------- Index of Articles
NUCLEAR
Iraq: 5 killed in uranium cleaning
India bombards military targets
Emergency at Leningrad NPP
NRC shuts down Web site citing concerns over safety
Yucca lawsuit will be litigated in federal court
You Won't Believe How Much Danger You Are In!!!
Ousted Goshute Leader Fails to Regain Control of Tribe
Doctors Speak Out On Environment
MILITARY
Afghan Guerrillas Claim Advance Toward Key City
Uncontrolled Flow of Arms into Afghanistan
Cats, Dogs and 'Collateral Damage'
Bush calls for cease-fire in Kashmir
Pakistan calls for cut in air strikes as Powell arrives
Ex-King: Afghanistan May Need U.N. Troops
U.S. gunship attacks Taliban troops
U.S. Intensifies Strikes on Afghanistan
Bombers and Airborne Gunship Blast Targets in Afghanistan
OTHER
Oklahoma looks to wind power
Carbon dioxide can clean radioactive soil
US FOOD DROPS 'USELESS' FOR HUNGRY HORDES
Refugee dearth puzzles border
U.N. Works to Restore Aid Deliveries
WTO Meeting to Remain in Qatar
FBI To Require ISPs To Reconfigure E-mail Systems
FBI fears truck bombs are next terror weapon
War against terrorism will fail, says former MI5 head
ACTIVISTS
Report on 13 October 2001 demo at Menwith Hill
Peace & Patriotism
Protests in Italy as PM meets Bush
SENTENCING for LACW affinity group
New Solutions for an Old War
Campuses Split Over Afghanistan
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- depleted uranium
Iraq: 5 killed in uranium cleaning
UPI
From the International Desk
10/16/2001 1:03 PM
http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=16102001-115220-4936r
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Oct. 16 -- Seven people were killed and 15 others injured while working in depleted uranium removal operations in southern Iraq, officials in the country said on Tuesday.
A Defense Ministry source was quoted by the weekly al Rafideen magazine saying Iraqi teams have been removing depleted uranium reportedly used in munitions fired by allied forces in southern Iraq during the 1991 Gulf War.
The source said that during the cleaning operations, land mines exploded in an area that had been the site of military operations between Iraq and coalition forces in 1991.
The explosions killed seven people and wounded 15 others, according to the source who said that special teams were supposedly to have removed the land mines before the personnel working on the removal of depleted uranium began their operations.
Iraq said the depleted uranium has polluted the environment and increased cases of cancer and newly born deformation. U.S. and British officials have denied that depleted uranium, in the amounts used in their weapons, could produce the illnesses.
-------- india / pakistan
India bombards military targets
By Rahul Bedi in New Delhi
16/10/2001
http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;$sessionid$T5WDXLIAAIXYZQFIQMGSFF4AVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2001/10/16/wkash16.xml&sSheet=/news/2001/10/16/ixhome.html
THE Indian army directed heavy mortar fire at Pakistani military targets in the northern province of Kashmir yesterday, heightening tension in the disputed region.
Indian officials said the attacks, which killed one woman and injured 25 others, was intended to send a clear message to Pakistan that it would not tolerate the movement of Pakistani militants through the region under the gaze of Pakistani troops.
The mortar attacks followed a 10-month lull in hostilities in the region. Earlier, 11 militants were killed trying to cross the border into the Indian-controlled sector.
"We have engaged posts which have actively abetted, facilitated and were involved in assisting the trans-border terrorist movement into India," said Brig P C Das of the Indian army.
He said Pakistani forces had retaliated after the Indian mortar fire, which had come from the state's Poonch and Jammu districts. There was no damage on the Indian side.
The 40 minutes of firing came on the day when Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, began a tour of Pakistan and India for talks on Afghanistan and the simmering dispute over Kashmir.
The mortar attacks are expected to raise tension between the nuclear rivals at a time when America is anxious to avoid any problems in disputed Kashmir that might jeopardise its action against Afghanistan.
-------- russia
Emergency at Leningrad NPP
One of the giant reactors at Leningrad nuclear power plant was shut down Monday after several failures in the valve-system of a generator
Thomas Nilsen,
2001-10-16 12:02,
Bellona
http://www.bellona.no/imaker?id=22116&sub=1
Leningrad nuclear power plant, the notorious safety troublemaker outside St Petersburg, once again lost control over one of its dangerous RBMK reactors. Monday afternoon, the safety system of reactor no. 4 forced its shutdown.
The reactor in question is similar to the one that exploded and burned in Chernobyl back in April 1986. A serious accident at Leningrad nuclear power plant could cause enormous radiation troubles for the Baltic and in worst case, the entire northern Europe. The safety problems, along with the lack of safe storage for the spent nuclear fuel and the highly radioactive waste are the main reasons why the Bellona Foundation, along with many other international experts, recommends the closure of this particular nuclear power plant.
A broken valve in turbo generator no. 7 at reactor no. 4 caused Monday's failure. While the workers on duty did their very best to repair the valve, the result was only more broken valves in the reactor's system. The RBMK reactors at Leningrad nuclear power plant are criticised because there are so many thousands of small pipes and valves inside the reactor core. This makes it difficult to locate the troubles as it comes.
The press-service of Leningrad NPP says the troubles should be repaired by 24 hours. In the meantime the power output from the plant was reduced by 500 MWt.
Leningrad NPP operates four reactors of the RBMK-1000 type. These are the oldest civilian reactors in Russia of the Chernobyl type. The first one started its operation in 1973, while Monday's trouble reactor is the newest one from 1980. According to the official monitoring, the radiation levels in the area around Leningrad NPP are normal at all 23 sites where on-line measurements are updated today. The link in the box to the left goes directly to this official on-line measurement system.
Bellona's St Petersburg office currently works on a energy-proposal for the region, also aimed to look into energy production that by time can replace the need for Leningrad NPP.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
NRC shuts down Web site citing concerns over safety
October 16, 2001
By JACK KASKEY Staff Writer, (609) 272-7213
Press Plus
http://www.pressplus.com/newjersey/101601NUKEWEB_O16.html
<http://www.pressplus.com/standing/mail.gif> jkaskey@pressplus.com
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has closed down its Web site so the agency can rid it of information that could be used by terrorists, but journalism groups say a recent spate of similar information blackouts threatens democracy.
The NRC Web site closed last Thursday, posting the following message:
"In support of our mission to protect public health and safety, we are performing a review of all material on our site," according to the only page accessible to the public. "We appreciate your patience and understanding during these difficult times."
NRC spokeswoman Diane Screnci said Monday that the agency is removing documents that could be used by terrorists. She didn't know how long the site would be down.
The NRC is not alone in restricting information in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has removed from its Web site reports detailing the risk of accidents at chemical plants and emergency response plans. The U.S. Department of Transportation is restricting public access to its national map of underground pipelines. The Federal Aviation Administration has removed data from its Web site on enforcement actions.
But the NRC is the first agency to completely shut out the public.
Among information previously shown on the NRC Web site was plant locations, including longitude and latitude, and general design specifications for each facility.
Nuclear watchdog groups, including Unplug Salem, check the site every day to see which of New Jersey's four nuclear plants are having problems.
"Now, I have no way of knowing what's going on there," said Norm Cohen, coordinator of the Linwood-based group.
Cohen said he has no problem with the NRC removing truly sensitive information from its Web site, but closing the entire site is overkill.
"It seems that reacting this way is another way in which the terrorists win and the public loses," Cohen said. "Part of what makes this country great is the access to information."
Nuclear plants cannot be made terrorist-proof, so the best defense would be to shut down the plants, not the NRC Web site, he said.
The Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a Washington, D.C.-based anti-nuclear group, called on the NRC to postpone any permitting decisions and public hearings until the site is functioning again.
The NRC's Screnci said the agency would review the request.
Electricity traders, who rely on the NRC's online plant-status reports for fundamental market supply data, told Reuters news service that not knowing whether a plant was operating raised uncertainties that would cause higher energy prices.
Over the weekend, the leaders of major journalism groups criticized the government's restrictions on the free flow of information.
Representatives of 21 groups, including the Society of Professional Journalists and the Society of Environmental Journalists, signed a statement that concludes: "We recognize that these are perilous times when unusual measures must be considered.
"However, we believe that these restrictions pose dangers to American democracy and prevent American citizens from obtaining the information they need."
-------- nevada
Yucca lawsuit will be litigated in federal court
9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rules
By DAVID KRAVETS
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Tuesday, October 16, 2001
Las Vegas Review-Journal
http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Oct-16-Tue-2001/news/17230431.html
SAN FRANCISCO -- The battle over where to store the nation's 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste inched forward Monday when a divided federal appeals court ruled a lawsuit over the Yucca Mountain Project will be heard in federal court.
The federal government sued Nevada after the state refused to issue water permits to operate the nation's only proposed repository for spent nuclear fuel. The dump site would be built 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
In what has become a battle of courtroom venues, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered a federal judge to hear the government's lawsuit. U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt had said the lawsuit should be heard in state court, but the appeals panel said the proposed dump site is authorized under federal law -- so a federal court should decide the case.
"The Department of Energy is gratified by the decision," Yucca Mountain Project spokeswoman Gayle Fisher said. "We now have the opportunity for a full hearing in (U.S.) District Court, which is what we wanted to do all along."
Regardless of the legal venue, the appeals panel did not dictate how Hunt should resolve what has become a classic case of states' rights vs. federal authority.
Nevada opposes a proposed nuclear waste dump site at Yucca Mountain. At stake is the housing of contaminated waste from the nation's nuclear energy and weapons facilities, which are running out of storage capacity.
Nevada has granted water rights to the federal government but only for the purpose of studying whether the uninhabited desert location is suitable for a nuclear repository, which the Bush administration said is needed as the government begins eyeing a renewed interest in nuclear power.
U.S. government attorney Jared Goldstein told the appeals court that Nevada is "interfering with a congressional mandate" by refusing to issue a water permit.
While state officials have said they withheld a water permit because of potential safety threats to the public, they also said they denied the permit because Congress only has approved the location for study.
Nevada cannot allocate water for a dump site until the government's studies are completed and Congress approves the area for a dump, said Robert Loux, executive director of Nevada's Agency for Nuclear Projects. Because Congress has not approved the site, Loux said, the federal government has no legal authority to order Nevada to issue the water permit.
In a dissent, appeals Judge Procter Hug Jr. of Reno agreed, saying, "I reach what I find a logical and compelling conclusion: an act which Congress has not yet passed cannot pre-empt state law or state agency decisions."
No hearing date has been scheduled regarding the water permit dispute. Congress has not said if or when it would approve the site.
-------- new york
We should all take notice of the following info, and provide the appropriate government agencies with info the help us fight terrorism from all directions. The government is not the source of all [in many cases any] knowledge John Shannon Nuclear Physicist/Nuclear Engineer
==
You Won't Believe How Much Danger You Are In!!!
email for distribution to as many people as possible
Date: 10/16/01
From: dag1nyc@aol.com
Reply-to: westcan@yahoogroups.com
To all those who live in the Tri-State area, do you realize that you LIVE IN THE NUCLEAR "DEAD ZONE?" The Nuclear Control Institute has warned that a terrorist attack on Indian Point in Buchanan "WOULD CAUSE LETHAL CONTAMINATION OF EVERYTHING WITHIN 50 MILES," and Tom Bevan from the Center for Emergency Response noted that there would be "several hundred square miles that you could NEVER USE AGAIN." This plant is located on the Hudson River in Buchanan, New York, approximately 35 miles from New York City. You have likely heard that nuclear power plants are considered terrorist targets, but do you know how that affects you?
This is an urgent message to all those who live in New York City, the counties of Westchester, Putnam, Orange, Sullivan, Ulster, Dutchess, Bergen, Passaic, Sussex, Hudson, Essex, Fairfield, parts of New Haven counties and in eastern Pennsylvania , or who know someone who lives in these areas.
The Westchester/Putnam Journal News reported the following on October 1, 2001: "All nuclear power plants (have) to be considered potential terrorist targets. That's especially true of Indian Point, which has two nuclear power plants and a fuel storage site, all within 50 miles of more than 20 million people. MORE PEOPLE ARE AT RISK FROM CONTAMINATION FROM INDIAN POINT THAN FROM ANY OTHER NUCLEAR SITE IN THE NATION." Remarkably, Indian Point also enjoys the very singular distinction of being at the very top of the Nuclear Regulartory Commission's list of the "most trouble-plagued nuclear plants in the nation."
It's scary. It's nearly overwhelming. But it is true. President Bush and many others have spoken repeatedly about the awakening of the "sleeping giant." This giant - and that is us - is not awake if it refuses to rationally deal with the reality of the security threat that Indian Point poses to the tri-state area and beyond.
We cannot afford not to contemplate the unthinkable. The unthinkable is here. It arrived on September 11. The plans of a maniacal terrorist converged with a remarkably unprepared national security apparatus and resulted in the attacks on the Twin Towers and Pentagon as well as the implosion of our confidence in the security of our nation. We, as citizens, are left to grieve and to contemplate the ever-widening effects on our nation and psyches. We are also left to wonder where our experts were, and how this could have happened without any warning, or at least without any action taken on any warning.
Don't let the terrorists find us asleep again. If you are interested in saving your life or that of someone you love, here's WHAT YOU CAN DO:
1. Make your voices heard. Here are some suggestions:
-spread this email far and wide -write letters to any and all governmental agencies (a list of addresses is provided at the end of this email, -make the candidates for the mayoral race in New York City address the issue -call into radio talk shows and raise the issue -email the news shows - Geraldo, Prime Time, etc. -wake up the New York Times
2. Join the Citizens Awareness Network and get yourself informed and keep yourself informed. Their website is www.nukebusters.org. There you can also find a list of measures CAN proposes as a starting point to ensure the public's safety and confidence. Also, join the local listserve and chapter of CAN by emailing mark@longviewschool.org.
3. Get yourself active. Petitions can be circulated and sent to our politicians, information must be dessiminated to the public, and we need help doing it. People of influence must be made aware of the danger and must use their powers to further the cause of ensuring nuclear safety.
SUGGESTED TOPICS FOR LETTERS, CALLS, CONTACTS, ETC. The installation of anti-aircraft weapons and a permanent military presence at all nuclear power plants (as recommended by the Nuclear Control Institute - which specializes in nuclear security issues)
The need to close Indian Point and remove all radio-active materials from the area.
The holding of public meetings to determine if there is a way to provide REAL security for Indian Point.
Open and in-depth discussions of the plans for security at Indian Point along with an evaluation of the remaining risk.
Evacuation plans
ADDRESSES, EMAIL ADDRESSES, PHONE NUMBERS, ETC.
If your representative or senator is not listed below, or if you do not know who they are, you can call the phone numbers or go to the website which appear at the end of this list.
President George Bush The White House Washington DC 20500 202 456 1111 fax: 202 456 2461 president@whitehouse.gov
Tom Ridge Office of Homeland Security The White House Washington DC 20500 202 456 1111
State Senator Goodman Chairman of the temporary state committee on ways to protect New Yorkers
Governor George E. Pataki Executive Chamber Albany, NY 12224 518 474 8390 fax 518 473 7669 gov.pataki@chamber.state.ny.us
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton United States Senate 476 Russell Senate Office Bldg. Washington, D.C. 20510 202.224.4451 Westchester Contact: Geri Shapiro gerishapiro@aol.com senator@clinton.senate.gov
Senator Charles Schumer United States Senator 313 Hart Senate Building Washington, DC 20510 202.224.6542 Senator@schumer.senate.gov
Senator Joseph Lieberman 313 Hart Senate Building Washington, DC 20510 202.224.4041 (voice) 202.224.9399 TDD www.senate.gov/-lieberman/newsite/contact.cfm
Congresswoman Sue Kelly House of Representatives 116 Radio Circle Mt. Kisco, NY 10549 914.241.6340 dearsue@mail.house.gov
Andrew J. Spano Westchester County Executive 148 Martine Avenue White Plains, NY 10601 914.995.2900 CEO@westchestergov.com
Assemblywoman Sandra Galef 2 Church Street Ossining, NY 10562 914.941.1111 galefs@assembly.state.ny.us
State Legislature Operator (Assembly and Senate) 518.474.2121
George Oros Legislator, District 1 Phone: 285 2828 Goo6@westchestergov.com
State Senator Vincent L. Leibell Southeast Business Center, Suite 301 Brewster, NY 10509 914 279 3773 fax 279 7156 room 802 LOB, Albany 12247 leibell@senate.state.ny.us
U.S. House of Representatives Switchboard 202.224.3121
-------- utah
Ousted Goshute Leader Fails to Regain Control of Tribe
From: Susi Snyder
Tuesday, October 16, 2001 9:56 PM
Immediate Release: October 16, 2001
Contact: Environmental Justice Foundation
Anne Sward Hansen 801-763-0551 or cell 755-4950
Ousted Goshute Leader Fails to Regain Control of Tribe Fate of Nuclear Waste Dump Unclear
Ousted Goshute Tribal Chairman Leon Bear's most recent attempt to regain control of the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes failed. Bear could not get support from the majority of the tribe to reinstate the illegitimate Bear regime at a meeting called by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) and Leon Bear on Saturday October 13th.
After Bear was ousted, a September 22nd Tribal Election for the Bears' replacements was conducted resulting in Marlinda Moon as Chairman, Sammy Blackbear, Vice Chairman and Miranda Wash, Secretary. The BIA and Leon Bear had refused to acknowledge that September 22nd election, instead stating they would heed the will of the Goshute People only after Bear and the BIA had an opportunity to hold their own meeting on October 13th. The BIA and Bear meeting failed to reach a tribal quorum. Both the BIA and Bear have refused any comment since that October 13th meeting.
The newly elected leadership says they will aggressively demand that Bear immediately surrender all tribal assets, records and documents to them or will take appropriate action if he refuses. The new leadership has declared, "The will of the Goshute People was made clear on September 22nd and the decision of leadership has been made. We will not tolerate any further interference in our inherent, sovereign right to tribal self-governance from the BIA or anyone else." On September 22nd, Leon Bear was removed from his "strangle hold" control of the Tribe and its money, amidst allegations of fraud, embezzlement, bribery and corruption. According to Rex Allen, the former Tribal Secretary, who resigned on September 22nd, federal criminal grand jury subpoenas have been issued and served on the Leon Bear Regime and on Private Fuel Storage with whom Bear signed an agreement to take 40,000 tons of the nations high-level nuclear waste. The FBI, the U.S. Inspector General, Goshute Tribal leadership and the State of Utah are all conducting their own investigations into these allegations. It is unclear what investigation, if any, the BIA is conducting. Allen stated he is cooperating fully with all investigators, including the new tribal leadership, and is willing to serve in whatever capacity needed.
When asked about the future of the proposed private Fuel Storage (PFS) nuclear waste dump on their reservation, the new Tribal leaders explained that under federal law, all leases of Skull Valley Tribal lands must be approved by the Goshute Tribal General Council. The new leadership stated that most Tribal General Council members have never even seen the purported PFS lease agreement or other important documents. Likewise, they have never been given an opportunity to evaluate the economics or safety of such a facility and are not in a position to decide what to do until they have more information. These new leaders are in the process of gathering all available information so a decision can be reached by the General Council as soon as possible. They emphasize that they and the tribe are neutral about the project and that the Tribe as a whole will make the decision, when they, have the information they need, not before.
Background:
Since 1993, there have been numerous attempts to free the Tribe of Leon Bear's corrupt control. Most recently, on August 25th, Leon Bear and cousin Lori Bear Skiby were confronted with Tribal resolutions and petitions calling for their ouster at a Tribal meeting they themselves had called. Three days later, on August 28th Bear sent out a letter stating that if the majority of the Tribe voted to replace him, he would surrender all Tribal assets and leave peaceably. But, Bear and his supporters boycotted the September 22nd election, hoping that without them the required majority of the General Council could not be assembled.
When Bear was informed of the September 22nd quorum and election results, he said he would honor the voice of the people if he could see the Tribal documents that proved a majority had met and voted for his replacement. When he was served last week with the official tribal documents he had requested, Bear refused to abide by his promise.
Bear's attorneys have attempted to block the new Tribal officers from gaining access to the Tribal checking accounts containing almost half a million dollars discovered thus far. The new Tribal leaders stated that massive amounts of Tribal money are apparently missing from those Tribal accounts.
Prior to Bear's October 13th meeting, all Tribal General Council members had been mailed a formal notice that the October 13th meeting was unnecessary and had been canceled because Rex Allen had resigned and his successor had been elected on September 22nd. Bear and other General Council members were also notified that a Certification of Tribal Election had been issued certifying that the September 22nd election meeting was attended by a majority of Tribal General Council members, that the election was held in accordance with the Tribe's traditional rules of governance, and that Chairman Marlinda Moon, Vice-Chairman Sammy Blackbear, Sr. and Secretary Miranda Wash had been duly elected. Bear was given a copy of the certification.
Despite these notices, the lack of a quorum, and the unofficial nature of the October 13th meeting, Bear decided he would hold an election to replace Rex Allen as the Tribal Secretary. When he was reminded of Rex Allen's September 22nd resignation and that Allen's replacement had already been elected, Bear continued with his own "election". Bear's "election" ignored additional Tribal customs and traditions as well. Instead of having nominations and secret ballots, Bear simply announced his nomination, asked for a verbal vote of confidence, and then announced a unanimous vote.
BIA Superintendent David Allison was present at the October 13th Leon Bear meeting, but refused to comment on the irregularities. Superintendent Allison, who did not attend the September 22nd election, has also refused to publicly announce any BIA position on the election or on the new Goshute leadership.
Goshute Tribal members have alleged that Bear has for years bribed General Council members to sign bogus "Tribal resolutions" supporting the Bear regime and PFS project. They say Bear has publicly admitted that he pays Tribal General Council members for their votes on the PFS project. Bear says he does not consider his payments bribes. BIA Superintendent Allison has notified Bear that he cannot pay his supporters more PFS money than he pays his opposition. At his October 13th meeting Bear asked his supporters to sign more of his "Tribal Resolutions" but refused to allow any of the new Tribal leaders present to read them.
Throughout the October 13th meeting, Moon, Blackbear and Wash and other observers heard repeated shouts of "Leon, as long as you keep bribing me, I'll support you and will sign whatever you want me to sign."
Bear sought to regain control over the world's largest private high-level nuclear waste dump and the millions of dollars in PFS lease payments. PFS, a consortium of mostly eastern nuclear utility companies, is behind the nuclear waste dump just 45 miles from Salt Lake City. These companies are facing extreme pressure from their home states to get the toxic waste out of the states in which it is generated.
----
Doctors Speak Out On Environment
October 16, 2001
BY JUDY FAHYS
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
http://www.sltrib.com/10162001/utah/140713.htm
Most Utah doctors do not want nuclear waste in Utah. They favor tougher limits on arsenic in drinking water. And they support steep fines for a Davis County garbage-burning plant whenever its chemical releases are too toxic.
The Utah Medical Association, which represents about 3,000 of the state's doctors, waded into the choppy political waters of the three environmental issues Sept. 22 when its House of Delegates passed resolutions voicing those stands.
"We are committed to doing the right thing," said Hugo Rodier, a Draper family practitioner and chairman of UMA's environmental committee. "I know it may not be politically correct in Utah, but we have got to do what is best for the community."
Rodier said the logic behind all three measures was the same: keeping Utahns healthy and preventing illness.
He noted that an article in The New England Journal of Medicine last year estimated that environment can be blamed for about 80 percent of all diseases.
"We can build a clinic at the bottom of the cliff," he said, "or we can build a fence at the top of the cliff so that people don't fall down."
While the briefly worded resolutions are certain to raise some eyebrows, they may not have a big impact on how those sensitive issues are handled, said Rob Bishop, a former lobbyist for Envirocare of Utah, which operates a radioactive and mixed waste landfill in Tooele County.
Bishop, a high school political science teacher and former Utah House speaker, described the UMA resolutions as arrows in the quivers of interest groups that might be trying to make a case for their position.
Craig W. Wilkinson, a Salt Lake City vascular surgeon, tried to persuade fellow doctors to vote against the nuclear waste resolution. He pointed out that the question of how to dispose of spent fuel rods and radioactive debris is a national issue and one that should be decided with a scientist's reasoning rather than an advocate's emotion.
"I don't think it's the place of the Utah Medical Association to be scaring people, especially when they [UMA members] probably don't know any more than their neighbors," said Wilkinson, adding that the issue warrants more study first.
Those who attended the meeting said no one spoke against the two other resolutions.
Utah has two significant nuclear waste facilities: a radioactive ore reprocessing mill outside Blanding and the Envirocare site at Grassy Mountain. A proposed third facility, an above-ground storage pad for spent fuel rods at the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation 45 miles from Salt Lake City, is under review by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The burn plant resolution specifically names the Wasatch Energy Systems plant in Layton. T he plant just last month completed $7 million in new air-emission controls. WES has logged five violations over the years for heavy metals, acid gasses and dioxins -- chemicals linked to cancer and other illnesses.
The resolution on arsenic urges support for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's plan to reduce the amount of arsenic allowed in drinking water by 80 percent, to 10 parts per billion. It also urges support for the reduction of other drinking water contaminants and financial aid to help communities meet these standards.
Louis Borgenicht, a Salt Lake City pediatrician, said doctors have a social responsibility to help the public understand the implications of public policies, such as the storage of nuclear waste in Utah's west desert.
"It's kind of radical," he said of the resolution. "I think it's good, though."
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
Afghan Guerrillas Claim Advance Toward Key City
By Sharon LaFraniere
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, October 16, 2001; Page A15
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63727-2001Oct15.html
TASHKENT, Uzbekistan, Oct. 15 -- Afghan rebel spokesmen said today that their forces had advanced closer to the strategic city of Mazar-e Sharif, hoping to rout Taliban forces from their base there and use it to launch raids throughout the northern half of the country.
Estimates varied as to how far the Northern Alliance rebels had advanced by nightfall. But an aide to one commander told reporters that his group's forces were within three miles of the city's airport.
Mazar-e Sharif has been a staging ground for the Taliban since 1998. The largest city in northern Afghanistan, it is just 40 miles south of the guard towers and barbed wire that mark the Uzbek border.
The capture of the city and the area north of it would mean that rebel supply trucks could use a road leading to a steel bridge that crosses the Amu Darya river into Uzbekistan. Rebel supplies now are brought into Afghanistan on an improvised metal ferry, powered by an old tractor engine, that crosses the Panj River at the Tajik border each night.
Northern Alliance officials were clearly encouraged by the reported advance toward Mazar-e Sharif. "I think the Taliban is broken," said Mohammad Hasham Saad, the alliance's envoy in Uzbekistan, in an interview this morning.
"I think in two or three weeks there will be a lot of changes in the north," he said. "If we capture Mazar, open the border and free up this large area, the problem will be finished for half of Afghanistan."
Before the advance on Mazar-e Sharif, Pentagon officials said U.S. planes had bombarded tanks, fighter aircraft and antiaircraft missiles near the city.
Saad said the Taliban forces are fighting less effectively and defecting in substantial numbers. Moreover, with the Taliban's airports and many of its aircraft destroyed, planes cannot resupply the troops, he said.
But the rebels also lack supplies, including clothes, ammunition and trucks, according to Northern Alliance officials. "Fighting without ammunition is not possible," said Saad. "For such a big operation, we need more help."
Initially, it seemed that Russia would help provide for the rebels. On the night of the first U.S. strikes in Afghanistan, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Moscow had armed anti-Taliban forces in the past and would continue to do so.
But according to Saad and Abdul Gayur, a Northern Alliance representative in Moscow, rebels must buy any equipment they get from Russia's military warehouses, which are stocked with obsolete Soviet-era tanks that cannot even be turned profitably into scrap metal.
Even though old Soviet equipment is cheap, Gayur said, the cost is more than the Northern Alliance can afford. "The U.S. should pay, and Russia deliver," Saad said.
--------
Uncontrolled Flow of Arms into Afghanistan Will Lead to More Human Misery
Amnesty International
16 October 2001 Afghanistan
http://www.amnesty-usa.org/news/2001/afghanistan10162001.html
The unconditional flow of weapons and other military equipment and expertise to the warring parties in Afghanistan will lead to further human rights abuses and war crimes, Amnesty International said today in a briefing on such transfers.
"To date, both the Taliban and the Northern Alliance have been heavily armed by foreign governments regardless of their appalling human rights records," the organization said.
"While the shifting of arms is inevitable in a conflict situation, it is crucial that further transfers of arms and expertise are rigorously controlled."
Amnesty International is calling for independent monitors to be put in place to verify that commanders who have been responsible for gross human rights abuses in the past are removed before any transfers take place. The monitors should remain in place to ensure that the arms and expertise are not used to commit human rights abuses.
During the 1980s and 1990s, arms and related supplies were sent from the USA and some of its West European allies, as well as the former Soviet Union, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran, and were used for perpetuating massive human rights abuses by various armed groups in Afghanistan.
Civilians in Afghanistan are suffering the legacy of these uncontrolled transfers, thousands have died from anti-personnel landmines alone.
Since 1994, the main supplies of arms and related items to the Taliban have come from official stocks in Pakistan or from Chinese or other sales through private dealers based in Pakistan and with private funding from Saudi Arabia.
Recent supplies to the Northern Alliance have been reportedly sent from Iran and the Russian Federation via the Central Asian states, especially Tajikistan, as well as from the Slovak Republic, although the Central Asian states have denied their involvement.
Amnesty International is concerned that the Russian government is reportedly planning deliveries of up to $45 million worth of arms to the Northern Alliance which are not conditioned to any human rights criteria. Furthermore a bill has been introduced in the US Congress to provide up to $300 million of direct military assistance to "eligible Afghan resistance organizations".
Amnesty International also urges all governments to refrain from the use of cluster bombs near civilian areas, from using depeleted uranium weapons whose effects are not fully known, and to refrain from providing such weapons to any of those involved in the conflict.
Read the report: Amnesty International's position on arms transfers and military aid to Afghanistan: PDF format
http://www.amnesty-usa.org/usacrisis/position_on_arms.pdf
Source: Amnesty International, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue SE, Washington, D.C. 20003 <http://www.amnesty-usa.org/i/blank.gif> Contact: Gwen Fitzgerald (202) 544-0200 x 302 or Alistair Hodgett 202-544-0200 x 289
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Cats, Dogs and 'Collateral Damage'
David McGowan
October 16, 2001
(The village referred to throughout this article is variously spelled Kadam, Karam, and Koram. It is unclear which is the correct spelling.)
"One week after United States-led forces began bombarding Afghanistan, disturbing evidence is emerging of unacceptably high civilian casualties and ill-defined military and political objectives. Afghans reaching the Pakistani city of Peshawar 60 kilometres from the border said the bombing on Friday of Kadam, a small rural community in Surkh Rud district near the eastern city of Jalalabad, had killed scores, possibly hundreds of civilians." (1)
So said the Sydney Morning Herald on Monday, October 15. This was just one of many reports filed Sunday and Monday concerning the destruction of an Afghan village. The first of these reports were based on the eyewitness accounts of the survivors of the attack, some seriously wounded, who fled into neighboring Pakistan.
A report in the Guardian began: "Serious blunders by American warplanes may have killed at least 100 civilians in Afghanistan, according to eye-witness accounts obtained by the Observer. Two U.S. jets, they said, had bombed a village in eastern Afghanistan, killing more than 100 people." (2) According to one witness cited, the jets circled back twice to unload additional ordnance on the village.
The Guardian also noted that while "Western politicians have been quick to dismiss the claims as propaganda ... apparent confirmation of serious casualties among non-combatants is beginning to emerge. If the evidence is accurate, an attack on Karam village, 18 miles west of Jalalabad, last Thursday was the most lethal blunder yet by Allied forces." (2)
An article in the Independent held that Karam was just one of several villages to be targeted: "Something went terribly wrong at the end of the week. In conversations with refugees, a string of names come up again and again: Darunta, Karam, Torghar, Farmada - insignificant villages where, according to consistent accounts by eyewitnesses, as well as those of the Taliban propaganda machine, hundreds of civilians were killed." (3)
Among the refugees that Independent reporter Richard Parry spoke to, he found that "many have seen at first hand the devastating effects which the attacks have begun to have on civilians. In hospitals, refugee camps and in the homes of friends, they describe how it feels to find yourself directly below one of the most technologically sophisticated bombing campaigns in history." (3)
U.S. officials were quick to deny civilian casualties and denounce the witness accounts as propaganda. Taliban officials countered by allowing Western reporters into the country to view the carnage at Karam first-hand. The journalists, skeptical of what they assumed would be a staged scene, filed reports that revealed their shock and revulsion at what they encountered.
A reporter for The Times described the scene at a nearby hospital: "In a gloomy Jalalabad hospital ward Ahmed Zai clings to his one-year-old son as they lie on a dirty sheet. Both have shrapnel wounds... Across the crowded ward three-year-old Rahmed cries for his mother. Bandages cover his head, arm and legs. Blood is oozing through ... Doctors tell us that both of his parents are dead ... Along with twenty-five others in this hospital Ahmed and Rahmed were in the village of Koram." (4)
In the village itself, the reporters were met with harrowing scenes of carnage and human suffering. First, however, their Taliban escorts had to subdue the wrathful villagers: "As we approached Koram, climbing a rocky hillside, the villagers erupted in fury, charging down the hill with shovels in hand. We had experienced orchestrated protests during our drive from the Pakistan border, but this was altogether different." (4)
An Associated Press writer made a similar observation: "Waving shovels and sticks, enraged villagers surged toward foreign journalists brought here Sunday by Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia to see what officials say was the devastation of a U.S. air attack. 'They are coming to kill us! They are coming for information, to tell the planes where to bomb!' angry and terrified villagers shouted as they charged the reporters." (5)
These were, mind you, ordinary Afghan villagers who - after just one week of terror bombing allegedly aimed at eliminating terrorism and keeping the Western world safe for democracy - were so enraged that they were prepared to violently attack the first Westerners they laid eyes on. I don't know about anyone else, but I'm feeling a whole lot safer already.
Ian Williams of The Times graphically described the village: "One man said that he was burying his wife bit by bit as he dug her out of the rubble. He put a severed leg into a plastic bag and dropped it into the hole that he had dug. The stench of rotten bodies was overwhelming in places. Dead cows and goats littered the hillside, as did chunks of metal, shrapnel from the bombs. Of around 40 stone houses more than half have been completely destroyed." (4)
Kathy Gannon of the Associated Press took in the scene as well: "Villagers pointed out other evidence of an attack: a bloodstained pillowcase by a house, bomb craters and what appeared to be a rotting human limb. Dozens of sheep and goat carcasses were strewn about the mud-hut village, and the air was thick with a rancid stench." (5)
Williams reported seeing "at least thirty fresh graves, villagers praying beside them." (4) Gannon watched as an "old man knelt by one grave, sobbing. He looked up, furiously, at journalists and their cameras and lobbed stones to drive the outsiders away." (5) Witnesses on the scene told the reporters that "more bodies were buried up in the mountains, taken there by residents as they fled the now mostly deserted community." (5)
One villager showed the visitors a piece of bomb shrapnel with English writing on it. His wife and all five of his kids had been killed by the bombs. Another villager demanded answers: "They are innocent people living here. There is no military base. What is it they are looking for in Afghanistan? Where is Osama bin Laden? He is not here. Why did they bomb us?" (5)
Williams ended his report with the following observation: "from the evidence we have seen Koram is no terrorist training camp or military base. There appears to have been a horrible mistake." (4) Not according to the Pentagon and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who put forth the preposterous story that it was an ammunition dump near the village that had been bombed.
As the Guardian reported, Rumsfeld claimed that "US bombs had hit the opening to two nearby tunnels believed to be possible ammunition dumps, causing powerful secondary explosions. People living near the site may have been involved in storing and guarding the ammunition store." (6) The village itself, according to the Pentagon, was not actually bombed at all.
Despite the fact that reporters had seen and photographed bomb craters, and had seen at least one unexploded warhead, the Pentagon "denied there were bomb craters in the village." (6) Left completely unexplained were the bombed-out dwellings, the livestock carcasses strewn about, the abundance of shrapnel, and the scattered body parts.
Rumsfeld washed his hands of the affair with the following shameless lie: "There's no question that people who were in close proximity to these isolated ammunition dumps, who very likely were there for a good reason because they were a part of that activity, may very well have been casualties. They were not cooking cookies inside those tunnels." (6)
No, actually they weren't in any tunnels at all. Some were sleeping. Some had just been called to morning prayer by the village mullah. All were, by any reasonable interpretation of the evidence, civilians.
After reading these reports on Sunday evening - all from British and Australian publications - I decided to catch the 11:00 PM edition of ABC News to see what sort of spin the American media would put on these well-documented reports of civilian casualties. No mention was made of them.
They did though manage to squeeze in an important story about some other tragic victims whose plight had previously been shamefully ignored by all avenues of the media. The following exchange between the talking heads 'teased' the story: Leslie Sykes: "Still ahead - the forgotten victims of September 11th." Phillip Palmer: "Tonight, a party to raise money for pets who lost their owners. That is coming up."
I didn't wait up to get the details.
-- REFERENCES:
1. Christopher Kremmer "Alarm Grows Over Scale of Civilian Casualties," Sydney Morning Herald, October 15, 2001
2. Jason Burke "US Admits Lethal Blunders," Guardian Unlimited, October 14, 2001
3. Richard Lloyd Parry "It Was If the Rocks Themselves Were on Fire," Independent, October 14, 2001
4. Ian Williams "He Is Burying His Wife Bit by Bit as He Digs Her Out of the Rubble," The Times, October 15, 2001
5. Kathy Gannon "Taliban Shows Fresh Graves and a Village Ruined by War," International Herald Tribune, October 15, 2001
6. Julian Borger "Rumsfeld Blames Taliban for Civilian Deaths," Guardian Unlimited, October 16, 2001
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Bush calls for cease-fire in Kashmir
October 16, 2001
By Bill Sammon
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20011016-11870331.htm
President Bush yesterday called for a cease-fire in Kashmir, where Indian forces shelled Pakistani bases just as Secretary of State Colin L. Powell arrived in a bid to stop the conflict from complicating U.S. strikes against the Taliban.
"It is very important that India and Pakistan stand down during our activities in Afghanistan and, for that matter, forever," Mr. Bush said in the Rose Garden. "We are mindful that activities around Kashmir could create issues in that part of the region, particularly as we're conducting our operations in Afghanistan."
National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice said she and the president and Mr. Powell urged the leaders of India and Pakistan just before the United States began bombing Afghanistan to refrain from fighting over the disputed, mostly Muslim region of Kashmir.
"I can tell you there were quite a few phone calls as we got ready for military action," Miss Rice told reporters yesterday. "There is a lot of diplomatic infrastructure in place to try to damp this down."
Mr. Powell departed Washington on Sunday with the "express purpose" of reminding leaders in Islamabad and New Delhi of "the importance of not having a flare-up in Kashmir," Miss Rice said.
But just such a flare-up occurred yesterday when Indian forces shelled Pakistani military bases across the cease-fire line in Kashmir, wiping out 11 posts, killing one person and injuring 25. The Indians used mortars, rockets, artillery, grenade launchers and machine guns in the heaviest fighting along the disputed border in 10 months.
The White House is alarmed that fighting has broken out between India and Pakistan, both of which possess nuclear weapons, just as the United States has enlisted Pakistan in the search-and-destroy mission against Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda terrorist network in neighboring Afghanistan. Pakistan has agreed to help, but retains diplomatic ties with the Taliban and is struggling to contain anti-American sentiment within its own borders.
The violence in Kashmir lent new urgency to Mr. Powell's journey and underscored the administration's broader effort to prevent the region from becoming destabilized by the U.S. offensive.
To that end, Miss Rice yesterday granted an interview to Al Jazeera, a Qatar-based TV station that reaches 40 million Arabs. The interviewer pointed out that while many Arab and Muslim governments support the president's war against terrorism, ordinary citizens of those nations do not.
"We care very much also about the people of the Middle East, the Arab populations," Miss Rice replied. "We're trying to do a better job in getting that message out to people. We want it to be very clear that the war on terrorism is not a war against Islam."
Mr. Bush will reiterate that theme later this week when he meets with leaders of 20 nations, including some with large Islamic populations, during an economic summit in Shanghai. Although some White House officials urged the president not to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, Mr. Bush decided to go anyway.
"Despite the press of the urgent business that we have in the war against terrorism, the president feels that this is an extremely important trip and an extremely important time to take this trip," Miss Rice said. "He will continue to build the coalition in the war on terrorism, enlisting Pacific Rim leaders in his counterterrorism efforts."
During the summit, Mr. Bush will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is engaged in a bloody, ongoing struggle with separatists in Chechnya. When Moscow agreed to help Washington in the war against terrorism, the White House began downplaying Russia's human rights abuses in Chechnya and began emphasizing the influence of al Qaeda on the separatists.
Miss Rice said yesterday that while the president will discuss "human rights" and "minority rights issues" with Mr. Putin, he will also urge the "legitimate Chechnyan leadership to make sure there are not international terrorists among them."
The president will also meet with Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, president of the Philippines, where al Qaeda has been supporting terrorism for years.
Although the war has forced Mr. Bush to cancel stops in Beijing, Tokyo and Seoul, he will meet with the leaders of China, Japan and South Korea in Shanghai. Yesterday, Miss Rice praised China for providing the United States with intelligence on terrorism.
"The Chinese have been very helpful on the information-sharing side," she said.
Italy is also "sharing intelligence" with the United States, Mr. Bush said after a meeting with Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in the Oval Office.
The president made no mention of Mr. Berlusconi's earlier remarks about Christian societies being superior to Islamic societies, which caused an uproar among Arabs and Muslims.
During a speech to federal workers later in the day, Mr. Bush addressed an issue that has troubled conservatives since the start of the war - the expansion of the federal government. Some House Republicans, for example, oppose a federal takeover of security operations at airports.
"In times of war, the American people look to the government more than they do in times of peace," Mr. Bush said. "They count on the government to defeat those who are trying to destroy us, and we will."
"In doing so, we must resist pressure to unwisely expand government," he said. "We need to affirm a few important principles: that government should be limited, but effective; should do a few things and do them well. It should welcome market-based competition wherever possible. It should respect the role and authority of state and local governments, which are closest to the people."
But the president's remarks came on a day when the White House announced a plan to use billions of tax dollars to bail out private insurers in the event of future terrorist strikes. These companies are refusing to renew terrorism coverage in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, which caused tens of billions in damages.
Also yesterday, Mr. Bush presided over a welcoming ceremony for the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard B. Myers, and his deputy, Gen. Pete Pace, at Fort Myers, Va.
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Pakistan calls for cut in air strikes as Powell arrives
October 16, 2001
By Willis Witter
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20011016-28434605.htm
PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Secretary of State Colin L. Powell arrived in Pakistan yesterday as President Pervez Musharraf's government called for curtailing U.S. air strikes in neighboring Afghanistan.
Mr. Powell, whose arrival in the capital, Islamabad, was cloaked in secrecy and tight security, was to meet Gen. Musharraf today to bolster an uneasy alliance constrained by widespread Pakistani concern over the bombing campaign.
Mr. Powell's plane touched down at the end of another day of anti-American protests in which demonstrators clashed with police.
Many shops throughout Pakistan closed to honor a general strike called by hard-line Islamic parties to protest the Powell visit. Some merchants shut their doors in fear of militants.
"The strike is a public verdict against the United States and Musharraf must resign now," Ghafoor Haideri, a leader of the Jamiat-I-Ulema Islami Party told reporters.
The general strike was only partially successful and the size of demonstrations in Pakistani cities remained modest. Nevertheless public unease over the air strikes remains a source of concern for Pakistan's government, even as it continues to back the U.S.-led war against terrorism.
"The longer this operation lasts, the greater the damage, collateral damage," Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar said in a television interview aired the day before Mr. Powell's arrival.
Shortly after the bombing began, Gen. Musharraf said the air campaign would be short.
In contrast, the United States has signaled that the campaign will be prolonged and open-ended, unless Afghanistan's ruling Taliban regime hands over Osama bin Laden, the suspected leader behind the Sept. 11 suicide attacks on the United States.
Police fired volleys of tear gas in Karachi and Lahore to disperse rock-throwing protesters. Dozens were injured and dozens were arrested, according to local news reports.
In Peshawar, near the Afghan border, several thousand protesters dispersed peacefully but their message underscored the divide separating thinking here and in the United States.
Asked about the tragedy of about 5,000 people dying in the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, without exception, protesters said it was America's fault, and even worse.
"The graveyard of America will be Afghanistan and Pakistan," read one banner.
"Musharraf is the agent of America, a person who has sacrificed the honor of the country and joined hands with the Jews," roared one speaker.
One man, with the utmost sincerity, asked a reporter whether reports were true that America had begun using biological weapons in Afghanistan, as reported in the Urdu-language press. He had no idea that America was under attack by biological weapons itself.
Pakistani leaders point out that the size of the demonstrations represents a minuscule fraction of the nation's 145 million people.
Still, the constant diet of hatred of America on constant display in the local press underscores the pressures facing Gen. Musharraf as he meets with Mr. Powell today.
En route here, Mr. Powell praised Gen. Musharraf for political courage in giving the United States landing rights at air bases to facilitate U.S. military activities across the border. He praised cooperation from Pakistan's archrival, India, which he will visit tomorrow, as well.
"I'm very pleased that the two nations are aligned with us in the campaign against terrorism, aligned with the entire civilized world," Mr. Powell told reporters.
But as he arrived, his objective of keeping both nations cooperating with the U.S. anti-terrorism efforts suffered a new setback.
Indian forces fired shells and mortars across the cease-fire line dividing Indian- and Pakistani-administered Kashmir to prevent border infiltration by Muslim militants, Indian officials said.
The trip is Mr. Powell's first abroad since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The State Department withheld details of his arrival time and his activities here.
Indicating he believes the demise of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan may be just a matter of time, Mr. Powell told reporters on the plane he sees a key role for the United Nations in the transition.
"Clearly, the United Nations will be playing a leading role. No one government will be able to handle it," he said, adding that the best hope for a future stability is a broad-based government.
USA Today and CBS yesterday reported that Gen. Musharraf told them that the United States should kill Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar in order to stop bin Laden.
"Get Mullah Omar and Osama won't be able to operate. He'll be on the run," Gen. Musharraf was quoted as telling USA Today and CBS radio.
-------- u.n.
Ex-King: Afghanistan May Need U.N. Troops
By Colum Lynch and Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, October 16, 2001; Page A12
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63736-2001Oct15.html
Afghanistan's exiled King Mohammed Zahir Shah has appealed to the United Nations Security Council to establish and dispatch a U.N. peacekeeping force to Afghanistan if the Taliban regime collapses under the pressure of the American and British military strikes.
The former king, 87, is at the center of international efforts to find a political alternative to the Taliban. He warned U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan in a letter distributed yesterday to members of the 15-nation council that the Taliban's defeat could lead to a bloody "power vacuum."
"I appeal to you to bring this probable imminent danger to the attention of the Security Council," the ex-king wrote in the letter, dated last Wednesday. "A peacekeeping force, under the authority of the United Nations, could be rapidly deployed with the cooperation of the international community."
If accepted, the request would significantly expand the U.N.'s already large role in Afghan affairs.
Zahir Shah said the Afghan capital of Kabul, which has received more than a week of allied airstrikes, faced the greatest "risk" of descending into chaos.
"The ongoing military operation in Afghanistan . . . could very well result in a sudden collapse of the so-called Taliban regime," he wrote. "It would be a tragedy, costly in human lives, should the various forces in opposition to the Taliban vie for domination of the capital city."
Harun Amin, Washington spokesman for opponents of the Taliban, said his United Front supports the king's call for a U.N. rapid deployment force.
"We want the United Nations to have a central and pivotal role in all of this," said Amin. "All efforts should be done under the aegis of the United Nations."
He said his group has requested that troops from another Islamic nation be used and that discussions have begun with the government of Turkey. Amin -- who has worked with the current, non-Taliban Afghan representatives to the United Nations -- said relying on one nation would allow the peacekeeping force to be assembled more quickly.
Fears of chaos in violence in Kabul and elsewhere if the Taliban falls are based on the nation's experience after the Afghan communist government fell in 1992. Factions within the then-victorious mujaheddin raced to claim the capital and reduced much of it to ruins in a bitter struggle for control. The Taliban came to power on the promise to establish order and stop the violence.
Members of the Taliban opposition, which is made up primarily of ethnic minorities in the north of Afghanistan, are dug in about 30 miles from Kabul. They are also moving on Taliban forces in the northern city of Mazar-e Sharif, which was the scene of several massacres since the Taliban first came to the area in 1996.
The call for a U.N. peacekeeping force reflects the growing importance of the international body in resolving the Afghan crisis. Special U.N. envoy for Afghanistan Lakhdar Brahimi of Algeria has met with governments from neighboring nations and Afghan parties to help fashion a new government, and top State Department official Richard Haass was appointed yesterday to work with that U.N. effort.
President Bush has promised large-scale reconstruction aid for Afghanistan if the Taliban is overthrown and has said that the U.N. should have a leading role in the effort. The U.N. has never recognized the Taliban as the legal government of Afghanistan.
It is unclear whether the U.N. has the ability -- or the funds -- to make a difference in Afghanistan. The U.N. has been involved in ineffectual efforts to bring peace to Afghanistan for years, and U.N. officials have raised doubts about whether donors will provide the necessary support.
The ex-king was deposed by his cousin in 1973. He has lived in Rome since losing power and has never returned to Afghanistan.
Representatives of the former king say he does not want to return to power, but would convene a national meeting to decide who should run the Afghan government.
Lynch reported from the United Nations.
-------- u.s.
U.S. gunship attacks Taliban troops
October 16, 2001
By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20011016-1384603.htm
The U.S. last night used a special-operations gunship for the first time in its air offensive against Afghanistan, attacking concentrations of troops in the Taliban headquarters of Kandahar.
A senior U.S. official said military plans called for also using Army Delta Force commandos on the ground to attack the elite forces around Kandahar, supported by the AC-130 gunships.
But a Pentagon official last night denied that any ground troops were involved in the AC-130 mission.
The AC-130 gunship, an armed version of the Lockheed Martin C-130 cargo plane, is typically used in support of commandos or other ground troops. The crew of 13 includes five gunners, relying on an array of night-vision target systems to attack ground forces.
The aircraft is studded with 40 mm and 105 mm cannon that can lay waste to people and buildings in rapid-fire fashion. Because it is low-flying and slow, it is rarely used where military planners expect serious air defenses.
The Washington Times yesterday quoted a senior Bush administration official as saying the first offensive ground operation by commandos against Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia and Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda terrorist group will happen "very soon."
Mr. Rumsfeld has refused to discuss future ground missions. He repeated again yesterday his requirements for conducting "sustained" anti-terrorists operations inside Afghanistan.
He said he wants the Taliban's air defenses reduced further. He also wants to establish better communications with anti-Taliban factions on the ground.
"Then one would think that the people on the ground would be more successful against the Taliban and al Qaeda forces and that they would be more inclined to have to move and find that their numbers are being attrited in a way that is going to be discouraging for them."
The Pentagon estimates al Qaeda has 1,500 to 3,000 troops in Afghanistan. Bin Laden has a fiercely loyal security detail of about 40 soldiers.
Earlier yesterday, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld labeled the ruling Taliban militia "accomplished liars" for their claim that U.S. bombs damaged an Afghan village and killed 200 civilians.
"We do not have information that validates any of that," Mr. Rumsfeld told reporters at the Pentagon. "Indeed, some of the numbers are ridiculous. I think that we know of certain knowledge that the Taliban leadership and al Qaeda are accomplished liars."
In his first response to a weekend media blitz by the Taliban, who accused the Pentagon of targeting the village of Karam on Thursday, Mr. Rumsfeld said the only target in the vicinity was a cave complex stocked with munitions. The bombs, he said, scored direct hits on a tunnel entrance.
The Taliban, a radical student militia which came to power in 1996, has provided a safe haven for bin Laden, al Qaeda and their training camps. More than 5,000 U.S. civilians were killed on Sept. 11 by terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon. President Bush has said bin Laden orchestrated those attacks.
Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, said the United States struck an underground stash of weapons in a tunneled cave. The hit ignited a series of secondary explosions and fires that lasted nearly four hours. He said an analysis of the attack (likely by "bunker-buster" 5,000-pound bombs) showed the pilots scored direct hits.
"There are no bomb craters on that village," Gen. Myers said. "They hit the tunnel area. They did not hit short." Karam lies about 40 miles from Jalalabad, a northeastern city near the Pakistan border. The area is home to several bin Laden training facilities bombed earlier by U.S. forces.
"They were not cooking cookies inside those tunnels," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "You do not spend that kind of money and dig that far in and store that many weapons and munitions that it would cause that kind of sustained secondary explosions, unless you have very serious purposes for doing it."
Mr. Rumsfeld has stressed throughout the campaign that planners are taking special precautions to ensure that each site on the target menu is a military or terrorist one.
In fact, the United States has not bombed electricity generation in Kabul, according to reports from the city. Usually, air strategists target electric grids to aid in shutting down the military and generally creating chaos. Reuters news agency reported that power lines were bombed in several cities last night. The Associated Press reported from Kabul, however, that the Taliban turns off the power each night.
"Any time that the Department of Defense is engaged from the air or on the ground, we have to know that there are going to be people hurt," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "Overwhelmingly, they will be people who we intend to hurt. On occasion, there will be people hurt that one wished had not been."
U.S. officials say they will admit to U.S. bombing mistakes if the evidence warrants. The Pentagon over the weekend acknowledged that a satellite-guided bomb meant to hit a helicopter instead struck homes near an airport. The Taliban said four civilians were killed.
Mr. Rumsfeld and Gen. Myers spoke to reporters as Air Force long-range bombers and carrier-based Navy jets conducted some of the heaviest raids to date, both during the day and at night.
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U.S. Intensifies Strikes on Afghanistan
Pentagon Disputes Regime's Tally of Civilian Casualties
By Vernon Loeb
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 16, 2001; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63751-2001Oct15.html
U.S. warplanes struck targets across Afghanistan yesterday in the heaviest day of bombing since the air campaign began, as huge explosions rocked the Afghan capital of Kabul and an Air Force AC-130 gunship fired on the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar, Pentagon officials said.
Fifty carrier-based fighter jets and 10 long-range bombers were joined for the first time by the AC-130, one of the most devastating weapons in the U.S. air arsenal. They struck targets throughout the day and into the night, aided in part by what Pentagon officials said was fresh information on Taliban and terrorist positions provided by opposition forces.
Defense officials declined to disclose the AC-130's mission around Kandahar, a city in southern Afghanistan that is one of the centers of power for the Taliban, the Islamic militia that rules most of the country. But the slow-moving aircraft, armed with a 150-mm howitzer and a Gatling gun capable of firing 1,800 rounds per minute, can lay down a withering carpet of fire against ground positions.
Although the pace of daily U.S. airstrikes against Afghanistan has not matched previous campaigns against Yugoslavia and Iraq, the attacks yesterday represented a marked escalation in the nine-day-old anti-terrorism war and signaled it could be entering a new phase.
The Pentagon also moved forcefully on another front -- the emerging war of information with the Taliban over the extent of civilian casualties and damage from the U.S. airstrikes.
As protests mounted in Pakistan and elsewhere in the Islamic world over the conduct of the U.S. campaign, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said U.S. forces had begun dropping leaflets over Afghanistan -- in the local languages of Pashto and Dari -- along with humanitarian food packets.
One leaflet shows a Western soldier in camouflage and helmet shaking hands with a man in traditional Afghan dress in front of a mountain scene. "The partnership of nations is here to assist the people of Afghanistan," the leaflet said.
Another depicted a radio transmitting tower and sketches of radios and included times and radio frequencies to tune to for what it calls "Information Radio" -- apparently a reference to broadcasts from a circling U.S. C-130 cargo plane that began shortly after U.S. and British forces launched the air campaign on Oct. 7.
Rumsfeld said the Taliban's charges that errant U.S. bombs have killed 300 civilians, including 200 in the eastern village of Karam, were "ridiculous." But he acknowledged that the United States has failed to justify the reasons for its anti-terrorism campaign with clarity with Muslims in the Middle East, South Asia and elsewhere.
"We have to do a better job," he said. "Our cause is just, what we're doing is right, and we have absolutely nothing to hide."
National security adviser Condoleezza Rice, seeking to buttress that point, went on a Middle Eastern news network and assured its audience, "We want it to be very clear that the war on terrorism is not a war against Islam."
Airstrikes were reported yesterday in regions across Afghanistan, which the Bush administration charges is harboring Saudi-born Islamic militant Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda network. The United States blames bin Laden for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.
Carrier-based fighter jets and long-range bombers began their assault on Kabul before dawn. They dropped bombs throughout the day and into the night, sending residents fleeing an area north of the city near an abandoned military base, witnesses said.
Further attacks were reported in Jalalabad to the east, Kandahar to the south and Mazar-e Sharif to the north, where Gen. Abdurrashid Dostum, a Northern Alliance leader, drove within a few miles of the city's airport.
One senior official familiar with yesterday's targets said that the AC-130 was scheduled to be part of the mission. As of late last night, the official said he had not received reports about how it performed.
"We just felt that it was the appropriate weapons system for the mission," the official said. "It's basically a flying artillery piece. It tends to be very, very precise fire, pretty heavy fire, and very accurate fire."
Rumsfeld and Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, denied the Taliban's claim that 200 civilians had been killed in the village of Karam. Rumsfeld said the attack near Karam had destroyed an underground cave complex associated with the Taliban and al Qaeda.
Calling leaders of the Taliban and al Qaeda "accomplished liars," Rumsfeld said the strike on the cave complex was "unambiguous. It was into the tunnels, and it worked."
Myers said military officials were surprised the strike had detonated stored ammunition and touched off a raging underground fire in the complex that lasted for 3-1/2 to 4 hours. He said that reconnaissance photographs taken before the attack showed that Karam was "not heavily occupied," and that pictures taken afterward revealed no bomb craters in the village.
While the Pentagon asserts that most fixed targets associated with the Taliban and al Qaeda have been destroyed, Rumsfeld and other senior defense officials said the pace of airstrikes would not diminish. They said U.S. pilots would begin turning their sights on troop concentrations and other "emerging targets."
Rumsfeld said recent targets were "significantly enhanced" by information from Afghan opposition forces and had included Taliban troop concentrations for the last three or four days.
Military commanders from the Northern Alliance, a coalition of opposition forces that occupies parts of northern Afghanistan, have complained in recent days that the United States has not bombed Taliban troops dug in north of Kabul in defense of the capital. Rumsfeld attributed the lack of strikes to a dearth of reliable target information and implied that bombing raids against those forces were imminent.
"I suspect that in the period ahead," Rumsfeld said, "that's not going to be a very safe place to be."
One U.S. official, who asked not to be quoted by name, said officials planning the air campaign are in direct contact with the Northern Alliance, among other opposition groups. "Some of the information from the Northern Alliance has not been particularly useful, which may explain why there may have been a lack of activity in certain areas," the official said.
Another senior defense official said targeting has shifted from a relatively small number of "strategic" targets such as surface-to-air missile sites to an "unlimited" number of Taliban troop concentrations. "I don't know what the Taliban has in terms of troops -- 30,000 or 40,000," the official said. "But that's a lot of places to drop ordnance."
The Navy has four aircraft carriers in the area, with the USS Roosevelt heading toward the northern Indian Ocean after sailing through the Suez Canal on Saturday. Since the bombing began, the USS Enterprise and the USS Carl Vinson have been responsible for launching all the carrier-strike aircraft over Afghanistan.
Navy officials have yet to decide whether the Roosevelt will replace the Enterprise, which is nearing the end of its standard deployment, or whether all three carriers are needed. A fourth carrier, the USS Kitty Hawk, is near Afghanistan, in the Arabian Sea, for use as a possible launching platform for special operations helicopters. The Kitty Hawk was deployed to the region without its fighter jets.
During his Pentagon briefing, Rumsfeld said that he would try to gather additional details about an aborted strike against Mohamad Omar, the Taliban's leader, first reported this week by the New Yorker magazine.
According to the New Yorker,, a Predator unmanned aerial vehicle armed with Hellfire missiles and operated by the CIA identified a convoy of vehicles on the first night of bombing as belonging to Omar. After tracking the convoy to a building on the outskirts of Kabul, the magazine said, an assault by fighter bombers was ordered but ultimately called off by a military lawyer attached to the U.S. Central Command who had concerns about the rules of engagement.
--------
THE COMBAT
Bombers and Airborne Gunship Blast Targets in Afghanistan
October 16, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Attacks-Afghanistan.html
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- A U.S. special-forces gunship swung into action Tuesday, raking a Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan with heavy machine gun and cannon fire. Fierce daylight bombing at Kabul set two International Red Cross warehouses afire.
Massive explosions from the battle over Kabul's skies could be heard along the front lines between Taliban and Afghan opposition forces 30 miles to the north. Huge clouds of black smoke billowed on the capital's northern edge.
The second straight day of fierce daylight raids and the first use of the low-flying, lumbering AC-130 marked an intensification of the air campaign against Taliban military sites and leaders.
It also signaled U.S. confidence that more than a week of attacks by ship-launched cruise missiles and high-flying jets had greatly eased the threat from Taliban air defense.
Secretary of State Colin Powell, in neighboring Pakistan to shore up support for the U.S.-led campaign, said Afghanistan's Islamic regime was ``under enormous pressure'' but refused to say whether he thought it was near collapse.
Tuesday's fresh waves of air strikes targeted the Taliban on multiple fronts -- military bases and airports outside the capital of Kabul, Taliban leaders' southern base city of Kandahar and the key northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif -- a former opposition stronghold.
Salvos of bombs struck in the north of Kabul throughout the day, blasting at a cluster of Taliban military bases and transport and fuel depots.
One bomb crashed into a Red Cross compound at Khair Khana, injuring a guard and setting two warehouses afire. Afghan workers braved the smoke to recover some of the blankets, tents and medicine from one building. The other contained wheat, ICRC staffers at the scene said.
In Islamabad, Pakistan, ICRC spokesman Mario Musa said the warehouse roofs had been marked with a Red Cross insignia.
U.S. officials said they were trying to determine whose firepower struck the warehouses.
``In a case like this ... It's hard to say whether something was a result of anti-aircraft weaponry that was shot from the ground, or other weapons that were shot from the ground and came back down, or whether or not it was coalition efforts,'' White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said in Washington.
Outside Kabul, an Associated Press reporter with opposition forces on the Shomali plain well to the north of the capital could hear huge explosions from the bombardment and the roar of heavy guns.
Taliban fuel supplies and vehicles were believed to have been removed from some of Tuesday's targeted installations in the Khair Khana area. Residents said Taliban forces are avoiding spending the night at the Khair Khana military bases, taking refuge in local mosques instead.
Locals say Tuesday's bombing injured three farmers out working in their fields when the U.S. jets roared overhead.
Taliban Information Ministry official Abdul Himat said 13 civilians died in the pre-dawn assault at Kandahar. The Taliban also said two people were killed in Tuesday's attack on Mazar-e-Sharif. The claims could not be independently verified.
In Washington, a defense official confirmed the overnight attack was led by an AC-130, marking the first acknowledged use of special-forces aircraft in the offensive, which began on Oct. 7. The official spoke on condition of anonymity.
Previous raids had targeted anti-aircraft artillery sites and other military installations with the aim of making the skies safe for aircraft like the AC-130. The Taliban are believed to still hold an unknown number of shoulder-fired Stinger missiles capable of bringing down aircraft, however.
High-firepower AC-130s typically are used to support ground forces trained for small-unit operations. There was no word whether the gunship's deployment meant special forces had entered the battle on the ground.
Aiming to make the skies safe, U.S. forces have made particular targets out of airports in Taliban territory throughout the campaign. Attacks put the Jalalabad airport in eastern Afghanistan out of commission almost from the start.
Other strikes have pounded Taliban jets at Kabul and the sprawling airport complex at Kandahar, which holds at least 300 housing units of Osama bin Laden's followers.
The only other major airfields in Taliban territory, at Shindand in southwestern Afghanistan and in Herat, have also taken repeated strikes.
The United States launched the air campaign to root out bin Laden -- the top suspect in the Sept. 11 terror attacks on the United States -- and to punish Afghanistan's rulers, the Taliban Islamic militia, who harbor him.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, speaking at the Pentagon, suggested Monday that U.S. airstrikes could next start targeting Taliban front-line positions facing Afghan opposition fighters in the northeast.
``I suspect that in the period ahead that's not going to be a very safe place to be'' for Taliban fighters, Rumsfeld said.
Taking advantage of the massive assaults, opposition forces on the ground claimed Monday to have advanced within miles of Mazar-e-Sharif.
In the Tajikistan capital Dushanbe, a spokesman for the opposition northern alliance said opposition troops were approaching Mazar-e-Sharif from the northeast and northwest and that some units were as close as 4 miles away.
The claim by Abdul Vadud, the military attache of the opposition-controlled Afghan Embassy in Dushanbe, could not be confirmed.
Mazar-e-Sharif is the largest city in northern Afghanistan and is dominated by ethnic minority Uzbeks. The fundamentalist Taliban, who are Sunni Muslims, captured the city in 1998 and have since ruled it with an iron hand.
Taking the city would enable the opposition to consolidate its grip on the small area it controls in the north, since the town controls routes running east to west and linking pockets of the northern alliance's strength.
Pakistan, which has agreed to lend logistical support for the campaign, has pressed for the U.S. and British offensive to avoid directly helping opposition troops. Pakistan fears the northern alliance, its longtime opponent, will seize power from the Taliban.
With Powell beside him, Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf told an Islamabad news conference Tuesday the military strikes should ``short and targeted.'' EDITOR'S NOTE -- Kathy Gannon contributed to this report from Islamabad, Pakistan.
-------- OTHER
-------- alternative energy
Oklahoma looks to wind power
Monday, October 15, 2001
By Russell Ray,
Tulsa World, Okla.
http://enn.com/news/wire-stories/2001/10/10152001/krt_wind_45256.asp
TULSA, Okla. -- Oklahoma could be a prime producer of a new energy source - wind farms.
Oklahomans have known about it for years. In 1943, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein included it in the opening verse of what would become an Oklahoma anthem.
Fifty-eight years later, out-of-state companies are journeying to Oklahoma to harness its power.
Rising demand for electricity has drawn several energy industry entrepreneurs to the plains of western Oklahoma, where the winds blow at incredible speeds.
Wind-generated electricity is what they're seeking.
"Oklahoma has a tremendous wind resource," said Randy Swisher, executive director of the American Wind Energy Association. "Almost nothing has been done to develop that resource until now."
Oklahoma is ranked eighth nationally in wind power potential, according to the association. In some parts of the state, the average wind speed (at more than 160 feet) is 16 mph, strong enough to turn the tall turbines of a large-scale wind farm. The expected boom in wind farm construction could generate millions of dollars in royalties for Oklahoma landowners, said University of Oklahoma researcher Tim Hughes.
By leasing land for the construction of large wind turbines, Oklahoma property owners could earn as much as $22 million a year from lease payments. The estimate is based on Oklahoma's wind power potential of 9,000 megawatts. However, without major improvements in the state's transmission system, only 1,000 megawatts is feasible.
Typically, large wind farms are comprised of several 1.5 megawatt wind turbines. For each turbine, the landowner would receive about $4,000 to $5,000 a year, or between 2 percent and 4 percent of the company's gross revenue, Hughes said.
So far, only one company - Chermac Energy Corp. of Edmond - has announced plans to build a wind farm in western Oklahoma, but other firms are sure to follow.
"I'm aware of at least a couple of other companies that have looked closely at the wind resource in the state," Swisher said. "They've been measuring the wind resource at specific locations."
Jaime McAlpine, president of Chermac, said he knows of at least four out-of-state companies with plans to develop wind farm projects in Oklahoma. He wouldn't say who.
American Electric Power of Columbus, Ohio, has leased several large tracts of land north of Lawton in southwest Oklahoma, enough to build 200 to 300 megawatts of wind power, said AEP spokesman Rick Walker.
In Oklahoma, the winds are certain and resolute, said McAlpine.
"If you've lived in Oklahoma, you know that the weather changes constantly, but the wind is always there," he said.
Chermac, a petroleum engineering company, plans to build two wind farms with a total generating capacity of 121 megawatts in Harper County near the Panhandle. In all, Chermac will build 81 of the 1.5-megawatt wind turbines, each standing more than 300 feet tall.
Chermac officials expect to complete both projects, which will cost an estimated $120 million, by December 2004. Together, they will be able to produce enough electricity to power 20,000 homes a year.
Chermac said it will begin producing electricity by September 2002. Already, the company is negotiating contracts with potential customers, McAlpine said.
"I believe a good portion of it probably will be exported out of the state," he said.
Deregulation of the power industry, which allows consumers to pick their power supplier, and improvements in wind power technologies have sparked a substantial increase in wind farm construction, especially in West Texas. The main drawback of wind power has been its cost. Until now, the cost of wind-generated electricity has been much higher than power produced from coal or natural gas. New technologies have helped lower the cost to a competitive level.
"There are utilities in Texas that are developing wind projects that compete well with the cost of a new gas or coal plant," Swisher said. "The economics have improved."
Also, an increasingly erratic natural gas market has contributed to the heightened interest in wind power production, he said.
"A lot of utilities recognize that they need a little more diversity in their portfolio if they want to avoid some of the volatility in gas prices," he said.
As more markets are deregulated, more customers will be able to choose the type of power used in their homes and businesses. Some will prefer to buy wind power over coal- or gas-fired power. Unlike coal- and gas-fired power plants, wind farms don't pump harmful emissions into the air or water.
Customers may not have to pay more for wind-generated electricity, according to researchers at Stanford University. In a recent study, they found that the cost of generating wind power is now less than the cost of producing coal-fired power.
Hughes favors legislation that would require the state's utilities to produce a certain percentage of their electricity with renewable sources such as wind and solar.
"If we really want this development to explode in Oklahoma, we've got to provide the market," Hughes said. "The best way to provide the market is to have a renewable portfolio standard."
Such a requirement was contained in previous state legislation dealing with electric deregulation, but the measure was killed after state officials expressed concern about the deregulation plan.
Carl Bergey, owner of Norman-based Bergey Windpower Inc., the nation's largest supplier of small wind turbines, described the Plains of Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas and the Dakotas as the "Saudi Arabia of wind."
The winds sweeping through the Plains could be used to help meet the power needs of California, which has struggled with insufficient resources.
"More states are beginning to recognize the advantage of alternate energy and are beginning to provide tax credits and other incentives," Bergey said.
Federal tax incentives for wind power production are scheduled to expire at the end of the year. Several companies are waiting for Congress to extend those incentives before breaking ground on wind power projects.
"From all indications, that extension will happen," Hughes said.
-------- environment
Carbon dioxide can clean radioactive soil
Tuesday, October 16, 2001
By Environmental News Network
http://enn.com/news/enn-stories/2001/10/10162001/carbon_45266.asp
Even dirt can be dirty. It can become contaminated with toxic chemicals or infused with radioactivity. Now, researchers have found a way to clean soil contaminated with two radioactive elements produced by past nuclear weapons development and nuclear energy research.
The method takes advantage of an industrial process called supercritical fluid extraction to clean up long-lived radioactivity that could persist long into the future. Researchers at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) used pressurized, heated carbon dioxide and an added metal binding chemical compound to clean radioactively contaminated soil.
The method removed more than 69 percent of the plutonium and americium from spiked, local soil, report two INEEL chemists in the October issue of the journal "Radiochemica Acta."
"Our follow up experiments removed almost 100 percent of the americium and plutonium," said INEEL chemist Robert Fox. "Someone needs to give us a harder problem or a harder sample."
Supercritical fluid extraction is already used to decaffeinate coffee, purify spices and dry clean clothes. It has been shown to remove plutonium from stainless steel, but this is the first time it has been used to remove plutonium from soil. The method is safe and environmentally friendly, the researchers say.
For these experiments, carbon dioxide and soil were mixed, heated and pressurized. Under these conditions, carbon dioxide flows like a gas, dissolves like a liquid, but behaves with chemical properties unlike gases or liquids.
A chemical agent added to the carbon dioxide flowed through the soil and grabbed the plutonium and americium, whisking the compounds back into the fluidized carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide was then shunted out of the soil and depressurized, dropping the compounds into a vial on its way back into the atmosphere. In an industrial scale setting, the carbon dioxide could be recycled.
Also, the researchers added ethanol and can add different chemical agents to improve the efficiency of extraction. The efficiency of the process on the INEEL soil surprised the researchers.
"We didn't think we'd get such high percentages right off the bat. Plutonium is fairly difficult to remove sometimes. I thought we'd get the easy plutonium. We perhaps got the plutonium that migrated into the mineral lattices of the soil, where it's almost impossible to get out," said INEEL chemist Bruce Mincher.
"The obvious next step is to obtain real world samples and demonstrate the method is effective on all manner of soils," said Fox. "We also want to have a fundamental understanding of the chemistry that occurs -- why does it work that way, and what is inhibiting it from working faster and better."
INEEL's Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center provides plenty of opportunity to clean up radioactively contaminated soils. The INTEC facility, which began operations in 1952, reprocessed defense related spent nuclear fuel until 1992.
Liquid wastes generated from this activity were stored in an underground tank farm until they were treated using a calcining process, which converts the liquid to a more stable granular form. The current mission of INTEC is to receive and temporarily store spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste for future disposition, manage waste, develop technologies and clean up past contamination.
Forty areas in and near the facility involving contaminated soils and groundwater will require cleanup actions to reduce the risk to human health and the environment. Supercritical fluid extraction is attracting attention around the world, and projects are underway in India and in Czechoslovakia.
-------- human rights
US FOOD DROPS 'USELESS' FOR HUNGRY HORDES
Tuesday, October 16, 2001
Daily Record and Sunday Mail
http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/shtml/NEWS/P10S1.shtml
AID agencies last night warned food drops to Afghanistan were doing more harm than good.
They said more than a million people faced starvation as refugees fleeing the Taliban were trapped between Allied bombs and the closed Pakistan border.
Glasgow-born Zia Choudhury, 29, humanitarian programme director for Oxfam, is in Islamabad, desperate to deliver food to the Afghans but unable to reach them.
He said: "It is extremely frustrating to be sitting here in the knowledge that things are getting worse every day and we are unable to do anything about it.
"Now we're facing a race against time to get enough food into Afghanistan to see them through the winter.
"If aid agencies are allowed to enter Afghanistan and the people trying to get into Pakistan are allowed over the border, we still have time to prevent a catastrophe. But I'm not hopeful we're going to be allowed to do that."
The Americans claim they have been trying to deliver aid to the country. More than 130,000 food parcels were dropped in the last week.
But Zia said: "Air drops have worked in other parts of the world but only as a last resort. In this situation, they are not effective and they are very expensive."
Other aid workers agreed, claiming many of the packages, which are dropped from a great height, have been scattered across Afghanistan's many minefields. Organisation of Mine Clearance and Afghan Rehabilitation spokesman Alhaj Fazel said: "When the food lands, these desperately hungry people will simply rush towards it. Women and children are most vulnerable."
A spokesman for French aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres added: "This is not a humanitarian effort, this is part of a military campaign designed to gather approval for the attacks. It is virtually useless and may even be doing harm."
Aid agencies said the food itself was of little use because it is totally unsuitable.
Most Afghans live on bread and rice and have never seen the kind of food in the parcels. They contain baked beans, beans in a tomato vinaigrette, peanut butter, strawberry jam, a biscuit, salt and pepper and a fruit bar.
None of the food meets strict Islamic requirements for food preparation .
And reports from the few aid workers left in the country say those who do eat it suffer digestive problems because their malnourished stomachs can't cope.
Zia Choudhury said: "Where air drops have been effective, they have been dropped on to a specific site where aid workers are in place to distribute it to those who most need it.
"We have worked out that this food costs 10 to 15 times more than the wheat and grain we would like to distribute in Afghanistan.
"The best thing would be to stop the air drops and open up two roads into Afghanistan so we can deliver food by truck. That way it will reach the people who need it most."
Some supplies are getting through. A convoy of 40 World Food Programme trucks with 1000 tons of food supplies left Peshawar on Wednesday.
Aid agencies believe they need to get 56,000 tons of food into Afghanistan in the next month if they are to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe.
But the World Food Programme estimates that even if the borders were opened immediately, just 1800 tons could be moved in every day before the Afghan winter makes roads impassable.
They have almost 300,000 tons of aid ready to be moved from Iran and Pakistan.
Another problem for the aid agencies is the attitude of Afghans toward westerners. There are reports of aid workers being attacked by people who make no distinction between western charity workers and the people who are bombing their country.
Zia said: "This is something we encountered in Kosovo, too. When we arrived in our white vehicles, they thought we were the military.
"It takes a lot of hard work to convince people that we are there to help them. Some think we are missionaries.
"We have to explain we are non-political and non- religious. All of that can hold up the aid operation."
--------
Refugee dearth puzzles border
October 16, 2001
By Colin Barraclough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20011016-44188318.htm
ZAHEDAN, Iran - International aid agencies, which have been stockpiling huge reserves of food, tents and medicine on Iran's border with Afghanistan, are wondering why the surge of refugees they expect has not materialized.
The U.N. World Food Program says it is ready to feed an anticipated 400,000 refugees for six months. Other U.N. and private agencies have flown in huge reserves of tents, plastic sheets and blankets. Potential refugee camps and water sources have been identified. All that are missing are the refugees.
For the past week, aid workers in Zahedan have struggled to understand what has happened. Several times each day they ask for an update on the border situation. Each time, they are told "all quiet," suggesting that U.S.-led air strikes in western Afghanistan may not be causing the level of civilian casualties that the Taliban has claimed.
Staff at the U.N. refugee agency office in Zahedan say it is not immediately clear whether the air strikes against Afghanistan's ruling Taliban in fact have triggered any new movements of Afghans.
"We don't have much idea of what is actually happening inside Afghanistan," said Surendra Panday, the local representative of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. "But we have not had reports of people coming over the border in significant numbers."
While Iran officially has sealed its 560-mile border with Afghanistan, an undetermined number of refugees have found their way to the back streets of Zahedan. On Sept. 15, Mohammed Amin, a 25-year-old laborer from Bamiyan, central Afghanistan, gathered his few belongings into a small canvas sack, bade farewell to his wife, Roghieh, and 2-year-old son, Kazem, and fled.
"I was forced to run away very quickly because my life was in danger," Mr. Amin said. "The Taliban killed my father and they were coming for me."
As a Shi'ite Muslim and a speaker of Dari, an ancient dialect of Persian, Mr. Amin knew he should head for Iran. What followed was an incredible 26-day journey of huge risk through Afghanistan and Pakistan toward the relative safety of Zahedan.
Braving minefields, robbers and wild animals, in addition to the ever-present threat of arrest by the Taliban, Mr. Amin managed to sneak across the border into Pakistan. He traveled on, hitching rides wherever possible, walking where not, to the town of Taftan, on Pakistan's border with Iran. There, Mr. Amin says, he paid smugglers the equivalent of $20 to escort him across the frontier.
Mr. Amir now is recuperating from his ordeal in a bare compound run by the Hezb-e Wahdat, a Hazara political party, in Zahedan. Officially an illegal alien, Mr. Amin is unable to leave the compound for fear of repatriation. As an unregistered immigrant, he will not qualify for assistance from many of the international aid agencies.
"It's very difficult to give any help to refugees who are not registered," said Marius de Gaay Fortman, the World Food Program's Iran representative. "We work through the government."
While aid workers have not faced a deluge of refugees, the number of Afghans like Mr. Amin appears to be growing. Most crossed first into Pakistan and then into Iran, finding temporary refuge with Afghans already in Iran.
According to U.N. figures, Iran already hosts the largest refugee population in the world. A registration program this year accounted for 2.4 million Afghans alone, in addition to others from Azerbaijan, Iraq and Turkey. Some came as long ago as 1979, when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. The country simply cannot handle any more refugees, Iranian officials argue.
Iran has largely borne the financial burden of its refugee crisis. In recent years, foreign donors gave just $12 million annually to U.N. refugee programs in Iran. Pakistan, which hosted roughly the same number of arrivals, received up to five times as much money each year.
In addition, some Iranian officials fear the country soon will pay a political cost as pressure builds for the Afghan refugees to be ejected.
Afghans are routinely blamed for rising crime, the spread of disease and a thriving cross-border drug trade. Iranians also accuse Afghans of taking local jobs, a sensitive point in a country suffering almost 20 percent unemployment.
Most troubling to Iranian officials, the threat of civil unrest increased since the U.S.-led air strikes began. A group of refugees and Sunni Baluchi people who populate southeast Iran rampaged through Zahedan on Friday, attacking Pakistan's consulate and mobbing Western journalists.
If large waves of refugees do not appear on Iran's border soon, aid workers say, they will be forced to transfer resources to Pakistan or Tajikistan.
--------
U.N. Works to Restore Aid Deliveries
October 16, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-South-Africa-AIDS.html
TERMEZ, Uzbekistan (AP) -- Aid efforts to northern Afghanistan appeared to be taking shape Tuesday, when the U.N. World Food Program announced it was trying to restore a vital supply route and Russia's first aid shipment arrived in the region.
Petar Bojilov, logistics coordinator for the WFP in Uzbekistan, was meeting with officials in this Uzbek border town to regain access to a U.N. office. Termez was a main point for delivery of aid to northern Afghanistan before Uzbekistan closed the border in 1997.
``We expect the northern corridor to soon be allowed to open by the Uzbek government,'' Bojilov told The Associated Press. U.N. officials were talking to Uzbek leaders in the capital Tashkent about reopening the border for humanitarian aid.
Termez offers a nearby airport, a port on the Amu-Darya River and the only bridge across that river to Afghanistan that can handle both rail and road traffic. The town is only about 50 miles from the main Afghan city in the north, Mazar-e-Sharif.
``We expect to receive a huge quantity'' of aid supplies, Bojilov said. ``Only one way (of transport) is not going to be enough.''
The U.N. office in Termez, which opened in 1991, ``used to be the main logistics point for the north'' of Afghanistan, said Bojilov, who worked here in 1995-99. ``The importance of this place is going to be restored.''
There are three government-owned barges in Termez for carrying aid to the Afghan port of Kharitom, where there are warehouses the United Nations previously used to store food. The WFP also has concrete warehouses here with a capacity of some 11,000 tons, and is looking into setting up tents that can also store about the same.
The United Nations was sending about 66,000 tons of aid a year into Afghanistan from Termez before the Taliban seized power in parts of northern Afghanistan, prompted Uzbekistan to close the border four years ago.
Since then aid has been dramatically reduced. Using shipment routes through Tajikistan over soaring mountain passes, Bojilov said the WFP expects to send only about 21,000 tons in aid by the end of this year.
With the ever-changing situation in Afghanistan, Bojilov couldn't give say when the WFP would be able to head back into Afghanistan from Termez.
Officials in Tajikistan said Russian emergency aid -- about 110 tons of tents, blankets, warm clothing and food -- had reached Faizabad, which is held by the northern alliance forces opposing the Taliban.
Russia was one of the first countries to start providing humanitarian aide via Tajikistan for refugees in Afghanistan's northern provinces.
Tajikistan itself is also in urgent need of aid, said Ardag Megdessiyan, the WFP's representative in the Tajik capital of Dushanbe.
He said Tajikistan had received far less support from WFP donors than neighboring Afghanistan, even though both countries have been severely affected by a punishing, two-year drought.
The Bush administration said Tuesday it would give the WFP $38.5 million, part of its $320 million humanitarian package aid to Afghanistan. The money will be used to buy about 55,000 tons of bulk wheat and 17,700 tons of lentils, yellow peas, vegetable oil and other commodities.
It takes about three to four months for paperwork to be processed and the food shipped, so the new aid probably would not reach the region until January, said Andrew Natsios of the U.S. Agency for International Development. The options considered for delivering the aid include civilian airlift and even donkeys used by UNICEF from Tajikistan, he said.
Also Tuesday, the International Organization for Migration said its offices in northern Afghanistan were looted. Two members of the staff were robbed and beaten, said Jean-Philippe Chauzy, a spokesman for the U.N. agency in Geneva.
The office in Mazar-e-Sharif was staffed by seven Afghan employees and was providing aid to displaced people in nearby camps. Chauzy said the staff was moved to locations nearby.
-------- imf / world bank / wto
WTO Meeting to Remain in Qatar
October 16, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-WTO-Mideast-Meeting.html
GENEVA (AP) -- The World Trade Organization said Tuesday it was going ahead with a meeting of ministers in Qatar despite suggestions to move it to Singapore for security reasons.
Hong Kong Ambassador Stuart Harbinson, who chairs the WTO's general council, told a meeting of the heads of delegations the decision to go to the capital of the Gulf state, Doha, still stood and could not be changed unless all 142 members agreed.
The Geneva-based trade body has insisted for weeks that the meeting will go ahead Nov. 9-13 despite the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks against the United States and the U.S. military reprisals against Afghanistan.
WTO officials have stressed that the trade conference and hoped-for new round of talks to reduce barriers to imports and exports will send a much-needed signal of reassurance at a time of global economic gloom.
The Qatari government was to meet Wednesday to discuss prospects for the meeting, Sheik Fahed Awaid, the Qatari ambassador, said Tuesday. ``It's up to the government to decide, but we are committed,'' he said.
A Qatari finance ministry official said Tuesday it was ``increasingly likely'' that the venue for next month's WTO meeting would be moved.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said a final decision would come in the next several days.
Qatar is continuing to prepare for the meeting, but the official said that ``there is a general tendency at the WTO to move the meeting given the imminent war in Afghanistan and the current instability in the world.''
Singapore emerged as an alternative site at a meeting of trade ministers there last weekend. The city state said it would be able to host a small-scale conference.
Singapore hosted a WTO ministerial conference in December 1996 -- the first since the body was formed in January 1995.
Arab countries have been hit by demonstrations since American forces began airstrikes on Oct. 7 to punish Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia for not turning Osama bin Laden, the prime suspect in the attacks in the United States.
Reaction to the airstrikes has been muted in Qatar, and the country has stopped issuing visas to visitors until Nov. 15 to help keep out troublemakers.
But this has not allayed security jitters about the meeting. European Union Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy said Tuesday it was ``no secret'' that Qatar is ``in the vicinity of the war zone.''
The decision to move the meeting to Singapore would be a major blow to the Qatar government. The small but wealthy U.S. ally planned to open two new hotels to host some of the 4,500 visitors. It has expanded its airport, laid new asphalt on major roads and planted flowers across the capital.
Canadian Ambassador Sergio Marchi said it was vital that a meeting take place somewhere, even if it could not be in Doha.
``I would hope that we don't miss this opportunity and miss this moment, whether it is in Qatar or whether it is elsewhere, because a successful launch by the WTO is a very positive signal that we can send to the world,'' he said.
-------- police / prisoners
FBI To Require ISPs To Reconfigure E-mail Systems
by Drew Clark
National Journal's Technology Daily
October 16, 2001
PHOENIX -- The FBI is in the process of finalizing technical guidelines that would require all Internet service providers (ISPS) to reconfigure their e-mail systems so they could be more easily accessible to law enforcers. The move, to be completed over the next two months, would cause ISPs to act as phone companies do to comply with a 1994 digital-wiretapping law. "They are in the process of developing a very detailed set of standards for how to make packet data" available to the FBI, said Stewart Baker, an attorney at Steptoe & Johnson who was formerly the chief counsel to the National Security Agency (NSA).
The proposal is not a part of the anti-terrorism legislation currently before Congress because the agency is expected to argue that the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) already grants it the authority to impose the requirement, Baker said. He added that some ISPs already meet the requirements.
Baker, who frequently represents Internet companies being asked to conduct electronic surveillance for the FBI, made the revelation Tuesday in a panel discussion at the Agenda 2002 conference here on how the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks are likely to affect the technology industry and civil liberties. He elaborated on the plan in an interview.
Such a stance could result in considerable cost to many ISPs, and it would constitute a reversal of previous government policy, which held that ISPs are not subject to CALEA's requirements. But Baker also said "it has been a long-term goal of the FBI and is not just a reaction to Sept. 11."
Mitchell Kapor, chairman of the Open Source Application Foundation and a founder of Lotus Development, also spoke on the panel. Kapor also started the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and has been a vocal advocate of Internet privacy. EFF played a significant role in the CALEA debate, and divisions over whether to support that law led to a split of the organization.
"Under the cover of people's outrage [over the terrorist attacks] and desire for revenge, lots of things that have been defeated before have been brought back in [to the anti-terrorism legislation] without a demonstration that the lack of appropriate law is a problem," Kapor said in an interview. But on the whole, Kapor and Baker shared more common ground on the acceptability of new electronic surveillance than they had in the past, with both expressing the view that now is a time for calm reconsideration of positions rather than butting horns over the details of how civil liberties would be curtailed by an anti-terrorism bill.
"I find myself more in the middle than I used to because my identity in life is not as a civil liberties advocate," Kapor said. "Part is being an American and a world citizen." Baker said it was entirely appropriate for the FBI to conduct far more surveillance.
"What has changed [since Sept. 11] is the view of the technology community," Baker said. "I used to get calls like, 'How can I beat the NSA?'" said Baker. "Now, people call and say, 'I have this great idea that would help NSA,' or, 'I want to go volunteer and do outreach on behalf of the FBI or NSA.' There is a real change of people's view about who the bad guys are."
-------- terrorism
FBI fears truck bombs are next terror weapon
The Times (UK)
MONDAY OCTOBER 15 2001
FROM ROLAND WATSON IN WASHINGTON
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2001350015-2001355592,00.html
THE FBI is trying urgently to trace about 30 Arab men who have received licences to transport hazardous chemicals around the US amid fears that lorries may be used to deliver the next terrorist attack.
The group has set alarm bells ringing because the way that the individuals secured their training bears an eerie resemblance to the approach used by the September 11 hijackers.
The 25 to 35 men have attended a driving school in Denver, Colorado, in small groups over the past two years. Each paid cash and none looked for work afterwards. They spoke little or no English, and were accompanied by the same interpreter for each group. The failure of any of them to look for work is viewed by Justice Department officials as highly suspicious.
Some of the September 11 hijackers who went to American flying schools rang alarm bells when they asked to learn only mid-air manoeuvres, saying they were not interested in take-off or landing tuition.
The licences the Denver group received are similar to those held by drivers of the 30,000 lorries that transport highly inflammable and toxic gases, liquids, explosives and petroleum products.
John Ashcroft, the Attorney- General, fuelled fears of another attack yesterday, saying that he believed there were terrorists, some of them connected to the September 11 attacks and others with their own plans, who were still in the country.
"I believe that it is very unlikely that all of those individuals who were associated with or involved with the terrorism events of September 11 and other terrorism events that may have been prepositioned and preplanned have been apprehended," he told NBC's Meet the Press.
Mr Ashcroft said that FBI checks made since September 11 had disclosed numerous cases where licences to transport hazardous materials - hazmat licences - had been handed out improperly. He confirmed that further, detailed checks of hazmat credentials, going back over the past few years, had become a priority.
He declined to comment on the Denver case in particular, but said: "We have examined the driver's licences and insurance procedure in a number of settings where we found particularly hazmat licences which were being issued without the appropriate safeguards."
FBI agents have visited dozens of the 600 truck-driving schools across the country, and are looking for enrolment records going back to 1994.
The broad focus is on students with Middle Eastern names, those who paid in cash, those who received hazmat permits suddenly or left in the middle of their training.
The group of Arab men under particular suspicion attended Careers Worldwide, according to this week's edition of Time magazine. The FBI has visited the school and removed enrolment records. The case would represent another serious breach of the system; it should be impossible to receive a hazmat licence without good English.
Lorries have proved a staple al-Qaeda weapon, and were used by suicide drivers to inflict the two US Embassy bombings in 1998 in Kenya and Tanzania which killed 224 people. The bombing of the Khobar towers military housing complex in Saudi Arabia in 1996 was also inflicted by a lorry packed with explosives.
Mr Ashcroft himself pointed out that the Oklahoma City bombing, America's worst terrorist outrage before September 11, had been detonated with a lorry. The first attempt to bomb the World Trade Centre in 1993 involved a lorry left in the basement.
Despite putting the country on the highest state of alert last week for an attack "within the coming days", American authorities have given no clues as to where it might come.
Nuclear plants and power plants have all received extra protection, a precaution highlighted by the suggestion yesterday that Mohammed Atta, the ringleader of the 19 hijackers, may have had plans for similar targets.
A Tennessee man, Dan Whitener, told Time that a man he recognised as Atta and another Middle Eastern man questioned him after landing at Martin Campell airport last spring about local landmarks, including a local chemical plant, a nuclear plant and a dam.
The FBI has been inundated with tip-offs about individuals and alleged threats. Mr Ashcroft tried to prevent fears spiralling out of control by insisting that all threats were checked.
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War against terrorism will fail, says former MI5 head
Independent
By Tahira Yaqoob
16 October 2001
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=99722
President Bush's war against global terrorism is destined for failure, the former head of MI5, Stella Rimington, warned yesterday.
Dame Stella, who was speaking about the military action in Afghanistan, said that terrorism could never be wiped out altogether. And she warned that there could be a repeat of the attack on New York because the intelligence network was not advanced enough.
The former director general, a diplomat's wife who rose to the highest position within the intelligence service before retiring five years ago, was speaking at the Cheltenham Literary Festival in Gloucestershire to promote her autobiography, Open Secret.
She said: "I do not feel incredibly confident about this war against terrorism. I think it is encouraging to see that there is better, closer collaboration between the world's intelligence agencies. That is quite positive, but rooting out terrorism strikes me as an extremely difficult thing to do.
"Terrorism is with us. New groups will come who regard terrorism as useful in drawing attention to their causes. I don't think rooting it out for all time is a very practical objective."
Dame Stella, who worked for MI5 for 27 years, said the spy network was not advanced enough to predict exactly when and where terrorists would strike. "There is no such thing as 100 per cent intelligence," she said. "There will always be a risk that terrorist incidents may take place because there is not sufficiently advanced intelligence."
Since 11 September, some of Dame Stella's critics within MI5 have blamed her for the failure of British intelligence to keep track of Islamic terrorists. They say she diverted resources towards in Northern Ireland and organised crime, particularly drugs.
In 1994 Dame Stella disbanded the special unit known as G7, a "joint section" set up with MI6 to monitor Islamic terrorism. As a result, when the threat from Osama bin Laden began to become apparent in 1998, vital experience and continuity had been lost, her critics said.
-------- activists
Report on 13 October 2001 demo at Menwith Hill
From: "Anni Rainbow" <caab.lindis_anni@virgin.net>
Date: Tue, 16 Oct 2001 00:23:48 +0100
Dear friends
Despite being fraught with unexpected problems the CAAB demonstration was great!
Two of our main speakers were unable to attend at the last minute due to medical reasons (best wishes for speedy recoveries to George Mombiot and Diane Wallis MEP). Believing that things could not get worse we were proved completely wrong when the police unexpectedly (and unnecessarily!) arrested Lindis Percy at her home on the Friday afternoon for alledged breach of bail and took her into custody. However friends rallied round and the demonstration went ahead on Saturday more-or-less as planned. (Thank you to Yorkshire CND for collecting and returning the sound system.)
Message from Lindis Percy:
Dear friends
This is what happened which meant I was unable to be at Menwith Hill for the demonstration organised by the Campaign for the Accountability of American Bases (CAAB) - the timing was all very curious.
I didn't get to the demo because I was suddenly arrested the day before (Friday midday) at home by a Ministry of Defence police officer who came with an Inspector from the Humberside civil police (very unusual) and PC for supposedly failing to attend court on Monday - I had faxed a letter to the court the night before and which the court had received. It was all very odd that they should have chosen the day before the demo at MHS which I was one of the organisers and would have played a significant part. It was odd because the warrent for my arrest was issued by the Magistrates on Monday.
I have been spuriously charged with alleged theft of two US flags (I didn't) I went to two US bases - in broad daylight - took down the US flag in protest against AMD - folded the flag neatly up and put it in my car in front of two US personel. The MDP were called - they did not arrest as I had written a note to the Americans to say that I did not intend to permanently deprive the owner of his flag. I would return the flag to the US Ambassador (the 'keeper of the US flag') and drove quietly away in front of the MDP who did nothing - they couldn't as it was not theft. For over a year I have tried to get an appointment with the US Ambassador so that I could return the flag - he won't meet as I have said I would be bringing a letter of protest about 'Star wars' - I keep trying! I took another down in September - before the 11th and was suddenly arrested at Mildenhall when I was protesting on my own there after the 11th - I was charged with theft of two US flags - each worth £100 apparently. I have elected to go to the Crown court - it will be an interesting case as the Crown Prosecution Service are wanting to keep it in the Magistrates' court and not before the twelve good people of the jury.
I was up at Menwith at the weekly demonstration on Tuesday and there were 16 MDP there for 8 demonstrators - they should/could have arrested then but chose to pick me up the day before the demonstration at Menwith Hill on Saturday
I have never appeared in court on the first stage of a case - I have been arrested hundreds of times and have had many many cases over 20 years so I do know the system. I have never failed to contact the court by letter to say that I will be pleading not guilty and that has always been accepted - until Friday.
I was taken to the Central police station at mid-day on Friday and stayed there over night - I was taken by Group 4 in one of those horrid vans to Oxford where I appeared in court at 1 pm ish. The court made no issue of the alleged breach of bail but did impose draconian bail conditions on the request of the CPS (MDP):
Over the years I have had all manner of bail conditions - not to go within 5 miles, all varieties of meters/yards/ to report daily to a police station, not to go outside the boundaries of Bradford, to reside and sleep at a variety of addresses, not to enter any MOD property in the world etc etc - I've in fact been on continuous bail since about 1986 - I say this with no pride or pleasure.
These conditions are: Not to go within 25 meters of any military establishment used by the United States within England and Wales -
We will of course be going to the High Court to try to get these conditions lifted as it totally stops me protesting at any US bases in England and Wales.
I thought of all the actions round the world as I sat in the cell from midday to after midday the following day - terribly terribly sad but sure that we can stop this madness. It sounded a very good demonstration at Menwith Hill.
In peace
Lindis Percy Co-Coordinator with Anni Rainbow
CAMPAIGN FOR THE ACCOUNTABILITY OF AMERICAN BASES (CAAB) www.caab.org.uk
The demonstration was held just inside the main entrance of the base in the visitors car park. It began with a candlelit vigil remembering all victims of all terrorist attacks ... on 11 September, before 11 September and after 11 September. A peace candle passed on from a chain of candles for peaceround the world was lit by the young son of Josephine Joffey from Bradford School of Peace Studies and a minute's silence was observed.
When we handed over the microphone to the demonstrators, we could have no conception of what an inspiring event it would become. Speaker after speaker moved us with their passionate, reasoned arguements against Star Wars, bombing Afghanistan, millions starving whilst each cruise missile costs $1 million, etc. etc. Danbert from the group Chumbawumba and Jane Shalice from the magazine Red Pepper tooks their turn at the microphone as did Tony and Sue who sung some stirring songs. With such a well-informed public, we were all given hope that one day we really shall overcome. We thank them all for their eloquence, and hope that they will return to Menwith Hill for future demonstrations.
Paul and friends shared their wonderful drumming and Veggies from Nottingham provided non-stop delicious food throughout the day. Geoff and Jane Clapp, solicitors and Chris Butler, first aider, were on call all day but not needed.
The afternoon walk around the base gave people the opportunity of getting the measure of the place. Many people told us that the word 'Menwith' meant more to them by the end of it. The intention had been for Lindis to speak from the front and Chris from the back. We were sorry we forgot the loud hailer in the morning rush but - running to and fro was not satisfactory but at least we tried!
Ministry of Defence police said 230 protesters were on the walk (thank you to North Yorkshire police for their low-key policing and for closing the roads while the walk was in progress) and it was estimated that nearly 300 people came to the demonstration during the day (10am-4pm) to say 'STOP STAR WARS' and 'STOP BOMBING AFGHANISTAN'.
If you can please continue supporting CAAB by coming on the weekly Tuesday night demonstrations against Star Wars and Bombing Afghanistan. We meet at the Main entrance to NSA Menwith Hill at 7pm with banners/candles/appropriately inscribed US flags and we stay for two hours.
Anni Rainbow and Lindis Percy (Co-coordinators) CAMPAIGN FOR THE ACCOUNTABILITY OF AMERICAN BASES (CAAB) 8 Park Row, Otley, West Yorkshire, LS21 1HQ, England, U.K. Tel/fax no: +44 (0)1943 466405 0R +44 (0)1482 702033 email: anniandlindis@caab.org.uk Website: http://www.caab.org.uk
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Peace & Patriotism
Why the old formulas may not work this time Tough fight for anti-war movement
Sunday, October 14, 2001
San Francisco Chronicle
Louis Freedberg, Insight Senior Writer
Since Sept. 11, people have been on the march to reclaim the Bay Area's place as a center of dissent and spawning ground of some of the great social movements of the past century.
It's an uphill climb.
The challenge facing this incipient peace movement is whether it can evolve into a potent force -- as did opposition to the Vietnam War -- or whether it will remain a sideshow with little impact on how the United States wages its battle against terrorism.
The Bay Area's war protesters in the late '60s and early '70s had advantages. Theirs was a widely unpopular war, fought far from home (without homeland terrorism) for reasons unpersuasive to many Americans. The draft was in full swing, and growing weekly death counts were frightening.
Today's anti-war fervor comes at the end of an era when activism had faded. For much of the 1990s, the Bay Area was synonymous in the national imagination not with protest but with an obsession with stock options, million-dollar homes, BMWs and upscale restaurants. Young people streamed to the Bay Area not to challenge the power elite but aspiring to become part of it.
Since Sept. 11, a new generation of anti-war activists has begun to reconnect with the Bay Area's past. Rallies, marches and teach-ins resemble protests against U.S. policies regarding Vietnam, El Salvador, the Gulf War, South Africa and elsewhere.
While familiar, the new protests have a distinctive flavor. Giant puppets of President George W. Bush were displayed at a large march in San Francisco's Mission District last weekend. And at a lunchtime rally at the University of California at Berkeley on Monday, several non-Muslim demonstrators sported kaffiyehs, a traditional Arab headdress.
Chants have been updated. In 1970, students protesting the secret U.S. air war against Cambodia yelled, "On Strike, Shut It Down" as they tried to close universities. Last week, Berkeley students shouted, "Join Us, Take a Stand, Stop the Bombing in Afghanistan." (And a small group of counter-protesters, shouting "USA! USA! USA!" held signs proclaiming, "Terrorize Terrorism!")
For the anti-war protests to become more than just a cry from the heart -- or a soapbox for complaints against U.S. policies abroad -- today's peace movement will have to come up with more than slogans.
A fundamental problem is that the protesters have been unable to generate a clear alternative to the Bush administration's anti-terrorism strategy. It's one thing to decry the bombing of Afghan citizens. It's quite another to come up with a realistic strategy to stop another murderous attack by bin Laden or his cronies.
At one Berkeley rally, an emblematic moment occurred when a counter- demonstrator confronted an anti-war protester.
"No one wants this war," she said. "Sometimes violence is unavoidable. What is your solution?''
There was no response.
Just what is the protesters' strategy?
There isn't one.
Adding to the confusion is that progressives are themselves divided. Many believe the United States has no choice but to chase down Osama bin Laden and his terrorist collaborators. Others think that by doing so the United States is playing into his hands. And some don't know what to think.
Two days after the attack, Alice Walker, author of "The Color Purple" and other books, argued before a packed crowd at the Berkeley Community Theater that the answer is love and compassion, rooted in Buddhist principles.
Kevin Danaher, co-founder of San Francisco-based Global Exchange says "tough love" is needed.
"I'm all for heart, but these guys are killers, they are mass murders, they can't be ignored," says Danaher. This is not an anti-war movement, he says, but a fight for "global justice."
"If you're going to get these guys, you need something more sophisticated than just bombing and killing," he says. "I don't want them dead. I want them alive. I want them on the stand. And I want whoever aided or abetted them behind bars."
Another obstacle to building an effective opposition is that often the new protests have turned into fuzzy forums for complaints about every conceivable misdeed. At the Berkeley rally, for example, one student dressed in a black cape declared, "Terrorism didn't start on Sept. 11 -- it started the day Christopher Columbus set foot on American soil."
Few protesters have embraced the new mood of patriotism that has surfaced even in some radical strongholds of the Bay Area. That will make it tougher to win over the 9 out of 10 Americans who support the war. Protesters wearing kaffiyehs risk inciting the same "love it or leave i" hostility Vietnam War protesters faced a generation ago. Arguing that dissent is itself patriotic is a hard sell when people's nerves are at the breaking point.
For the growing but scattered movement to morph into a full-fledged social and political force will also depend on events beyond its control.
Will there be large number of U.S. casualties? Will there be more terrorist attacks? Will there be a draft? How long will the war go on? Will it evolve into a wider war? Will it drain the nation's financial reserves? Will other interest groups and constituencies rise up against it?
For now, the budding peace movement has shown surprising vitality. Alice Hamburg, a 95-year-old peace activist from Berkeley, says people have responded more quickly than at the beginning stages of the Vietnam War.
"You can't expect that within a week people will come flocking to the peace movement," says Hamburg, whose autobiography, "Grassroots: From Prairie to Politics," will be published later this month. "That is too much to expect. It is a slow process."
But as the conflict deepens, as it is sure to do, the peace movement will have to engage in some fancy footwork. It will need a clear message, a well- defined purpose and a compelling answer to combatting terrorism without dropping bombs. Recycling Vietnam-era rhetoric won't work.
"The way this war is going to touch people is different," says Charles Wollenberg, chairman of the Social Sciences Department at Vista Community College in Berkeley. "The fact that there was this terrible attack on U.S. soil justifies it in a way the Vietnam War never could be."
E-mail Louis Freedberg at lfreedberg@sfchronicle.com
--------
Protests in Italy as PM meets Bush
Tuesday, October 16, 2001
By Vaiju Naravane
The Hindu
http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2001/10/16/stories/03160007.htm
PARIS, OCT 15. In what has been described as the biggest demonstration of its kind in Italy for over a decade, an estimated 200,00 to 300,000 persons staged a peace walk from the cities of Perugia to Assisi. Bearing placards and banners saying Stop War!, the marchers, all along the 24-km stretch, shouted slogans and chanted anti-war songs to express their hostility to the current U.S. and British strikes against Afghanistan.
The road they travelled is the same taken by Saint Francis of Assisi, founder of the Franciscan order. The peace march was created in 1961 by the Italian left during the height of the cold war. But not since the Cold War years have so many people joined it. The marchers were supported by the Roman Catholic Church. The marchers included many prominent Italians including Mr. Francesco Rutelli, who led the left-wing alliance in legislative elections earlier this year and former left wing Prime Minister, Mr. Massimo D'Alema. Not even during the Gulf War or the one in Kosovo did the peace march attract so many people.
The march is an embarrassment to the Government of the conservative anti-communist Prime Minister, Mr. Silvio Berlusconi, who is in Washington today for talks with the U.S. President, Mr. George Bush.
Mr. Berlusconi has been bending over backwards in his attempts to be useful to Washington. So far, most major European leaders have met Mr. Bush in Washington. Not so Mr. Berlusconi. Washington has now bowed to the intense pressure exerted by Rome and wearily agreed to a meeting. ``I want to tell President Bush that Italy is ready to do whatever its allies ask,'' Mr. Berlusconi told a Cabinet meeting prior to his departure.
But Washington had so far turned a deaf ear to Italy's assertions of loyalty, especially after the Italian Premier committed the monumental gaffe of stating that Western civilisation was superior to that of the Islamic world.
``Why are the Americans doing this? We feel sorry for those who perished in the attacks against the World Trade Center and the perpetrators of these crimes must be punished. But what has the poor man in Afghanistan whose five year old boy has been killed to deserve the wrath of America? The U.S. must be made to understand that it cannot behave like a cowboy any more. It is U.S. policies of support to the Taliban and Pakistan and corrupt regimes like Saudi Arabia that has given us the likes of Osama bin Laden in the first place. Why does the U.S. not do its mea culpa about that ?'' asked a retired schoolteacher from Como who made the trip to Perugia.
As the bombing of Afghanistan continues, there is growing resistance across Europe. The Greens and their allies demonstrated in Paris. Over 25,000 persons demonstrated in Germany and there were demonstrations in London as well.
The French Health Minister, Mr. Bernard Kouchner, who was one of the founders of Medecins Sans Frontiers - the world's most respected medical NGO - and who was U.N. Administrator in Kosovo said in an interview: ``Is it good to bomb Afghanistan like this? Perhaps. But the campaign should now quickly move into phase two.'' A coalition government should be put into place in Kabul under the aegis of the United Nations, he urged.
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SENTENCING for LACW affinity group (VAFB Resistance Update:)
From: "Marc P Blaise P" <ammonhennacy@hotmail.com>
NEWS RELEASE - 16 Oct 2001
ACTIVISTS RESISTING US SPACE COMMAND SENTENCED TO PROBATION AND JAIL TIME
WHO: Four peace activists connected to the Los Angeles Catholic Worker
WHAT: Three sentenced to probation and fines; one sentenced to 3 months in jail
WHERE: Federal Courthouse at Los Angeles, CA, because of prayer-action at Vandenberg Air Force Base
WHEN: Monday October 15th 2001; 3:00pm
WHY: On May 19th 2001, hundreds of peace & justice demonstrators gathered at Vandenberg Air Force Base (near Santa Barbara, CA) to call for an end to global exploitation enforced by US Space Command programs conducted from Vandenberg (VAFB). Since July 2000, about 60 people have been arrested for protesting these star wars programs, and in July 2001 four of the activists went to trial and were convicted by a jury on August 2nd.
Brian Buckley, Liz Wyrsch, Scott Galindez & Marc Page were part of a Catholic Worker affinity group that conducted a prayer-action at VAFB on May 20th 2001. Two other co-defendants (Jeff Dietrich & Elizabeth Griswold) pleaded guilty early; Elizabeth is on probation for three years and Jeff is in prison for six months. Yesterday Judge William Rae pronounced a three-month prison sentence for Galindez, $560 fine & fees for Buckley & Wyrsch, and one year of probation for Buckley, Wyrsch, & Page. Galindez & Page were also ordered to pay the mandatory $60 fees. The three defendants sentenced to probation told Judge Rae that they would not pay any fees and fines, and that they are likely to resist compliance with probation.
US Attorney Sharon McCaslin asked for Galindez to be jailed because of prior arrests and convictions. Three community members spontaneously stood up in the courtroom to support Galindez' request for a two-week stay of execution prior to his impending incarceration. Judge Rae accepted the request. Responding to McCaslin's accusation that the group acted under a hierarchical model of someone leading his followers, Wyrsch replied in anarchist fashion, "We led each other and we followed each other."
(Down the street in another federal courthouse, 15 Greenpeace activists were arraigned for the third time in a revised indictment of their action against star wars testing at VAFB. The internationals were granted the right to return to their homelands prior to their impending trial. They face up to 11 years for their successful delay of a national missile defense test on July 14th of this year.)
For further info: http://www.nevadadesertexperience.org/M19.html or CONTACT Elizabeth Griswold==323.267.8789 or Piper Weinberg===775.537.6088
FROM: Marcus P Blaise Page PO BOX 4973 GALLUP, NM 87305 U.S.A. http://www.angelfire.com/folk/AMMON
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New Solutions for an Old War
William Rivers Pitt
10/16/01
Turn on the television and find a news station, and you will be greeted within seconds by a graphic, and by suitably dramatic music, that tells us we are engaged in America's New War. You will be reminded that we were attacked out of nowhere by entities that hate our freedom. You will be counseled to understand that everything has changed.
In his recent prime time press conference, George W. Bush took the long walk, a la Reagan, down the red-carpeted hallway to the East Room of the White House and answered about twelve questions. In one response, he professed amazement at the hatred our new enemies hold for us. We're so good, he claimed. How could they miss that?
The answer to that question embarrasses all the networks that tell us we are involved in a 'new' war, and should embarrass a President whose oft-repeated disdain for reading has left him with little historical understanding for our current circumstances.
For you see, this is not a new war at all, nor is it a new world, nor has everything changed.
This is a very old war that has been raging for decades. There are nations, some of whom are apparently complicit in the 9/11 attacks, who believe that they have been at war with the United States for twenty years. The destruction of the Trade Towers and a section of the Pentagon was not a lightning-strike from a blameless sky. It was a bold tactical stroke by an enemy that has, for the first time, managed to strike back.
This is not a new world, and nothing has changed. America has been rudely and horrifyingly awakened to the circumstances of the world around them. The cushion provided by two oceans, 2,000 nuclear missiles, and a media establishment that quails from reporting what is actually happening elsewhere because of our policies, has been ripped from under us.
Welcome to the world, America. This is what life is like for many, many nations.
Now that we are here, at last aware of the war that we have been waging for a generation, we must analyze our reaction and decide if the course we have set is just, proper, worthy of the lives of our servicepeople, and above all, winnable.
As it stands today, I am against this war.
I am against this war because it is being fought in exactly the wrong way. Pursued as it is, we will soon find ourselves facing a united Muslim world that has a long laundry list of grievances against us to begin with. A united Pan-Islamic Front is precisely what bin Laden wants, and by strafing the rubble in Afghanistan, we are skipping gaily into his arms.
The more civilians we kill, the stronger and more sympathetic we make bin Laden to a poor and enraged Muslim world. Continue to support this bombing campaign and you are feeding the fires that will burn us all out of house and home.
I am against this war because the millions of Afghan civilians who escape the bombs can look forward to unknown amounts of time eating grass and drinking poisoned water in deathtrap refugee camps. We dropped 37,000 meals on Afghanistan when the bombing started, which leaves, by my math, 6,963,000 people who need to eat.
There is dying, and there is dying. Among those who flee will undoubtedly be thousands who listen to clerical rhetoric against America and decide, in their despair, that strapping Semtex to their chests and boarding a plane is preferable to a squalid death far from home at the hands of an unseen bomb-dropping enemy.
Better to die on you feet than live on your knees, right? I would bet the farm that many of those now fleeing our bombs will come to decide the same thing. Again, we put the barrel of the gun to our own heads.
The head of the largest Islamic group in Pakistan has called for the overthrow of that government. If Pakistan falls, as it may well do, the fundamentalists will have nuclear weapons. On that road lies total annihilation. India, China and Russia will immediately go 'red-alert' if Pakistan falls. If just one bomb goes off over there, all of our Cold War night sweats will become a reality.
Besides, who says those Pakistan-based fundamentalists can't cart one of those bombs over here, should they get their hands on them?
I am against this war because Afghanistan is a convenient target whose ultimate destruction will do little to win 'The War On Terrorism.' bin Laden will survive and flee, and the thousands of Al Qaeda terrorists in places like Syria, Egypt, Palestine, Germany, Ireland, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland and Los Angeles will be totally unharmed.
Afghanistan is a straw man. Yes, they are repressive. Yes, they treat women unspeakably. They did so on September 10th, and I heard no one advocate the limitless bombing of that country on that day or any day before it.
I have heard in several forums the comparison of bin Laden and the Taliban to Hitler and the Nazis. That is a joke. bin laden has no mechanized army to roll on Poland or France, nor does he have a Navy to close sea lanes, nor does he have an air force, nor even a nation. The Taliban are not a government. They are a gang.
This is a war between two rich power-brokers - Bush and bin Laden - that is gambling with all of our lives. bin Laden is no Hitler. He is a lunatic who kills us with weapons and training we provided him.
In that, he is like Saddam Hussein, another lunatic who kills people with weapons and training we provided him. Also like bin Laden, Hussein was compared to Hitler by Bush Sr.. The comparison did not, and does not, hold water. It did, however, manage to get us all whipped up as we are now.
Waving the bloody shirt of Hitler is exactly what Bush wants you to do, because it obscures clear and critical thinking. Being afraid right now is understandable, but lashing out with that fear and destabilizing the planet is stupid and suicidal.
If we continue to lash out, if we continue to bomb the nothing that is Afghanistan, bin Laden can fulfill his Pan-Islamic dreams. He will unite the Muslim world against us, and will then have the capability to become Hitler. He's not there yet, but is helped on his way with such inflammatory and inaccurate comparisons.
Defense Secretary Rumsfeld has described this conflict as a 'new Cold War.' That war lasted from Truman to Bush Sr., and the circumstances we are currently enduring are a direct result. I refuse to even consider supporting something that will create a new 45-year war.
The old Cold War gave us nuclear weapons in all corners of the globe, Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Nicaragua, Iraq, the Gulf War, the Red Scare, the Black Lists, McCarthy, Hoover, anthrax weapons, smallpox weapons, Star Wars, massive ecological destruction, and yes, Osama bin Laden and the Taliban.
The ultimate fallacy behind the idea that this is a new war lies in the fact that we are fighting it in a very old-fashioned way. Bombing a defenseless nation will not stop terrorism. It will not allay the fears of our populace, who are bombarded daily with reports of anthrax infections.
All the bombing of Afghanistan will do is create new jihad warriors who are ready to die so as to see you die. In their rage and despair, they will sign up willingly. Our so-called endless war will become a reality, as we manufacture droves of the very people we seek to destroy. It will never end.
Let us speak of new solutions for this old war:
1. Immediately recognize a Palestinian State, and pull out all the stops to broker a peace deal. Beat Arafat and Sharon about the head and shoulders until they come to an agreement that will stop the unspeakable suffering of the Palestinian people while ensuring the safety and security of Israel. Make Jerusalem a UN Protectorate guarded by Swiss troops, or some equally uninvolved nation. This is no longer an eternally nagging problem. It is the lynchpin upon which peace or total destruction will turn.
2. Take the billions of dollars we are currently spending to destroy rubble and mud in Afghanistan and turn it into food, medicine, radios, propaganda, clothing, seeds. If we can read Mullah Abdul bin Tallal bin Alla bin Mustafa's watch as he rides his camel through the Kaybher pass with our satellites, we can feed and clothe these people, because we are clever. Who says a Marshall Plan has to come after a war? With a concentrated effort, all the Taliban warriors in Afghanistan won't be able to stop it. They will fall.
3. Continue what had been shaping up to be an excellent diplomatic course. Cut off terrorist funding. Organize the coalition to marshal every iota of intelligence ability to tracking, arresting and convicting terrorists in every corner of the globe. Before we started bombing, we had massive cooperation. That may evaporate in a cloud of outrage soon, and the aforementioned safe terrorists will not have the combined might of the international community looking for them anymore.
4. Stop bombing Afghanistan. Hundreds of civilians have been killed already by errant munitions. We have already created more terrorists. Stop the bombing and stop this genesis. We've got Special Forces in Afghanistan right now lazing 'targets', i.e. mudpiles and rubble. Reconstitute their mission to search-and-destroy mode. Shoot these Al Qaeda fighters between the eyes from 1,000 yards out...you know we can do it.
These actions will strip bin Laden and the Taliban of their most potent weapon - the ability to generate outrage in the Muslim world. If we are not bombing cities, if we are actively seeking peace between Palestine and Israel, if we are lobbing tons of food and supplies at Afghan civilians, nothing bin Laden can say or do will be able to deflect the obvious fact that America is not being belligerent to yet another Muslim country. His ranting will make him and his friends more and more isolated, and a well-fed Afghan populace with the Northern Alliance hot on their heels will make some good changes.
There are problems which require cures on the home front, as well:
1. Restore Congressional oversight to its full Constitutional stature. Bush has sworn to limit the flow of data to Congress. This must not stand. Harry Truman investigated America's conduct of World War II while a Senator, and Congress investigated several facets of the Vietnam War. Both actions helped America in its actions. We can not lose this essential aspect of our government in the rush to battle.
2. The Republican Party must immediately cease its attempts to pass partisan legislation under the guise of military necessity. The war will not be helped by tax cuts, nor will it be helped by drilling for oil in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge, nor will it be helped by a ceaseless barrage of denunciations aimed at President Clinton. If this does not cease, our much ballyhooed unity will fall to dust, and rightly so.
3. Immediately begin Congressional investigations into the spectacular failures by the FBI, CIA, NSA and the security sections of the national airlines that allowed this travesty to take place with nary a word of warning.
4. A complete analysis of our international policies over the last fifty years must be immediately undertaken. We must determine where our own actions have helped bring this old war to our shores. From our toppling of the Iranian government, to Palestine, to Lebanon, to the sanctions on Iraq, our policies have left many large and damaging footprints. Before we can get to how we will win, we must first undertake to fully understand why it all happened. Simply being amazed at the hatred of our enemies is not enough, and does scant justice to the American lives that have been lost.
There is one last truth we all have to face when considering this war:
Absolutely, positively nothing we can say or do will completely end the threat of terrorism in this country.
Nothing.
It's here, friends. For 225 years we were protected by those two oceans and 2,000 nuclear missiles. Those days are gone. We were protected and isolated from our policies, our wars, our mistakes and our evils. Not anymore.
We did not deserve the attack we have absorbed, but neither did those whom we have attacked, or helped others to attack. Nobody deserves it, but it has done by us and in our name for generations. The Bible says that he who troubles his own house shall inherit the wind. We have troubled this house for a long time, and that wind has begun to blow hard and strong.
9/11 was merely an upping of an ante that has been bid upon for years. Super-terrorism did not come from nowhere. It is a step on the ladder to hell, a ladder we did much to place.
Finally, the time has come to ask the really hard question:
If we cannot stop terror without becoming a barricaded, isolated, totalitarian state - a dark choice that is the only sure cure - then what is left?
More bombs far away? More civilian death? More feeding of the cycle that will surely bring more of the same to our shores and theirs?
Or a long, slow, tortured path towards some kind of redemption?
There is no way to win this old war if we fight it the way we have been for the past several days. The only way to guarantee victory is to transform the conflict into a genuine New War, one that looks inward as well as outward.
If we can come up with solutions that do not involve the bombing of civilians and the creation of new terrorists, we will win. If we can bring the criminals who attacked us to justice without such tactics, we will win. If we can foster genuine peace in that tortured region, we will win. If we can come to understand the desperation and rage that is aimed at us and change that reality, we will win. If we can maintain democracy in our own country, we will win.
I'd like to think we can win this new war. To do so, we must discard the old one, and the old ways in which we fight it.
William Rivers Pitt is a contributing writer for Liberal Slant. w_pitt@hotmail.com
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Campuses Split Over Afghanistan
By JODI WILGOREN
October 15, 2001
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/15/education/15ANTI.html
ANN ARBOR, Mich., Oct. 12 - The Eugene V. Debs cooperative house here on the University of Michigan campus is a house divided. A flowered sheet hangs over the porch, painted with a huge peace symbol, the message "No More Dead" and a picture of a bomb with a red line through it. Inside, the long- haired students who gather nightly over vats of vegetarian food all want peace.
But some wonder if it is possible without bombs and body bags. "If we don't drop bombs, there's still no peace," said Beth Nagalski, a junior, one of 21 students who share the house filled with raggedy couches and mismatched dishes.
"This doesn't seem right," Jen Dombrowski, a junior from Grand Rapids, Mich., said of the airstrikes in Afghanistan, "but what else can we do?" The dissension here, in a left-leaning house on the liberal Michigan campus, reflects the quandary facing the fledgling antiwar movement that has been sprouting at colleges and universities across the country since Sept. 11.
While there have been scores of fervent rallies on more than 100 campuses, they have been staged by small bands of committed organizers, veterans of the labor struggles and affirmative action battles of recent years, and in many cases have faced strong opposition, even among leftists who previously sympathized with their causes.
The peace movement students here and around the nation are reluctant even to use the word "antiwar" has benefited from the wave of student protests that culminated in the antiglobalization demonstrations in Seattle and Genoa, Italy, and student sit-ins for higher wages for Harvard's lowest-paid workers.
Many of the new organizers are leaders of those previous campaigns and are linking the war on terrorism to racism at home and imperialism abroad, issues that they have been rallying about for years. "This attracts people who already had some sort of grudge before this," said Michael Frazer, a graduate student at Princeton, where the Princeton Peace Network's chants of "One world, no war" have been matched by the Princeton Committee Against Terrorism's flag-waving and a cappella patriotic songs. "There is this love of the 60's on the part of these activists," Mr. Frazer said.
Even at Wesleyan University in Connecticut, where students helped coordinate a "national day of action" with rallies on Sept. 20, only a few dozen students participated in a classroom walkout last Monday, the day after the bombing began.
"This ambivalence is definitely there," said Robert Loevy, a political science professor at Colorado College in Colorado Springs who studies social protest.
Still, here in the birthplace of the antiwar teach-in, and at other prominent colleges, seeds of protest might yet blossom.
In the current climate, many students are shunning slogans and signs in favor of educational leaflets and teach-ins about nonviolence as a philosophy and about Islam and Afghanistan. They are focusing on racial profiling scores of non-Muslim women here have donned head scarves on Fridays in solidarity with those who have faced discrimination rather than the more complex questions about United States foreign policy.
"No one can say, 'Make love, not war,' " said Lara Jirmanus, who participated in the sit-ins before graduating from Harvard last spring, and who has helped coordinate antiwar activities this fall. "It's not like you want war and we want peace. Who wants war? What we're saying is that this isn't going to work, to go and attack more people."
Here at Michigan, advocacy organizations quickly morphed into peace groups. (Students here, as at Berkeley and Princeton, are teaming up with left-leaning professors, though far fewer than in the Vietnam era, and perennial protesters from their communities.) "Being American does not mean blindly supporting the American government," said Fadi Kiblawi, 20, a Kuwaiti-born Palestinian who went to high school in St. Louis and is among the peace group leaders. "It means using your civil rights to say what you think America should be."
Instead of bombing targets in Afghanistan, these students suggest prosecuting Osama bin Laden and other terrorism suspects through an international war tribunal. They fault the United States sanctions against Iraq and Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, as well as Western economic policies throughout the third world, for inciting anti-American hatred. Even if few civilians are killed by allied bombs, they say, the action will create millions more Afghan refugees.
"There are institutions in place that can bring justice in a way that is not retaliation," said Jackie Bray, 19, a sophomore from Ridgewood, N.J. "The idea of wiping out every terrorist across the world is very appealing, but it's not very realistic."
The Michigan Daily -- Tom Hayden, author of the Port Huron statement and founder of Students for a Democratic Society, was once its editor -- has been critical of the military campaign, but a divided Michigan Student Assembly passed a pro- war resolution on Tuesday. For every co-op house with a peace banner there is a fraternity with a flag hanging from its window. At each antiwar gathering, a handful of counterdemonstrators show up with flags and soon swell to a modest crowd. "Instead of being a conservative organization with these conservative views, we've all of a sudden become the hub of patriotism on campus," said Peter Apel, a senior, whose Young Americans for Freedom chapter has been coordinating the pro-war protests.
Many on the 38,000-student campus are preoccupied with midterm exams, not military policy. The Diag, the crossroads of the Ann Arbor campus, was decorated this week with banners advertising Homecoming 2001, National Coming Out Day, and "All Nations, Campus Ministry." In the center of the Diag, young men tossed a lacrosse ball, part of a 100-hour fund-raising marathon (they are donating 10 percent of the proceeds to New York firefighters). "We stayed out of it, just trying to stay in the middle," said Jason Hall, a sophomore, referring to the dueling antiwar and pro-war rallies as he played catch in the rain on Thursday night. "This campus is so active. Everything's a huge deal around here."
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