries a lot of baggage with it," Rees said.

The old gun club is one of 14 badly polluted properties across the state now being cleaned up voluntarily. Since 1997 when the Utah Legislature enacted the program, seven contaminated sites have been completely cleaned up.

Quite simply, industry officials like the state approach as much as they loathe Superfund, the federal program that has been the hallmark of industrial cleanups since the 1970s.

For one thing, once the property is cleaned up under the state program, state environmental regulators issue a "certificate of completion" that certifies that the property is clean. The certificate releases the developer from any responsibility or liability for the contamination, and it turns once-unusable lands into prime development properties.

"It provides a little bit of comfort that the state may not come back to the applicant for further enforcement action," Rees said.

Voluntary cleanup also is quicker and less costly than Superfund, primarily because it is pursued voluntarily without costly litigation and compliance requirements that typically dog Superfund projects.

Not that Superfund hasn't played an important role in cleaning up some of Utah's worst toxic messes. To date, more than $500 million in private and federal dollars has been spent cleaning up 12 contaminated Superfund sites in Salt Lake County alone, from the infamous lead and arsenic contamination around the Sharon Steel plant in Midvale to the toxic chemicals at the American Barrel site in downtown Salt Lake City near the TriadCenter.

Cleanups have been completed at eight Superfund sites, while work is still being done at seven others. Five other Utah sites have been proposed for Superfund listing, but these are being cleaned up under cooperative agreements whereby the property owners can avoid the Superfund stigma if they meet certain federal requirements.

Funded by a tax on petrochemicals, Superfund - more accurately the National Priority List - has been the primary weapon in the battle to clean up an industrial legacy that, prior to the passage of environmental laws in the early 1970s, resulted in dangerously polluted air, water and land.

But state officials say Superfund is a dinosaur whose time has passed. The tax that funded the Superfund program was repealed three years ago, and now the EPA-administered fund is gradually running out of money, said Brad Johnson, a manager of DEQ's division of environmental response and remediation.

With the fund running dry, "EPA has been more willing to work with the state and communities in finding the best way to reach the (cleanup) objective rather than moving immediately toward putting sites on the National Priority List," Johnson said. "We are seeing a lot more voluntary agreements," he added. "All of them costing less than fighting a National Priority List designation in the courtroom."

"Once a Superfund site, always a Superfund site," Johnson said, noting that businesses and their host cities will do anything to stay off the Superfund list.

That was certainly the case at the 700-acre Richardson tailings site in Summit County that was contaminated with lead and arsenic. The site was proposed for Superfund listing in 1988, but image-conscious Park City officials worried about the effects of a Superfund designation on their lucrative ski industry and negotiated a mitigation agreement that has kept the site off the list.

Murray officials likewise negotiated a deal with the state and EPA over the 170-acre Murray Smelter site, home of the two infamous smokestacks toppled last year. The site was proposed for Superfund listing in 1994, but the entire project is being done through a cooperative agreement that city officials hope will transform the parcel into prime commercial property.

The biggest "keep me off Superfund" cleanup of all involves two separate projects being funded entirely by Kennecott. The copper giant is expected to spend $310 million by the time the projects are completed. One project was completed late last year and the other should be finished later this year.

Johnson said state and federal regulators have expended a lot of effort over the past 15 years identifying potential Superfund sites, and Johnson insists there aren't that many more that would qualify. The big sites have already been or are on schedule to be cleaned up, and the many other smaller sites can be addressed through other less costly programs.

"The program is winding down and it's time to wrap it up," Johnson said.

However, Johnson admits that most Superfund efforts have focused on the populous Wasatch Front, and there are potential sites in rural Utah. In Eureka, lead contamination has shown up in children, prompting a joint DEQ and Department of Health study. Remnants of mining around Marysvale are also a concern, and in the Silver Reef area near St. George, subdivisions are creeping toward toxic tailings piles left over from generations of mining.

Under Superfund, the owner of the property must pay for the costs of cleanup under tough federal guidelines that often force the companies into bankruptcy. If that happens and there is not enough money to pay for the cleanup, federal Superfund monies are used, along with a 10 percent match from the state.

E-mail: donna@desnews.com; spang@desnews.com

--------

Toxic Utah: Firms take pains to avoid polluter list
Sandy company spends millions to clean the air

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Deseret News
By Donna Kemp Spangler and Jerry D. Spangler http://www.deseretnews.com/dn/sview/1,3329,250011728,00.html

It's not exactly an honor list. In fact, industry bosses cringe whenever their companies make the Toxic Release Inventory - a catalog of the nation's worst polluters compiled annually by the Environmental Protection Agency.

"For businesses, it is typically the kind of list you don't want to be on," said Cal Alexander, vice president of operations for Becton-Dickinson, which makes medical devices at its Sandy plant.

Becton-Dickinson's Sandy plant has tried to avoid the list by changing the chemicals it uses from those that harm the environment to those that are less damaging. For instance, the company no longer releases ethylene oxide, a cancer-causing chemical used to sterilize the medical devices. Now, the company contracts for the sterilization process with a New Mexico firm that has state-of-the-art pollution-control equipment that captures most of the ethylene oxide gas before it is released into the atmosphere.

"We did not just ship the problem to New Mexico," Alexander insists. Instead, the New Mexico company offered a cleaner alternative.

"We chose the high road," he said. "We are a medical company. We think of ourselves as a company that helps people. We like to be thought of as a clean industry."

Becton-Dickinson is now trying to phase out another solvent that is linked to global warming. And it's making good strides.

"We're getting real close," Alexander said. In 1993, the company replaced dangerous, solvent-like Freon used as a lubricant on medical equipment with a chemical that is less harmful. And by 2002, the company will switch to an even cleaner substitute that doesn't have near the impact on ozone depletion.

"Industry, in general, is struggling to find substitute chemicals that work as well," Alexander said.

The company has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to reduce its pollution, and it has paid off environmentally. The Sandy plant is among the top 10 companies in North America with an environmental certification. "We were the first medical device company in North America to achieve it," Alexander said. "It is our measure of social responsibility to reduce our waste."

But a host of other Utah companies are still struggling.

Two make the list every year and are at or near the top of the nation's worst polluters. Magnesium Corp. of America emits more air pollution - chlorine mostly - than any other company in America.

And Kennecott makes the list because of releases of 33.9 million pounds of various toxic materials - mostly natural byproducts of copper mining - to the air, land and water.

Since 1987, the Environmental Protection Agency has required all manufacturing companies that emit pollutants to submit annual reports totaling the amount and type of emissions. In 1997, the types of industries required to report were expanded to include mining companies and power plants.

Mining companies like Kennecott are screaming foul because the materials being listed as toxic are usually nothing more than natural rocks being pulled out of the mountainside and left behind because they did not contain enough ore to be processed.

"The TRI is the most misleading inventory I know of," said Kennecott spokesman Louis Cononelos. "You move one rock and it becomes toxic. It makes no sense." Theoretically, the Toxic Release Inventory allows citizens to know the types of toxic substances released by companies in their neighborhoods.

In reality, "Knowing the pounds of exotic chemicals is not going to help people (assess the risks)," said Neil Taylor, an environmental scientist with the Utah Department of Environmental Quality. "There are a lot of questions about what the numbers really mean."

A more important question, he said, is how the companies manage the toxic chemicals and whether they are allowed to escape the confines of the business properties and contaminate neighborhoods. That question is not addressed in the TRI, nor is information provided about the dangers of particular chemicals.

"Gross poundage doesn't mean anything in terms of managing risk," Taylor said.

Still, for all its flaws, the TRI is the only tool whereby the public can readily determine what kinds of toxins are produced by industry in their neighborhoods. But it's fairly complex and esoteric, and without advanced degrees in chemistry and epidemiology, the report probably doesn't mean much to an individual trying to assess environmental risks.

More than anything, the TRI has become a tool for state environmental regulators and health officials who can now compare and contrast pollution data with health dangers. For example, epidemiologists looking at clusters of cancers or rare diseases now have a "one-stop shop" for pollution data from nearby businesses.

Taylor said environmental regulators often knew that chemicals were being released, but until the TRI they didn't know exactly how much, nor specific types. In some cases, regulators did not have an inkling of certain releases until the TRI.

"More than anything, the TRI has changed company policy," Taylor said. "They are uncomfortable reporting the chemicals, they don't want to be on the list."

Still, Taylor cautions against putting too much stock in the TRI. For starters, there are smokestack-sized loopholes in the TRI reporting requirements.

Citing an obscure EPA report, Taylor says the TRI represents only about 1 percent of all the toxic substances released.

Companies with fewer than 10 employees are not required to report. Nor are companies that emit less than 10,000 pounds annually of any single toxic chemical, even if the total of all chemicals is well above the threshold. Furthermore, only manufacturers, power companies and mining operations are required to report.

For example, hospitals operate medical waste incinerators, but they are not required to report. Nor are mom-and-pop dry cleaners or repair shops or auto body shops that use degreasers and solvents. And that has proven to be a vexing problem for state regulators.

"Chlorinated solvents were not managed properly in the past, and now we are finding them in shallow groundwater," Taylor said, pointing to a case where Salt Lake water officials are now treating a drinking-water well in Sugarhouse Park that has been contaminated with chlorinated solvents.

"Past disposal practices have created a lot of problems for us now," he said. "We have found they stay in the environment for a long, long time."

E-mail: donna@desnews.com; spang@desnews.com

-------

Top Utah polluters on EPA list

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Deseret News
http://www.deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,250011732,00.html

Manufacturing and government sources:

Magnesium Corp. of America: 57,691,060; chlorine; hydrochloric acid; 1-2-4 trimethylbenzene (Rowley, Tooele County)

Kennecott Utah Copper Smelter: 34,495,395; copper compounds; arsenic compounds; lead compounds (Magna)

Geneva Steel: 1,835,624; nitrate compounds; manganese compounds; zinc compounds (Vineyard, Utah County)

Western Zirconium: 1,783,000; nitrate compounds; ammonia; chlorine (Weber County)

Thiokol Propulsion: 1,012,229; hydrochloric acid; methyl tert-butyl ether; 1-1-1 trichloroethane (Promontory, Box Elder County)

Pacific States Cast Iron Pipe: 172,624; barium; phenol; manganese (Provo)

U.S. Air Force's Ogden Air Logistics Center: 172,402; methyl ethyl ketone; dichloromethane; phenol (Ogden)

Gossner Foods: 119,748; nitrate compounds (Cache County)

Becton Dickinson: 110,000; dichloro-fluoroethane (Sandy)

Alliant Aerospace-Bacchus Works: 97,709; hydrochloric acid; 1-1-1 trichloroethane; nitroglycerin (West Salt Lake County - Kearns, Magna, West Valley - up against the mountain)

Mining, power plant and waste dump sources:

Kennecott Utah Copper Mine: 405,388,216; copper compounds; manganese compounds; zinc compounds (Copperton)

Safety-Kleen: 15,148,128; manganese compounds; lead compounds; copper compounds (Grassy Mountain, Tooele County)

Barrick Resources-Mercur Gold Mine: 5,233,470; arsenic compounds; nitrate compounds; copper compounds (Tooele County)

Bonanza Power Plant: 1,910,370; barium; hydrochloric acid; vanadium (Unita County)

Intermountain Power Plant: 1,808,400; barium compounds; chromium compounds; manganese compounds (near Delta)

PacifiCorp Huntington Plant: 1,385,743; barium compounds; hydrogen fluoride; manganese compounds (Huntington, Emery County)

Envirocare of Utah: 1,364,359; lead; polychlorinated biphenyls; sodium dimethyldithiocarbamate (Clive, Tooele County)

Source: 1998 Toxic Release Inventory


-------- MILITARY

-------- drug war

Bush Gives Mexico Backing on Drive Against Narcotics

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By TIM WEINER with GINGER THOMPSON
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17MEXI.html?pagewanted=all

SAN CRISTÓBAL DE LOS RANCHOS, Mexico, Feb. 16 - Acknowledging that Americans' demand feeds drug traffic, President Bush signaled today that he would support Mexico in its efforts to end the annual ritual in which Congress requires the Mexican government to prove its commitment to the war against narcotics or face economic sanctions.

On his first trip outside the United States as president, Mr. Bush said his choice of Mexico was intended to show the importance of Mexico, and he used the occasion to open formal talks for resolving disputes over trade, immigration and the fight against drug trafficking.

With unusual candor, Mr. Bush said the reason that billions of dollars in drugs are shipped across Mexico is that people in the United States buy them.

Asked if he would work to end the annual drug certification process, which the Mexican government deeply resents, he said he was confident the administration of President Vicente Fox was committed to fighting the traffickers.

President Bush said he would deliver that message to Congress as lawmakers discuss proposals to end the certification process. The annual decision, in which the United States judges whether countries are living up to their commitments in the war on drugs, has been criticized in Mexico as a humiliating ritual and one that infringes on the nation's sovereignty.

After a seven-hour meeting, the two presidents agreed to begin cabinet-level talks to develop programs for ending violence against Mexican immigrants and expanding guest worker programs in the United States.

Officials from Washington indicated that they would comply with a recent Nafta panel finding that the United States was unfairly prohibiting Mexican trucks from carrying goods across the border. nd President Bush said he would move energy negotiations "to the level of presidents."

For most of the day, however, in a setting that was free of pomp and protocol, the two presidents spoke with each other as friends would. In words and tone, Mr. Bush tried to strike an alliance with a man who, ending decades of one-party rule by winning the Mexican presidency in December, has become a symbol of democracy there and a rising star on the world stage.

President Fox made clear that Mexico would stand as an equal with the United States as the two men work on a common agenda.

"Our nations are bound together by ties of history, family, values, commerce and culture," President Bush said in a news conference at President Fox's family ranch in the state of Guanajuato. "Today these ties give us an unprecedented opportunity. We have the chance to build a partnership that will improve the lives of citizens in both countries."

Mr. Bush added: "Geography has made us neighbors. Cooperation and respect will make us partners."

Before ending his remarks, President Fox looked at President Bush and, switching to English from Spanish, said, "Know that we consider you a friend to Mexico, a friend to Mexican people and a friend of mine."

Informality marked the meeting of the presidents, which was staged to seem not staged. Referred to by academics and taxi drivers alike as the "men in cowboy boots," they visited at the Fox family ranch in this dusty village in central Mexico.

Both leaders had said that, more than setting new policies, they wanted this to be a kind of meeting between old friends who happened to become presidents.

Mr. Fox and Mr. Bush met at least three times when Mr. Bush was governor of Texas. Even as Mr. Fox played host for Mr. Bush's first trip abroad as president, the Mexican could not stay cooped up for long in the trappings of power. They endured an arrival ceremony full of protocol with firm handshakes, warm smiles and a band playing lilting versions of both national anthems. But before getting down to work, President Fox, true to his image as an attentive son of ranchers, took the American home to meet his Mamá.

As maids emerged timidly from the kitchen, the presidents reached out with hearty handshakes as if they were just a couple of hands coming in for supper. One of the women seemed so swept up by the moment that she stared at President Bush and swooned. Before even getting into their most serious talks, the presidents were out of their blazers and ties, talking about the qualities of a good Mexican saddle. And in a piece of symbolic choreography, as the two presidents approached their lecterns to speak to the press, they deliberately crossed paths so that President Bush stood next to the flag of Mexico and President Fox next to the American flag.

But aides to President Fox said the informal appearances belied the substantive discussions that lasted through the whole meeting. The presidents talked about issues ranging from United States military aid to Colombia to the American military strike against Baghdad.

The two presidents talked about ways to work together to reduce the economic and educational disparities between Mexico and the United States.

Aides said that serious commitments were made, including an agreement by Mexico to begin giving back water to farmers in Texas, resolving a long-disputed water debt. There were even conversations about the importance of choosing common terms when trying to resolve issues that have long divided their nations.

Aides to President Fox said, for example, that they would reconsider using the word amnesty when talking about legal residency for the more than three million undocumented Mexicans living in the United States. And, aides to Mr. Fox said, they would seek words other than violence and brutality, when talking about the plight of immigrants who die along the border because they tend to incite fierce reactions in the United States and Mexico.

In a written agreement released yesterday by the two presidents, called the Guanajuato Proposal, the governments used the word migration, rather than immigration, as if the waves of Mexicans crossing the border were like flocks of birds flying north. And in numerous places throughout the document, the United States and Mexico, with unusual frankness about their respective strengths and failures, made commitments to resolve the issues that have most divided them.

Saying "migration is a tie that binds us, not divides us," the presidents appointed a working group to explore new policies that would help stem the tide of illegal immigration from Mexico to the United States and bolster protections for immigrants along the border and at work north of the border.

For Mexico, the working group will be led by Foreign Minister Jorge G. Castañeda and Interior Minister Santiago Creel. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and Attorney General John Ashcroft will represent the United States.

Both presidents said they would try to devise a common energy policy. Mr. Bush has spoken of seeking ways for the United States to import more natural gas, oil and electricity from Mexico. But Mexico cannot meet its own energy needs, as Mr. Fox acknowledged today. And Mexico's Constitution gives the government nearly complete control of the energy market, including energy production and transmission, making foreign investment difficult.

The issue "needs to be elevated to the presidential level," Mr. Bush said.

"We need more supply," he said. "Demand is far outstripping supply, which is creating a real problem for the working people of our respective countries."

Some of the most candid discussions revolved around the fight against drugs.

"The main reason why drugs are shipped through Mexico to the United States is because United States citizens use drugs," Mr. Bush said. "Our nation must do a better job of educating our citizenry about the dangers and evils of drug use."

Mr. Bush said there was a movement in Congress to re-examine the benefits and problems of the annual drug certification process. Every year since 1986, the White House has had to certify to Congress that Mexico is doing its part on the war on drugs.

A failure to certify would make Mexico potentially ineligible for many forms of United States assistance. Mr. Casteñeda has said in the past that Mexico finds the process irritating at best. And Mr. Bush said he intended to tell Congress that it had a trustworthy ally in President Fox.

"He's the kind of man you can look in the eye and know he's shooting straight with you," President Bush said of his Mexican counterpart.

President Bush added that he would tell members of Congress, "I firmly believe that Mr. Fox will do everything in his power to root out the drug lords."

-------- iraq

U.S., British Bomb Iraq

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Washington Post
By Thomas E. Ricks
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A16760-2001Feb16?language=printer

Two dozen U.S. and British aircraft bombed five radar and other antiaircraft sites around Baghdad yesterday with guided missiles in the first major military action of the Bush administration.

It was the largest airstrike against Iraq in two years and targeted sites near the Iraqi capital, a significant departure from the low-key enforcement of "no-fly" zones in the country's south and north, which the United States declared off-limits to Iraqi aircraft after the Persian Gulf War.

President Bush, speaking at a news conference in Mexico alongside Mexican President Vicente Fox, called the raid "routine." But it was widely interpreted in Washington and other world capitals as presaging a get-tough attitude by the new administration toward a country that has vexed U.S. policymakers for more than a decade.

"Saddam Hussein has got to understand we expect him to conform to the agreement that he signed after Desert Storm," Bush said.

Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), chairman of the House International Relations Committee, called the attack a signal that Bush "is not interested in simply maintaining an appearance of containment."

In a Pentagon briefing, U.S. military commanders described the raid as a response to Iraqi antiaircraft fire in recent weeks against U.S. and British aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones. "Iraqi air defenses had been increasing both their frequency and the sophistication of their operations," said Marine Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

But a senior Pentagon official said in an interview that the raid also was conducted because U.S. intelligence showed that the Iraqi military was on the verge of linking its antiaircraft command-and-control sites with underground, fiber-optic cables, which are difficult to tap or destroy. The timing of the raid was dictated by the need to destroy the links while they were still under construction, he said.

Iraqi television reported that one person was killed and nine injured in the attack, and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein vowed to fight back.

"They thought they would scare Iraq but they are wrong," he said in a statement read on television in Baghdad. "The more they continue their aggression, the stronger the Iraqi people . . . will be in facing them. We will fight them in the air, land and sea, and their aggression will deepen failure."

The airstrikes were condemned by several governments, including Russia and China, which have opposed U.S. policy on Iraq. "What the American militarists are doing at the start of the new administration's activity is a challenge to international security and the entire world community," said Col. Gen. Leonid Ivashov of the Russian Defense Ministry.

In military terms, the airstrikes were notable for their exclusive reliance on long-range, precision guided weapons. Although none of the U.S. aircraft crossed the 33rd parallel, the northern edge of the southern no-fly zone, four of the sites they bombed were miles away on the outskirts of Baghdad.

The most distant, labeled by the Pentagon as the Taji radar site, was more than 50 miles away. It was hit by AGM-130s, guided bombs that are directed to their targets by global positioning satellites. The U.S. military used AGM-130s in the 1999 Kosovo air campaign, but not at such long distances, a Pentagon official said.

"How will this day be remembered?" said Cmdr. Ward Carroll, a naval aviator who also is the author of "Punk's War," a forthcoming novel about patrolling the no-fly zones. "It will be remembered for the use of the next generation of precision weapons."

Newbold, the Joint Staff officer, said at a Pentagon news conference that the United States and Britain were forced to act by Iraq's increasing efforts to shoot down aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones. "It reached the point where it was obvious to our forces that they had to conduct operations to safeguard those pilots and the aircraft," he said.

Since the beginning of this year, the Iraqi military has fired at least 13 surface-to-air missiles at U.S. aircraft, compared with an average of about one a month in previous years, a Pentagon official said. In addition, he said, U.S. aircraft reported seeing antiaircraft artillery firing at them almost daily.

"Pilots [were] able to observe either the missile plumes or the bursting of the antiaircraft fire," Newbold said.

Worried by the increasingly aggressive Iraqi stance, Pentagon officials said, U.S. commanders in the Mideast recently asked for permission to execute a large-scale raid against radar sites that were picking up U.S. aircraft as they entered Iraqi airspace and then telling the operators of surface-to-air missiles where to fire.

The request was sent up the chain of command. Bush's national security advisers met Thursday, officials said. Later that day, Bush approved the strike.

About 50 U.S. aircraft -- fighter-bombers, aerial refuelers, command-and-control planes and electronic jammers -- took off from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman in the Persian Gulf and from bases in Kuwait, Bahrain and elsewhere in the region about 11:20 a.m. EST yesterday. They were accompanied by four British Tornado jets.

About two dozen aircraft actually dropped bombs or launched missiles -- Air Force F-15Es carrying AGM-130s, Navy F/A-18s carrying the similar AGM-154 "Joint Stand-Off Weapon," and the British Tornadoes, whose ordnance was not made public. They began hitting their five targets -- four around Baghdad, the fifth further south -- at 12:30 p.m. EST.

"These were long shots -- very long shots," said a Pentagon official who monitored the performance of the AGM-130s, which the Air Force began buying only six years ago. The long-range weapons, he added, allowed the warplanes "to stay outside the threat rings," a reference to the range of Iraqi missile batteries.

All the aircraft returned safely to their bases and to the Truman about 70 minutes later, officials said.

A preliminary assessment of the strikes "looked good," a Pentagon official said last night. But, he added, "We won't know for another 24 to 48 hours."

Officials said both publicly and privately that they did not expect the attack to be repeated in the near future. "We don't anticipate strikes like this soon," Newbold said. "We think we've accomplished what we were looking for . . . to degrade, disrupt the ability of the Iraqi air defenses to coordinate attacks against our aircraft."

Over the past year, the Air Force had taken a low-key approach to patrolling the no-fly zones. That de-escalation was partly a reaction to international criticism of civilian casualties in past raids and partly because commanders were waiting to see whether a new administration would bring a more vigorous Iraq policy. A side effect of that cautious stance was that some pilots became frustrated with patrolling the no-fly zones.

"Finally, teeth in the no-fly zone enforcement scheme," one Air Force officer exulted yesterday.

Since the first Bush administration ended the Persian Gulf War with Saddam Hussein still in power, the Iraqi leader has vexed U.S. efforts to constrain his military and force him from office. Iraq has been free of U.N. weapons inspections since December 1998, when inspectors were withdrawn hours before the United States and Britain launched airstrikes on Baghdad. U.S. officials believe Saddam Hussein has since redoubled efforts to develop chemical and biological weapons.

Senior members of the current Bush administration have called for strengthening the economic sanctions placed on Iraq after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. But some U.S. allies, both in Europe and the Arab world, have grown weary of the embargo and are urging that the sanctions be softened to ease the suffering of the Iraqi population.

As the campaign to isolate Saddam Hussein erodes -- international flights to Baghdad are becoming increasingly frequent and more countries are reestablishing diplomatic and commercial ties with the country -- some U.S. officials have urged a more aggressive, unilateral approach, including vigorous support for the Iraqi opposition and the creation of enclaves for Iraqi rebels within the no-fly zones.

The northern no-fly zone was created in spring 1991 to protect the Kurdish minority in northern Iraq, after the Kurds rose up against Saddam Hussein's government and fighting sent thousands of refugees streaming across the border into Turkey. The United States cited U.N. Security Council Resolution 688 -- which authorized the use of force to protect relief efforts in the area -- in establishing the no-fly zone.

The United States and its allies established the southern no-fly zone in August 1992 after Iraqi forces attacked Shi'a rebels who had revolted against Hussein. The southern zone, which initially extended to the 32nd parallel, was moved closer to Baghdad in 1996.

Bombing has been steady over the past decade, and twice the United States has launched short but intensive air campaigns. In 1996, during Operation Desert Strike, the United States fired 44 cruise missiles at military targets in southern Iraq.

In 1998, after U.N. weapons inspectors withdrew from Iraq, the United States and Britain waged a four-day air and cruise missile campaign called Operation Desert Fox. They launched 400 cruise missile strikes against approximately 100 sites, including presidential palaces, air defenses, intelligence facilities and economic targets.

-------- u.n.

U.N. Envoy Fears Palestinian Financial Collapse

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/17PALE.html

UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 16 - The special United Nations envoy to the Middle East warned today that without urgent economic aid, the Palestinian Authority might soon collapse, leading to "chaos and anarchy" in Palestinian areas.

"In our opinion, there is a situation developing where there is first a fiscal collapse, then an institutional collapse of the Palestinian Authority, which will lead to further violence and a situation which might get completely out of control," the envoy, Terje Rod-Larsen, said at a news conference.

Speaking to reporters after briefing Secretary General Kofi Annan, Mr. Rod-Larsen spoke of the possibility of violence "on a massive scale."

The secretary general "is very concerned and has instructed me to go to key European capitals and Washington to discuss the situation," he said, adding he would visit Washington next week.

The Palestinian Authority is fast running out of funds and within a few weeks will be unable to pay its salaries, he said. Much of the authority's problems are brought about because in the recent months of violence, Israel has begun to withhold value- added tax and customs revenues that it agreed to give the Palestinians.

The authority is going to need about $50 million a month in international aid, beginning this month, to keep it afloat until the local economy can start recovering, Mr. Rod-Larsen said.

He said he had already spoken with European Union officials and top Israeli leaders to "impress on them how acute the situation is."

---

U.S. Is Set to Assail China on Rights at U.N.

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By JANE PERLEZ
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17DIPL.html

WASHINGTON, Feb. 16 - In its first major policy decision regarding China, the Bush administration plans to sponsor a United Nations resolution next month condemning Beijing's record on human rights, officials said today. But it was unclear how vigorously it would seek the international support necessary to make the resolution a diplomatic success.

The decision follows a debate over the wisdom of maintaining the Clinton administration's emphasis on using the resolutions to censure China at the annual meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva. The efforts have won insufficient backing from other countries, and even some human rights advocates dispute the effectiveness of the exercise.

Although the American effort in recent years to organize international criticism of China's rights abuses has been a major irritant in relations with Beijing, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell was preparing a recommendation for the White House to move ahead, the officials said.

By deciding not to change course, the Bush administration will be sending a signal that at least in the early going, its relations with Beijing will depend on issues besides trade and security.

At home, the administration will be satisfying the demands of a Congressional coalition that includes Senators Jesse Helms, the conservative Republican of North Carolina, and Paul Wellstone, the liberal Democrat of Minnesota. Many saw the decision on the China resolution as an early test of the administration's commitment to human rights.

A number of rights groups have called for persistence on the resolution, pointing out that religious persecution has been particularly intense in China in the last year.

But rights advocates are divided on how useful the measure really is in improving rights in China, especially if the administration does not lobby its allies to garner support.

State Department officials who toured European capitals this month to test support for a resolution found very mixed reactions and little enthusiasm for joining the Americans at the annual Geneva meeting of the rights commission next month.

Not only are the Europeans cool to the plan, but the administration will also be proposing it to a panel dramatically changed in composition. The 53-member human rights commission now includes Libya, Malaysia, Vietnam and Syria.

Even as the administration appeared to be doing what some rights groups wanted, there was skepticism about its motives.

As Mike Jendrzejczyk, the Washington director for Asia of Human Rights Watch, put it, "Is this going to be done for domestic consumption, or to have a serious impact in Beijing - which will require high-level lobbying by the secretary of state and the president to get co-sponsors of the resolution?"

Stronger criticism came from John Kamm, a rights advocate who heads the Dui Hua Foundation, and who has been conducting an unofficial dialogue with Beijing on the release of political prisoners.

"I'm asking someone to explain to me how a resolution that will almost certainly fail and will not be supported by our allies can help the human rights situation in China," Mr. Kamm said. "I think the Chinese government will portray a failed resolution as a validation of their human rights policies."

Some diplomats - and rights specialists - argue that sponsoring a resolution satisfies an urge to wave a banner of protest but precludes the United States from bringing effective pressure on the Chinese to improve their record. After past rights resolutions in Geneva, those people say, Beijing has generally refused to discuss reforms because it has feared looking as though it was caving in to outside pressure.

"By sponsoring a resolution we greatly reduce the chance of a renewed bilateral human rights dialogue in which we could have handed over a comprehensive list of political and religious prisoners," Mr. Kamm said.

Experience has shown, Mr. Kamm said, that the more often a Chinese political prisoner is asked about by outsiders, the "better chance" the prisoner has of release.

The State Department's annual human rights report, due to be released next Friday, is expected to detail China's crackdown against the Falun Gong spiritual movement, as well as widespread use of torture.

As the State Department mapped its strategy on the rights resolution, the administration was also planning to nominate a new ambassador to Beijing, Clark T. Randt, a Hong Kong-based businessman, officials said. Mr. Randt was in Washington this week, but it was not clear how extensively he was consulted on the planned resolution.

-------- u.s.

The World Stage, Act I

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By FRANK BRUNI with DAVID E. SANGER
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17POLI.html?pagewanted=all

SAN CRISTÓBAL DE LOS RANCHOS, Mexico, Feb. 16 - On the first four days of what President Bush designated "national security week," he promised troops in Georgia a pay raise, visited a NATO outpost to describe his long-range plans for the military and went to West Virginia to sympathize with the troubles facing reservists - all visits intended to show how seriously he took and understood his role as commander in chief.

On the fifth day, he acted.

He consented to the Pentagon's request to bomb Iraq. Not hard enough to do much real damage or signal a major change in policy, but just hard enough to make the statement that Mr. Bush, not yet a month into his presidency, had arrived on the world stage; that despite his inexperience there, he was a player.

"Saddam Hussein has got to understand that we expect him to conform to the agreement that he signed after Desert Storm," Mr. Bush said here today. He was answering questions about his order, carried out just hours earlier and a long way away, to attack radar installations and command and control centers that Mr. Hussein had used to harass the British and American planes that are enforcing the no-flight zones in Iraq.

To some extent, the timing of the bombing raid today was dictated by Mr. Hussein, because it was a reaction to what American officials say was a deliberate test by the Iraqi leader of United States resolve.

But Mr. Bush stressed that he had been in control. "It is a mission about which I was informed," he said, "and I authorized."

Those words suggested that the message Mr. Bush was sending was intended not just for Iraq but for all the world, and for all the Americans with whom he is trying to establish as much presidential credibility as possible in the early weeks of his administration.

And that message - that he was approaching his role as a world leader without timidity - was reinforced by the timing of his first decisive foreign action and the circumstances in which Mr. Bush spoke about it.

Mr. Bush was, as it happened, on his first foreign trip, visiting President Vicente Fox of Mexico at his ranch here. It was a trip that afforded Mr. Bush the opportunity not only to reiterate his message that Latin America matters deeply to the United States, but also to travel to the only foreign country he had visited with any frequency in the past, a country with which he inevitably became familiar in his six years as governor of Texas.

He had met Mr. Fox on three previous occasions, and the comfort that Mr. Bush felt here, in the company of a man who has become a Mexican doppelgänger of sorts, showed. He and Mr. Fox ditched their suit jackets and ties less than 90 minutes after Mr. Bush had arrived and stayed in that casual attire when they stepped to twin lecterns to talk to reporters this afternoon. Each man wore black cowboy boots that peeked out mischievously from beneath the bottoms of the pants.

Mr. Bush chuckled at times, called out to reporters by the nicknames that he has given them and regularly shot smiles Mr. Fox's way. There was a subtle message, too - that Mr. Bush was confident enough to take military action without actually being in the situation room.

The White House press secretary, Ari Fleischer, said Mr. Bush authorized the action on Thursday and knew that it was about to begin even as he stepped off Air Force One at the airport in León around 9 a.m. New York time and gave Mr. Fox a light hug on the tarmac.

In his comments, Mr. Bush repeatedly presented the military action as anything but a big deal, a mantra repeated by his national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, who was traveling with him, as was Secretary of State Colin L. Powell.

"I want to assure those who don't understand U.S. policy that this is a routine mission," Mr. Bush said of the Iraq strikes. "Some of the missions require the commander in chief to be informed. This was such a mission. It is not the first time it has happened, regrettably so."

Mr. Bush added that this did not represent a change in foreign policy, just an emphatic reiteration of what was in place. He spoke under the trees, with shadows dappling his face, and he spoke softly. But he also spoke firmly, especially about Mr. Hussein, and, in a sense, was picking up where his father left off.

"We're going to watch very carefully as to whether or not he develops weapons of mass destruction," he said. "And if we catch him doing so, we'll take appropriate action."

Current and former national security officials said Mr. Bush had wanted to put down an early marker that he would renew efforts to contain Iraq, not only militarily, but also by breathing new life into the sanctions that have gradually fallen apart.

Mr. Bush, in an interview last month, said that those sanctions now resembled "Swiss cheese," and he left no doubt that he would find a way to stop Mr. Hussein from rebuilding his military power.

The president was not the only one flexing his muscle. Ms. Rice, a former Russia specialist in the previous Bush administration, also ventured into new territory. And yet she, too, struck a demeanor and tone of nonchalance about the bombing, signaling that the administration was ready to deal forcefully with Iraq.

In fact, other administration members have experience and unfinished business with Iraq. Vice President Dick Cheney was the defense secretary in the Persian Gulf war, and Secretary Powell was the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

Next week, General Powell plans to visit Saudi Arabia and Egypt, whose response to the bombing is uncertain. Both were crucial in the gulf war, and both have seen a resurgence of public sympathy with the Iraqi people as they endure hardships brought on by the sanctions.

But whatever lies ahead for General Powell, it was Mr. Bush who was going through a rite of passage, the culmination of a week that had amounted to a carefully orchestrated exercise of his claim to the role of a resolute, steady caretaker of national security.

In fact, he seemed to go almost out of his way today to demonstrate how utterly relaxed he felt in another country, dealing with a foreign leader on a brief visit that included time for scenic photo opportunities.

And when he stepped up to the lectern, he talked about big themes and big dreams - free trade throughout the Americas; extensive cooperation in energy production among the United States, Canada and Mexico; and unfettered trust between the United States and Mexico on efforts to stop drug trafficking.

"Ours is going to be an active foreign policy," Mr. Bush said. "It's going to be consistent and firm." Those were words of assurance, matched by actions far away that seemed to be saying the very same thing.

---------

Cadet at VMI is pregnant, school says

Saturday, February 17, 2001
Philadelphia Inquirer
News in Brief
http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/02/17/national/BITS17.htm

A cadet at the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Va., is pregnant, less than four years after the 162-year-old military school admitted its first female students, VMI officials said yesterday. The cadet, who was not identified, was offered a chance to take a leave from the school or move to separate quarters but chose to continue living in the barracks.


-------- OTHER

-------- environment

Test Case on Property Rights Challenges Wetland Curbs

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By CAREY GOLDBERG
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/national/17PROP.html?pagewanted=all

WESTERLY, R.I., Feb. 13 - In a little over a week, Anthony Palazzolo - a former auto wrecker, 80-year- old father of six and the kind of outspoken, tenacious guy a lot of people around here call a character - is finally getting his day in the big court. And depending on how the United States Supreme Court rules, experts say, Mr. Palazzolo could enter the pantheon of plaintiffs whose cases have changed property rights law in America.

"In my lighter moments," Mr. Palazzolo said as he trod a dirt road leading along his property to the edge of wave-raked Winnapaug Pond, "I say this is my road to fame and fortune."

Fame, maybe, at least in land-use circles. But fortune? That is the question. At issue is about 18 acres of wetlands here on the pond's shores, puddled in spots and fringed here and there by tall plumed reeds, across the street from fine Atlantic Ocean beachfront.

Mr. Palazzolo has been coming to this beach for 75 years, he says, and when he bought the land here - in 1959 or 1978, depending on how you interpret his dealings - he envisioned dozens of beach houses, a beach club, or he says, "whatever the law would allow."

These days, the law allows virtually nothing; such wetlands are considered environmentally precious and subject to heavy restrictions.

All right, Mr. Palazzolo says, then compensate him for the value he has lost by not being able to build here.

"This land had rights," he said, "After the sweep of a pen, it had no rights. Where did they go to? The state got them. How much did it pay for them? Zero."

Such lawsuits have fueled - and many have been fueled by - a national conservative movement to defend private property rights. Cases abounded in the courts, and how they are resolved has depended on their specifics. But the central principle at work is the Fifth Amendment clause saying that if the government takes a person's property, it must pay "just compensation." The question in cases like Mr. Palazzolo's is: When does a regulation that does not physically seize property, but does deny the owner the ability to use it as he wants, become a "taking" that merits just compensation?

Mr. Palazzolo's case, which will be heard on Feb. 26, has a couple of extra twists, raising the question of whether a property owner has a right to seek compensation, even if the regulations were already in place when he bought the land, said Eric Grant, a lawyer for the Pacific Legal Foundation who is working on the case. (Rhode Island created its coastal commission in the early 1970's, so if the court decides that Mr. Palazzolo bought the land in 1978, the regulations were already in place.)

"It doesn't really matter that the government tells you it's going to violate your constitutional rights," Mr. Grant said in a telephone interview from Sacramento, where his group is based. "That shouldn't prevent you from asserting your rights or seeking legal redress when your rights have been violated."

"If the government says, `Look, in this neighborhood we're going to conduct strip searches without probable cause," he said, "and if you don't want to be subject to that, don't come here, they've given you notice. I think we all agree that really doesn't matter; if they go ahead and do that, the fact they told you ahead of time makes no difference to the court."

Sheldon Whitehouse, the attorney general of Rhode Island, will be arguing the state's side against Mr. Palazzolo. The case, he said, "will help define the boundary of permissible land use regulation by states, and that has big consequences for environmental protection."

"Mr. Palazzolo is asserting in this case that because what he claims to be the most valuable use of his property is prohibited, that the state of Rhode Island therefore has to buy the property from him at the value of its highest and best use," he said. "So if the Supreme Court accepted the extreme position, one could arguably have a situation in which, in fairly short order, taxpayers would have to buy property in order to protect it from development."

For many years, Mr. Palazzolo said, he pursued the case on his own as the state turned down one development application after another. But after he lost in the Rhode Island Supreme Court last year, the Pacific Legal Foundation, one of the legal leaders of the property rights movement, found him as it trawled by computer for cases it could use to advance its national property rights agenda, and will represent him at the Supreme Court.

Mr. Palazzolo has become well- versed on property rights law over the years. He does not seem an angry ideologue, though. Mainly, he sounds frustrated. "I wish it were easier," he said. But whatever the outcome, he said, "I'll at least be at peace with myself - I'll know I didn't quit."

In a two-page summary he recently typed up of his case, he talks about his need to leave "character and property" to his children, and brings in colonists who felt so strongly about their rights they challenged the king of England. "No one was about to tell them that the right to own and use property was conditional," he wrote.

At another point, he wrote: "Palazzolo also feels that, at any time, the state and he could have sat and resolved this problem years ago. The state, in refusing to do so, sent a message that they could, by the use of police powers, gain control of this property."

This property seems to bring out a softer side of Mr. Palazzolo sometimes. "You sit on that deck and watch the sun set," he said, referring to his little cottage, called The Great Escape. "It's out of this world, the many hues of purple."

-------- spying

Clinton Did Not Consult C.I.A. Chief on Pardon, Official Says

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By JAMES RISEN
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/politics/17DEUT.html

WASHINGTON, Feb. 16 - George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, was not consulted by President Clinton on his decision to pardon the former director John M. Deutch on Mr. Clinton's final day in office, a United States intelligence official said today.

In fact, Mr. Tenet was at the Capitol attending President Bush's swearing-in when he was told about news reports of Mr. Deutch's pardon, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

White House officials had not consulted any Central Intelligence Agency officials about whether to issue the pardon, and C.I.A. officials found out about it only after it was reported on television the morning of Jan. 20, just before President Bush's inauguration, the official said.

President Clinton's pardon of Mr. Deutch came as the former intelligence chief was in the midst of negotiating a plea agreement with prosecutors on charges stemming from accusations that he had mishandled classified material while director.

The Deutch pardon has not generated nearly the controversy surrounding Mr. Clinton's decision to grant clemency to the fugitive financier Marc Rich, but some members of Congress have now begun to question the decision. The chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence have sent a letter to the C.I.A. asking if officials there were consulted on the decision.

United States intelligence officials said the Deutch pardon caught them by surprise because they were expecting a possible last-minute pardon of the convicted Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard. In 1998, when Israeli leaders were pressing Mr. Clinton to grant clemency to Mr. Pollard, Mr. Tenet objected and told the president he would resign if he agreed to the Israeli demands. Mr. Clinton never did pardon Mr. Pollard.

Since Mr. Deutch's pardon, Mr. Tenet has formally revoked the former director's security clearances, officials added. Mr. Tenet had suspended the clearances in August 1999, after an investigation by the C.I.A's inspector general into Mr. Deutch's handling of classified material.

Mr. Deutch's lawyer, Terrence O'Donnell, did not respond today to a request for comment.

White House officials did ask the C.I.A. for its views on another pardon, that of a former Navy analyst, Samuel Loring Morison. In 1985 Mr. Morison was convicted of giving a British publication classified spy satellite photographs of a Soviet nuclear aircraft carrier. His conviction for disclosing classified information to the press was upheld after the Supreme Court refused to hear his appeal in 1988.

On Jan. 11, the White House asked the C.I.A. for its views on a possible pardon for Mr. Morison. That was the first the agency had heard that Mr. Clinton was considering a pardon for him, an official said. The C.I.A. responded by telling the White House that it opposed the pardon. The next thing the C.I.A. heard on the matter was when Mr. Morison's pardon was announced on Jan. 20, an intelligence official said. That same request for a C.I.A. review was never sought on the Deutch pardon, officials emphasized.

American intelligence officials believe that Mr. Tenet's strong opposition to the Pollard pardon may have made Mr. Clinton reluctant to seek his advice on whether to grant clemency to Mr. Deutch. The C.I.A.'s investigation into Mr. Deutch began as he was leaving the job in late 1996.

---

In Spy Hunt, Peru Wants U.S. to Make a Better Effort

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By CLIFFORD KRAUSS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17PERU.html

LIMA, Peru, Feb. 16 - The Peruvian government called on the Bush administration today to step up its efforts to apprehend Vladimiro Montesinos, the fugitive former Peruvian spy chief, who has long ties to the Central Intelligence Agency.

Mr. Montesinos fled the country four months ago to escape drug and gun-running charges, and his whereabouts are unknown.

"There are many fugitives in the world today but not many with connections to a particular agency of the United States government," Justice Minister Diego García Sayan said in an interview today.

"You can deduce that there is a special moral obligation in this case to offer Peruvian authorities an extraordinary effort that responds to that responsibility."

Mr. Montesinos was the most powerful official in the government of President Alberto K. Fujimori, which collapsed late last year in a series of scandals. The former spy chief left thousands of videotapes behind, which prosecutors say show his involvement in bribing election officials, judges, politicians and journalists in an effort to keep Mr. Fujimori in power.

Prosecution documents allege that Mr. Montesinos built an organized- crime racket in alliance with senior military officers, first by accepting protection money from international narcotics traffickers and later by siphoning off funds from military arms purchases. Prosecutors also assert that $54 million of $70 million found in Swiss bank accounts linked to Mr. Montesinos came from arms trafficking.

Mr. Montesinos's ties to the Central Intelligence Agency date back to the 1970's, when he was a middle- ranking officer in a leftist military government friendly to Cuba. He was caught stealing documents pertaining to arms purchases from the Soviet Union, and was later cashiered and briefly imprisoned.

During most of the 1990's, Mr. Montesinos led government anti- drug efforts and personally took charge of a Peruvian National Intelligence Service unit set up by the C.I.A. to combat drug trafficking. Former United States officials say Mr. Montesinos was the only official in the Fujimori government capable of coordinating law enforcement and military agencies at a time when Peru was the leading producer of coca for cocaine trafficking.

Mr. Montesinos was last reportedly seen in December in Venezuela while seeking plastic surgery. The Venezuela government denies that he is still there.

In recent weeks, several Peruvian lawmakers have charged that the C.I.A. continues to protect Mr. Montesinos - which the American ambassador, John Hamilton, has repeatedly denied. "The U.S. government is cooperating fully in the Montesinos investigation, both in the search and the investigation of specific corruption charges," Mr. Hamilton said today.

But Mr. García Sayan said today: "We have no explicit indication of specific actions or a special strategy that the United States is mounting internationally to find Vladimiro Montesinos."

He said Interpol, an international police agency that has a strong American presence, was leading the international effort to find Mr. Montesinos.

Mr. García Sayan strongly distanced himself from the allegations that the C.I.A. was protecting Mr. Montesinos, calling them unproven and "irresponsible."

But he said the United States should do more in the search "that corresponds to the special nature of the circumstances."

He added that Peruvian evidence suggesting Mr. Montesinos's involvement in gun-running to leftist guerrillas in Colombia meant that "this also is a matter of national interest for the United States."

Mr. García Sayan said he would like Washington to share with Peruvian officials declassified intelligence documents that might shed light on Mr. Montesinos's criminal activities.

He said that Economy Minister Javier Silva Ruete, meeting with State Department officials in Washington last week, had requested more help in tracking down Mr. Montesinos, and that Carlos Alzamora, the Peruvian ambassador to Washington, was also pressing the issue.

-------- terrorism

Terrorism in Equador Takes Its Toll on Families in Oregon

February 17, 2001
New York Times
By SAM HOWE VERHOVEK
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/national/17HOST.html?pagewanted=all

GOLD HILL, Ore., Feb. 16 - It has been more than four months now, and Gold Hill is still waiting for some good news from Ecuador.

"I don't want to say anything more until I know my brother's on the plane and on his way home," Mike Derry said today.

His brother, Steve Derry, was among the 10 workers, 4 of them employed by a helicopter company here in southern Oregon, who were kidnapped last October at an oilfield camp in Ecuador.

"I just don't want to jinx anything," Mr. Derry explained.

What Mr. Derry feared jinxing was the latest flurry of hope that came from Ecuador in recent days about the workers, who are at the center of ransom demands by a jungle-based paramilitary group that has already shot and killed one of its hostages, according to the Ecuadorean government. That victim, Ronald Sander, 54, of Sunrise Beach, Mo., was found in the jungle on Jan. 31, shot five times in the back, his body draped in a white sheet on which was scrawled in Spanish: "I am a gringo. For nonpayment of ransom."

On Wednesday, the head of Ecuador's military forces, Vice Adm. Miguel Saona, announced that the kidnappers had agreed to an unspecified ransom deal and to let their deadline for killing another captive pass without violence. The International Red Cross was put on standby to assist in the exchange that would free the captives. But as of this evening, there was no word of any such activity, and friends and family members here were left waiting, as they also were in New Zealand, the home of one of the helicopter company's kidnapped employees, and in Wyoming, Chile and Argentina, the homes of other hostages. (Two other men originally abducted, both from France, escaped a few days after the kidnapping.)

The entire kidnapping episode has been cloaked not only in a considerable degree of mystery, but also, at least until last week, of muted reaction, as relatives largely followed what they called the implorings of the companies not to create waves that could endanger negotiations with the kidnappers. But after Mr. Sander was shot, several relatives, including those of the men from here, started speaking out. At the Erickson Air-Crane Company, the helicopter company here, friends and family members held a vigil on Feb. 7, pressing it to pay ransom demands.

"Pay up," said one sign held aloft at the rally. Others proclaimed, "Bring our men home" and "We want results."

And some relatives recently set up a Web site, soshostages.com, with updates about the hostage situation.

"This event has been a carefully guarded secret for four months at the request of the companies involved," the Web site says. "For the sake of negotiations, the family and friends of the hostages have silently waited, prayed and hoped with the only result being the brutal murder of one of the American hostages, Ronald Sander."

"Ron was shot to death by the terrorists," the site said. "This tragedy ended our silence."

The site does not solicit donations, though some relatives of the men have tried to start a fund that might be used to raise money to pay the kidnappers. Sheila Sander, the widow of Ronald Sander, who was also a father of five grown children, has also released a statement urging the companies who employ the men to reach a deal.

"People need to know that these are just working-class people being held captive," Ms. Sander said. "The oil companies should pay the money. Please don't let another family go through this."

The Associated Press, quoting unnamed police sources, reported from Ecuador today that the kidnappers had agreed to release the hostages for a payment of $13 million. The news agency said negotiators for the companies involved had insisted that the abductors first produce proof that the captives were alive and well, and it said the release process could take several days.

The agency also said that about 150 police troopers, bearing assault rifles and bulletproof vests and dressed in camouflage uniforms, had landed in the jungle town of Lago Agrio on Wednesday and were deployed to an area near the Colombian border. There, the abductors - recently described by the United States ambassador to Ecuador, Gwen Clare, as "a bloodthirsty, totally criminal organization" - are believed to have their base. The agency said that the group was solely motivated by greed and that it was not allied with Colombian leftists, as initially suspected.

That sort of activity came in marked contrast to the quiet, nervous waiting that is going on here in this placid little place, where yellow ribbons and bows are hung throughout in honor of the hostages and a sign at the edge of downtown says: "Welcome to Gold Hill - a quiet city - all loud and unnecessary noises are prohibited."

Three of the hostages - Steve Derry, 40; Arnold Alford, 41; and Jason Weber, 29 - are residents of Gold Hill and employees of the helicopter company, which is based in nearby Central Point and builds, operates and maintains heavy-lift helicopters. A fourth employee, Dennis Corrin, 52, is from New Zealand.

The company did not return telephone calls but did issue a statement from its chief operating officer, Lee Ramage.

"With regard to recent reports of developments in Ecuador," Mr. Ramage said, "Erickson Air-Crane will neither confirm nor deny these, or any other, reports until all hostages are safely home with their families."

Christina Slover, a waitress at El Rogue Café, a local restaurant, said most people in town were trying to protect the families' privacy by not speaking out today. "Nobody wants to say too much, especially with things getting so close to freedom," she explained. "We're all just praying, really, really hard."

After Mr. Sander's death, relatives of another hostage, David Bradley, of Casper, Wyo., spoke out. Mr. Bradley, 41, is an oilfield platform technician for Helmerich & Payne, the same Tulsa-based company for which Mr. Sander worked.

His sister, Julie Bradley, an assistant principal at an elementary school in Denver, said she had been silent for months on the company's advice, but was now urging some sort of deal. She said she knew the United States government generally had a "no-negotiation policy with terrorists," but, she said, "Somebody's got to do something. People are dying now."

And Mr. Bradley's uncle, Gregory Bradley of Phoenix, said he was abandoning his reticence.

"They're saying: `Keep a low profile. Don't make any noise,'" Mr. Bradley told reporters in early February, just after Mr. Sander's body was found. "And I think now that one person is dead, that's not the way to go. I think we need to get everybody in the world involved in this and get those young men and take them home, because it's only money."

---

Six charged in Britain under anti-terrorism act

02/17/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2001-02-17-britain-terrorism.htm

LONDON (AP) - Six Algerian men arrested in a three-day crackdown by British anti-terrorism police were charged Saturday with planning terrorist acts and conspiring to commit fraud.

Metropolitan Police would not comment on what prompted the arrests of nine Algerians and one Jordanian between Tuesday and Thursday, saying only that it was a single operation by anti-terrorism and security branches.

Six of the Algerians were charged at a London magistrates court with possession of materials including computers, electronic equipment and false identity documents suspected of being used to prepare for acts of terrorism, according to a police statement.

They were also charged with conspiring to defraud banks and other financial institutions by manufacturing false credit cards. They were to remain in custody until a second court appearance on Feb. 22.

Three other suspects, including the Jordanian, have been released but are subject to further questioning. A 34-year-old Algerian remains in custody but has not been charged.

Police and Foreign Office authorities provided no further details. Algerian diplomats could not be reached for comment.

-------- activists

BACKING FOR EX-OFFICIAL

February 17, 2001
New York Times
World Briefing
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/17/world/17BRIE.html?pagewanted=all

UKRAINE: Hundreds of protesters chanting "Yulia!" marched through Kiev demanding the release of Yulia V. Timoshenko, the former deputy prime minister arrested on corruption charges that she claims are politically motivated. Ms. Timoshenko, left, waged a battle last year to bring transparency to the corrupt energy sector. The Interfax news agency said up to 1,000 marchers from Ms. Timoshenko's Fatherland Party picketed the prosecutor general's office in central Kiev, the scene of large protests against President Leonid D. Kuchma this winter. Patrick E. Tyler (NYT)

THE AMERICAS

COLOMBIA: PEASANTS PROTEST Thousands of peasants blocked highways in the volatile northeast to protest President Andrés Pastrana's plans to open peace talks and cede territory to a second guerrilla faction. Mr. Pastrana threatened to take the roads back by force if the government found that right-wing paramilitary forces were behind the demonstrations. As many as 20,000 villagers have joined the protests. (AP)

INDONESIA: STUDENTS AGAINST PRESIDENT President Abdurrahman Wahid canceled a visit to a college in Yogyakarta, 240 miles east of Jakarta, after more than 1,000 students defied police water cannons, blocked the campus' gates and demanded that he resign over corruption allegations. (AP)

ZIMBABWE: OPPOSITION LEADER CHARGED Continuing its crackdown on the opposition, the authorities charged the leader of the opposition party, Morgan Tsvangirai, left, for inciting violence at a rally in September. At the rally, Mr. Tsvangirai warned President Robert Mugabe, "If you don't want to go peacefully, we will remove you violently." Mr. Tsvangirai, who was summoned to court and then released, is the third opposition party member to be arrested on such charges in the last week. Rachel L. Swarns (NYT)

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Psychiatric Abuse by China Reported in Repressing Sect

February 18, 2001
New York Times
By ERIK ECKHOLM
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/18/world/18CHIN.html?pagewanted=all

BEIJING, Feb. 17 - China's crackdown on the Falun Gong spiritual movement is focusing new attention on Beijing's practice of imprisoning dissenters in psychiatric hospitals.

In the government's campaign to discredit Falun Gong, the official press here has openly suggested that believers are mentally disturbed and need treatment. Hundreds of defiant followers have been forcibly hospitalized and medicated, according to reports from Falun Gong and from human rights monitors.

A new report has further stoked alarm abroad by documenting an unexpectedly rich history of questionable psychiatric practices aimed at stifling political dissenters.

"But what's surprising now is the sharp increase in cases," said Robin Munro, a British researcher and author of the report, which appeared in the Columbia Journal of Asian Law. He said the rise was attributable to the government's 18-month-old crackdown on Falun Gong, a widespread spiritual movement that the government has condemned as a dangerous cult.

The new attention on China's abuses comes as the country has been trying to burnish its human rights image, hoping to be chosen as the site for the 2008 Olympics. Bush administration officials nonetheless said on Friday that they would condemn China's record at an annual United Nations forum in Geneva.

Apart from the wrenching decade of Mao's Cultural Revolution, which ended in 1976, China has not been known for the systematic abuses of psychiatry that occurred in the Soviet Union, where hundreds of dissidents were spuriously diagnosed as schizophrenic and locked away. And Chinese and Western experts have praised the broader field of psychiatry here for advancing under difficult conditions and becoming more scientific.

But with the Falun Gong crackdown, concern over the political misuse of psychiatry is rising. And outside Falun Gong, political cases like that of Cao Maobing, a worker in a state-owned silk mill in Jiangsu Province, have attracted international attention.

Last year, Mr. Cao was in trouble with authorities after he protested against corruption and tried to organize fellow workers into an independent trade union. Then in December, one day after he spoke with foreign reporters about his complaints, the police took him to a psychiatric hospital, where he has been medicated and forced to undergo electroshock therapy, said relatives and friends who insist that he is not insane but a determined advocate.

The hospital director says a committee of 17 experts has declared that Mr. Cao suffers "paranoid psychosis."

Even given such cases, Mr. Munro said official data indicated that China's political use of psychiatric confinement had declined significantly in the 1990's, before Falun Gong was banned a year and a half ago.

Now, he said, "the new repression of Falun Gong has sounded a loud warning bell."

"The mental-pathology model is being extended to religious nonconformists," Mr. Munro charged. He calls this a potentially ominous harbinger as China enters an era of rapid social change.

That fear is vehemently countered by leading Chinese psychiatrists, supported by some experts in the West, who say the fervent spiritual practices of Falun Gong present a special case.

Mr. Munro's report casts special attention on a secretive, police-managed system of 20 centers for the criminally insane. Critics say those hospitals may harbor the worst examples of political abuse, although they have not generally been used for Falun Gong believers.

Alarmed by the Falun Gong reports and by the evidence in Mr. Munro's article of a broader history of problems than many had realized, medical and rights groups abroad are starting a global campaign to condemn psychiatric abuses in China and to push for access to suspect hospitals by outside experts.

"We hope that outside pressure can end this form of repression," said Robert van Voren, general secretary of the Geneva Initiative on Psychiatry, a coalition of European and American doctors that drew world attention to Soviet misdeeds.

"With China's desire to host the 2008 Olympics, I don't think they'll want another scandal," Mr. van Voren said in an interview.

The group has started lobbying national psychiatric associations around the world to consider censuring or suspending China at next year's meeting of the World Psychological Association.

But many Chinese psychiatrists, supported by some Western experts, insist that comparisons with the former Soviet Union are misleading and that political malpractice by their profession is uncommon today.

"Our biggest problem is not that normal people are diagnosed as mentally ill, but that ill people are not getting the evaluation and treatment they need," said Dr. Tian Zu'en, chief of forensic psychiatry at Anding Psychiatric Hospital, run by the Bureau of Health in Beijing.

Dr. Tian said that while there might be a few examples around the country of people in the criminal system having been committed to hospitals without the required scientific evaluation, the problem "should not be wildly blown out of proportion."

Mr. Munro, the report author, said the problem was ultimately rooted outside psychiatry, in China's repression of independent political speech and organizing.

"Sane or insane, these people are not committing criminal offenses by international standards," he said. Those who have mental disorders should be treated in a medical rather than a criminal setting, he said.

Mr. Munro hazards a calculation that since 1980, at least 3,000 people who were arrested for some kind of "political" crime were referred for psychiatric evaluation, with many of them deemed mentally ill and confined for some period.

"We don't know how many of these people were mentally disordered," Mr. Munro said. "What we know is that the official threshold for doubting the sanity of these individuals is very low."

His review of official documents, Mr. Munro said, indicated that specific types of "political criminals" are most likely to be referred to psychiatrists. These include persistent petitioners, those who shout or post anti-Communist slogans and those who display what the police see as "a perplexing absence of any normal instinct for self-preservation" in the face of certain arrest.

Citing Chinese textbooks, Mr. Munro shows that diagnostic concepts like "political mania" and "litigious mania" have received mention here within the last decade. As a residue of such ideas, he argues, some people who are especially driven or eccentric in their actions may be improperly labeled as psychotic.

In Western societies, he said, many of these same people might be seen as odd or even as neurotic or suffering from personality disorders, but forced confinement would not be an issue.

In an example often cited by human rights groups, a politically independent worker in Beijing named Wang Wanxing was diagnosed as a "paranoid psychotic" after his arrest in 1992 for unfurling a pro-democracy banner in Tiananmen Square. He spent the next seven years in a police hospital for the criminally insane.

He was sent home in early 1999 and seemed perfectly lucid to acquaintances. But later that year - after he said he intended to hold a news conference to denounce his treatment - he was taken back to the center, where he remains.

In response to inquiries from the United Nations, Chinese authorities said an appraisal by hospital doctors "had determined that he was suffering from paranoia, that some of his actions were governed by wishful thinking, that he had lost his normal capacity for recognition and was irresponsible."

Dr. Yu Qingbo, deputy chief of forensic psychiatry at Anding Hospital, said Chinese psychiatrists - including those at the centers run by the police - use diagnostic criteria consistent with those in the West.

Both Dr. Yu and Dr. Tian said it was usually not hard to distinguish between a sane, committed political dissident and a person who is lost in delusions. "If true dissidents are sent to us and we falsely claim they are ill, then we can be accused of trying to protect them," Dr. Yu said.

Likewise, Dr. Tian said, it is usually not hard to distinguish between a religious believer in a hypnotic or "altered state" - who is not considered ill - and a person whose ego is shattered. "Around the world, all psychiatrists could agree on that," he said.

More difficult to discern, he said, were cases where a person joins a religious sect while in the early stages of developing psychosis, a common phenomenon that can require longer-term observation.

Another psychiatrist here said that abusive practices were more likely outside the major cities, where trained doctors are scarcer and the police may hold greater influence over doctors.

Like many experts here, this doctor asked why the authorities would need to resort to psychiatric commitments at all. "They have labor camps everywhere, and they've shown they aren't afraid to use them," the doctor said. "Why go to the trouble and expense of psychiatric confinement?"

A leading Western expert on Chinese psychiatry, Dr. Arthur Kleinman of Harvard University, said the abuses "are lodged mainly in the mental hospitals run by the police."

"Getting observers into that sector is important," he said. "But what I fear is that the entire profession will be unfairly tarnished in what will amount to a global witch hunt."

------- Onelist (submissions from subscribers)