------- Index of Articles

NUCLEAR
Some cheesy '50s flicks actually reflect nuclear era fears
US, China Discuss Missiles
Startech Environmental Ships Japan's First Plasma Converter
U.S. Envoy Says Russia Has Time in Missile Talks
Russian book sheds light on missile
Russia Shipyard Prepares to Raise Kursk
U.S. Envoy Fails to Sway Russia on ABM Pact
Why Scrap the ABM Treaty?
Bush Says U.S. to Quit Arms Pact on 'Our Timetable'
Treaty Exit Could Unleash Criticism
USA missile defenses
Rumsfeld: New Strategy Near
Ultimate Conservative Leaves Senate Without an Heir

MILITARY
Israeli riot-gear sale fuels concern
Colombian Deal With Rebels Is Vexing U.S.
Colombia on Offensive vs. Rebels
Israel Kills 6 in Series Of Clashes
Israeli Army Enters Palestinian Area of Hebron
NAVY MAY SEEK EXEMPTIONS FROM ENVIRONMENTAL LAWS
Bush Is Said to Pick General in Air Force to Lead Military
Rumsfeld Avoids Weapons Discussions

OTHER
UtiliCorp, FPL Energy power up wind farm in Kansas
EPA ANNOUNCES $2 MILLION FOR BROWNFIELDS CLEANUP
$4 MILLION PROJECT WILL CLEANUP UNDERGROUND STORAGE TANKS
NASA Pulls Plug on Costly Satellite
Nordic states ask Britain to cut nuclear pollution
Virtuous Globalization
The quest for certifiably eco-friendly lumber
'Good wood' labeling: Can it save Asia's tropical forests?
Scientists Question Report on Genes
China, in a Switch, Concedes It Is Facing AIDS Epidemic
Turkish Watchdog Says Reports of Torture Soaring
Lower the Limousine Windows
Just say no to global summits
Cameras nab 15,000 speeders in 10 days
White House Still Undecided on Proposal to Limit Leaks

ACTIVISTS
Activists Urge U.S. on UN Meeting
Anti-Nuclear Activists Deliver Opening Message



-------- NUCLEAR

Some cheesy '50s flicks actually reflect nuclear era fears

By ROBERT W. BUTLER -
The Kansas City Star
08/23/01
http://www.kcstar.com/item/pages/printer.pat,fyi/3acce925.821,.html

Maybe those wonderfully cheesy old '50s science fiction films were more than mere escapism. Maybe they provided a forum for airing -- in coded forms -- the fears that plagued Americans in the first years of the nuclear era.

Anyway, that's the premise of the "Hollywood and the Red Menace Film Festival," which continues this weekend with its August installment: a screening of "Them!" at 11 a.m. Saturday at the Rio Theatre. Admission is $3.

The series, being shown in conjunction with "Cold War: Promise and Fear," the current exhibit at the Johnson County Museum of History, got under way last month with "High Noon." Some have viewed that 1952 Western as a thinly veiled criticism of the Commie witch hunt conducted by right-wingers like Sen. Joe McCarthy. Gary Cooper's sheriff, standing up to a gang of ruthless thugs while his fellow townspeople turn their backs, represents those brave enough to defy the Red-baiting politicos.

Anyway, that's one interpretation.

In "Them!" (1954), radioactivity from nuclear tests turns common desert ants into rampaging giants. It's good fun, but there's no doubt that for Eisenhower-era Americans, the threat of A-bomb-generated mutations seemed all too real.

The next film in the series is "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" (11 a.m. Sept. 29 at the Fine Arts Theatre), the 1956 alien invasion flick that many film historians interpret as a comment on homogeneous American culture ("pod people") during the Eisenhower era. Of course, you could also see it as a commentary on the dehumanizing effects of socialism.

The project wraps up with "On the Beach" (11 a.m. Oct. 27 at the Rio Theatre). That 1959 drama unfolds in a world devastated by nuclear war; survivors in Australia try to find meaning in the disaster while facing a slow death from radiation poisoning.

As much fun as the "Hollywood and the Red Menace" series may be, it's also sort of depressing.

Back in the '50s filmmakers had to use guile to slip subversive messages into popular entertainment -- resulting in movies that worked on several levels.

Today Pandora's Box is wide open as far as content is concerned. But instead of enriching our films, this freedom seems to have depleted them. We're lucky if today's movies succeed as basic storytelling, much less on any deeper level.

The closest thing to hidden meanings in contemporary cinema can be found in action flicks, which invariably operate on the premise that might is right. Which, of course, is a fascist notion.

`Devils' flashback

There's a bit of heartache among the many pleasures derived from a recent viewing of "Last of the Blue Devils," the classic KC jazz documentary that just came out on DVD.

Fans of the local jazz scene can't help but feel a pang or two of sadness as they watch guitarist Sonny Kenner performing with Jay McShann and Big Joe Turner in a 1974 jam session at the Mutual Musicians Foundation.

Kenner, of course, died earlier this year at age 67. After decades of superb musicianship, he left behind so meager an estate that his friends had to pass the hat to pay for his funeral.

But to watch the young Kenner in action, plucking juicy notes and riffs from his instrument, his head thrown back, his eyes closed and a smile on his face that suggests he's just caught a glimpse of nirvana...well, all of us should know that kind of joy.

-------- china

U.S., China Discuss Missiles

By Ted Anthony
Associated Press Writer
Thursday, Aug. 23, 2001
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20010823/aponline092744_000.htm

BEIJING -- Their visit smoothed by recent improvements in U.S.-China relations, American defense experts talked with Chinese counterparts Thursday over China's agreement not to help other nations build missile arsenals or develop nuclear weapons technology.

China's Foreign Ministry confirmed the talks were under way but would not elaborate. The U.S. Embassy said they might stretch into Friday.

Vann Van Diepen, an acting deputy assistant secretary of state who specializes in nonproliferation, was leading the U.S. team of technical advisers from the Defense Department and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the top council of American military leaders.

In November, China agreed to institute missile-related export controls to prevent its companies from helping other nations develop missile technology. In exchange, U.S. officials waived sanctions against Chinese companies for past cooperation with Iran and Pakistan. Washington agreed to resume processing licenses for American satellites to be launched aboard Chinese rockets.

When U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell visited Beijing last month, he said this week's talks would be used to discuss nonproliferation issues related to the November pact.

Washington also wants to ensure that China does not help Iraq rebuild air-defense systems, which would violate U.N. edicts.

The United States has repeatedly pressed China for "scrupulous adherence" by Chinese firms to U.N. resolutions, a U.S. Embassy spokesman said. He said senior Chinese leaders have assured that China "will live up to its responsibility."

Reports in a U.S. newspaper, The Washington Times, identified China National Machinery and Equipment Import and Export Corp. as the seller of missile components to Pakistan. The company has vehemently denied the allegations and China's Foreign Ministry dismissed them as "groundless rumors."

Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Joseph Biden raised the issue earlier this month with Chinese President Jiang Zemin. Biden said Jiang told him China has "kept to the letter" of all its agreements.

This week's talks come during a warming of U.S.-China ties, which sank to the lowest level in two years after a U.S. spy plane and a Chinese fighter jet collided over the South China Sea in April, killing the Chinese pilot.

-------- japan

Startech Environmental Ships Japan's First Plasma Converter to Process Hazardous Incinerator Ash and PCBs

WILTON, Conn., Aug. 23
E-Wire/PRNewswire/
http://ens.lycos.com/e-wire/Aug01/23Aug0102.html

Startech Environmental Corp. (Nasdaq: STHK), the world leader in plasma waste remediation and recycling technology, announced today that it commenced shipment of Eiko Systems Corporation's first Plasma Converter(TM) to process hazardous waste incinerator ash and also PCBs in Fukuoka, Japan. The last container will be shipped by August 28th 2001.

Joseph Klimek, Startech Executive VP, said, "Considering the fact that the customer increased the scope of the contract during manufacturing, we're actually a little ahead of schedule." He added, "Not only does our manufacturing method of modular construction keep our costs down and quality up, it also makes it easy and inexpensive to ship long distances. This means that we can manufacture anywhere and ship anywhere in the world without the cost being a factor." Klimek, also said, "2001 has been a year of significant milestones for Startech. They include the opening of our Demonstration and Training Center, the unveiling of StarCell, and the StarCell Hydrogen Vehicle, positioning ourselves in the alternative energy sector, opening our manufacturing facility and now manufacturing, assembling and shipping our sale to Eiko."

Joseph Longo, Startech President, said, "Ninety percent of the waste incinerators in Japan fail to meet stricter environmental standards, according to a recent Kyodo News report of a Ministry of the Environment survey." He said, "The Plasma Converter shipped to Eiko will safely process the ash from waste burning incinerators. Incinerator ash is extremely hazardous and is recognized as such in the many enlightened communities of the world. A lot of very toxic substances such as dioxins, furans, poly-aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) and many products of incomplete combustion (PICs) get concentrated in the ash. The Converter safely destroys these hazards and turns the ash into a safe, inert, glassy obsidian-like stone that can be used in the abrasives industry and in the construction industry." Longo added, "Putting ash in a landfill is a primitive and injurious environmental practice. Melted snow and rain water draining down through the landfill produce very harmful soupy leachates that are vectored to and corrupt aquifers in the landfill vicinity and corrupt the down-stream waters fed by the aquifers. The PCBs will be completely and safely destroyed and converted into a clean synthesis fuel."

About Startech Environmental Corp: Startech is an environmental equipment company whose Plasma Converter is essentially an electrochemical system that, while safely destroying wastes, even hazardous wastes, converts those materials into useful and valuable commodity products. It does this economically, efficiently, with relatively few moving parts, and without combustion. The prime mover in the Plasma Converter process is the chemical dissociation (decomposition) of the feed materials after which their elemental components (atoms) are reformed into useful commodities. The United States Environmental Protection Agency has designated materials, even if they may have once been regarded as wastes, or hazardous wastes, undergoing such a recycling process, no longer as wastes, but as "feedstocks."

Safe Harbor for Forward-Looking Statements: This press release contains forward-looking statements, including statements regarding the Company's plans and expectations regarding the development and commercialization of its Plasma Converter(TM) technology. All forward-looking statements are subject to risk and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected. Factors that could cause such a difference include, without limitation, general risks associated with product development, manufacturing, rapid technological change and competition as well as other risks set forth in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The forward-looking statements contained herein speak only as of the date of this press release. The Company expressly disclaims any obligation or undertaking to release publicly any updates or revisions to any such statement to reflect any change in the Company's expectations or any change in events, conditions or circumstances on which any such statement is based.

-------- missile defense

U.S. Envoy Says Russia Has Time in Missile Talks

New York Times
August 23, 2001
By MICHAEL WINES
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/23/international/europe/23MISS.html?searchpv=nytToday

MOSCOW, Aug. 22 - Under Secretary of State John R. Bolton said tonight that "a vast open space" still exists for an agreement with Russia on joint development of a limited defense against ballistic missiles, but that the time for such an accord was running out.

Mr. Bolton denied, however, that he had issued an unofficial deadline of November for reaching such an agreement.

The New York Times reported today, based on excerpts from an interview with a Moscow radio station, that Mr. Bolton had indicated the United States would declare its intention to withdraw from the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty unless Russia agreed to changes by November.

The missile defense system comes into conflict with the treaty, which effectively bans the deployment of a nationwide defense against incoming missiles.

At a news conference tonight, Mr. Bolton, the State Department's senior arms-control official, called the account mistaken. "I did not say that to the Russians," he said, "and I would not have said it in an interview."

In that interview, broadcast tonight on the Echo Moscow news radio station, Mr. Bolton nevertheless made it clear that American research into missile-defense systems was approaching the strict limits imposed by the 1972 treaty, and that it would not stop when those limits are reached.

And he repeated the White House's insistence that it would exercise its right to withdraw from the agreement unilaterally "at some point in the not-too-distant future," unless Moscow agreed to a new arms-control framework.

The White House has never defined explicitly when that not-too- distant future will arrive, saying instead that it is talking in terms "of months, not years." Asked tonight what that meant, Mr. Bolton replied, "By definition, I think, `months less than years' means 23 months or less."

Some Russian officials have said they expect an American declaration of intent to quit the treaty, which requires six months' notice, as soon as this November, when President Vladimir V. Putin is scheduled to visit President Bush at his Crawford, Tex., ranch.

Those expectations have been buttressed by the announcement that the Pentagon intends to start building missile silos at a test site south of Fairbanks, Alaska, as early as next April, or roughly six months after the Texas meeting.

Although the treaty allows construction of certain land-based missile-defense sites - one has existed outside Moscow for decades - some experts say continued construction in Alaska could be construed as a violation of the accord.

In the radio interview, Mr. Bolton said he believed that "the two presidents would be disappointed in us if we didn't have something for them to consider when they get together in Texas."

"But we don't - also consider it an artificial deadline, and we're going to try and make as much progress as we can and we'll see what happens," he said. "The real issue, I think, is the deepening of the political and economic conversations between the two governments, and that alone would be substantial progress. But we'll just have to see what happens by November."

The United States and Russia have been at loggerheads over the need for and purpose of a limited missile- defense system since the idea first gained steam late in President Bill Clinton's second term. Mr. Bolton, who is here to prepare for later talks between Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and the Russian foreign minister, Igor S. Ivanov, indicated today that the two sides had narrowed some differences but that their basic positions remained unchanged.

The Kremlin argues that building a missile-defense system will undermine global security by destroying the basic premise of arms control: the logic that no nation will attack another if it is unable to defend itself against the inevitable counterstrike.

That may be true of superpowers with hundreds or thousands of warheads, the White House says. But it contends that some shield is urgently needed against smaller volleys - accidental launching of nuclear missiles by major powers, or sneak missile attacks by so-called rogue states such as North Korea or Libya.

Mr. Bolton said 27 nations already have the capacity to build or launch ballistic missiles, and that that number will only grow.

Tonight he said a summer of intensive talks had narrowed the gap on at least a few missile-defense issues. In particular, he said, Russian experts no longer reject outright the American rationale that the world is at risk from rogue states brandishing nuclear- or chemical-tipped missiles.

"In fact, I'd say the opposite," he said. "What some of them said during the consultations just concluded was that they thought Russia might be at greater risk from some of them than the United States. And given the geographic proximity of states like Iran, I think that's a fair assessment on their part."

Mr. Bolton said the two sides also agreed today to elevate from bureaucratic to political levels their efforts to control the spread of mass-destruction weapons and to regulate "dual-use" exports, devices and technologies with both peaceful and military applications.

And he called it "a small sign of progress" that they had begun to discuss the underlying arguments for and against a joint missile-defense effort rather than the merits and demerits of the treaties and covenants that currently prohibit it.

But despite what he described as an avalanche of data given the Russians about American missile-defense thinking, the Kremlin position remains that the Antiballistic Missile Treaty isn't broken, and does not need fixing.

"They didn't say anything specific on the defensive weapons side other than acknowledging, as I said, the clear treaty provision that allows us to withdraw," he said.

Despite that seemingly unequivocal rejection, Mr. Bolton suggested, the Russian position does not lack wiggle room. Between rejecting the mutual abrogation of the 1972 treaty and rejecting the United States's unilateral withdrawal, he said, "there's a vast open space that we're willing to sit and listen and discuss."

But not for long.

"We're the State Department," he said. "We'll talk, and we're happy to do it. But the operational track, the ongoing work of testing and developing the ballistic missile defense architecture is proceeding.

"And this is not a situation where the talking is going to interrupt the operational work."

-------- russia

Russian book sheds light on missile

August 23, 2001
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20010823-94642340.htm

Russia's military has disclosed details of a high-speed underwater missile that may have been the cause of the Kursk submarine disaster.

The Shkval-E is identified in a newly published encyclopedia of Russian naval weapons as a "high-velocity underwater missile" capable of sinking surface ships, protecting ports and blocking straits.

The missile, which is fired from a torpedo tube, travels underwater at speeds of 200 to 224 miles per hour - three to four times faster than conventional torpedoes.

The missile uses a process known as "supercavitation" that creates a gas envelope around the weapon that lets it travel through water at high speed.

The book shows a diagram of that process, and also a graphic explaining how the Russian military would fire the missile against surface ships from submarines, shore batteries and surface ships.

The U.S. Navy is said to have very limited defenses against this high-speed underwater missile.

China's military, said U.S. officials, is interested in purchasing Shkval missiles for use against U.S. aircraft carriers and ships in the event of a conflict with the United States over Taiwan.

China also has purchased Russian guided-missile destroyers equipped with supersonic Moskit anti-ship missiles, identified in the book as the 3M-80E anti-ship missile. These missiles travel at a speed of up to Mach 2.5 - or 21/2 times the speed of sound - and can hit ships up to 120 miles away with their 660-pound warhead.

The book, "Naval Weapons: The 21st Century Encyclopedia, Russia's Arms and Technologies," is the third volume in a series that has provided extraordinary details and photographs of Russia's strategic and conventional forces. It was produced jointly with the Russian Defense Ministry and Tommax, Inc., a technology information firm in New Jersey.

U.S. intelligence officials said one among several theories about the Kursk accident is that the Russian attack submarine sank after a Shkval, which in Russian means "squall," exploded during a test last year.

Russian officials have said their leading theory about the cause of the accident is the explosion of a test torpedo with a special propulsion system.

The Kursk sank in the Barents Sea on Aug. 12, 2000, killing all 118 crew members. Russia is currently attempting to raise the submarine.

Information about the Shkval missile also was the focus of the espionage trial in Moscow last year of retired U.S. Navy Capt. Edmond Pope, who was convicted by a Russian court of trying to obtain information on Shkval. He was later deported.

The naval weapons book is the first government listing of Russia's sea-launched strategic and anti-ship missiles, anti-submarine weaponry, torpedoes, mines and naval electronic-warfare systems.

Editor Nikolai Spassky stated that the book is intended to help Russia's defense-industrial complex in the "development, manufacture and export of these types of weapons."

Adm. Vladimir Kuroyedov, commander in chief of the Russian navy, stated in an introduction that "priority shall be given to the search for and implementation of unorthodox approaches to the creation of weapons."

The 631-page book is written in both Russian and English and sells for $495. It contains hundreds of photographs and diagrams of Russian naval weapons and is more detailed than "Soviet Military Power," the Pentagon's annual publication cataloguing Moscow's military until it was halted in the early 1990s.

--------

Russia Shipyard Prepares to Raise Kursk

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Russia-Nuclear-Submarine.html?searchpv=aponline

SEVERODVINSK, Russia (AP) -- Soviet-era patriotic songs blared from loudspeakers Thursday as a priest blessed a huge pontoon that will help hoist the sunken Kursk nuclear submarine back onto dry land next month.

Thursday's ceremony was a step forward in the operation to raise the 18,000-ton vessel that sank after a torpedo exploded a year ago, killing the entire 118-man crew. Hundreds of officials, journalists and workers from the Sevmash shipyard watched the pontoon inch along a track and onto a dock.

The 330-foot-long, 53-foot-wide pontoon -- one of two that will be used -- was blessed by an Orthodox priest who sprinkled it with holy water. A bottle of champagne was also shattered on it.

In two days, the pontoon will be lowered into the White Sea, 600 miles north of Moscow.

Sevmash built the pontoon on order from the Dutch company Mammoet, which is preparing to lift the Kursk with another Dutch firm, Smit International, under a contract with the Russian government. The shipyard, which specializes in nuclear submarines, launched the Kursk in 1994.

``The plant has proven its ability to accomplish a difficult job in a very short time,'' Sevmash director David Pashayev said. ``The work was also important for us because we built the submarine, and we consider it our duty to help raise it.''

The pontoons, the second of which is to be launched next week, were built at unprecedented speed. Each pontoon is equipped with engines, pumps, life-support systems and other essential equipment.

Early next month, the pontoons will be towed to the Russian navy's Roslyakovo ship-repair plant near the port of Murmansk, where they will await the sub's arrival.

After the Kursk is towed to harbor, the pontoons will be used to hoist it onto a dry dock.

The Kursk sank in the Barents Sea during naval exercises Aug. 12 last year. Russian officials say the sub's two nuclear reactors had been safely shut down and have not leaked any radiation, but that the vessel should be lifted to avoid any potential danger to the area's rich fishing grounds. They also say a close look at the submarine could shed light on the cause of the disaster.

``The reactor has been safely shut down, and we are convinced its condition will not change during the raising,'' said Alexander Zavalishin, a senior engineer on the project.

Officials say the powerful explosions that sank the Kursk were triggered by a practice torpedo, but they remain uncertain whether they were caused by an internal flaw in the torpedo -- the theory favored by most outside experts -- or a collision, possibly with a foreign submarine.

The Kursk is to be brought to the surface Sept. 15 by steel cables connected to 26 computer-controlled hydraulic lifting devices, anchored to a giant barge.

The chief of the Russian navy's weather service, Capt. Viktor Kotov, warned earlier this week that rough weather in the area may interfere with the salvage effort, but a Mammoet official said Thursday the company hoped to stick to the Sept. 15 target date.

An international team of divers has so far made 16 of 26 holes in the Kursk's double hull. Once that is completed, they will prepare to sever the submarine's mangled fore section, which is to be left behind when the Kursk is lifted -- for fear it could contain unexploded torpedoes.

Once the Kursk's bow is sawed off, the divers will attach steel cables. Towing the submarine to harbor is expected to take up to two weeks, depending on the weather.

Official Web site for Kursk salvage operation: http://www.kursk141.org

-------- treaties

U.S. Envoy Fails to Sway Russia on ABM Pact

By Peter Baker
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A20
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A48578-2001Aug22?language=printer

MOSCOW, Aug. 22 -- Russia signaled again today that it was willing to make "certain amendments" to the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty to accommodate President Bush's desire to build a nuclear shield, but a top U.S. envoy said rewriting the 1972 pact would be impossible.

Instead, senior Bush negotiator John R. Bolton pushed Moscow to join Washington in withdrawing from the treaty altogether, a proposal flatly rejected by Russia, which is determined to preserve the agreement in some form.

The impasse left the two sides no closer to a settlement of the most significant strategic issue separating the world's preeminent nuclear powers as the United States proceeds with development of a missile defense system that could soon conflict with the restrictions of the Cold War-era treaty. Bolton acknowledged that Russia had made no movement on the ABM dispute in two days of talks here.

"We've tried to explain our preference for mutual withdrawal and they have not agreed to that, that's for sure," he said. "But we're still talking."

Bolton said that there was "vast open space" for compromise but that he could not describe what middle ground exists between one side that refuses to withdraw from the treaty and another that refuses to amend it. "I haven't come up with an alternative, but if there are proposals the Russians have to make, we're here to listen to them," he said.

At a news conference following his consultations this evening, Bolton claimed some success in persuading the Russians to accept the U.S. rationale for a missile defense program: the possible launch of a ballistic missile by a "rogue state" or by accident. The Russians, he said, told him that they would be even more vulnerable than the United States because they are nearer to unpredictable nations such as North Korea or Iraq.

"They didn't dispute either the figures or the risk," said Bolton, the undersecretary of state for arms control and international security. "I think this is something they're beginning to appreciate."

While the two sides remained far apart, they apparently felt positive enough about the discussions to consider extending them. Although Bolton was supposed to wrap up his consultations today, officials were working to arrange a Friday meeting with Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov. Bolton also scheduled another meeting with the Russians for Sept. 13 or 14 in advance of a planned Sept. 19 session in the United States between Ivanov and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell.

The intense pace reflects Bush's desire to win Russian acquiescence to his plan to develop a program to shoot down ballistic missiles aimed at the United States.

In an interview taped with Ekho Moskvy radio on Tuesday, Bolton held out November as a target for making significant progress and stated that if no agreement is reached Washington would withdraw from the treaty. His comments were first reported from a Russian-language transcript.

An English-language tape of the interview, provided by the U.S. Embassy today, made clear Bolton did not present the date as a line in the sand. "I think the two presidents would be disappointed if we didn't have something for them to consider when they get together in Texas," Bolton said on the tape. "But we don't also consider [that] an artificial deadline. We're going to try to make as much progress as we can."

He also told the radio station, "If we're not able to reach an agreement with Russia, then at some point in the not-too-distant future we would exercise our express right under the treaty to give notice of withdrawal."

In a subsequent telephone interview this morning, Bolton emphasized that he was not delivering an ultimatum. "The idea that there was ever a November deadline is just wrong," he said. "We haven't set a hard deadline, and it would certainly not be for me to come to Moscow to do that."

Russia suggested that it also did not view Bolton's comments as an ultimatum but added that his meaning was clear. "During the consultations, the American side made it understood that the United States will withdraw from the ABM Treaty alone or with Russia and intends to make this announcement in October-November," an unnamed Russian official told Interfax news agency. Bolton denied this.

The Russian official said that Moscow had rejected a joint withdrawal from the treaty. However, the official was quoted as saying, "Of course, we realize that we live in a post-Cold War age and are ready to agree with our American counterparts that certain amendments should be made to the existing system of treaties on strategic stability."

The report did not elaborate on what amendments would be acceptable. The Foreign Ministry declined to comment, but Moscow often uses such statements to Interfax to telegraph its official positions.

Bolton seemed to rule out such an approach, saying that amendments would not work because the ABM Treaty explicitly prohibits precisely what Bush wants to build. "You can't line-in, line-out change a treaty whose prohibition is 180 degrees opposite from the objective that we're trying to achieve," he said at the news conference.

However, Bolton said Washington was willing to discuss a ceiling on the number of interceptor missiles allowed at a defense facility, a limitation intended to reassure Russia that such a system would not be designed to counter its nuclear arsenal of 6,000 strategic warheads.

----

Why Scrap the ABM Treaty?

By Melvin R. Laird
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A25
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A49272-2001Aug22?language=printer

An alternative does exist to the United States' unilaterally deep-sixing the present ABM Treaty so it can pursue a national missile defense. It is this: The Bush administration proposes only a defense against a limited missile attack by rogue nations or terrorists. Russia has recently indicated a willingness to negotiate the present defensive prohibitions in the ABM Treaty -- provided that changes are coupled with reductions in the numbers of offensive missiles. That is the alternative that should be pursued.

The Russian military wants to reduce its strategic missile force because of its high costs in maintenance and military manpower, as well as rubles. We can reduce our offensive missile force; but these reductions should be considered in connection with negotiating amendments to the ABM Treaty. There is no need, while reducing our nuclear forces (even if unilaterally), to abandon the clear benefits that derive from the treaty's provisions for verification, transparency and confidence-building negotiation processes.

For almost 30 years, the ABM Treaty has preserved strategic stability and kept the peace by restricting strategic ballistic missile defense systems. Those restrictions, in turn, have ensured that both Washington and Moscow could retain confidence in their respective retaliatory capability. It appears that both the United States and Russia plan to maintain sizable, even if declining, numbers of strategic nuclear weapons for the indefinite future. This being the case, mutual deterrence is an inescapable element of a stable relationship between the world's two major nuclear powers, whether they see each other as strategic partners or as potential adversaries.

The concept of mutual deterrence is less a function of policy than of the reality that both Russia and the United States will continue to have enough strategic weapons to destroy each other many times over. If mutual deterrence is to remain with us, it is essential that an amended ABM Treaty remain with us as well. It is the key to maintaining stability between the two largest nuclear forces.

Thus an amended ABM Treaty remains as relevant to peace and security today as it was 30 years ago. It ensures that the relationship of mutual deterrence is stable and predictable. Deep-sixing the treaty instead of negotiating amendments would only create a less stable and less predictable deterrent relationship.

The Russians and Chinese have already said they intend to maintain their retaliatory capabilities. They state unequivocally that their response to a unilateral abrogation of the ABM Treaty would be a buildup of their nuclear stockpiles, a reaction that would significantly decrease international stability.

The administration has hoped it could minimize this reaction by unilaterally reducing the number of U.S. strategic weapons. While such plans certainly would not harm the international security environment, they are unlikely to affect the actions by Russia and China to maintain their retaliatory capability.

It's not sufficient to contend that Russia or China can't afford offensive increases. They might try. In such a process, the United States would sacrifice stability without cause. There is no substitute for the predictability, transparency and irreversibility that come with formal arms reduction agreements. We should not take the risk that missile defense, to be effective, will impose such high costs that we will have to divert substantial resources from other authentic national security needs.

We cannot let our country drift into a period of isolationism or unilateralism. We are the strongest country in the world, ethically, economically and militarily. The Senate was right in questioning the Kyoto accord, hastily signed on to by Vice President Gore, and President Bush is right in pursuing a course of amending these accords. The biological weapons protocol initiated by the Nixon administration can and will be brought into line through strong negotiations. We can have a revised form of multilateralism in which all participating partners share not only in results but in costs and resources as well.

We are at the threshold of great opportunities, if we use our position as the world leader with the skills and abilities we possess. We must clearly work for these goals in a bipartisan manner. There is no reason to abandon the clear benefits of the ABM Treaty. We can have those benefits and at the same time pursue appropriate missile defense alternatives.

The writer was a nine-term Republican member of the House from Wisconsin and served as secretary of defense from 1969 to 1973. He played a key role in obtaining Senate ratification of the ABM Treaty.

--------

Bush Says U.S. to Quit Arms Pact on 'Our Timetable'

August 23, 2001
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-arms-usa-bush.html?searchpv=reuters

CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - President Bush flatly declared on Thursday that the United States would withdraw ``on our timetable'' from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, a long-standing cornerstone of arms control.

In one of his most explicit statements on the issue, Bush told reporters the accord hampered U.S. ability to keep the peace because it prohibited deployment of a missile defense shield. He said he had made that clear to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

``We will withdraw from the ABM treaty on our timetable at a time convenient to America,'' Bush said. ``I have no specific timetable in mind.'' He added that Washington would continue to ''consult closely'' with its allies in Europe and with Putin.

But administration officials have said crucial decisions must be made before Bush and Putin met in November at Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas. The treaty requires either side to give six months' notice of its intent to withdraw.

Undersecretary of State John Bolton, wrapping up arms talks in Moscow this week, said the United States wanted to work with Russia, ``either to find a way to mutually withdraw from the treaty, or in some way together move beyond the constraints that the ABM treaty places on our development effort.''

But he said a unilateral U.S. pullout from the ABM treaty ''is already in the market'' and predicted it would not unduly hurt relations with Moscow.

WASHINGTON CITES 'ROGUE STATES'

Bush told reporters at the Crawford Elementary School that Putin knew the U.S. position.

``I have made it clear that I think the treaty hampers our ability to keep the peace,'' he said. ``I do know that Mr. Putin is aware of our desires to move beyond the ABM treaty and we will.''

Bush and Putin agreed in July to link missile defense to mutual cuts in their respective nuclear arsenals, and ordered officials to fast-track talks on a new security relationship.

Washington says it needs a missile shield to defend itself from accidental missile launches or attack from what it calls ''rogue states,'' such as Iraq, Iran, Libya and North Korea. Bolton said some Russian officials believed such nations could pose a greater threat to Moscow than the United States.

Time is running out for Russia to extract concessions from Washington. The United States has warned its testing program would ``bump against'' the ABM treaty within months, not years.

The Pentagon has given the go-ahead to begin clearing ground in Alaska this month to prepare for construction of a missile defense test site.

Pam Bain, a spokeswoman for the Defense Department's Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, said a private firm had been hired for $9 million to clear a 135-acre site at Fort Greely, an Army base 100 miles southeast of Fairbanks.

Clearing the ground for the test base represents a key step in the Bush administration's plan to develop and deploy a missile defense system over bitter opposition from Russia and China.

Bain said the facility, including a command and control center and ``hit-to-kill'' projectiles to be aimed at approaching test warheads, could not be completed until 2003 or 2004 at the earliest, depending on congressional approval of future military budgets.

Pentagon officials have said the initial clearing work would not violate the ABM treaty. Moscow has thus far rejected requests by the Bush administration to jointly abandon the ABM treaty, negotiated between the United States and former Soviet Union.

--------

Treaty Exit Could Unleash Criticism

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Missile-Defense.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- By emphasizing its option to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, the Bush administration is indicating it is prepared to endure a firestorm of criticism -- from Russia, from U.S. allies and from Congress -- for going it alone on missile defense.

President Bush underscored on Thursday that he still hopes to reach an accommodation with the Russians that would ``move beyond'' the treaty -- presumably to replace it with some other arrangement that permits the United States to develop and deploy the kind of missile defenses he says are urgently needed.

``We will consult closely with our allies in Europe as well as continue to consult closely with (Russian President Vladimir) Putin. I have no specific timetable in mind. I do know that the ABM treaty hampers us from doing what we need to do,'' Bush said.

``Mr. Putin is aware of our desires to move beyond the ABM treaty and we will.''

If accommodation with the Russians is reached, Bush probably could proceed without fierce opposition from the allies.

But if that cannot be done, and if Bush sticks to his promise of building a robust missile defense, then the likely choice given recent comments from Bush aides would be to exercise a provision in the ABM treaty that permits either party to withdraw on six months' notice.

The question is how long Bush would be willing to wait on the Russians. It's also unclear whether Bush, if faced with the decision, would actually withdraw from a treaty that many key U.S. allies, including Germany and France, are reluctant to abandon as long as the Russians insist it remain in force.

Jan Lodal, an arms control expert who was a deputy undersecretary of defense during the Clinton administration, said the United States has never withdrawn from an arms control treaty. He thinks it would be a mistake to exercise that option anytime soon, since the Pentagon could adjust its anti-missile technology testing program for 2002 to avoid any appearance of conflict with the ABM treaty.

``We don't have any compelling reasons'' to withdraw as early as next year, Lodal said in an interview.

The withdrawal option has been there all along, and Bush aides have mentioned it from time to time. But in recent days several administration officials have emphasized the possibility of withdrawing, perhaps in hopes of increasing pressure on the Russians to strike a deal soon.

John Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control, said in an interview Tuesday with Echo of Moscow radio station that the United States is prepared to unilaterally withdraw from the ABM treaty if necessary. He mentioned this in the context of a planned November meeting in Texas between Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin, leading some to conclude that Bolton was signaling that if no deal were reached by then, the United States would feel compelled to withdraw.

On Wednesday Bolton said there is no such deadline.

Rose Gottemoeller, an arms control expert who served on the National Security Council staff during the Clinton administration, said Wednesday she believes one motivation for Bolton's mentioning of the withdrawal option was to ``keep the heat on'' the Russians to back off their position.

Russia is opposed to abandoning the treaty, which it calls a cornerstone of international security. Bush considers it a relic of the Cold War that does not reflect the security threats of the 21st century, such as ballistic missiles in the hands of nations like North Korea, potentially hostile to the United States.

The Bush administration proposed that both countries jointly withdraw from the treaty, but the Russians rejected that approach when it was presented by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in Moscow on Aug. 13.

After Rumsfeld's return to Washington, he and his aides began stating more explicitly in public the option of withdrawing from the treaty, which they had mentioned but not emphasized earlier.

In an Aug. 17 interview with PBS Newshour, Rumsfeld was asked to respond to comments by Russian officials that if the United States violated or abandoned the treaty, then Russia might feel compelled to add multiple nuclear warheads to missiles in its arsenal which currently have single warheads.

``If we are unable to establish a new relationship with Russia so that we can get the treaty behind us ... then obviously the United States would have to give notice'' of its intent to withdraw, Rumsfeld said.

Three days earlier, he made a similar remark in an interview with KSDK-TV in St. Louis, while adding that if the United States were to withdraw from the treaty, it would continue talking with the Russian government about establishing a new security relationship.

-------- u.s. nuc weapons

USA missile defenses

TODAY'S NEWS IN BRIEF
Christian Science Monitor
08/23/01

If the US and Russia fail to reach agreement on missile defenses by November, the Bush administration will use its right to unilaterally withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, Undersecretary of State John Bolton said. But in a radio interview in Moscow, he said the White House would rather come to a joint decision with Russia and hoped for progress before Presidents Bush and Vladimir Putin hold a scheduled summit three months hence. Russia opposes dismantling the ABM treaty, which bans national missile-defense systems. The US wants to proceed with such a system because of threats from rogue nations.

-------- us nuc politics

Rumsfeld: New Strategy Near
Secretary Predicts Changes and Support Will Jell in October

By Vernon Loeb and Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A47976-2001Aug22?language=printer

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld yesterday defended his review of the U.S. military and said he would have a new strategy in place by October to enable the Pentagon to keep its current commitments around the globe, modernize aging equipment and invest in future technologies.

While acknowledging some strains in relations on Capitol Hill and a few early missteps, Rumsfeld said he and all of the nation's top military commanders had reached unanimous agreement late last week on guidelines for developing next year's defense budget.

He also confidently predicted that with the completion of a congressionally mandated Quadrennial Defense Review by the end of September, the Pentagon would recommend an array of major changes, including sharp reductions in nuclear forces and new rules on mandatory retirements to keep key personnel in uniform longer.

"In the next two or three months, most of the things we have been working on for the past four or five months will be rolled out in a way that they will be a coherent whole," Rumsfeld said. "And I think that will have a calming effect."

In a wide-ranging interview with Washington Post reporters and editors, Rumsfeld outlined the challenges that have marked his return to the Pentagon, noting how much Washington has changed since he first served as defense secretary a quarter century ago in the Ford administration.

"There's an enormous appetite for personality and conflict," he said.

He also said Congress has become much more deeply involved in the inner workings of the Defense Department, continually legislating new requirements and demanding more than 900 reports a year on military matters, work that employs an army of bureaucrats and auditors.

"We're killing trees all over the world to do it," he said. "Nothing ever ends. There's no sunset on things. And it all happens a little bit at a time. It's well intentioned, but of course it doesn't make it better, because you end up so constrained that you can't function efficiently or effectively."

Rumsfeld took sharp exception, however, to media reports attributing his tensions with the military brass and members of Congress to a high-handed, exclusionary style, particularly early in his tenure. A spate of recent reports has characterized his effort to "transform" the military as sputtering, particularly after the administration's $1.35 trillion tax cut reduced the available funds.

"If you believe all the things you read in the newspaper, you are going to be sadly misinformed," Rumsfeld said over lunch in his private dining room.

Running down a list of statistics on his first seven months in office, Rumsfeld said he had met 361 times with members of Congress, 320 times with military leaders and 93 times with the press.

But the real problem, he insisted, lies not with Congress, the Pentagon brass or the media, but with the enormous complexity of the job. "I didn't come in with a computer chip in my head saying, 'We need more of these and fewer of these and less of those in this [congressman's] district or that district,' " he said. "The president decided that he wanted to have a defense review and see that we engage in a process of transformation. . . . And if you do it, you do it seriously."

The reality, he continued, is that serious moves to transform the military to meet such emerging threats as computer warfare, terrorism and missile proliferation will not produce new war-fighting capabilities for a number of years -- "and therefore people who are interested in the present are going to resist that."

Rumsfeld declined to confirm or deny that President Bush intends to name Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers as the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But he lamented that it has taken so long to get senior Pentagon officials through the nomination and confirmation process. "Our team will have been on board a month or two or three by September or October," he said.

He also expressed confidence that the service chiefs and nine war-fighting commanders in chief around the globe have lined up behind a strategic framework that is likely to replace the formal requirement that the armed forces be able to win two major wars simultaneously.

The new "force sizing construct," Rumsfeld said, calls for the military to be able to win one major war decisively -- meaning that it could occupy the enemy's capital, if necessary -- as well as to swiftly defeat a second adversary, engage in peacekeeping operations and invest in "leap ahead" technologies, all at once.

"We've had a strategy/force mismatch in the department for about the past five years," Rumsfeld said. "You could pretend it isn't there, and go about your business. Or you can just be honest and say, 'Look, it is there.' It seems to me that that is the thing to do. We don't have the airlift. We don't have the troops."

Rumsfeld criticized press reports last week that said he had essentially turned over hard questions regarding cuts in forces to the services to decide. But he acknowledged that in the formal planning guidance agreed on last week for crafting next year's budget, he is relying on the services to balance current operational requirements with the need to invest in future technologies.

Once the services come back with recommendations, he said, his office must "create a cohesive whole out of it, and it's in that iterative process that you'll find out what you'll give up for what you're getting."

As for significant cuts in nuclear forces, Rumsfeld said he expects to present the president with recommendations this fall aimed at reducing the nation's arsenal of 7,000 warheads while preserving confidence in the maintenance and safety of the weapons.

Rather than putting a specific number on how many warheads could be done away with, Rumsfeld said he would recommend a range and a phased reduction that would coincide with similar steps taken by Russia, which has proposed that each country cut its arsenal to about 1,500 warheads. Both sides, he said, should be assured that they will be able to verify cuts made by the other.

The question of cuts in nuclear forces, he said, is complicated by proliferation, tactical nuclear weapons and the inability to test aging weapons.

"There are a lot of people who, wisely in my view, are concerned about building weapons and not testing them, so as the stockpiles age, at some point people are going to have to address that," Rumsfeld said. He quickly added, however, that neither he nor Bush is considering an end to the moratorium on nuclear testing that was begun by the first President Bush.

Rumsfeld reiterated Bush's call for a new strategic framework with Russia that would enable the United States to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and pursue plans to develop and test various missile defense technologies.

"It's pretty clear that the Russians are not terribly uptight about the testing," Rumsfeld said. "The problem is, you've got other people who will look at it. . . . I don't want the United States to be in a position of having people legitimately look at us and say we break treaties."

----

Ultimate Conservative Leaves Senate Without an Heir

By Helen Dewar and Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A04
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A48857-2001Aug22?language=printer

With its constant turnover in membership and frequent shifts in party control, there is rarely anything as precise as an end to an era in the Senate. But Sen. Jesse Helms's departure comes about as close as it gets. Friends and foes of the conservative Republican icon from North Carolina agree on one thing: There will never be another quite like him.

Helms, who announced last night that he will leave the Senate at the end of his term in early 2003, was a product of the segregationist South who cut his political teeth in fighting communism abroad and liberalism at home. He may have mellowed a little, especially after taking over as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee in 1995, but colleagues say he remains as true to his beliefs now as he did when he burst on the national scene a quarter of a century ago.

His relentless pursuit of these beliefs, often tying the Senate in knots in the process, made him one of the most controversial lawmakers of his era, as much an anathema to his critics as he was a hero to his followers. Even some in his own party winced privately at his opposition to civil rights initiatives, his attacks on gay rights and his tendency to try to put the Senate on record on every combustible social issue.

But, despite these frustrations, it is "the power of his personality that makes him special as a force" in the Senate, said Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), who disagrees with Helms on most issues, foreign and domestic. "Helms's approval or disapproval carried a lot of weight because he had so many followers around the country. Putting aside the ideological argument, people like a sense of commitment. People knew if he was the only person on your side, he'd stick with you."

On Capitol Hill, Helms became known as "Senator No," skilled in the art of killing bills, thwarting nominations and using still other bills and nominations as legislative hostages to get his way on a favorite cause, such as promoting school prayer, opposing abortion and trying to ban flag-burning. He would often say outrageous things and did not appear to care about criticism. He was an old-school politician who mastered the rules and used them as instruments of power, exuding Southern charm as he eviscerated liberal foes.

"Jesse Helms didn't mind appearing mean-spirited and as a result he went into battle well armed," said Ross K. Baker, a Rutgers University professor who closely follows the Senate. His departure will necessarily mean a less ideologically conservative -- and "certainly less overtly hard-edged" Senate GOP, he added.

In politics, Helms helped build the GOP in the South on a staunchly conservative base and, without ever running for national office, had a profound influence nationally. "He morphed from a regional politician to a national politician with a huge following and the ability to raise incredible amounts of money," said Merle Black, a political scientist at Emory University in Georgia.

For instance, Helms helped engineer Ronald Reagan's surprise victory in the 1976 North Carolina primary by persuading Reagan to use opposition to the Panama Canal treaty as a rallying point for conservatives. Reagan had to wait another four years to win the presidency but, "without Helms, there might not have been a Reagan presidency," said David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union.

Republicans said yesterday they could not envision an heir to the Helms legacy, in part because the GOP and the country have changed so much since he was first elected.

"I think Helms's number is going to be retired," said John J. Pitney, a political scientist at Claremont McKenna College in California. "He came to prominence as an opposition figure and in some respects the party has moved to the right and in other respects the issues that initially engaged him are gone."

"I don't think a firebrand like that can be elected any more" to the Senate, added Tripp Baird, the conservative Heritage Foundation's liaison to the Senate. Unlike other conservatives who specialize in an issue or two, Helms juggled the whole panoply of conservative causes, Baird contended. Helms did not always win but always made a point, he added.

Ralph G. Neas, president of the liberal People for the American Way, regards Helms as the "father of the modern Republican right-wing movement," with younger proteges who "now run the House of Representatives, lead the Senate Republicans and determine the legal policies of the Bush administration."

Throughout his Senate career, Helms left more of a mark by blocking legislation, appointments and treaties than he did by winning passage of anything, colleagues agreed. But recently he has played a key -- and often conciliatory -- role in arranging terms for payment of U.S. debts to the United Nations, reorganizing foreign policy agencies and organizing a committee visit to Mexico, one of his favorite diplomatic targets in the past.

"Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Jesse Helms is that, notwithstanding his conservative credentials, when confronted with new facts, he is willing to reconsider his position," said Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), who succeeded him as Foreign Relations Committee chairman.

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), whose internationalist outlook often caused disagreements with Helms, said Helms never stood in his way. "He had a very genteel style to go with the more cutting, hard-edged foreign policy that he ascribed to, so it was difficult sometimes for opponents to deal with him."

In politics, Republicans credited him with revolutionizing the conduct of campaigns with his heavy use of negative advertising and by helping perfect the art of round-the-clock direct-mail and telephone appeals for contributions.

Still, many contend that Helms, unlike many Southern politicians, never fully adapted to changes in his region. He continued to use a racial appeal in his campaigns as recently as 1990. On civil rights issues, Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.) "was far more adaptive than Helms," said Emory University's Black.


-------- MILITARY

-------- chemical weapons

Israeli riot-gear sale fuels concern
Israelis debate the pending sale of water cannons, armored vehicles to Zimbabwe regime.

Christian Science Monitor
08/23/01
By Ben Lynfield/Special to The Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0823/p6s3-woaf.html

JERUSALEM - A kibbutz that markets low-grade chemical weapons is poised to sell millions of dollars worth of "riot-control equipment" to Zimbabwe in a move its critics warn will translate into heightened repression by President Robert Mugabe's regime (see story). But the firm, the Beit Alfa Trailer Company (BAT), insists its intention to sell equipment to Zimbabwe is actually humane: Demonstrators would be faced with water cannons, not live ammunition.

This is far from the first time Israel has supplied weaponry to a state increasingly considered an international pariah. Analysts say Israel's defense industrial complex - which is US-subsidized, and is massive for a country its size - is becoming one of the world's most competitive arms exporters. China, India, Burma, and Zambia are Israeli customers, despite the fact that the US either embargoes or severely restricts its own arms sales to those countries, says a Tel Aviv University study.

The UN reportedly had asked Israel to stop supplying both sides of the Ethiopian-Eritrean war, including an air-surveillance system to Ethiopia and two navy boats to Eritrea, according to Ha'aretz, an Israeli daily.

Israel and South Africa's apartheid regime had a close defense-production relationship across a broad range of armaments, including nuclear weapons, according to Africa Business magazine.

The issue of BAT sales to Zimbabwe emerged in public discussion last week when Alon Liel, a former director-general of the foreign ministry and a former ambassador to Harare, wrote an opinion piece in Ha'aretz expressing revulsion that equipment produced on a kibbutz, Beit Alfa, would be used "to pursue the courageous proponents of democracy or the farmers trying to continue working their land, or against the thousand frightened Jewish citizens."

According to the website, www.bat.co.il, BAT builds riot-control vehicles and specializes in water-cannon technology. The chemical additives - to be used in restraining "dangerous inmate situations" in correctional facilities - "can be injected in the water stream, under further officer control, to further restrain and demobilize the inmate." Reuven Canfi, BAT general manager, says the chemical is a "food color" that aims at having "a psychological effect." But the website suggests other chemicals, such as pepper spray, can be injected into the cannon's water stream.

The company prides itself on producing nonlethal products that provide alternatives to opening fire. But its equipment has other uses. BAT sells an armored vehicle that comes with gun ports - which is basically an armored personnel carrier. Mr. Canfi says the latter type of vehicle would not be sold to Zimbabwe and that the planned transaction would concern only riot control vehicles that use water cannons.

The Zimbabwean newspaper, Financial Gazette, reported recently that Zimbabwe was seeking at least 30 riot control vehicles as part of a $10 million deal with BAT. Canfi says BAT plans to sell a much smaller number of vehicles in a deal amounting to far less than $10 million, but he would not specify.

"As long as they are using water with food color, instead of live ammunition, I'm happy," Canfi says. "It does not matter if it is Zimbabwe, Chile, or Angola, we help the government to save lives."

In 30 years of business, BAT counts among its customers the Israeli security forces.

The company started negotiating sales in Africa about a year ago, he says, with South Africa as one of its customers. During the 1980s, Israel maintained a close security alliance with South Africa while Pretoria was supplying Iran and Iraq, according to Africa Business. But even South Africa, which sells arms to Zimbabwe, is debating suspending those sales.

Yuval Steinitz, a legislator from Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud party, says he supports supplying Zimbabwe. "Beit Alfa cars usually end up saving lives of demonstrators. We would be happy if Saddam Hussein and the Syrians used them. I would be happy if the Chinese in Tiananmen Square had used only water cannons."

An Israeli official says the government "has a mechanism, including many checks and balances, that take into consideration all the sensitivities. When there is a fear that a sale would affect civilians in an internal conflict, we simply stop it."

"I think this is outrageous, and I don't think it helps Israel-Zimbabwe relations," said Nomi Chazan, a member of the Knesset from the liberal Meretz party. Israel, she say, should be forging ties with the people of Zimbabwe.

-------- colombia

Colombian Deal With Rebels Is Vexing U.S.

New York Times
August 23, 2001
By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/23/international/americas/23COLO.html

WASHINGTON, Aug. 22 - Bush administration officials are voicing rising impatience with the concessions President Andrés Pastrana of Colombia has granted to leftist rebels in his country. The officials say that a large swath of territory ceded to the guerrillas is being used to train terrorists, run prison camps and traffic in drugs.

Although public statements have been supportive of President Pastrana, a top State Department official, Marc Grossman, who is planning a fact-finding trip to Colombia next week, will discuss these concerns, officials said today.

The suspension of peace talks this month with the second largest rebel group, the National Liberation Army, has left the administration persuaded that "there is no reason to believe there will be any substantive agreement with either of the groups in the near term," a senior official said.

The Americans expressed concern that the leading rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, is using a Switzerland- sized swath of territory it controls to learn bomb-making techniques from the Irish Republican Army and to operate dismal mobile prisons for captured police officers and other enemies.

Mr. Pastrana ceded the demilitarized zone, known is Spanish as the despeje, to the FARC as a peace gesture in 1998. "The despeje is being badly misused," the senior official said.

Mr. Pastrana's government has received nearly $1 billion in mostly military aid from Washington, and stands to take in hundreds of millions more.

Mr. Grossman, the under secretary of state for political affairs, will lead a delegation to Colombia that will stop first in Mexico before arriving in Colombia on Aug. 29, officials said. He will be accompanied by officials responsible for national security, drugs, development projects and justice-related issues.

Officials said Mr. Grossman would raise American concerns that concessions to the guerrillas have proved fruitless and undercut President Pastrana's leverage in peace talks, officials said.

Mr. Pastrana took office in 1998 pledging to bring peace. He now has just a year remaining in office and must decide in October whether to renew the demilitarized zone.

Colombian officials said he is likely to do so, so as not to deal a mortal blow to peace negotiations. They voiced hopes that military operations under way in the jungle regions of Meta and Guaviare would strengthen their leverage in future talks. The zone, in addition to other territory held by the guerrillas , has left the FARC in control of about 90,000 civilians, and Mr. Pastrana is facing mounting domestic and international pressure to act against rebel abuses there.

Administration officials expressed particular outrage this week at the arrest of three men suspected of being members of the Irish Republican Army on charges that they were training FARC rebels in urban warfare tactics. According to the Colombian police, the men, who included the Havana-based representative of Sinn Fein, the I.R.A.'s political arm, spent six weeks this summer training rebels in the demilitarized zone.

"No one should be in doubt about the seriousness with which we take such charges," said a State Department spokesman, Philip Reeker. "Any collaboration with the FARC by an individual or organization is of utmost concern to us."

The three men - Niall Connolly, Martin McCauley and James Monaghan - were formally charged this week, though American officials said the evidence against them, including residue from explosives, was probably insufficient to convict them.

Cuban authorities said Mr. Connolly has been Sinn Fein's representative for Latin America; administration officials said they have nothing to indicate Cuban complicity in the reported I.R.A. training.

Administration officials said the suspected I.R.A. link suggests that the FARC rebels are preparing to step up attacks on Colombian cities.

The policy makers also cited testimony from several Colombian police officers that the rebels are operating prison camps inside the demilitarized zone. A cable from the American Embassy in Bogotá, which was provided to The New York Times, recounted the travails of four policemen who had been held by the guerrillas for nearly three years before their release in June.

It said that the officers, along with dozens of their colleagues, were bound by the wrist and neck, underwent forced marches, received meager rations, were confined to sweltering makeshift cells, were denied medical attention and were repeatedly threatened with death.

--------

Colombia on Offensive vs. Rebels

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Colombia-Army-Offensive.html

SAN JOSE DEL GUAVIARE, Colombia (AP) -- Waves of helicopters carrying troops lifted off from a staging area in Colombia's coca-growing plains Thursday, as the U.S.-backed military hunted down a wounded column of more than 1,000 leftist rebels.

After many years on the defensive, the military is trying to show it can hit back at the rebels. The offensive comes a week before the arrival of a high-level U.S. delegation, and with the spotlight on Colombian President Andres Pastrana over the rebels' misuse of a Switzerland-sized safe haven he ceded them in peace talks.

The army's week-old offensive is unlikely to prove decisive in a 37-year war that shows no signs of letup. But it demonstrates how the military -- stocked with U.S.-made combat helicopters and growing aid and training from Washington -- has been faring better lately on the battlefield against the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the country's largest insurgency.

The rebels on the run near San Jose del Guaviare are believed to be hiding in the jungles to the east, cut off from their base and running low on food and other supplies.

A half-dozen deserters say the guerillas are desperately trying to make their way back to the rebel's southern safe haven after their plan to attack towns and an army base in Colombia's southeast was foiled by a government counterattack -- one of the biggest in memory.

Leaflets dropped from helicopters invite the insurgents to surrender.

``They are running out of food. Their radios must be losing power. They have many wounded,'' said an army colonel commanding a brigade, who refused to give his name for security reasons. ``Our mission now is to eliminate them,'' he said.

The military's success here and in other recent battles would have seemed impossible just a few years ago, when the 16,000-strong FARC was routinely battering an undertrained army.

In June, helicopter-borne troops turned back another attempted large rebel strike, killing 26 guerrillas in a battle in which 30 troops also died. In November, a nearly 400-rebel unit was dismantled by the military after being spotted from air traversing a high-Andean plateau.

Washington approved a $1.3 billion aid package last year devoted to helping Colombia fight drugs. However, there are voices calling for U.S. military aid to be targeted directly against the rebels -- something critics worry will draw the United States into Colombia's brutal war.

A U.S. delegation is scheduled to arrive in Bogota next week, the first such visit since President Bush took office. The delegation is expected to raise concerns with Pastrana about the enormous jungle sanctuary he ceded them to initiate peace talks, a U.S. official in Washington said Thursday.

In the battle zone Wednesday, a Blackhawk helicopter skimmed over jungle canopy to retrieve bodies of some of the dozens of rebels killed in combat. The door gunners, looking insect-like with dark visors pulled over their faces, hunched over M-60 machine guns as the jungle sped past in a blur.

The U.S.-trained pilot, army Maj. Camilo Rosso, spotted smoke marking where the bodies of two rebels lay, and put the helicopter into a hover about 100 feet over the spot.

A commando leapt out of the door of the helicopter, rappelled to the ground, stuffed the shot-up corpses of two rebels into black body bags and then tied them to his rope. When the helicopter soared into the sky, the soldier dangled below, straddling atop his grizzly cargo.

Viewed from the chopper, government troops swarmed like ants through sections of jungle that had been cleared to grow coca leaves, the raw ingredient of cocaine, and a huge source of revenue for the FARC.

Back at the army base serving as the staging ground in San Jose del Guaviare, 170 miles southeast of Bogota, officers examined documents found alongside rebel corpses.

The rebel group's commander, Urias Cuellar, was killed last week along with dozens of other guerrillas, the army says. But the jungle has made it difficult to locate and display guerrilla casualties -- the military's way of persuading a skeptical public of its victories.

One seized notebook with a picture of a Barbie doll on the cover contained handwritten notes on explosives and tactics. Other documents showed the rebels intended to retake a strategic river corridor leading from their safe haven to the borders of Brazil and Venezuela, according to army spokesman Col. Paulino Coronado.

Government warplanes using night-vision gear began bombarding the rebel column late on August 13. The next day, helicopters began ferrying some 4,000 troops into the zone, lying along a river dividing Guaviare and Meta states.

An additional 1,800 men were being flown into the area on Thursday -- a vast region of dense vegetation offering the guerrillas many escape routes.

The troops involved in the offensive are not member of the counternarcotics brigade trained under the U.S. aid package. The Blackhawk helicopters were purchased by Colombia, not donated from Washington. The military says it has not relied on U.S. intelligence assistance in the operations.

Three years ago, the FARC overran a nearby anti-narcotics base during a nationwide rebel offensive that helped force Pastrana into peace talks. The negotiations have ground to virtual standstill.

-------- israel

Israel Kills 6 in Series Of Clashes
Attacks Dim Prospects For German-Led Talks

By Daniel Williams
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A19
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A48577-2001Aug22?language=printer

RAMALLAH, West Bank, Aug. 22 -- Israeli forces striking out at leaders of the 11-month-old uprising in Gaza and the West Bank killed at least six Palestinians today in three bloody attacks, eclipsing a German-mediated effort to calm the violence and renew long-frozen peace talks.

The day's violence began in the early hours not far from the northern West Bank city of Nablus when an Israeli anti-guerrilla unit shot and killed a Palestinian, Ahed Haniyi, who was setting a bomb on a roadside close to a Jewish settlement, Palestinian and Israeli sources said.

LAW, a Palestinian human rights organization, said the soldiers then shot and killed three Palestinians from the nearby hamlet of Beit Iba when they tried to retrieve the body. At least three other villagers were wounded. The Israeli soldiers also fired on an ambulance that tried to reach the scene before the three salvagers tried to sneak there on foot in the early-morning darkness, LAW said.

Israeli officials issued two versions of the events, both starkly different from the Palestinian reports.

An Israeli government spokesman, Dore Gold, first charged that Palestinians used the cover of an ambulance and "sprang out of the vehicle and attacked Israeli soldiers." Later, Israeli officials reported that a bomber and an accomplice were killed, as were three members of an "armed cell" who arrived later.

Angry mourners in Nablus punctuated the funeral of the dead Palestinians with shouts of "Uprising until death!" as 30 riflemen fired into the air.One bullet hit a marcher in the head, and Nablus hospital officials said he was in critical condition.

In the Gaza Strip, Israeli Apache helicopters fired missiles at a car carrying Mohammed Deif, a leader of a radical Islamic group, and his chief bomb-maker, Adnan Ghoul. Deif and Ghoul escaped unhurt just before their white sedan was hit, according to reports from the area. But seconds earlier, another rocket destroyed a vehicle carrying a bodyguard and Ghoul's son Bilal, killing both.

Deif heads the Izzedine al Qassam Brigades, the armed unit of the Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas. Izzedine al Qassam has carried out terrorist attacks in Israel and assaults on settlers and soldiers in Israeli-occupied areas of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Because of that, Deif has long been at the top of Israel's wanted-dead-or-alive list. The effort to liquidate him appeared to be the latest example of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's policy of targeting military activists in Palestinian-run territory.

But Israeli military officials said Deif was not the target of today's attack. They said they were trying to hit a group of Palestinians who had fired mortars into Israeli-held territory bordering Palestinian-controlled land.

Farther south, in the town of Rafah near the border with Egypt, Israeli soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian policeman who joined a group inspecting a building that had just been destroyed by Israeli bulldozers. Rafah, surrounded on three sides by Israeli-controlled territory, has been the scene of steady clashes. Israel has knocked down scores of houses along the Rafah frontier and local militias have made dozens of rifle, grenade and mortar attacks on the Israelis.

In other violence, Palestinians fired a mortar at a Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip. No injuries were reported. Israelis retaliated by rocketing a police outpost, injuring seven policemen.

Palestinians also shot at a settlement near the West Bank city of Ramallah, 12 miles north of Jerusalem, and the two sides exchanged fire in Bethlehem and Beitunia on the other side of the Israeli capital.

The outburst of clashes dimmed hopes -- already faint -- for success of the diplomatic activity pursued by German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer. Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian leader, persuaded Fischer to invite him and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to Berlin for talks to explore ways to bring the shooting to a close. But no date has been set, and Fischer said the encounter would have to be "well prepared." Arafat said he would meet Peres "at any moment" but took off for Cairo, to be followed by a trip to China. Peres, visiting Poland, said he would meet Arafat "soon."

Sharon has authorized Peres to discuss a cease-fire, but not to engage in negotiations over the political destiny of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Israeli newspapers have floated a possible Peres proposal for a rolling cease-fire, to take place in a variety of West Bank and Gaza areas. In return, travel restrictions would be lifted on each place.

But Palestinians appeared more preoccupied with shoring up diplomatic support from Arab countries. In Cairo, where 14 Arab League foreign ministers convened at his request, Arafat demanded firmer action against Israel on the grounds that it is "destroying the Palestinian dream" of statehood.

There was no sign anything concrete would come out of the meeting. The ministers were preparing demands that the United States take an active role in settling the conflict and that the U.N. Security Council endorse a Palestinian call for the dispatch of international monitors to the region.

Syria's foreign minister, Farouk Charaa, expressed intense skepticism of Arab commitment to helping the Palestinians. "We've met many times . . . and we did not put forward any plan," he said.

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Israeli Army Enters Palestinian Area of Hebron

August 23, 2001
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-mideast-leadall.html

HEBRON, West Bank (Reuters) - The Israeli army took control of a Palestinian-ruled area of the West Bank city of Hebron on Thursday after an 11-year-old Jewish settler was shot by a Palestinian sniper, Palestinian witnesses said.

A Reuters correspondent at the scene said more than 15 armored personnel carriers and military jeeps had taken over the Palestinian-ruled Abu Sneinah hill that overlooks the Jewish settler enclave in the city.

Soldiers also surrounded a nearby neighborhood, while more jeeps made there way up the hill and two helicopters hovered overhead. A firefight between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian gunmen erupted.

The army declined to comment on the troop movements on the hilltop.

Six Palestinians and an Israeli soldier were also wounded in Thursday's fighting in the city, a flashpoint of violence since the start of a Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.

The ancient city, home to 120,000 Palestinians, is one of the most sensitive areas in the West Bank due to the Jewish settlement in its center housing some 400 Israelis.

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

NAVY MAY SEEK EXEMPTIONS FROM ENVIRONMENTAL LAWS

AmeriScan: ENS
August 23, 2001
http://ens-news.com/ens/aug2001/2001L-08-23-09.html

WASHINGTON, DC, Citing growing restrictions on its operations, weapons development and training, the U.S. Navy will soon seek Congressional exemption from compliance with several environmental laws, according to agency documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

"The Navy's environmental philosophy is 'damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead,'" commented PEER general counsel Dan Meyer, a former Navy officer. "The Navy's senior command does not appreciate that defense of the nation does not demand despoliation of our natural resources."

In recent briefings and position papers, Navy officials contend "the cumulative impact of compliance [with applicable environmental laws] can have severe to extreme consequences on operational readiness."

Present and future limitations on firing live explosives, night training, operations in marine sanctuaries and emerging weapon systems, such as its new Low Frequency Active (LFA) sonar, present potential obstacles to the Navy's mission.

The PEER report says that the Navy objects to actions to protect threatened and endangered species by federal wildlife protection agencies such as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service because they take a "precautionary approach" toward protecting sea life. The Navy argues that its operations should not be hampered by "lack of quality data" and "limited scientific understanding" of the vulnerability of marine mammals, sea turtles and other aquatic life, PEER says.

Despite recommendations that Navy contractors "consider, wherever practical, using closed environments (e.g. quarries, catch ponds) for the testing of ordnance and other live fire testing" the Navy resists adopting any possible changes in its own operations to avoid environmental impacts, PEER charges. Instead, the Navy documents outline a series of statutory exemptions that the Navy intends to seek from the Endangered Species Act.

"We cannot simply stand by while the military or anyone else attempts to cut and shred the fabric of our nation's environmental laws, especially one that was so painstakingly crafted by past generations," said Brock Evans, a former marine and executive director of the Endangered Species Coalition.

Another document lists "seven regulatory programs that impact DOD [Department of Defense] operations, training and testing in the marine environment in order of their severity" starting with the Marine Mammal Protection Act followed by the Endangered Species Act, the National Marine Sanctuaries Act, the Coastal Zone Management Act, the Magnuson-Stevens Act (protecting fish habitat) and two executive orders by former President Bill Clinton on coral reefs and marine protected areas.

----

Bush Is Said to Pick General in Air Force to Lead Military

August 23, 2001
New York Times
By FRANK BRUNI
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/23/politics/23CHIE.html?searchpv=nytToday

CRAWFORD, Tex., Aug. 22 - Administration officials said today that they expected President Bush to nominate Gen. Richard B. Myers, a former head of the Air Force's space command, as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The officials cautioned that they had not received final word of that decision, which Mr. Bush is expected to announce here on Friday, from either the president or the tiny circle of senior advisers who know his intentions.

But they said the information they had received in recent days, coupled with General Myers's scheduled visit to the president's ranch on Friday, left them all but certain that Mr. Bush had chosen him as his top uniformed adviser on military matters.

General Myers, now the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs, would be the first non-Army general in more than a decade to hold the military's top job and would be the first Air Force general to have the job in almost two decades. Gen. Henry H. Shelton of the Army, the current chairman, will step down on Sept. 30.

Perhaps more important, the nomination of General Myers would signal the commitment that Mr. Bush and Donald H. Rumsfeld, the secretary of defense, have toward a space-based missile defense shield. The 19 months General Myers spent as the head of the space command, ending in February 2000, gave him a familiarity with the kinds of technology the program would use.

One prominent Republican who advises the administration said that if General Myers was selected, it would mean that Mr. Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney, who was the defense secretary in the administration of Mr. Bush's father, "became convinced that he was a guy who could embrace significant - some might say radical - change in the way the military is planning and procuring to fight war."

"If you're really trying to do something, and obviously Rumsfeld is - for good and ill - then you've got to have somebody who's willing to buy into the program," this adviser said. "Shelton really didn't."

Michael O'Hanlon, a military affairs expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington, said General Myers's work with the space command made him an understandable choice "for an administration thinking about military uses of space and missile defense."

Mr. O'Hanlon also cited General Myers's time as the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs and his past position as commander of Pacific Air Forces as experiences that undoubtedly made him a leading candidate to succeed General Shelton. Some influential Pentagon planners foresee a shift in military strategy to emphasize the Pacific theater over Europe.

"I think he has sort of the perfect résumé, at least in terms of which boxes he's checked, and without getting into the specifics of his ideas," Mr. O'Hanlon said. "He's been in major positions in the space command, the Pacific command and he's of course had an important position in Washington."

"For an administration thinking about military uses of space and missile defense on the one hand, China on the other and then dealing in a Washington political and budgetary context, those three major experiences are optimal," he said.

Mr. Bush has kept his deliberations about a new chairman of the Joint Chiefs extremely quiet, and several close aides said today that they could not confirm the selection of General Myers, which would require Senate confirmation, because they did not know.

Other leading aides said the president very much wanted the official announcement to come from him and not anyone else in his administration. On Friday, Mr. Bush will be visited at his ranch not only by General Myers but also by Mr. Rumsfeld, who would be expected to attend such an announcement.

Ari Fleischer, the White House press secretary, declined at a news conference here today to comment on whether the president had chosen General Myers, saying only that a decision had been made and that it would be announced "as soon as we have final word."

Should General Myers get the job, he would assume leadership of the military at a tense time and confront an array of formidable challenges, including the bitterness among many Pentagon officials and others in the armed forces over Mr. Rumsfeld's managerial style, which some have called heavy-handed.

He would also take up the difficult task of instituting the administration's envisioned reform and modernization of the military, which could require troop reductions and other cutbacks to make way for a new generation of weapons.

General Myers, 59, has been presiding with Mr. Rumsfeld over a major study of changes in United States military strategy for the new century.

In recent days, speculation on who would be nominated as chairman of the Joint Chiefs centered on General Myers and Adm. Vern Clark, the chief of naval operations.

Indeed, several prominent Republicans said today that they had thought Admiral Clark had the edge and were surprised at the emergence of General Myers as the likely choice.

Mr. Bush has always put a heavy emphasis on the personal chemistry and comfort he feels with his top advisers, and General Myers has something in common with both him and his father.

The first President Bush was a fighter pilot in the Navy, while the second President Bush was a fighter pilot in the Texas Air National Guard. General Myers was a fighter pilot in the Air Force.

Unlike many other four-star officers, General Myers did not graduate from one of the pre-eminent service academies but from the Reserve Officer Training Corps program at Kansas State University, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering.

He also holds a master's degree in business administration from Auburn University. He is a native of Kansas City, Mo.

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Rumsfeld Avoids Weapons Discussions

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Rumsfeld.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Thursday he has stayed out of any decision-making on weapons programs and proposed defense industry mergers to avoid the appearance of a personal conflict of interest.

He mentioned specifically General Dynamics Corp.'s proposed merger with Newport News Shipbuilding. The Pentagon is preparing a recommendation to the antitrust division of the Justice Department on whether it supports the merger. Rumsfeld said he has avoided involvement in those deliberations.

Rumsfeld, a multimillionaire who spent more than 20 years as a business executive before taking the Pentagon job in January, also said he has avoided Pentagon meetings in which AIDS is discussed. He said this was because he owns stock in a company that is working on an AIDS drug that might one day be commercialized.

Rumsfeld said he still owns one or two investment funds, which he described as illiquid. He said he does not know what companies those funds have invested in, and therefore he has stayed away from Pentagon deliberations involving weapons and proposed mergers, to avoid a potential conflict of interest.

``I have tended to stay away from them thus far,'' he said. ``We've got senior people who are perfectly capable of doing them.''

``I have not formally recused myself in a lot of things. I have just tended to stay away,'' he told a news conference.

Rumsfeld had a wide array of financial interests and affiliations when he came to the Pentagon, many of which he has dropped. He was chairman of the board of Gilead Sciences Inc. and served on the board of directors of other companies.

Rumsfeld said he sold a number of investment funds at considerable financial loss. He would not be more specific except to say they were sold for as little as 10 percent of their original value.


-------- OTHER

-------- alternative energy

UtiliCorp, FPL Energy power up wind farm in Kansas

REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
USA: August 23, 2001
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/12125/newsDate/23-Aug-2001/story.htm

MONTEZUMA, Kan. - UtiliCorp United and FPL Group unit FPL Energy said this week they had activated the first operational wind turbines at the largest wind farm ever constructed in Kansas.

The facility, which is owned and operated by FPL Energy, will supply electricity to UtiliCorp's customers in Missouri and Kansas.

Officials from the two companies energized several turbines this morning near Montezuma in southwestern Kansas.

Construction of 170 turbines, each about 214 feet high, will be completed by the end of the year.

When complete, the wind farm will be capable of generating 110 megawatts (MW) of electricity, enough to power 30,000 homes.

UtiliCorp will purchase all the power produced at the wind farm. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"The electricity from this wind farm provides an important cornerstone in UtiliCorp's commitment to provide its customers with renewable and reliable energy supplies," said James G. Miller, senior vice president of UtiliCorp and CEO of its U.S. utility unit.

The electricity from the facility located in Gray County, Kansas, will serve UtiliCorp's WestPlains Energy customers in Kansas, as well as its Missouri Public Service and St. Joseph Light & Power customers in Missouri.

UtiliCorp is the first utility to provide wind-generated power to residential customers in Missouri. The company began providing wind power to its Missouri Public Service division customers in 1999.

UtiliCorp provides electricity to 265,000 customers in Missouri, 65,000 in Kansas and 80,000 customers in Colorado.

FPL Energy, the nation's largest generator of wind power, currently operates wind farms in Iowa, Texas, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Oregon, and California, with more than 1,000 MW of capacity and a net ownership of approximately 800 MW.

The company has announced wind projects that will add approximately 650 additional MW to its portfolio by the end of 2001.

Wind power represents nearly 15 percent of the company's portfolio, with a total of 80 percent fueled by renewable sources or clean-burning natural gas.

Given current development activities, FPL Energy expects to have more than 10,000 MW in operation by 2003.

FPL Group's principal subsidiary is Florida Power & Light Co., which serves approximately 3.9 million customers in Florida.

Kansas City, Mo.-based UtiliCorp United has more than four customers in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Spain, Germany, Norway, New Zealand and Australia.

-------- environment

EPA ANNOUNCES $2 MILLION FOR BROWNFIELDS CLEANUP

August 23, 2001
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/aug2001/2001L-08-23-09.html

WASHINGTON, DC, The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will provide $2 million in financial assistance to provide training for residents in communities impacted by brownfields, Administrator Christie Whitman announced today.

Brownfields are abandoned, contaminated industrial sites. Many developers hesitate to purchase and redevelop brownfields due to concerns about cleanup costs.

The EPA pilot project, called the Brownfields Job Training and Development Demonstration Pilots, will facilitate cleanup of brownfields sites contaminated with hazardous substances and will also prepare trainees for future employment in the environmental field. The pilot projects must prepare trainees in activities that can be applied to a cleanup employing an alternative or innovative treatment technology.

The agency expects to select up to 10 pilot projects by December.

"We are not only cleaning up and redeveloping hazardous sites, but training new workers in the fight to make our communities cleaner and safer," Whitman said. "The Bush Administration has made the cleanup and redevelopment of brownfields a top environmental goal. This is a perfect example of the government working with local communities to ensure a safer, cleaner future for our children."

Each selected pilot will receive up to $200,000 over two years. The funds will be used to build partnerships between community groups, job training organizations, employers, investors, lenders, developers and other affected parties to provide training for residents in communities impacted by brownfields.

The deadline for submitting proposals for the pilots is October 19. More information is available at: http://www.epa.gov/brownfields

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$4 MILLION PROJECT WILL CLEANUP UNDERGROUND STORAGE TANKS

August 23, 2001
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/aug2001/2001L-08-23-09.html

WASHINGTON, DC, The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will provide $4 million in financial assistance to clean up contamination from leaking underground storage tanks around the nation.

The agency expects to select up to 40 pilot projects to help states and cities clean up these properties and encourage their redevelopment.

"These sites have caused problems that in many cases have very costly solutions. With this pilot money, recipients will be able to accelerate cleanup and return properties to viable use," said EPA Administrator Christie Whitman. "Fostering clean up at these sites not only restores the land but helps protect our water resources from petroleum contamination. The new pilot program is similar to our Brownfields initiatives in that it can help revitalize industrial areas and communities."

While the Brownfields program, which cleans up contaminated industrial sites, has been very successful, it has been unable to address abandoned petroleum tanks, Whitman explained. These new pilot projects will help bridge that gap.

The pilot project, called USTfields, involves abandoned or under used industrial and commercial properties with perceived or actual contamination from petroleum that has leaked from underground storage tanks (USTs).

The EPA is inviting states, territories and tribes as well as eligible intertribal consortia to compete for these pilots. Each selected pilot will receive up to $100,000 in Leaking Underground Storage Tank Trust Fund monies.

The deadline for submitting proposals for the USTfields Pilots is October 22. The announcement of the selected pilots will take place by the end of the year.

----

NASA Pulls Plug on Costly Satellite

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/science/AP-Satellite-Unplugged.html

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Citing the $10-million-a-year operating costs, NASA is pulling the plug on a satellite that has measured the ozone hole for the past decade.

NASA said the 6 1/2-ton, 35-foot satellite will either be plucked from orbit by the space shuttle or allowed to crash back to Earth sometime between 2016 and 2027.

The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite mission is being cut at a time when NASA faces overruns on a number of projects, including the international space station.

``Scientists are screaming, `How can NASA turn off a satellite?''' NASA spokesman David Steitz said. ``Sorry guys, but it's over. We can't afford to continue to feed it and we have other priorities with new technologies.''

The satellite will cease scientific operations by Sept. 30, or 10 years after it was put in orbit by a space shuttle. Seven of its 10 instruments still work.

The mission was originally designed to last for just three years. A replacement is scheduled to be launched in 2003.

Over the course of its mission, the satellite has measured ozone and chemical compounds found in the ozone layer of the atmosphere. The satellite is best known for its monitoring of the ozone hole over Antarctica.

Scientists on the ozone project are angry over the decision. They have proposed suspending operations and restoring them in a year or so when the satellite could work in tandem with a European satellite now being prepared for launch.

``It's a $1 billion asset we're throwing down the drain because we can't come up with a couple of million to keep it running,'' said Mark Schoeberl, the mission's former project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

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Nordic states ask Britain to cut nuclear pollution

Story by Erik Brynhildsbakken
REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
NORWAY: August 23, 2001
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/12133/newsDate/23-Aug-2001/story.htm

OSLO - Environment ministers from five Nordic countries sent a letter to Britain this week urging the government to curb nuclear pollution from a reprocessing plant, Norway's Environment Minister said this week.

It was just the latest move in a long-running international dispute over emissions from Britain's Sellafield complex, which boasts one of the world's largest nuclear fuel recycling plants, after Norway detected rising levels of radioactivity in marine life on its coast.

"We have from the Nordic side - and the environment ministers especially - been worried about the emissions from Sellafield for a long time," Environment Minister Siri Bjerke told Reuters.

"I hope this (letter) will be taken into account and lead to a reduction in the emissions from Sellafield," she added.

Norway would prefer to see the complex shut down for good, but a more realistic aim was an emissions cut, she said.

In addition to Bjerke, the letter bore the signature of environment ministers from Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland, and was sent to British Prime Minister Tony Blair this week.

LONG TERM RISK?

Rising levels of radioactivity from Sellafield, owned by state-run British Nuclear Fuels, was last year detected in marine life on Norway's southern coast, and latest research shows pollution has followed North Sea currents as far as the Barents Sea and Svalbard, east of Norway.

The Norwegian authorities said the levels found did not pose a threat to human health, but some experts fear that it could cause harm to marine life in the long term.

Britain maintains that its discharges from Sellafield, which prepares spent nuclear fuel from power stations for recycling into fresh fuel, are within international limits.

Sellafield was a hot topic at a recent meeting between Nordic environment ministers and the Russian government in Kirkenes, Norway to discuss the Barents Sea region, Bjerke said.

"We want to focus on the Barents Sea as a clean ocean area which should be allowed to remain clean in the future," she said, adding that the Arctic region was extremely vulnerable to pollution of any kind.

It is not the first time Norway has pressed Britain over Sellafield emissions, but Bjerke said the letter comes at a time when the British government is faced with a decision about the complex's future.

"We want to encourage the British government to choose an alternative that would prevent any further emissions into the North Sea which could then spread further across large areas," the minister said.

Seafood is Norway's top export after oil and gas.

----------

Virtuous Globalization

Christian Science Monitor
08/23/01
http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0823/p10s2-comv.html

The ability of American consumers to use their immense purchasing power to influence global trends knows no end.

First it was a campaign not to buy clothes made in overseas sweatshops. Then it was "fair trade coffee." Now it's a campaign to buy only lumber that's been certified as "green," which means it supposedly wasn't cut down in a way that damages tropical forests or the endangered animals that live in them. (See story)

Home Depot and other big lumber outlets have signed on to this latest campaign. The result may be higher prices for consumers, but the long-term benefits to the planet - and to timber-exporting nations - are immeasurable. That assumes, of course, that the campaign actually works.

Enforcing "green" standards in many developing countries faces big obstacles, such as corruption. Southeast Asian nations have seen their forests ravaged, often by Japanese-led groups. A campaign led by Philippine environmentalists in the 1990s forced Mitsubishi and other timber-processing companies enough to revamp their ways.

"Green" restrictions on the forest industry in the US have forced Americans to import more timber. That dependency, fed by an ever-rising demand for timber products, requires a closer watch on how foreign timber is felled. If "green" certification doesn't work, US consumers should look hard at how much wood they use.

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The quest for certifiably eco-friendly lumber

By Dan Murphy
Christian Science Monitor
08/23/01
http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0823/p10s2-comv.html

JAKARTA, INDONESIA - Ikea sells eco-friendly teak patio tables and chairs. Home Depot stores in Seattle now stock "certified" hardwood flooring. And Wickes Lumber won't be buying wood from endangered forests by the end of this year.

But such examples are few and far between. One of the big problems facing the effort to sell "good wood" - timber that's been certified as coming from a well-managed forest - is the slow pace of certification.

The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) has put its stamp of approval on 59 million acres of forest in 47 countries. But that still only represents about 4 percent of the world's forests being logged. Many major retailers are not advertising eco-friendly wood because the global supply is still minuscule.

"Lauan doors, lauan plywood, and ramin dowels: These things are among the most egregious products [from illegal logging in Indonesia], but they're also industry standards,'' says Tim Keating, executive director of Rainforest Relief, a New York-based group.

The US logging industry has created its own certification system, Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI), but because it's industry-run, it has less credibility with environmental groups. The FSC has timber-industry representatives on its board, but takes no industry money. It has the most rigorous certification standard, and is recognized by most environmental groups. The FSC requires a series of independent environmental, economic, and social audits of a forest before certification. FSC third-party auditors will go to a forest to check, for example, the extent of clear-cutting and the quantities of pesticides or herbicides used.

The FSC has 10 guiding principles to gain certification, including: Obey the law, protect the rights of native peoples, limit waste, preserve species, contribute to the economic well-being of nearby communities, and preserve the forest.

The review, which logging companies have to pay for, can take years, and there's no guarantee that the coveted certification will be granted at the end of the process. The FSC also has a "chain of custody" certification that requires tracking wood from the jungle, to the mill, to the container ship, and eventually to the store shelf.

This certification is considered critical to the integrity of the program. Without it, certifications could be used for "greenwashing" - the creation of legitimate documents to cover up trade in illegally cut wood.

"People have been screaming at me for more certified wood since the day I got here,'' says Jeff Hayward, who runs the Asian operations of Smartwood, one of 11 organizations accredited by the FSC to conduct certification audits. "But it's a long, difficult process and there's only a handful of forests that have a chance to quickly meet the standards.''

In April, PT Diamond Raya became the first Indonesian timber company to get a certification - granted by the Indonesian Ecolabeling Foundation, working jointly with the FSC. As of this month, two more forest owners have been certified and four Indonesian firms are working toward certification. Three have failed to meet audit criteria.

Europe leads the way in certifying wood and selling it. For example, in Britain, consumers can buy "everything from a 2x4 stud to a piece of furniture, the handle on a broom, paper, anything sold as a derivative product," says Hank Cauley, FSC's executive director in the United States.

"We are making good progress in Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, the US, and particularly in Sweden and Poland for forest areas," he says. In the United Kingdom, 1.5 percent of wood products sold are now FSC certified. While that may sound like a small number, he notes that it's about equal to the market penetration of organic foods.

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'Good wood' labeling: Can it save Asia's tropical forests?

PHOTO BY GARY PAOLI
August 23, 2001
http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0823/p1s3-woap.html

The world's three biggest buyers of lumber - Home Depot, Lowe's, and IKEA - vow to buy 'green.' By Dan Murphy/Special to The Christian Science Monitor

JAKARTA, INDONESIA - The next time you're in a Home Depot or Lowe's, stroll down the lumber aisles. Check out that $26 sheet of lauan plywood or the $22 hardwood doors.

You're probably looking at "stolen" goods.

"Lauan" is the trade name for hardwood milled from the rainforest trees that grow in Indonesia and Malaysia. It accounts for about 80 percent of all tropical timber sold in the US. And, according to a not-yet-published report from the World Wildlife Fund, an estimated 7 out of every 10 trees cut down in Indonesia are from an illegal or uncontrolled harvest.

In short, consumers in the US are unwittingly contributing to the destruction of Indonesia's tropical forests. At current rates of deforestation, that means some of the most biologically diverse rainforests on earth will be gone in just four years.

But a "good wood" certification effort is just getting started, offering hope by laying bare the connection between the chainsaw gangs in Southeast Asia and the wood on store shelves.

The goal is to create a market for eco-friendly timber by riding the same wave of environmental consciousness that is starting to build markets for "fair trade" coffee, bananas, and cocoa.

Certification systems have been set up to review which forests are being the most responsibly logged, and to reward their owners with higher prices and more customers. (See PDF file of Where Timber Slips Away Unnoticed, 183K.) You will need Adobe Acrobat to view this file.

To its boosters, forest certification could be the rainforests' salvation. "Market demand can change forest practices,'' says Rod Taylor, an ecologist at the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in Asia.

A coalition of environmentalists and timber executives called the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is actively testing that theory. The Oaxaca, Mexico-based group's voluntary certification program is the most rigorous in the world - and the only one endorsed by the WWF.

The idea is to inform consumers about where wood comes from and at what environmental cost.

That's an almost revolutionary step for an industry that has traditionally focused on a wood's strength or color, not on its place of origin.

The US market for Southeast Asian timber was first developed 40 years ago by the Philippines, with the timber marketed as lauan or Philippines Mahogany, a trade name created by the US Forest Service to help Filipino logging companies sell their wood.

Today, there's almost no commercial logging in the Philippines. "There is no forest left in the Philippines, and Indonesia is going down the same road, just 15 years later,'' says Lisa Curran, a Yale University ecologist who is studying the impact of logging in Indonesia.

"This is the most unregulated industry on the planet,'' says Mike Roselle at Greenpeace in Washington. "You buy a $10 bottle of wine from Chile, and you can pinpoint the winery owner and when his grandfather founded it. You buy a $200 roof beam, and it's a mystery.''

If Indonesia's tropical rainforests are to be saved, say environmentalists, the mystery has to be taken out of the business. In the past decade, according to the World Bank, the rate of deforestation in Indonesia has almost doubled, from 2.47 million to 4.2 million acres per year.

That kind of volume comes with an ecological pricetag. Over the past 10 years, the world's orangutan population has been cut in half, and the Sumatran tiger has edged closer to extinction. Millions of Indonesians now face more flooding, wildfires, and mudslides as a result of denuding forests.

And logging is accelerating. Each day, Indonesia's rainforests shudder as 400-year-old giants thump to ground, even in national parks and protected lands. "We have to find a way to pay for these global environmental commons before they're gone,'' says Mr. Taylor, who says sustainable forestry practices are the only hope of slowing the onslaught, since logging bans seem to just encourage smuggling.

"You try to smuggle a parrot or a snake into this country, you'd be hunted down. But you smuggle the tree that the parrot or the snake lived in, you're a respectable businessman,'' says Greenpeace's Mr. Roselle.

He isn't exactly the FSC's biggest booster. Greenpeace wants logging in all the world's old-growth forests to be banned, and developed world restrictions placed on tropical-wood imports. Still, in the absence of legislation, he says certification is worth a try.

Certification was put on the map in 1998 and 1999, when activists picketed 150 Home Depot outlets, occasionally rappelling from the roofs of the megastores and chaining themselves to piles of old-growth wood.

In August 1999, Home Depot President and CEO Arthur Blank promised to eliminate wood sales from environmentally endangered areas and to give preference to certified wood by the end of 2002. Home Depot is the world's largest lumber retailer, and 2000 sales were $45 billion, or about a third of Indonesia's gross domestic product. As such, it sets the industry standard.

"It was incredible,'' says Tim Keating, executive director of Rainforest Relief, a Brooklyn, New York-based environmental group - and who helped run the campaign. Within a year, the world's second- and third-largest buyers of lumber - Lowes Companies Inc. and IKEA (the furniture retailer) - had signed up, too.

"We're serious,'' says Suzanne Apple, a Home Depot vice president for community and environmental affairs. "We're working with suppliers to make sure there are alternatives if there isn't enough certified wood by the end of next year.''

It's hard to get certified

The growing preference for certified suppliers has caught the attention of timber companies in Indonesia, including Inhutani I, an Indonesian government logging company that makes moldings, doors, and window frames for the US, Australian, and European markets.

But the company's experience with certification is a case study both in the potential good certification can do and in the shortcomings that may ultimately undermine the movement.

For the past 18 months, Irsal Yasmin, the development director for Inhutani, has been fighting to certify a 500-square-mile forest the company logs in East Kalimantan province. Kalimantan is the name for Indonesia's three-quarters of Borneo, an island it shares with Malaysia and the tiny sultanate of Brunei.

"For us, this is an issue of global competition,'' says Dr. Irsal. "We could lose customers if we don't get certified.''

By all accounts, Inhutani's practices are among the best in Indonesia, and it has fulfilled most of the FSC criteria, including promising to spare some of the biggest trees. But two years ago, wildcat loggers began to stream through Inhutani's forest, cutting trees earmarked for survival. Though Inhutani has complained to local officials, the logging has continued. Some executives privately allege that the loggers have ties to the local police and government. As a result, "they tell us we may not get certified,'' says Irsal. "It's something beyond our control."

It's a problem that's hitting almost all of Indonesia's legitimate timber operations, with companies complaining that the illegal loggers turn violent if they're opposed. In some places, concession owners have taken to blowing up bridges and dumping loads of rocks on their access roads to keep the illegal loggers out.

"The situation is overwhelming the best efforts of good people,'' says Graham Tyrie, a forester working on a European Union project to help Inhutani improve its forest management. "It's depressing.''

A stop-gap step?

Certification has met with some success in North America and Europe, where environmental groups are more effective and forests are easier to monitor. In tropical countries such as Indonesia and Brazil, though, the forests are remote and often bedeviled by communal conflicts and mismanagement. As a result, only about 17,000 square miles of tropical forest has been certified by FSC-accredited groups.

But Indonesia alone loses more than 17,000 square miles of rainforest a year, and the global annual deforestation rate is estimated to be about five times that.

Some environmentalists say that certification is a stop-gap measure. "Something that even the NGO's don't want to accept is that there has to be a dramatic cut in consumption,'' says Mr. Keating. Otherwise, he says, "demand will simply bulldoze over certification.''

Time is running short, if the supply of certified wood is going to meet demand. While about 200 patches of global forest have already been certified, they represent a tiny fraction of world demand. "If Home Depot came on board tomorrow, they'd exhaust the global supply of certified wood in about a day," says the WWF's Taylor.

Rainforest Relief's Keating says his big worry now is that the FSC and buyers are going to fudge on their commitments when confronted with the reality that there's not enough wood. "There's been this rush to certify, but they're going to have to water down their standards if they're going to meet demand.''

For Keating, the euphoria of the 1999 success is wearing off. He's begun to doubt Home Depot's ability to meet its commitment. "This is so big, we're willing to wait,'' he says. "But we may end up having to start another campaign.''

-------- genetics

Scientists Question Report on Genes

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Human-Gene-Count.html

BOSTON (AP) -- Scientists are questioning the most surprising discovery from last winter's deciphering of the human genetic code -- the assertion that people have only about 30,000 genes, or roughly twice as many as the fruit fly.

A new analysis suggests that number is too low, and the real total could be considerably bigger. However, researchers who came up with the original figure are sticking with it, at least for now.

Scientists have long argued over how many genes it takes to build a human. Educated guesses have ranged up to 150,000.

The issue seemed settled last February, when two competing scientific teams published the first detailed look at virtually the entire library of genetic information contained in every human cell.

Both groups laid out the 3 billion bits of data that make up the code. Both used computers to distinguish the information that is genes from the look-alike filler. And both came up with roughly the same estimate: between 30,000 and 40,000 genes, with the best bet under 35,000.

Some speculated that the relatively small number of human genes was good news, because it means less work to understand how they all work and perhaps translate that information into cures and treatments for various diseases.

To many scientists, the fact that the two groups independently arrived at the same number made it believable.

However, a team lead by Dr. Michael Cooke of the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation in San Diego compared the two groups' findings and found out that they had identified two quite different sets of genes, with only roughly a 50 percent overlap between them.

The two groups agreed on the existence of about 17,000 genes. But about 25,000 more were found only by one group or the other.

``It's a jaw-dropper,'' said Cooke, whose findings are published in Friday's issue of the journal Cell.

Just how many genes it takes to construct a human is unclear from the latest analysis. While Cooke believes 30,000 is too low, he estimates the total is probably not more than 60,000.

For now, nobody knows how many genes were missed by both teams or how many of those identified by just one group truly are genes.

One catalog of genes was compiled by Celera Genomics of Rockville, Md., the other by an international consortium headed by the National Human Genome Research Institute.

Officials of both Celera and the consortium contend that most of the 25,000 genes found by just one group or the other will turn out to be phonies, so the final answer may still be somewhere around 30,000.

``It's way too simplistic to say you can add up the non-overlapping sets and get a bigger number,'' said Celera President Craig Venter. ``They're probably bogus.''

Dr. Francis Collins, head of the genome institute, agreed the total is unlikely to grow hugely. ``It would not stun me if there turned out to be 50,000,'' he said. ``It would stun me greatly if there were 100,000.''

Dr. Gerald Rubin, a fruit fly expert at the University of California at Berkeley, said some scientists suspected all along that the total number would turn out to be higher than 30,000. His guess: Humans will have 54,000 genes, or four times more than the 13,600 in the fruit fly Drosophila.

Scientists are running a betting pool on what the total will be, and so far 165 have entered. (The cost of a bet rose from $1 to $5 after the release of February's data.) Right now, their average guess is 61,710 genes. The winner will be chosen in 2003, by which time it is hoped the answer will be clear.

Collins' bet, made two years ago, was 48,011. ``I'll hold on,'' he said. ``I'm not completely retracting that.''

-------- health

China, in a Switch, Concedes It Is Facing AIDS Epidemic

New York Times
August 23, 2001
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/23/international/asia/23CND-CHINA.html?pagewanted=all

BEIJING, Aug. 23 - In a departure from the Chinese government's general reticence on the subject of AIDS, a senior official openly admitted today that China is facing an epidemic that is threatening to outpace official efforts to control it.

"Like many other countries, we are also facing a very serious epidemic of H.I.V.-AIDS," said Yin Dakui, China's vice minister of health, adding, "We have not effectively controlled the epidemic."

Mr. Yin's 90-minute news conference - the first on the topic by a government official - was the latest in a series of small steps suggesting that China is ready to address more openly a topic that has been mostly taboo in the past.

Mr. Yin stressed that China's epidemic of H.I.V, the virus that causes AIDS, was still relatively small - but he also released some alarming new statistics.

Reported H.I.V. infections rose 67.4 percent in the first six months of 2001 compared with last year, he said, and about 5 percent of drug users in China are now infected with the virus, up from less than five-tenths of 1 percent in 1995.

In response, the government has decided to spend about $12 million a year on prevention and educating the public, he said, as well as more than $11 million to improve blood safety.

More important, though, Mr. Yin addressed some of the more sensitive aspects of China's AIDS problem. These included the government's failure to develop effective education programs and the tendency of officials in some provinces to cover up what they regard as an embarrassing problem, allowing H.I.V. to spread unchecked.

"In some regions, leaders and the general public have not fully realized the hidden dangers of a large-scale epidemic," he said.

He also discussed, for the first time by a public official, a covered-up AIDS epidemic in Henan Province, where tens if not hundreds of thousands of poor farmers have contracted AIDS by selling their blood to blood-collection stations that use nonsterile practices.

Just last week, Mr. Yin had a widely publicized meeting with AIDS patients in the village of Wenlou, in Henan. It was the first time that such a high-level delegation had visited the area and the first time that this sensitive epidemic had been featured in the mainstream state press.

Although today's news conference was a milestone of sorts, it also underscored the gulf between the government and its critics both in and out of China. The critics remain at least somewhat skeptical, feeling that the government has been maddeningly slow in confronting a burgeoning AIDS problem.

"In the past, I may have believed things but now I'm not sure about what I'm told, so I must observe and judge," said Dr. Gao Yaojie, a retired gynecologist who defiantly created her own H.I.V.-education program in Henan Province, earning international praise and the enmity of local officials.

And the government's apparent commitment to greater openness about AIDS was undercut by the fact that reports on the lengthy news conference in the state-controlled press were brief and statistical. They left out mention of Mr. Yin's judgment that China faced a "serious epidemic" and did not mentioned Henan Province at all.

Also, despite acknowledging a rapid increase in the number of people testing positive for H.I.V., Mr. Yin staunchly defended earlier government estimates that 600,000 Chinese were infected with the virus by the end of 2000. And he repeated the goal, set this May by China's State Council, a powerful government organization, that China should control the total number of H.I.V. infections to below 1.5 million in 2010.

But a recent update by Unaids, the United Nations AIDS agency, estimated that there were already "above 1 million" H.I.V. sufferers at the start of 2001, and that the country could well have 20 million sufferers by the end of 2010.

According to government data, almost 70 percent of those infected with H.I.V. are intravenous drug users, although critics say that statistic may be partly an artifact of widespread testing in that group.

Even those who welcomed today's shift pointed out that it was too little too late for the thousands of people who had been needlessly infected during the last two years - while health officials failed to take decisive action.

The United Nations update noted that China is now experiencing local H.I.V. epidemics that could have been prevented with simple education programs.

The government surveillance system, for instance, showed that needle-sharing rates among drug users in Jiangxi Province were rising through the 1990's, reaching an alarming 93 percent in 1999. Since health officials made little effort to stem the practice, H.I.V. spread quickly from addict to addict when the virus entered the population in 2000.

"Education is extremely important, especially at the grass-roots level," said Dr. Gao, who is distributing 120,000 copies of a book she recently wrote and printed on the topic. "Education is essential and so is a proper attitude toward people with AIDS - an attitude of support and understanding."

Mr. Yin angrily disputed accusations that the government had been previously unconcerned, noting that the government has had an office in charge of overseeing sexually transmitted diseases and AIDS since 1996 and has had a plan for H.I.V. prevention and containment since 1998.

But until China announced its infusions of money this week, that plan was drastically under-financed; in recent years, China has spent only a fraction of the money spent on education and prevention by Thailand, for example.

Mr. Yin got particularly testy on the issue of why the Ministry of Health had not been more forceful in dealing with the epidemic among blood sellers in rural Henan Province.

The bulk of H.I.V. cases there were contracted during the 1990's when poor farmers sold their blood at blood stations that Mr.Yin admitted today used shockingly unsanitary procedures.

Blood from farmers of the same blood type would be pooled and centrifuged to separate out the plasma, which was sold to make medicines. The remainder of the pooled blood, mostly red cells, was divided and returned to the farmers to prevent anemia.

Many gave several times a month for a fee of about $5. While Mr. Yin blamed "underground and illegal plasma collection stations" for H.I.V.'s spread, he did not mention that many of these stations were owned or operated in collaboration with government bureaus, including the Chinese Army.

The practice tailed off in the late 1990's, in part because of a government ban on blood sales and in part because the farmers realized that it had infected them with a fatal disease.

But data on infection rates in the area remain sketchy, in large part because provincial officials have generally refused to let outside researchers conduct independent surveys, often forcing them to work undercover. Chinese journalists who have tried to report on the problem have been fired. Foreign journalists who have tried to visit the villages have been detained.

Mr. Yin denied that Ministry of Health officials were in any way responsible, saying that "it is not appropriate to blame the Chinese government for the suppression."

"We have all along encouraged the grass-roots individuals to stand up to the issue rather than to suppress its release," he said.

"Our experts have made efforts to change the way of thinking of the leaders and the people at the grass roots. But they are worried that once the problem is revealed it will harm their social and economic development."

Indeed, because of widespread ignorance, AIDS sufferers in China generally face severe discrimination, and once a village gets the reputation of having an AIDS problem, its residents often have trouble selling their produce or even traveling on buses out of town.

Still, even as some village officials have tried to suppress information, many AIDS patients have made desperate efforts to get their story out - even traveling to Beijing to petition China's leaders to meet with journalists.

Reached by telephone, an AIDS patient in Wenlou who would give only his surname, Cheng, said that while people generally appreciated the vice minister's recent visit, they felt he offered no solution to their plight.

He said that 12 people in the village of several thousand had died of AIDS over the summer and that several more were close to death. He said that though the health authorities had now set up a free clinic it only dispensed medicines for headaches, diarrhea and fevers - which were not effective anyway.

He said that the police surrounded the village during the visit of the vice minister and his delegation of several dozen. "He didn't say what would happen to us," he said. "He encouraged us, and warned us not to talk to foreign reporters."

In villages like Wenlou, a large majority of adults sold blood and many are now infected with H.I.V. Mr. Yin estimated that 30,000 to 50,000 former blood sellers are infected in the province.

In April the Henan health department - in conjunction with the health ministry - attempted a comprehensive survey of the village, although a number of people refused to take part. Of over 1,600 people, 568 reported that they had sold blood before 1995 and, of those, 244 tested positive for H.I.V., for a rate of about 42 percent among that group. Some previous studies had suggested rates as high as 60 percent for the village as a whole.

But the April study probably understates the impact of the virus on the village since it included people up to the age of 65 and few people under 20 could have sold blood. It also does not include the many villagers who have already died.

Ministry officials say they are continuing their efforts to understand the size of the problem.

"It is important to get an accurate estimate of carriers so we can establish the future costs of their medical care," said Dr. Shen Jie, a leading H.I.V. expert at the health ministry, "because the villagers are poor and can't afford their own treatment."

Today Mr. Yin also addressed the government's future plans for AIDS education, confessing that it has so far failed in many respects. "We still have a poor record of education on how to prevent H.I.V.," he said.

He noted that in surveys, only about 9 percent of prostitutes regularly used condoms and only 30 to 40 percent of intravenous drug addicts understood how to protect themselves from contracting H.I.V.

"That number is even less among people living in impoverished or remote areas," he said, where many people have still never even heard of AIDS.

That lack of knowledge is of special concern because cases of H.I.V. infection have now been found in all 31 provinces.

Dr. Gao said she has been deluged with requests for copies of her new education book, which she printed in part with the proceeds of the Jonathan Mann Award, a prestigious international public health prize that she was awarded this year. Local officials blocked her from traveling to Washington to accept it from the United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan.

"Of course, education should be the government's job," she said. "There's so much to be done."

-------- human rights

Turkish Watchdog Says Reports of Torture Soaring

August 23, 2001
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-rights-turkey.html

ANKARA (Reuters) - There has been a sharp increase in allegations of torture and curbs on freedom of expression in Turkey, the country's Human Rights Association (IHD) said on Thursday.

IHD head Husnu Ondul said 435 people had complained of torture in detention in the first half of this year, compared to 263 for the same period last year and 334 for the same period in 1999.

``It is clear that no improvement has been made in getting rid of torture since 1999,'' Ondul told a news conference to present the association's half-yearly report on human rights in Turkey.

Turkey, which is keen to join the European Union, has long pledged to root out such abuses.

Although accepted as a candidate for EU membership in 1999, it has yet to begin negotiations partly because of concern over its human rights record.

Critics say little is done to investigate charges of abuse and those who carry it out are rarely punished.

According to IHD figures, prosecutors charged 1,519 people in the first half of this year for views expressed in speeches or writing, and sought jail terms totaling 3,125 years for them.

The human rights group did not say how many people had been charged in previous years, but said the total jail terms sought in the first half of 1999 amounted to 372 years, and 813 years in the first half of last year.

Many politicians, writers and intellectuals face jail sentences on catch-all charges such as ``separatist propaganda'' or ``provoking hatred'' for what they have said or written.

Allegations of mistreatment at the hands of security forces are also common.

The laws are most often used against Kurdish activists or proponents of political Islam, two movements the establishment sees as a serious threat to the secular Turkish state.

-------- imf / world bank / G-7

Lower the Limousine Windows

By Jim Hoagland
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A25
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A49273-2001Aug22?language=printer

The threat of ugly street protests wherever they gather in mass is suddenly forcing the world's most powerful bankers, financiers and politicians to regroup and, it must be hoped, reassess some fundamental assumptions about wealth and power in the age of globalization.

The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank have cut short their scheduled autumn meetings here from a week to two days in hopes of avoiding the kind of street violence that has repeatedly erupted over the past 20 months from Seattle to Genoa, Italy. That same concern will drive world trade officials to the Persian Gulf emirate of Qatar in November and the Group of Seven political leaders to remote Canadian forests for their summit next year.

You do not have to sympathize with the anarchists, protectionists and publicity hounds among the demonstrators -- or even with the well-meaning environmental, civic and political organizations that also participate in these protests -- to recognize that they have forced a telling admission from their chosen adversaries, who can run but can't hide on the world stage.

A lot of the pomp and ceremony (and media coverage that the pomp and ceremony are designed to attract) turns out to be unnecessary if not self-defeating. The summits of the Group of Seven, World Trade Organization, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum and other proliferating world leadership clubs increasingly find it difficult to justify the sweeping powers they have claimed or had imputed to them in times of perceived prosperity.

Like murder in the classics, bad ideas in politics will out over time. The threadbare state of several such ideas has particular bearing on the current success that the world's protesters are having in fastening blame and criticism on the international Establishment for allegedly ignoring or exploiting the world's disadvantaged and poor.

Nearly two decades ago, the G-7 expanded beyond its original purpose, which was to have the leaders of the world's most affluent industrial democracies -- Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States -- consult informally with each other on economic problems, with a minimum of publicity. But in 1982 summit participants began to hold their own, often competing news conferences and the organization began to issue declarations on political questions as well.

The Reagan administration pushed for this change for a serious reason -- it wanted European and Japanese support for the deployment of U.S. missiles to counter Soviet SS-20s -- and for the less noble purpose of self-glorification. Background accounts extolling Reagan's wisdom and courage inside the closed meetings abounded at Versailles, Venice and other summit spots.

The end of the Cold War ended the SS-20 threat. But the propaganda shops survive and continue to fight their battles at the G-7 and other international summits. These meetings now serve as focal points for the disillusionment and bitterness that have been stirred in the Third World and elsewhere by the economic dislocations created by the market forces lumped together under the label of globalization.

Today it is possible to see how the G-7 members overreached in arrogating to themselves powers of a world political directorate based entirely on their wealth. They have given symbolic political membership to Russia in an expanded G-8, in the name of "integrating" that giant but poor nation into the world economy. This has made the political nature of the group only more apparent, and only more unwieldy.

The search for legitimacy -- a growing problem for the powerful nations of the world's Northern Hemisphere in a time of plague, devastation and deprivation throughout the global "South" -- has led the G-7 to inscribe debt relief, disease control and poverty on its annual agenda, and to do some good things.

But the doubts that the rich will voluntarily donate the resources needed to resolve the problems of the world's poor is expressed in the street demonstrations that now disrupt the G-7, WTO, IMF and World Bank clambakes. In this light, these institutions need to reassess the roles they have come to play in world politics.

The authentic backlash they have helped spark is a reaction against the complacent and greedy version of globalization that has been widely hyped and sold in the marketplace of ideas and goods. Criminals and charlatans have joined capitalists in taking advantage of this era's greater flows of trade, capital and technology across national borders.

Internet services turn out to be handy tools, not value-changing spreaders of prosperity and peace. Foreign investment can still be productive or exploitative, depending on circumstances. For better and for worse, destiny is not an inevitable product of market forces alone but also of human intent and will.

--------

Just say no to global summits

Christian Science Monitor
By Murray Weidenbaum
08/23/01
http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0823/p11s1-coop.html
IGOR KOPELNITSKY

WASHINGTON - With the benefit of hindsight, it is tempting to conclude that the protesters in Genoa, Italy, were right, but for the wrong reasons. The phenomenon of highly orchestrated annual meetings of world leaders should be halted. Those controversial spectacles have degenerated into costly global photo opportunities at which presidents and prime ministers strut the world stage - and accomplish little of substance.

One of the easiest forecasts to make in advance of any annual summit is that the joint communiqué will be disappointingly bland. Thus, the protesters are fundamentally misguided in massing at summit cities in an effort to influence a supposedly powerful decisionmaking operation. Few decisions of importance are made there.

Although the original intent was to focus on economic matters, today's summit meeting at its best is now merely a colorful social occasion. The leaders of the major nations get to meet each other. As in the encounter between Presidents Bush and Putin, sometimes the most useful function is to provide a forum for informal side meetings of pairs of leaders. Holding a formal summit is a very costly way of doing that. Other alternatives are available for such get-acquainted sessions, including the regularly scheduled United Nations meetings.

More-imaginative approaches have been used. When he was vice president, former President Bush found that he could meet many government leaders by attending funerals of important people. Although some observers teased him at the time, he clearly put those obligatory trips to good use.

The clearest evidence was his ability to quickly form the international alliance that successfully prosecuted the Gulf War. It surely was a big help for former President Bush to have met previously and privately with many of the national leaders whom he reached by telephone.

The annual summits have become far more costly and burdensome than the informal get-togethers originally anticipated. In recent years, each government represented feels obliged to send a huge delegation to back up its national leader. After all, who knows what technical questions will be raised? In any event, that justifies a vast array of supporting officials and staff members to be present. These taxpayer-financed junkets also involve a variety of preparatory meetings to deal in advance with a host of bureaucratic matters ranging from security to culinary concerns.

Given the millions of dollars directly spent on the summits - much less the very substantial indirect costs that are generated - it is tempting to perform the simplest of benefit/cost analyses on this phenomenon. Just contrast the huge outlays with the modest benefits that are achieved. Surely the benefit side of the equation does not include the tendency to provoke violent confrontations, which journalists and photographers tend to favor over the coverage of more serious but duller policy events.

Under the circumstances, I offer a modest proposal: Declare a moratorium on global summits and at minimum, cancel the meeting scheduled for the summer of 2002. Let the leaders use modern means to communicate (translation: make a phone call). Use the money saved for some worthy endeavor such as treatment for the sick.

My forecast is that, aside from folks who enjoy taking expensive international trips paid for by someone else, no serious government function will be adversely affected by not holding a global summit meeting next year.

As for the protesters, perhaps they will find themselves taking the more-prosaic summer vacations that the rest of us do.

• Murray Weidenbaum was the first chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Reagan. He is a visiting distinguished scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Business & Finance

A week later than predicted, the International Monetary Fund announced a new $8 billion loan offer to help rescue Argentina from deep financial crisis. The package brings to $22 billion the total IMF aid to the Buenos Aires government and is expected to avert a short-term default on its $129 billion foreign debt.

-------- police / prisoners

Cameras nab 15,000 speeders in 10 days

August 23, 2001
By Daniel F. Drummond and Matthew Cella
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/metro/20010823-96805020.htm

The District issued more than 15,000 traffic citations in the first 10 days of a program that catches speeders using photo-radar cameras, Executive Assistant Police Chief Terrance W. Gainer said.

From Aug. 6-15, more than 9,000 citations were issued to speeders on highways and more than 6,000 to speeders in residential areas and school zones. Chief Gainer said the preliminary figures show the number of citations issued, not the number of photographs taken.

The 15,000 speeding tickets in 10 days put the city on a pace to issue about 45,000 citations a month -- fewer than the 80,000 monthly tickets city officials anticipated before starting the automated program, but much more than the 10,000 tickets police issued during all of last year.

The tickets, which are mailed to the vehicles' owners, range from $30 to $200, depending on how much drivers exceed the threshold speed limit set by camera operators -- at least 11 mph above the posted speed limit, police have said.

The District's contract with Lockheed Martin IMS, which makes and operates the cameras, projects that the speed cameras will add another $11 million per year to the general fund, but that figure could skyrocket if the citations issued average more than $40 a ticket.

If the 15,000 citations issued already average $100 per ticket, for example, the District's share of fines during the last 10 days would be more than $1 million.

Lockheed receives $29 for each ticket issued under its contract with the Metropolitan Police Department. Based on the figures provided by Chief Gainer, Lockheed stands to collect at least $435,000 for the 10-day period.

Citing widespread criticism of the program's revenue-generating aspect, Chief Gainer said the department wants to get beyond the money issue and focus on the cameras' safety effect. To do that, officials are considering a fixed-fee contract, instead of the per-ticket contract, he said.

A Lockheed spokesman was unavailable yesterday, but company officials have said they would prefer a fixed-fee contract. The Bethesda company has sold its traffic camera operations to Affiliated Computer Systems of Dallas, which assumes control next month.

Police and Lockheed sources said the photo-radar contract would be restructured to include the city's red-light camera contract, and an announcement on the deal is expected this fall.

The city's 39 red-light cameras, also operated by Lockheed, have generated more than 240,000 citations since the program began in August 1999. The city has collected more than $12 million from the program and expects more than $117 million by 2004. Lockheed, which gets $32.50 for every $75 red-light ticket, anticipates $44 million from the program by 2004.

"I really don't see how you can make the case this is about anything but money," said Richard Diamond, a spokesman for House Majority Leader Dick Armey, Texas Republican. Mr. Armey has criticized the technology, saying cameras violate drivers' privacy and are simply revenue makers for cities.

"It is a life safety issue," Chief Gainer said. "We are losing sight of what this is about reducing accidents, reducing deaths."

He said the photo-radar cameras already have reduced the number of city speeders, noting that more than 28,000 warning citations were issued during the program's trial period last month.

"When people know there are consequences out there, they commit less violations," the chief said.

Kevin P. Morison, director of corporate communications for the Metropolitan Police Department, said a proportionally greater number of warning citations were issued during the monthlong trial period because fewer cameras were in use.

Only about 50 to 60 percent of the cameras' photographs generate citations because malfunctions, fouled film, unreadable license plates or review officers' decisions cause questionable tickets to be thrown out, he said.

The cameras' threshold will be reduced when school starts next month, Chief Gainer said, adding that a driver exceeding the speed limit by 5 mph in a school zone is as dangerous as a highway driver exceeding the limit by 10 mph. Chief Gainer said 75 to 80 percent of the 60 areas monitored by the cameras are residential and school zones.

Lockheed processes the cameras' film, mails the tickets, maintains the devices and pays off-duty officers overtime to operate the $100,000 mobile cameras in five specially equipped Ford Crown Victorias. The vehicles rove around 60 speed-enforcement areas Monday through Saturday, 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. A stationary camera is located near Gallaudet University.

Lockheed officials requesting anonymity said police received the preliminary figures Wednesday of last week. The Washington Times has requested the numbers since Aug. 7, the second day of the program, but officials declined to divulge them.

Police officials say about 55 percent of fatalities are linked to speeding, citing $27.7 billion lost annually in wages, health care costs, law enforcement and insurance costs.

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White House Still Undecided on Proposal to Limit Leaks
Measure Would Criminalize Disclosure of Classified Data

By Walter Pincus and Vernon Loeb
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, August 23, 2001; Page A23
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A49335-2001Aug22?language=printer

The White House has not decided whether to support legislation, vetoed last fall by President Bill Clinton, to criminalize leaks of "properly classified" information by current or former government employees.

The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has scheduled a Sept. 5 public hearing on the controversial proposal that was authored last year by Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.), then chairman and now ranking Republican on the committee. Shelby wants to add the same language to the fiscal 2001 intelligence authorization bill that is to be marked up by the panel the day after the hearing.

Shelby, according to a committee aide, has asked President Bush and Vice President Cheney to support the measure but so far has been told only that "the administration position is being worked on."

"The White House is currently studying whether a new criminal statute is necessary," a Bush National Security Council spokesman said yesterday.

A senior intelligence official said the administration is hesitating "because it does not want to take on any additional political problems at this time."

In vetoing last year's intelligence authorization bill to prevent Shelby's language from becoming law, Clinton said the measure was "overbroad and may unnecessarily chill legitimate activities that are at the heart of a democracy."

Media organizations opposed the legislative language last year and again this year because they fear it could result in subpoenas to journalists who report leaked information to find out who their sources are. Supporters of the Shelby measure argue that such subpoenas, which could be issued under the current law, would still be governed by Justice Department regulations that require specific approval by the attorney general.

Intelligence Committee Chairman Bob Graham (D-Fla.) agreed to hold next month's public hearing after opponents of the measure, particularly from the media, complained that they had not been heard last year.

Graham, who supported the Shelby measure last year, has not yet discussed it publicly since becoming chairman but "will outline his current position at the hearing," spokesman Paul Anderson said yesterday.

Graham has invited CIA Director George J. Tenet and Deputy Attorney General Larry D. Thompson to present the Bush administration position.

Tenet, who has been a strong advocate of cutting down on leaks of classified information, is expected at the hearing "to talk about the problem but not take a position on the language," a senior administration official said yesterday. A Justice spokesman said the department has not yet determined whether Thompson or some other official would participate in the hearing.

Also scheduled to appear are opponents from media organizations and Thomas S. Blanton, director of the National Security Archives.

Shelby's measure would make it a felony, punishable by a fine and up to three years in prison, for an active or retired government employee to willfully disclose "properly classified information" knowing "the person receiving it was not authorized to have access to it."

Under current law, leaked information must relate to national defense and the individual must have disclosed it believing it would be used to injure the United States in order to be convicted. The new language would punish the leaking of any properly classified information without requiring prosecutors to show an intent "to injure" this country.

An aide to Shelby said the senator is willing to consider compromise proposals. "But for now, he's going with the language that every department in the government agreed to last year, except the president [Clinton]," the aide said.

Current law, according to a position paper prepared by the intelligence committee last year supporting Shelby's language, does not cover leaked "intelligence information regarding sources and methods, counter-narcotics, counterintelligence capabilities and liaison relationships" with foreign intelligence groups because they don't "fall within the accepted definition of 'national defense information.' "

John Martin, for more than 10 years the top Justice Department official supervising investigations of leaked information as well as espionage cases, said yesterday that "current law is sufficient to cover people who provide classified information to unauthorized persons, including the press."

The real problem with leaks, Martin said, "has not been the lack of statutory sanctions but the lack of will on the part of agency heads and Cabinet secretaries to enforce security regulations."

Jeffrey Smith, CIA general counsel during the Clinton administration, said he opposed the new language because prosecutors would no longer need to prove intent to harm national security.

"It could lead to selective prosecution of an individual when a senior official doesn't like what was said by someone else inside the government," Smith said.


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Activists Urge U.S. on UN Meeting

August 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-UN-Racism-Conference.html

NEW YORK (AP) -- Civil rights activists are urging the Bush administration to drop its threat to boycott a United Nations conference on racism because of proposed discussions on slavery and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

While acknowledging the Aug. 31-Sept. 7 meeting in South Africa may have little immediate impact on race relations in this country, activists and black civic leaders say it would be irresponsible for the United States to skip the conference.

``Given a foundation so rotted by racism and slavery, America has a moral obligation, not just a political obligation, to provide leadership to the world on this issue,'' said the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who plans to attend the meeting.

``If the U.S. government does not attend, it's a giant step toward isolation and embarrassment, and loss of global authority,'' Jackson said in a telephone interview.

U.S. officials are discussing whether to boycott the conference, or send a low-level delegation rather than one headed by Secretary of State Colin Powell, because of disputes over the agenda. The Bush administration opposes efforts by Middle Eastern and African nations to denounce Zionism as a form of racism and seek reparations for slavery.

No timetable has been announced for a decision on conference participation.

U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel, a Democrat whose New York City district includes Harlem, said the United States should try to set the tone for a productive discussion of racism, rather than shy away from possible quarrels.

``Once we start running away from an agenda we don't like, it gives people with other agendas the opportunity to attack the U.S.,'' he said.

Rangel said the United States, in confronting the legacy of slavery, should take a lesson from Germany's willingness to shoulder responsibility for the Holocaust. ``How much better you can perform when you admit you've done wrong,'' he said.

In New York City's largest black neighborhood, the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, leaders of two community organizations said the conference could be valuable even though its outcome might seem irrelevant to many of their hard-pressed clients.

``All that money being spent to travel to South Africa, that could be spent on programs here, to help youth,'' said Job Mashariki, president of Black Veterans for Social Justice. ``But I don't have control over that. These conferences happen, and you root for the best.''

Mashariki, whose group runs housing, counseling and training programs, said racism ``is very much alive and real'' to Bedford-Stuyvesant residents.

``It's good to know that the issues we deal with each and every day are being raised on an international level,'' he said.

Deborah Thompson, chief operating officer of the nonprofit Bridge Street Development Corp. in Bedford-Stuyvesant, said the racism conference might prompt some useful brainstorming among delegates.

``The challenge is what happens when the conference is over -- to move from think-pieces to what's actually happening on the ground,'' she said.

She noted that Western nations at the conference, seeking to boost employment for minorities in their inner cities, might have different goals than developing nations hoping to lure Western manufacturers.

``The fact that there are such different agendas shows the potential importance of the conference,'' she said. ``The days when you can stick your head in the sand are gone.''

Bill Spriggs, director of the National Urban League's Institute for Opportunity and Equality, said other countries head toward the conference showing more forthrightness on racial issues than the United States. He cited Brazil, which has stepped up efforts to address racial inequality, and European nations, which are trying to combat prejudice against the Roma, or Gypsy, people.

``The rest of the world is catching the fever of trying to seriously discuss these issues,'' said Spriggs, who also will attend the conference. ``We shouldn't put our heads in the sand and say, 'We've got it good; we don't need to change anything.'''

On the Net:

Racism conference: http://www.un.org/WCAR

----

Anti-Nuclear Activists Deliver "Opening" Message to Exelon: "NO MORE, NO WAY!"

Thursday, August 23, 2001
From: Larry Fletcher <ay903@lafn.org>

International Conference for a Sustainable Energy Future: Confronting Nuclear Power with People Power

Yorkville, IL -- With the opening of the new Exelon corporate offices as the backdrop, safe-energy and anti-nuclear activists from 11 countries converged on the new corporate headquarters in Warrenville, IL to deliver a message about the future of nuclear power.

"No more new reactors, no more radioactive wastes, no more weapons proliferation or construction, no more fake and broken promises about efficiency and renewable energy. No more, no way!" challenged Michael Mariotte from Nuclear Information and Resource Service of Washington, D.C.

The demonstration at the new Exelon headquarters ribbon cutting ceremony was the culminating event of a week-long conference and activist training camp to prepare the next generation of safe energy activists who will oppose nuclear power expansion, and advocate an aggressive phase- in of energy efficiency and renewable energy programs.

"Illinois is the 'belly of the beast' when it comes to nuclear power," observed Chris Williams of Citizen Action Coalition of Indiana. "It has more reactors than any other state, and it makes more nuclear wastes. It spawned the nuclear age, and continues its problems more than any other state. That's why we are here -- to end these nuclear hazards once and for all."

"Exelon's plans to extend the operating lifetimes of the aging Illinois reactors is unacceptable energy policy, as is their plan to build new pebble-bed modular reactors at the Zion site on the shore of Lake Michigan," stated David Kraft, director of the Illinois nuclear power watchdog group, Nuclear Energy Information Service of Evanston. "The environmental community will never allow these plans to succeed," Kraft warned.

The controversial Exelon plans have also attracted the attention of the international community. "The construction of PBMR (pebble-bed modular reactor) stations was canceled in Germany, Europe, as the design does not meet safety standards. We are looking with great concern at this dangerous technology development in the USA. If it cannot be accepted in Germany, how is it acceptable in the USA?" stated Myrthe Verweij, nuclear campaigner for WISE (World Information Service on Energy) in the Netherlands, one of the groups of the Exelon Watch International, which consists of members from Russia, Ukraine, Romania, Germany, the Netherlands, Korea, Canada, Hungary, Argentina, and Slovakia. The activists from these countries came to the action to deliver their statement opposing Exelon's plans, and to meet with Exelon co-CEO John Rowe. Their request was refused.

The Action Camp consisted of a 2-day conference in Chicago, followed by the week-long intensive training for activists in Yorkville. "We're preparing people for a long-term fight for sustainable energy," stated Gabriela Bulisova, one of the Camp Steering Committee members. "We will conduct these Camps and actions for as many times as it takes for the Administration and the nuclear utilities to abandon their plans for nuclear power," she said.

One of the issues covered at the Camp and Conference with serious implications for Illinois is the transportation of high-level "spent" reactor fuel through the state. "A severe transportation accident releasing high-level nuclear waste into the environment could cost tens to hundreds of billions of dollars to clean up and could kill hundreds," stated Kevin Kamps, Nuclear Waste Specialist with the Washington-based Nuclear Information and Resource Service of Washington, D.C. "Each shipment represents a potential 'Mobile Chernobyl' rolling through our communities on the roads and rails," Kamps said.

The DOE stated at a public hearing held in Chicago in 2000 that as many as 36,300 truck shipments of high-level radioactive wastes could be expected to pass through Illinois over a 24 year period when utilities begin to send these wastes away for perpetual storage. Kamps brought a full-size replica of an irradiated nuclear fuel shipping cask to the Camp, and has driven it several times across Illinois to increase public awareness of the hazards of radwaste transportation.

"The nuclear industry has been touting a 'renaissance' for the past year trying to get the public to believe the phony message that they are needed," said Laura Campbell of Citizen Action Coalition of Indiana. "Through public education and non-violent direct action, this Camp and the future ones we plan expose this message as a false myth," Campbell said. "We're here to put an end to the Nuclear Age and its myths, once and for all."

Michael Mariotte, NIRS Myrthe Verweij, Exelon Watch International Chris Williams, Citizen Action Coalition Indiana David Kraft, NEIS neis@forward.net (630) 553-9435 (202) 262-9518 cell 011-620000626 international cell


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