------- Index of Articles
NUCLEAR
Australian state tightens radiation leak reporting
U.S. Says More Weapons Sites Found in Afghanistan
North Korea Allows Visit by Nuclear Inspectors
Russia's Nuclear Arsenal
Price battle threatens Russian uranium deal
U.S. and Russian officials discuss deep nuclear cuts
Russia denounces U.S. missile treaty moves
Russian parliament assails US withdrawal from ABM treaty
Levin Attacks Plan To Store Warheads
U.S., Russia Still at Odds on Nuclear Warhead Fate
Fuel-Rod Study Discounts Theft
Govt. Reports on Missing Nuke Fuel
Conversion plant for uranium hits new political snag
Anti-Radiation Pill Distribution at Least a Month Away
Push for Iodide Pills
U.S. - Russia to Make Military Plans
MILITARY
Afghan 'Shepherds' Concern Marines
Rumsfeld Believes bin Laden and Omar Are Still in Afghanistan
U.S. Says More Weapons Sites Found in Afghanistan
Indian Air Force may procure Russian stealth: Jane's
US okays Phalcon sale
US to present diesel submarines concepts to Taiwan
Court spurns lawsuit on guns as 'nuisance'
Powell Says South Asia War Must Be Averted
Straw warns US over treatment of Britons in Cuba
Deborah Orr: Is this what we call winning the war?
Scepticism grows as chemicals disappear
Afghanistan bans opium poppy cultivation
Aerial Herbicide War on Drugs Poisons Land, Water
Fear and Flight in Deadly Kashmir
Indian armed forces fully mobilised: Naval chief
Russia Is Top Iraqi Importer
Iraq, fearing US attack, woos Arab neighbors
2 Civilians From Israel Killed in Palestinian Militant Attacks
Attacks ally India, Turkey, Israel
Fire guts Pakistan government edifice holding extremist records
U.S.-Philippine Command May Signal War's Next Phase
Special Forces Join Effort in Philippines
Widening U.S. battle stirs unease
Admiral never requested to train at Vieques
New law gives Russian president right to declare war
Dismay With Saudi Arabia Fuels Pullout Talk
U.S. may end use of Saudi base
Navy says it needs money to modernize fleet
Misdirected Defense Dollars
Military draft law introduced
POLICE / PRISONERS
A Cop in Every Computer
Nepal Maoists attack jail, free 32 prisoners
Fake Drugs Force an End to 24 Cases in Dallas
ENERGY AND OTHER
UTAH BREWERY CHOOSES 100 PERCENT WIND POWER
Biomass power hopes for UK boost in 2002
Sanyo, Samsung group in fuel cell tie
Energy security - 9:30 a.m.
REPORT DETAILS PROBLEMS, SOLUTIONS OF OIL DEPENDENCE
Dangerous Addiction - Ending America's Oil Dependence
Suits Against Power Firms Justified, Justice Dept. Says
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE APPROVES EXPANDED OIL EXPLORATION IN EVERGLADES
Monkey Dies in AIDS Vaccine Test
War on terror is 'leading to civil rights abuses'
WEF foes won't nix violence in N.Y.
ACTIVISTS
As the bombs continue to fall, another US aircraft lands in Afghanistan.
"Peace trail" across U.S. starts with A-bomb flame
Save The Date - March 2 at Swarthmore College Campus
Thursday is White House Call-In Day
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- australia
Australian state tightens radiation leak reporting
Reuters:
16/1/2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/14050/story.htm
SYDNEY - An Australian state yesterday ordered urgent changes to rules on reporting radioactive leaks after revelations an outback uranium mine had recorded 24 spills over the last two years.
"The current situation has highlighted that there is no mandatory public notification of radioactive liquid spills," South Australia Acting Minister for Minerals and Energy Rob Lucas said, adding the state premier had ordered a review of the rules.
Lucas said there had been 24 spills at the remote Beverley mine, 600 km (370 miles) north of Adelaide, over the past two years.
While all were classified as minor, three of the incidents involved more than 2,000 litres of contaminated solution.
The series of spills came to light after 62,000 litres of radioactive uranium solution spewed from a ruptured pipe at the mine site during routine maintenance work last Friday.
The mine's owner, Heathgate Resources Ltd, owned by U.S.-based General Atomic, said it was not required to report the majority of the incidents since they were deemed to pose no health or environmental concerns.
The latest spill did not present a radiation hazard to the mine's 70 employees or to an Aboriginal settlement some 60 km (37 miles) away, government investigators said.
But the mine's owner has agreed to remove the contaminated soil at the site and the mine will remain idle while further investigations are carried out by the authorities.
"We expect to be back in commercial operation by the end of the week pending government clearance," Heathgate vice president Stephen Middleton told Reuters.
Contaminated soil is to be placed in drums and stored for disposal in an approved area, Middleton said.
Heathgate captures uranium contained in sand by injecting oxygen to create an "in situ" leaching solution that is dried, leaving talc-like uranium, or yellowcake.
Environmental groups say the technique is unsafe because it requires large amounts of liquid, creating hazardous runoff in the processing stage.
-------- depleted uranium
U.S. Says More Weapons Sites Found in Afghanistan
["U.S. forces found some missiles with depleted uranium warheads in the Kandahar area near the end of December.... It was not known where al Qaeda obtained those weapons."]
By Tabassum Zakaria
Wednesday January 16 7:14 PM ET
Reuters
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/htx/nm/20020116/ts/attack_military_dc_234.html
WASHINGTON - U.S. forces in Afghanistan found more evidence Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network was seeking chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, and the number of sites to inspect is growing, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Wednesday.
The United States does not have evidence that al Qaeda has acquired weapons of mass destruction but the materials indicate they wanted to use such deadly items, he said.
``In terms of having hard evidence of actual possession of weapons of mass destruction, I do not have that at this stage,'' Rumsfeld told a Pentagon media briefing.
Canisters found in Afghanistan initially appeared not to contain deadly chemicals, but would be brought back to the United States for further testing, a military spokesman said.
``We have not tested them completely yet. We are going to bring them back to the States and test them,'' Army Col. Rick Thomas, a spokesman for Central Command which is running U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, told Reuters.
``We don't think there is anything in there, but until the tests are done, we just can't say with certainty,'' he said.
Two canisters unearthed about a week ago by a British engineering firm clearing mines near Kabul had the skull and crossbones symbol on them as well as warnings in Russian that referred to nuclear material, Thomas said.
Rumsfeld said earlier the canisters were believed to contain chemicals and that ``externally they appear to be weapons of mass destruction.''
The number of suspected chemical, biological and nuclear weapon sites in Afghanistan is growing and U.S. forces are now targeting more than 50, about 10 more than they have already inspected, Rumsfeld said.
``The number of facilities keeps going up,'' he said.
``We have found a number of things that show an appetite for weapons of mass destruction -- diagrams, materials, reports that things were asked for, things were discussed at meetings,'' Rumsfeld said.
One site registered an elevated level of radioactivity but it appeared to be a result of depleted uranium on some warheads and not from any nuclear or radiological weapon of mass destruction, Rumsfeld said.
Depleted uranium is a heavy metal that can pierce armor and has small levels of radioactivity associated with it.
U.S. forces found some missiles with depleted uranium warheads in the Kandahar area near the end of December, Thomas said. It was not known where al Qaeda obtained those weapons.
BIN LADEN HUNT
The U.S. military pressed on with the hunt for bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, getting help from Afghans and partner countries to locate them.
The United States accuses bin Laden of masterminding the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington that killed more than 3,000 people, and blames the Taliban for harboring him.
Despite a bombing campaign that began on Oct. 7 and targeted Taliban and al Qaeda sites, bin Laden and Mullah Omar appear to have escaped unscathed.
The two men are still believed to be in Afghanistan, but many reports citing locations for them have turned out to be wrong, Rumsfeld said.
``We still believe they're in the country. We're still working on that basis, although we are looking some other places as well, from time to time,'' he said.
``We've got Afghan people working on it. We've got Americans working on it. We've got other countries' special forces working on it,'' Rumsfeld said.
``It is a very difficult thing to find one or two or three or 12 or 15 or 20 specific human beings,'' he said.
The U.S. military is preparing to transfer to Pakistan about 90 detainees of Pakistani origin who are being held in Afghanistan, Pentagon officials said.
The number of al Qaeda and Taliban detainees held by U.S. forces in Afghanistan is 403, while an additional 80 are being held at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Military intelligence officers are questioning a man at a U.S. base in Kandahar who voluntarily came to the Americans offering to provide key information on al Qaeda and the Taliban, U.S. defense officials said.
The man claimed to have been a major financial contributor to the former Taliban leadership in Afghanistan, and he is not being held as a ``detainee,'' the officials said.
``We don't have much on the guy right now,'' a defense official told Reuters in Washington. ``He showed up at the gate and offered to talk. You know how that is in Afghanistan; things are not always as they appear to be.''
-------- korea
North Korea Allows Visit by Nuclear Inspectors
January 16, 2002
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-16-03.html
VIENNA, Austria, A technical team from the United Nations nuclear oversight agency is visiting a nuclear laboratory in North Korea for the first time this week.
Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency are visiting the Isotope Production Laboratory during their survey of nuclear facilities in the Nyongbyon area of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).
At their Vienna headquarters, agency officials said the Isotope Production Laboratory was said by the DPRK to have been involved in the early stages of development of the North Korean nuclear program.
IAEA safeguards seals are verified with laser disk recording. (Photos courtesy IAEA)
Last May, the agency proposed to the DPRK concrete steps that need to be carried out to verify that all nuclear material in the country had been declared to the agency, process IAEA officials say could take up to four years. The agency indicated its readiness to start implementing verification measures immediately.
At a technical meeting between the DPRK and the agency in Vienna in November 2001, the DPRK did not agree to promptly implement those proposals, citing the delay in implementation of the USA/DPRK Agreed Framework as the principal reason for declining.
Under the Agreed Framework signed in 1994, North Korea froze its suspected nuclear arms program in exchange for receiving two safer nuclear power reactors which are being constructed by a U.S. led international consortium.
The multi-billion dollar project was supposed to be finished by 2003 but delays now make 2008 the earliest possible completion date.
Despite the delay, North Korea did agree to a visit, not an inspection, by IAEA inspectors to the Isotope Production Laboratory, a move viewed as a step towards normalization of relations with the agency.
North Korea withdrew its membership from the IAEA in June 1994.
Mohamed ElBaradei is IAEA director general.
"This is a small but welcome step towards a return to full-fledged inspections required under North Korea's safeguards agreement," said Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Since 1993, the IAEA has been unable to fully implement its comprehensive safeguards agreement with the DPRK, and has been therefore unable to verify the completeness and correctness of the DPRK's initial 1992 declaration of its nuclear inventory.
Since November 1994, the agency has been monitoring the "freeze" of the DPRK's graphite moderated reactors and related facilities. It has also maintained a continuous inspector presence at the Nyongbyon site.
The IAEA has done this monitoring at the request of the United Nations Security Council request and in accordance with the Agreed Framework between the USA and the DPRK.
Director General ElBaradei is encouraging North Korea to normalize its relations with the agency including resumption of full safeguards inspections.
-------- russia
Russia's Nuclear Arsenal
New York Times
January 16, 2002
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/opinion/L16NUKE.html
To the Editor:
You report that many Democrats and arms control advocates contend that President Bush's plan to move many of the United States' 7,000 nuclear warheads into storage will do nothing to encourage Russia to address its 6,000 nuclear warheads (news article, Jan. 9).
Unfortunately, the situation in Russia is much worse. Russian tactical nuclear weapons are not addressed in these reductions at all. At least 3,500 and as many as 18,000 Russian tactical nuclear weapons exist. Tactical, or "battlefield," nuclear weapons can be as destructive and more susceptible to theft than Russian strategic nuclear weapons.
Extraordinarily, these weapons are not covered by any international arms control treaty, and President Bush has given no indication that his nuclear reductions will address the Russian tactical nuclear arsenal. BRIAN ALEXANDER Washington, Jan. 10, 2002 The writer is a research analyst, Fourth Freedom Forum.
----
Price battle threatens Russian uranium deal
By David Willman and Alan Miller in Washington
Thursday, January 17, 2002
Los Angeles Times
http://www.smh.com.au/news/0201/17/world/world6.html
A historic 1993 agreement to sell uranium stripped from Russian warheads to fuel American power plants is in jeopardy because of a dispute over price. The stand-off between the Russians and the US company responsible for carrying out the deal has stalled shipment of uranium to the United States. Arms control specialists fear that the deal's collapse could increase the chance of terrorists or rogue nations obtaining the nuclear material.
The US Energy Undersecretary, Robert Card, told the American company in a letter last week that "US strategic interests may be at risk if the [firm] cannot ensure continuity of shipments of Russian down-blended [uranium] to the United States". He said the disagreement could also lead to "a nuclear power fuel shortage" in the United States.
In mid-1998, the US Government ceded to the private company USEC responsibility for implementing the agreement with the Russians to buy 500 tonnes of military uranium.
Because USEC and the Russians remain at odds over pricing, no shipments have been authorised for 2002.
Responding to Mr Card last Thursday, USEC's president, William Timbers, said his letter "undermines and could significantly affect the ability of [USEC] to reach prompt and successful agreement" with the Russians.
A USEC spokesman said the company expected to resolve its differences with the Russians.
However, a Bush Administration official said that USEC and the Russians "seem to be at loggerheads ... I think [the uranium agreement] is in jeopardy. I would not characterise this as normal negotiations."
The 1993 US-Russian accord, known as "Megatons to Megawatts", was a watershed. The US Government agreed to buy about 500 tonnes of highly enriched uranium stripped from former Soviet warheads over 20 years.
The proceeds were to employ thousands of Russian scientists and technicians, who would blend down, or dilute, the material for use as fuel.
The securing of the weapons-grade uranium meant it could not be obtained by terrorists, such as Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network. And by employing Russians to blend down the material, the deal would help dissuade them from selling their services to others who covet nuclear materials and expertise.
-------- treaties
U.S. and Russian officials discuss deep nuclear cuts
By Charles Aldinger
Wednesday January 16, 2002
Reuters
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/reuters/asia-83991.html
WASHINGTON - U.S. and Russian defence officials on Tuesday began a two-day planning meeting on joint nuclear arms cuts, with a spotlight on U.S. plans to store -- not destroy -- many of its thousands of warheads.
U.S. Undersecretary of Defence Douglas Feith met privately with Russia's first deputy chief of staff, Colonel General Yuri Baluyevsky, and they then joined their delegations in a third-floor conference room at U.S. military headquarters.
No details of the initial round of planning were expected before they were completed late on Wednesday. But Russia was expected to repeat objections to U.S. storage of perhaps hundreds of strategic warheads now on missiles and bombs.
Both countries have pledged to reduce by about two-thirds their currently deployed Cold War strategic nuclear arsenals of more than 6,000 warheads each over the coming decade.
But Assistant U.S. Defence Secretary J.D. Crouch told reporters last week the United States planned to store at least some of the removed warheads for possible emergency redeployment.
The Russian Foreign Ministry quickly urged Washington to fulfil pledges to proceed with real cuts, saying, "That means strategic nuclear weapons must be cut not only 'on paper'."
"We are certainly not trying to mislead anybody," Crouch said when pressed by reporters on why all of the U.S. warheads to be taken off of missiles and aircraft would not be destroyed.
"We think it is a major step in the right direction that we are able to move those (deployed) forces down to significantly lower levels. And we also think it is a prudent thing to have, in a very uncertain period, some responsive capability."
FIRST OF SEVERAL ROUNDS THIS YEAR
Baluyevsky was quoted by Itar-Tass news agency before departing Moscow as saying the bilateral talks would be followed by other rounds in the coming months ahead of an expected visit by President George W. Bush to Moscow at mid-year for a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Bush has vowed to cut the deployed U.S. arsenal to between 1,700 and 2,200 warheads, while Putin has said he plans cuts to between 1,500 and 2,200.
Putin, at a 2001 summit with Bush in Texas, raised questions about what the United States planned to do with the warheads that it removed from missiles and bombers.
A senior U.S. diplomat expressed confidence ahead of the Pentagon meeting that a deal would be reached with Russia that could quell fears about the U.S. plans.
"The Russians have fired their opening salvo on the issue but I think we'll be able to wrestle it to the ground," the diplomat told reporters on Friday, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The Pentagon talks, which follow a December 2001 meeting in Brussels between U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Russian counterpart Sergei Ivanov, were another sign of the warming security relationship between the former Cold War foes.
Also on the agenda for the talks was the U.S. plan to develop a strategic missile defence over objections from Russia and China. Bush announced last month that Washington would withdraw in six months from the 1972 anti-ballistic missile (ABM) treaty, which prohibits such defences.
Bush says new threats have emerged from "rogue states" including Iran, Iraq and North Korea and the September 11 attacks on America have further fuelled arguments for a strong defence.
----
Russia denounces U.S. missile treaty moves
Wednesday January 16, 11:44 PM
Reuters
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/reuters/asia-84193.html
MOSCOW - Russia's parliament on Wednesday denounced Washington's plans to ditch a landmark missile treaty as a destabilising move that could provoke another round of the arms race.
The State Duma lower house returned to the issue of the planned U.S. break-out from the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty as U.S. and Russian defence officials held talks in Washington on joint nuclear arms cuts.
In a resolution, the Duma, which is dominated by supporters of President Vladimir Putin, described the U.S. move as "mistaken and destabilising" and said it could create "real conditions for a new round of the arms race".
U.S. President George W. Bush announced in December that Washington would withdraw in six months from the 1972 treaty, allowing the United States to go ahead with developing a strategic missile defence.
Washington says the ABM treaty, which limits U.S. and Russian anti-missile systems, is a vestige of the Cold War that has out-lived its usefulness. Russia partly agrees but would like to preserve it since other disarmament pacts depend on it.
The Duma called on Putin, who has also condemned the U.S. move as mistaken, to ensure the government provided a report on the state of Russia's strategic nuclear forces in the light of the U.S. decision.
Disagreement over disarmament is one of several rows to resurface between the two former Cold War foes after a honeymoon period following Russia's support for the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks.
In Washington, U.S. and Russian defence officials have been meeting for planning talks on joint nuclear arms cuts, with the spotlight on U.S. plans to store, not destroy, many of its thousands of warheads.
Russia is expected to repeat objections to those plans.
Both countries have pledged to reduce by about two thirds their currently deployed Cold War strategic nuclear arsenals of around 6,000 warheads each over the coming decade.
----
Russian parliament assails US withdrawal from ABM treaty
Vladimir Isachenkov
AP
January 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR41.asp
Moscow, The lower house of Russia's parliament on Wednesday overwhelmingly condemned the US withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty as harmful for global stability, and urged President Vladimir Putin to consult lawmakers on Moscow's response.
The State Duma voted 326-3 for a non-binding resolution that assailed last month's decision by US President George W. Bush to withdraw from the ABM treaty in six months to deploy a national missile defense.
The US move was "mistaken and destabilizing since it effectively ruins the existing highly efficient system of ensuring strategic stability and paves ground for a new round of the arms race," the resolution said.
The vote came as a Russian military delegation was holding talks in Washington with Pentagon officials on cooperation in fighting terrorism and a new military relationship, and on working out details of arms cuts to pave the way for Bush's trip to Russia in late May or early June.
The Duma also asked Putin to hold urgent consultations with parliament on ways to "ensure national security and preserve strategic stability," and asked the government to make proposals on future development of Russia's nuclear forces in view of the US withdrawal.
Amid newly warm ties with the United States, Putin reacted calmly to Bush's withdrawal notice, saying it was a mistake but not a threat to Russia. The low-key response contrasted sharply with years of vociferous Russian protests against the US missile defense plan.
Some analysts have said the US withdrawal plays into Russia's hands by freeing it from constraints under other nuclear arms control agreements, in particular the START II treaty's ban on land-based missiles with multiple nuclear warheads, which make up the core of Russian nuclear arsenal.
When the Russian parliament ratified START II in 2000, it made it conditional on the preservation of the ABM treaty.
START II critics in Russia have said the treaty has pushed the cash-strapped government into a costly, losing effort to match US arsenals by deploying new single-warhead missiles. Putin has said that US withdrawal from the ABM treaty had freed Russia from the ban on multiple warheads but that it had no plans to take advantage of the fact "in the close, foreseeable future."
Retired Gen. Andrei Nikolayev, who heads the Duma's defense committee, insisted Wednesday that START II was dead, but for a different reason - because it hasn't been approved by the United States. The US Senate ratified START II in 1996, but has refused to acknowledge subsequent US-Russian protocols supplementing it.
"Russia considers itself free of any obligations concerning its implementation," Nikolayev told lawmakers.
START II would force both countries to cut their arsenals to 3,000 warheads from the current 6,000 each is allowed under the START I treaty. Last November, Bush pledged to slash the US nuclear arsenals to 1,700 to 2,200, while Putin has said that Russia could go as low as 1,500 warheads.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
Levin Attacks Plan To Store Warheads
WASHINGTON IN BRIEF
Washington Post
Wednesday, January 16, 2002; Page A04
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51992-2002Jan15?language=printer
The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday criticized the administration's plans to store -- not destroy -- nuclear warheads removed from the nation's strategic nuclear arsenal, charging that the policy would increase the chances of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists.
"It seems to me that by talking about putting nuclear weapons in warehouses where they're readily available for reinsertion into planes or missiles, that what we're doing is increasing the threat of proliferation," Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) told reporters.
Levin said his panel would hold hearings to push for changes in the Pentagon's Nuclear Posture Review, part of President Bush's proposed strategic arms reductions. The review recommends keeping warheads from many dismantled weapons as a "responsive force" that could be moved back into the active inventory.
Levin also said the U.S. military might need to end operations at a Saudi Arabian air base because of restrictions on U.S. military personnel there. He said female service members were uncomfortable in the remote region where the Prince Sultan Air Base is located and the Saudis had been less than welcoming.
"We may need to move that base," Levin said. A female U.S. Air Force fighter pilot is suing to end a Pentagon policy requiring female military personnel to wear an "abaya," a traditional item of dress similar to the Afghan burqa, when off base in Saudi Arabia.
--------
U.S., Russia Still at Odds on Nuclear Warhead Fate
January 16, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-arms-russia-usa.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. and Russian defense officials, ending two days of talks on nuclear and other security issues, remained at odds on Wednesday over U.S. intentions to store, not destroy, thousands of warheads.
But despite continued differences, the two sides said they still aimed to conclude written agreements for signing at an anticipated summit in May or June between Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Bush.
One of those agreements could cover U.S. and Russian pledges to slash their nuclear arsenals, although it remained unclear whether the Bush administration would ever accept the kind of ``legally binding'' accord Russia has demanded.
The negotiations, led by U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith and Russia's first deputy chief of staff, Col. Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, are the latest in a series aimed at charting a new security relationship between two ex-enemies.
Both countries have pledged to reduce by about two-thirds their currently deployed Cold War strategic nuclear arsenals of more than 6,000 warheads each over the coming decade.
But U.S. officials have said they would store at least some of the removed warheads for possible emergency redeployment.
Russia is happy with U.S. plans to reduce its nuclear arsenal to a range of 1,700 to 2,200 warheads but insists on ''irreversibility'' of those cuts, Baluyevsky told reporters.
ARMS DESTRUCTION URGED
Asked if Moscow would also store a portion of the nuclear warheads taken from missiles and aircraft if the United States did so, the general said through an interpreter:
``We are following the principle that in the last, the whole nuclear weapon should be destroyed.''
This will take time as ``we clearly understand that is not a matter for a day or a matter of a year or a matter even of a decade,'' he added.
Later at a briefing, Feith defended the U.S. position.
He said key arms control pacts signed with the Soviet Union during the Cold War -- the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty, the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty and the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty -- were widely praised but also did not require destruction of all warheads.
``There has been talk that what we're proposing ... is somehow not as thorough-going a reduction as what was accomplished by arms control agreements in past decades. It's not so,'' he said.
Baluyevsky reiterated that Russia is seeking a ``legally binding agreement'' to codify the nuclear reductions.
``There is legal obligations over both sides while conducting reductions of their forces,'' he said.
Feith described Washington as ``open minded'' as to the form of any agreement, but reiterated the administration view that Cold War arms control treaties that set up specific weapons parities between the two nuclear powers are out of date.
``We're going to approach this very practically and if we can achieve agreement (on issues under discussion), then we will be pleased to record that agreement,'' Feith said.
DEBATE OVER FORM
``We will decide on what the appropriate form for that is depending on what it is that we agree to. We are open to any kind of document that is appropriate for the subject matter that we can reach agreement on,'' he added.
Types of accords under consideration range from formal treaties to much less formal joint communiqus.
The Bush team is aiming to develop what it calls a ``more normal'' relationship with Russia.
The process has accelerated since Moscow and Washington forged new cooperation against terrorism following the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
U.S. officials said they are confident the two sides can develop effective ways to reassure each other of their nuclear and military forces outside a formal treaty through increased data exchanges, reciprocal visits and other steps.
The two defense officials set up working groups to continue discussions on nuclear reductions; military technical cooperation, including on missile defense; halting the spread of weapons of mass destruction, and counter-terrorism efforts.
Baluyevsky noted that Washington announced last month its intention to unilaterally withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Defense Treaty and decried the move as a ``mistake.''
Still, he said, the two sides are working hard to find ''mutual ground on which we can keep working in the future.''
Bush has vowed to cut the deployed U.S. arsenal to 1,700 to 2,200 warheads, while Putin's range is 1,500-2,200 warheads.
Putin, at a 2001 summit with Bush in Texas, raised questions about what the United States planned to do with the warheads that it removed from missiles and bombers.
Ahead of the Pentagon meeting, a senior U.S. diplomat expressed confidence a deal would be reached with Russia that could quell fears about the U.S. plans.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
-------- connecticut
Fuel-Rod Study Discounts Theft
January 16, 2002
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/nyregion/16NUKE.html
WATERFORD, Conn., Jan. 15 - Federal energy regulators said today that their investigation into two radioactive fuel rods discovered missing two years ago from the Dominion Millstone Nuclear Power Plant here had concluded that the rods had probably been mistakenly shipped to two national underground disposal sites.
In a public meeting here, Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials said there was no evidence that the 13-foot-long rods, made of plutonium in sealed lead-lined containers, had been stolen.
But the commission said its investigation had turned up five potential violations at the Millstone plant that might have caused the mishandling of the rods.
Northeast Utilities sold all three reactors to Dominion, an energy company in Virginia, in March 2001.
Dominion officials said today that they believed this would be the last problem with Millstone.
--------
Govt. Reports on Missing Nuke Fuel
January 16, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Missing-Fuel-Rods.html
WATERFORD, Conn. (AP) -- Two radioactive fuel rods missing from a nuclear power plant for at least two decades were likely mistaken for other radioactive waste and safely disposed of, federal investigators have concluded.
Inspectors from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Tuesday they were considering whether to sanction or fine Dominion Inc., which owns the Millstone One nuclear power plant, for the lapse in record-keeping and mishandling of highly radioactive spent fuel.
Dominion bought the Millstone complex of three nuclear reactors last year and said it would seek compensation from former owner Northeast Utilities if fined. A final report is due from the NRC in a few weeks.
Fuel rods have never before gone missing in the history of commercial nuclear power in the United States, according to the NRC.
The investigation into the missing fuel rods began in December 2000 after NU conducted an inventory of the plant's spent fuel pool. Neither NU nor Dominion could determine conclusively where the rods ended up.
The NRC and Dominion insist the rods could not have been stolen.
The 13 1/2-foot-long rods emit lethal doses of radiation. Anyone removing them would have to use proper equipment and would have to get past numerous radiation monitors and other security measures, the NRC said.
``There is nothing that indicated that as a possibility in any way,'' said Todd Jackson, the NRC's head investigator.
Based on records, the NRC and Dominion agreed the rods were probably mistaken for other radioactive material being stored in the spent fuel pool, such as monitoring equipment, and shipped off for long-term storage. The shipping containers are buried on arrival and never opened.
The most likely storage sites are in Barnwell, S.C., and Hanford, Wash., investigations by the company and the NRC said.
Officials at the Barnwell site, upset that spent fuel rods may have been shipped to them without their knowledge and stored in violation of their license, are refusing to accept more radioactive material from Millstone until the rods are found.
``Even though this happened 20 years ago, it is still painful to hear the description of it,'' said Alan Price, acting vice president of operations at Millstone.
The company said it has implemented procedures to ensure nuclear rods never disappear again. While Millstone One is in the process of being decommissioned and has not operated since 1995, the other two plants in the complex are in operation.
Dominion, based in Virginia, inherited the missing fuel rod problem from Berlin-based NU when it paid $1.3 billion for the complex last year.
NU advised Dominion before the sale that the fuel rods were missing. NU paid more than $9 million to investigate, said Bill Matthews, vice president of Millstone.
NU spokeswoman Deborah Beauchamp said the company is pleased that the NRC's investigation backed up NU's findings. She said it was premature to discuss fines.
Joe Besade, an anti-nuclear activist, said Tuesday that NU had paid more than $10 million in penalties in the past for violating nuclear and clean-water regulations.
``Nobody's been held accountable for anything I've seen,'' Besade said. ``This is going to be another whitewash.''
-------- kentucky
Conversion plant for uranium hits new political snag
Tuesday was supposed to be the deadline for announcing a winning bid for construction of the waste-conversion plant. The delay is indefinite.
The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky
Wednesday, January 16, 2002
By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com--270.575.8650
From: "vcolley" <vcolley@earthlink.net>
Four years after a federal law was passed to build a uranium waste-conversion facility at Paducah, the project apparently has hit still another political snag in the nation's capital. On Tuesday, the day a contractor was slated to be named after months of bid evaluations, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Louisville, who authored the legislation, talked by phone with Department of Energy and Office of Management and Budget officials regarding concerns with the project.
"I can confirm there have been discussions with OMB and DOE," said Robert Steurer, press secretary for McConnell, who is in Kentucky this month during a congressional recess. "He's working really hard to get this project moving forward."
Steurer said he could not discuss details of the conversations. Department of Energy officials who had planned to announce the winning bidder provided no insight about the reported indefinite delay.
Although official word was unavailable, some sources speculated the OMB, Congress' financial arm, has continuing concerns about the cost and scope of the work. DOE's preferred option of converting the uranium hexafluoride into safer uranium dioxide is expected to cost $1.2 billion to $1.5 billion and create several hundred construction jobs. Construction must start by Jan. 31, 2004.
Rumors surfaced a month ago within the nuclear industry that the OMB had told the Department of Energy the conversion project was not a funding priority. That was despite a 1998 federal law calling for the work and earmarking about $373 million for facilities at Paducah and Piketon, Ohio, to convert about 14 billion pounds of the material in about 60,000 cylinders. About two-thirds of the canisters are at the Paducah uranium enrichment plant and the rest are at closed enrichment plants at Piketon and Oak Ridge, Tenn.
Phil Potter, Washington-based policy analyst for Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers (PACE) International, said he understands the delay is largely due to disagreement over how many plants should be built.
"We've not been able to confirm that with anybody with real authority with the OMB," he added.
He said the OMB apparently favored no plants and DOE favored two, after which the OMB responded it would back a one-plant plan.
"It's been going back and forth now for a couple of weeks and we just don't know what the outcome is and how they're going to deal with it," said Potter, whose union workers would have priority for the jobs. "Everybody seems to believe that if there is only one plant, Paducah would have an advantage because it has more cylinders."
That is "totally unsatisfactory" to the Ohio delegation, which co-wrote the legislation with McConnell only to see USEC Inc. close the Piketon plant last summer amid financial trouble, he said.
Congress mandated the plan to eliminate the waste while creating about 150 long-term jobs in each community, heavily affected by USEC layoffs. DOE hopes some parts of the material, particularly fluorine compounds, can be used commercially to generate about $200 million in revenue during the roughly 25 years of conversion work.
But the project has stumbled again and again since 1998. Labor leaders, civic officials and congressional delegations have repeatedly criticized the OMB and DOE for foot-dragging over budgetary issues. DOE delayed bidding for more than a year before resuming the process in late 2000.
There are also concerns by some plant neighbors and watchdog groups about the safety of converting the material, which contains low-level radiation and poses chemical hazards. Some of the cylinders are rusty and have leaked.
Chamber of commerce, economic development and county government officials have endorsed the conversion project because of its economic potential and the public safety risk of continuing to store the cylinders. DOE officials say the canisters cover about 42 acres at the three sites and, containing dense uranium, have a total weight about a tenth as much as the Great Pyramid in Egypt.
DOE is doing an environmental study to assess worker and public health and environmental impacts of the conversion project. It also will gauge the facilities' construction and effect on local employment, income, population, housing and public services.
A draft environmental impact statement is expected to be issued in June and a final statement in January 2003.
-------- maryland
Anti-Radiation Pill Distribution at Least a Month Away
Emergency Plan Covers Nuclear Plant Neighbors
By Raymond McCaffrey
Washington Post Staff Writer
January 17, 2002
Thursday,http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A55290-2002Jan16?language=printer
Distribution of potassium iodide pills to help residents guard against radiation poisoning in the event of an accident at Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant will not begin for at least a month, a state official said this week.
Michael Sharon, chief of the emergency response division at the state Department of the Environment, told the Calvert County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday that Maryland is still awaiting delivery of the pills from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. In the interim, the state will meet with representatives of the five Maryland counties with residents living within a 10-mile radius of nuclear power plants in an attempt to decide how to distribute the medication.
"It would be nice to have one policy throughout the state," Sharon said after the meeting. "We're going to try to work closely with the counties."
Maryland officials announced Friday that they would accept the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's offer to provide the pills to all states with nuclear plants for residents living within 10 miles of reactors. The compound can help prevent thyroid damage.
The state will receive about 160,000 doses of potassium iodide, or two pills for each of the 80,000 residents within that fallout zone, according to Sharon. Three-fourths of those individuals live in Calvert, St. Mary's and Dorchester counties, all within a 10-mile radius of Calvert Cliffs, the state's only nuclear power plant. The rest live in Harford and Cecil counties, near the Peach Bottom nuclear facility in Pennsylvania.
Maryland's decision to accept the offer the NRC made last month represents a change of policy for the state, which has strictly advocated evacuation and sheltering in response to a nuclear plant emergency, but did not stockpile potassium iodide for residents.
"Since 9-11, the whole picture's changed," said David Rogers, the Calvert County health officer.
In the past, officials felt that in the event of a mishap at the nuclear plant, they would receive warning, allowing for an evacuation of residents, according to Rogers.
Now, in case of a sudden maximum release of radiation, residents might need immediate shelter, Rogers said, explaining that in such a scenario it would be appropriate to take the potassium iodide.
"In the aftermath of 9-11, we're looking at the possibility of . . . a terrorism attack," Rogers said.
One reason that the state historically did not stockpile potassium iodide was the fear that people would become reliant on a pill that offers limited protection.
Commissioner Barbara A. Stinnett (D-At Large) expressed that same concern Tuesday, though she maintained that she is a supporter of distributing potassium iodide.
"I don't want them to misunderstand and think this is a cure-all," Stinnett said.
The distribution plan, according to Sharon, could involve handing out pills at a central location or delivering them door to door. One method discussed Tuesday would involve local schools.
So far, the cost of distribution is unknown.
Several commissioners expressed concern about unnecessarily alarming residents or suggesting that there was something unsafe about the Calvert Cliffs plant.
"I believe in being prepared, but I also don't believe in being the harbinger of doom," Commissioner Linda L. Kelley (R-Owings) said.
"I don't lose a minute's sleep living close to it," John Douglas Parran (R-At Large) said.
----
Push for Iodide Pills
By Theola Labbé and Monte Reel
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, January 17, 2002
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52729-2002Jan16?language=printer
The League of Women Voters of Calvert County was one of those lobbying for last week's decision by the Maryland Department of the Environment to accept potassium iodide pills for residents within 10 miles of the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant.
The drug is being offered by the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Resident living near the plant would take the pills to counteract the effects of radiation that could be released in the event of an accident or terrorist attack at the Calvert Cliffs plant.
Marie Andrews and Barbara Fetterhoff, co-presidents of Calvert's League of Women Voters, urged residents to call state agencies, including the governor's office -- and last week they sent a letter to the editor stating the group's position that the state Department of the Environment should accept the NRC's offer.
The league and others achieved that result before the letter could be published. On Friday, state officials agreed to participate in the potassium iodide program. Details are still being worked out. [Related story, Page 3]
Staff writers Michael Amon and Raymond McCaffrey contributed to this report.
-------- us politics
U.S. - Russia to Make Military Plans
January 16, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-US-Russia.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Russian and American delegations decided in two days of talks to make plans for military cooperation, hoping for a new and friendly relationship that can be crowned by Presidents Bush and Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg, Russia, in the spring.
Committees were created to work on ways to verify that promised reductions in long-range nuclear arsenals are executed, to exchange data on technology and to cooperate in a joint response to terror threats.
Douglas Feith, the undersecretary of defense who headed the U.S. delegation, said the Bush administration was willing to codify understandings once they are reached -- a formality Russia has demanded.
But the wintry chill that swept the Pentagon steps as Feith and the Russian delegation leader, Col. Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, discussed the results of their talks Wednesday also enveloped sensitive issues.
Russia still resents Bush's decision to junk a 1972 treaty with Moscow that is a cornerstone of arms control.
As the delegations met, the lower house of Russia's parliament condemned the U.S. withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, voting 326-3 for a resolution assailing the decision. The withdrawal frees the United States to experiment with an anti-missile shield in ways banned by the treaty.
The U.S. move was ``mistaken and destabilizing since it effectively ruins the existing highly efficient system of ensuring strategic stability and paves ground for a new round of the arms race,'' said the State Duma's resolution.
Disagreement at the Pentagon, meanwhile, centered on the Bush administration's refusal to guarantee destruction of warheads removed from launchers as part of a promised cutback.
``The warheads dismounted from the carriers should be destroyed and eliminated,'' Baluyevsky insisted. Cutbacks must be ``irreversible,'' he said through a translator.
But Feith told reporters later that the contention was a ``red herring'' since several past arms control agreements between the United States and the Soviet Union did not specify destruction of weapons as they were retired.
Besides, the Pentagon official said, U.S.-Russian relations were on a new and friendly footing. He said the Bush administration was willing to adopt versions of provisions of the 1991 START I treaty that are designed to make sure cutbacks are implemented.
He also seemed to go out of his way to consider Russia's demand that any new agreements be formalized. ``We are completely open-minded on the subject,'' he said.
Still, Feith ruled out the sort of tortuous arms control negotiations that marked the Cold War era and dismissed as an out-of-touch ``priesthood'' contemporary arms control advocates in Russia and the United States.
``The United States and Russia are not enemies,'' he said. ``What we are looking to do with the Russians is to develop a view of security that allows us to work together to deal with threats that face both of us.''
But Baluyevsky said there must be a ``legally binding document'' on weapons reductions.
The two sides are committed to major reductions in their strategic nuclear weapons. Bush pledged in November to cut back to 1,700 to 2,200 long-range warheads from the current U.S. level of about 7,000. And Putin, in talks with Bush, said Russia, which has about 6,000 strategic warheads, would respond in kind.
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
Afghan 'Shepherds' Concern Marines
By Ellen Knickmeyer
Associated Press Writer
Wednesday, January 16, 2002; 8:54 AM
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- Sauntering past disguised as shepherds or walking back and forth carrying Kalashnikov rifles, hostile Afghan forces have been boldly testing Marine defenses at the allied air base in southern Afghanistan.
Concealed by scarves and robes, the men pass in plain view and count heads among the Marines who face them. That's when the Americans brace themselves inside their sandbagged foxholes.
"It's when they start moving in and out that they're staging for an attack," Marine Cpl. Jason Gravem, 23, of San Diego, said Tuesday.
"They act like sheep herders, but these sheep herders carry radios and call stuff in," said Marine Sgt. Ethan Ramsey, 22, of White Plains, Mo.
"The weird part of it is, they can just appear in an instant," Ramsey said. "There's got to be tunnels."
Suspected al-Qaida or Taliban holdouts have already attacked coalition forces at Kandahar airport once during the past week. Gunmen in the arid scrub north of the runway opened fire Thursday as a C-17 screamed into the air carrying 20 detainees bound for Guantanamo, Cuba.
A heavily guarded dirt-wall compound at the base holds more than 300 alleged Taliban and al-Qaida figures bound for a U.S. prison in Cuba for investigation.
U.S. Marine officials have said they believe the two events Thursday - the departure of the first detainees and the first fire on forces here - were unrelated. But the U.S. military is taking no chances.
Air Force, Army and Marine service members sent their second batch of detainees off Sunday, closely flanked by Cobra attack helicopters, while U.S. Humvees rigged with 50-caliber machine guns and TOW missiles sped across the runway below.
On Tuesday, debris rained down on the young Marines in their sandbag bunkers as explosives experts destroyed caches of arms newly found on the runway. It was evidence, Marines said, that hostile forces were massing for another try.
Experts used TNT and other explosives to collapse a mud-walled house and a network of tunnels recently found in the area. The house was only about 100 yards from the base perimeter, and a few dozen yards from one of the areas of fire of last week's attack.
Bulldozers leveled other mud ruins in the area on Tuesday. Foot patrols searched under cover of light-armored vehicles armed with machine guns.
The U.S. military on Monday had found mortar fuses and rocket-propelled grenades in the house - arms that weren't there on previous occasions, Marine spokesman Lt. James Jarvis said.
"They were coming in to use them for an attack of some sort," Jarvis said.
U.S. forces found the stash after seeing seven men carrying Kalashnikovs and rocket-propelled grenades across the parched dirt plain at sunset Monday.
Men had been crossing back and forth throughout the day, Marines guarding the perimeter said. The men moved slowly along the fence line, Gravem said. Some of the men even waved, Marines who saw them said.
Marine officials declined to reveal the rules of engagement for armed forces here. The officials say they don't want hostile forces to know just how far they can provoke the Americans without retaliation.
But rank-and-file Marines say the suspected Taliban out there already know.
"They know the Geneva Convention better than we do," Ramsey said. "They go back and forth, and we can't do anything."
Crisscrossing ravines in the shrapnel-strewn, mined plains help intruders get in and out, Marines say. They have upped security since Thursday's shooting and may expand the base's perimeter.
Jarvis said he knew of no legitimate civilian use of the area; villagers who lived in mud homes nearby have long abandoned them. He said the U.S. military was inclined to treat anyone in the area as suspicious.
Young Marines camp out night and day in the line of fighting holes along the runway. New sandbags have replaced ones pocked with bullet holes from the last attack.
"I don't underestimate them," Ramsey said. "I think they might underestimate us. I want them to come back. They're taunting us now."
--------
Rumsfeld Believes bin Laden and Omar Are Still in Afghanistan
New York Times
January 16, 2002
By DAVID STOUT
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/international/16CND-MILI.html
WASHINGTON, Jan. 16 - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said today that he believes the elusive Osama bin Laden and Mullah Muhammad Omar are still in Afghanistan.
"We still believe they're in the country," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "We're still operating on that basis."
Asked at a Pentagon news briefing whether he would concede that Mr. bin Laden, who is accused of masterminding the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and Mullah Omar, the Taliban spiritual leader, had simply "vanished," the Secretary rejected that term.
"They know where they are. They know who they are. They know we're looking for them," Mr. Rumsfeld said.
For a moment, the secretary seemed to lose patience with the subject. "Pursuing this is fruitless, orally," he said, quickly adding that the American-led military campaign in Afghanistan still includes pursuing Mr. bin Laden and Mullah Omar on the ground.
Mr. Rumsfeld said he continued to see a lot of intelligence on the possible whereabouts of the two men. "It's all specific," he said. "Most of it is wrong, but it's all specific."
Asked whether he was confident that the United States would eventually capture the two, he said, "I certainly believe we will."
Mr. Rumsfeld said, as he had many times, that the campaign in Afghanistan is about much more than capturing two terrorists. "We've tried from the outset not to personalize this," he said.
That may be true, from Mr. Rumsfeld's standpoint, but President Bush said just after the Sept. 11 attacks that the United States wanted Osama bin Laden "dead or alive."
In recent weeks, speculation about Mr. bin Laden, and to a lesser extent Mullah Omar, has raised the possibilities that they may have escaped to Pakistan, may still be hiding in Afghanistan or may already be dead and entombed in the caves that American bombers have obliterated.
With essentially nothing new to say about Mr. bin Laden and Mullah Omar, Mr. Rumsfeld reiterated the theme that the campaign to root out terrorism is more ambitious than ousting the Taliban and smashing Al Qaeda's terror network.
"If we have to go into 15 more countries, we ought to do it to deal with the problem of terrorism," Mr. Rumsfeld said, "so we don't allow this problem to damage and kill tens and thousands more people."
--------
U.S. Says More Weapons Sites Found in Afghanistan
January 16, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-attack-military.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. forces in Afghanistan found more evidence Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network was seeking chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, and the number of sites to inspect is growing, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Wednesday.
The United States does not have evidence that al Qaeda has acquired weapons of mass destruction but the materials indicate they wanted to use such deadly items, he said.
``In terms of having hard evidence of actual possession of weapons of mass destruction, I do not have that at this stage,'' Rumsfeld told a Pentagon media briefing.
Canisters found in Afghanistan initially appeared not to contain deadly chemicals, but would be brought back to the United States for further testing, a military spokesman said.
``We have not tested them completely yet. We are going to bring them back to the States and test them,'' Army Col. Rick Thomas, a spokesman for Central Command which is running U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, told Reuters.
``We don't think there is anything in there, but until the tests are done, we just can't say with certainty,'' he said.
Two canisters unearthed about a week ago by a British engineering firm clearing mines near Kabul had the skull and crossbones symbol on them as well as warnings in Russian that referred to nuclear material, Thomas said.
Rumsfeld said earlier the canisters were believed to contain chemicals and that ``externally they appear to be weapons of mass destruction.''
The number of suspected chemical, biological and nuclear weapon sites in Afghanistan is growing and U.S. forces are now targeting more than 50, about 10 more than they have already inspected, Rumsfeld said.
``The number of facilities keeps going up,'' he said.
``We have found a number of things that show an appetite for weapons of mass destruction -- diagrams, materials, reports that things were asked for, things were discussed at meetings,'' Rumsfeld said.
One site registered an elevated level of radioactivity but it appeared to be a result of depleted uranium on some warheads and not from any nuclear or radiological weapon of mass destruction, Rumsfeld said.
Depleted uranium is a heavy metal that can pierce armor and has small levels of radioactivity associated with it.
U.S. forces found some missiles with depleted uranium warheads in the Kandahar area near the end of December, Thomas said. It was not known where al Qaeda obtained those weapons.
BIN LADEN HUNT
The U.S. military pressed on with the hunt for bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, getting help from Afghans and partner countries to locate them.
The United States accuses bin Laden of masterminding the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington that killed more than 3,000 people, and blames the Taliban for harboring him.
Despite a bombing campaign that began on Oct. 7 and targeted Taliban and al Qaeda sites, bin Laden and Mullah Omar appear to have escaped unscathed.
The two men are still believed to be in Afghanistan, but many reports citing locations for them have turned out to be wrong, Rumsfeld said.
``We still believe they're in the country. We're still working on that basis, although we are looking some other places as well, from time to time,'' he said.
``We've got Afghan people working on it. We've got Americans working on it. We've got other countries' special forces working on it,'' Rumsfeld said.
``It is a very difficult thing to find one or two or three or 12 or 15 or 20 specific human beings,'' he said.
The U.S. military is preparing to transfer to Pakistan about 90 detainees of Pakistani origin who are being held in Afghanistan, Pentagon officials said.
The number of al Qaeda and Taliban detainees held by U.S. forces in Afghanistan is 403, while an additional 80 are being held at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Military intelligence officers are questioning a man at a U.S. base in Kandahar who voluntarily came to the Americans offering to provide key information on al Qaeda and the Taliban, U.S. defense officials said.
The man claimed to have been a major financial contributor to the former Taliban leadership in Afghanistan, and he is not being held as a ``detainee,'' the officials said.
``We don't have much on the guy right now,'' a defense official told Reuters in Washington. ``He showed up at the gate and offered to talk. You know how that is in Afghanistan; things are not always as they appear to be.''
-------- arms sales
Indian Air Force may procure Russian stealth: Jane's
H S Rao London,
January 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR16.asp
The Indian Air Force (IAF) is believed to be considering adding stealth modifications to its MiG-21Bs fighters in order to upgrade them to MiG-21-93 standard, a leading defence weekly has said.
Recommendations in this regard were made by the Russian Aircraft Corporation after trials 18 months ago at Sokol aircraft plant in Nizhniy Novgorod in Russia, during which Russian stealth capabilities were showcased to Indian Defence Ministry officials.
On May 29, 2000, a series of demonstration flights were conducted at the Sokol airfield - co-located with production facilities for MIG-29 (Fulcrum) and MIG-31 (Foxhound) fighter-interceptors.
The purpose of the trials was to demonstrate the effectiveness of radar-absorbent materials (RAM) and coatings developed at the Moscow Institute of Applied and Theoretical Electrodynamics, the Janes Defence Weekly reported in its latest issue.
A total of 125 IAF MIG-21Bis are being upgraded under the MiG-21-93 programme, which is being carried out by Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) in co-operation with Sokol Nizhegorodsky Aviastroitelnyi Zavod AO (Sokol Nizhniy Novgorod Aircraft Manufacturing Plant JSC) under a 340 million US dollars contract of 1996.
The principal features are modernised avionics suite that includes the Phazotron Kopyo multi-mode radar and the ability to utilise advanced air-to-air and air-to-ground ordnance, the weekly said. (PTI)
----
US okays Phalcon sale
CHIDANAND RAJGHATTA
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16, 2002
http://www.timesofindia.com/Articleshow.asp?art_id=1085939400
WASHINGTON: The White House on Tuesday clarified that it supported the sale by Israel to India of the Phalcon Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) and Arrow anti-missile systems.
Seemingly overriding objections from the State Department, White House officials told their Indian counterparts that Washington did not oppose the transaction. If anything they were a little concerned about the timing of the sale.
Unnamed State Department officials had expressed opposition to the sales on Monday, queering the pitch ahead of Defence Minister George Fernandes' visit to Washington starting Wednesday. Indian officials sought clarifications from the administration and were told that the US had in principle no objections to Israel fulfilling its contractual obligations.
A senior Indian defence official told this correspondent that India had from the very outset told Israel that the deal would go ahead only if Tel Aviv could ensure that there would not be any problems with Washington. Close military ties between Israel and US, especially in areas of weapons research and development, often results in Washington exercising tight oversight on Israeli arms sales to other countries.
The surmise here is that the unnamed State Department official who expressed reservations about the sale was not articulating US policy but expressing the views of the non-proliferation lobby. The official had wondered why anyone would sell anything to India and Pakistan 'other than chewing gum' at this point when tension in the region was so high.
While India has plentiful supply of chewing gum - thanks also to a Wrigley's plant outside Bangalore - the remarks had put a crimp on Fernandes' visit during which New Delhi hopes to explore the possibility of acquiring US technology platforms such as the P3C Orion maritime surveillance aircraft and engines for the Light Combat Aircraft.
While Fernandes was not coming with any shopping list, the senior defence official said the same principle - a steady, uncomplicated, and sustained defence relationship - would mark any Indian decision to acquire weapons and technology from the United States. Evidently, New Delhi is extremely wary of the US system of arms sales that involves complicated inter-agency processes and pulls in the White House, Pentagon, State Department, Congress, and even the Department of Commerce.
Even as the White House gave the go ahead to the arms sales, Secretary of State Colin Powell was altering his earlier stand that suggested Musharraf was acting on his words and it was incumbent on India to stand down its troops. He told reporters on board a special aircraft carrying him to the region that de-escalation would follow automatically once the political process initiated by Pakistan took form.
"The important thing is to get a political decision of the kind that we have now (from Pakistan) and keep it in place. As long as that is the case, then the presence of forces forward deployed is not as great a problem as if we didn't have some success along a diplomatic track," Powell said.
"In due course, if we have success, these de-escalatory steps will follow in, I think, a normal, natural scheme of things," he added. The remarks were more in tune with the Indian view that preferred to wait and watch how Pakistan's political turnaround will translate on the ground before asking its forces to stand down.
The softening of stand on the two issues smoothes the path for Fernandes, whose maverick politics and remarkable personality has kept him far away from a system and ethos he rebelled against much of his life.
In many ways the United States too is just getting to know the region and the players. Like Home Minister Advani, who last came to the US as a leader of the opposition in 1992 before his visit last week, Fernandes too is a relative stranger to America. In fact, it is not known when he last visited here.
One official hazarded a guess that he transited through New York in October 2000 while visiting one of his brothers who lives in Canada. The last Indian Defence Minister to visit Washington was Sharad Pawar in 1993, another official said.
Powell, who left for the sub-continent on Tuesday, is also finding his feet in the region. During his last visit to New Delhi some weeks back, Powell said he had never visited India before because no one had invited him. Even more remarkable, Powell will be the first US Secretary of State ever to visit Nepal when he touches down in Kathmandu after his New Delhi visit en route Japan.
While Powell navigates the treacherous diplomatic minefield of the region, Fernandes will be taking to Washington with gusto.
Officials said he got along 'famously' with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld during the latter's visit to New Delhi last year. Both men are said to be blunt and direct, "unencumbered by the kind of diplomatic baggage and niceties state department officials have to carry."
Besides Rumsfeld, Fernandes is also slated to meet National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice at the White House (without the now famous Bush 'drop-in') and Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. He will also do a slew of media appearances. CNN's Larry King, who had offered to host him on Friday night, backed off, but Fernandes will appear on other CNN slots.
PTI adds from New Delhi: India has sought clarification from the US on certain statements made by State Department officials on the proposed sale of Phalcon aircraft warning systems.
"We have sought further clarification from Washington," an external affairs ministry spokesperson told reporters here on Wednesday. "The deal is to go ahead," she added.
----
US to present diesel submarines concepts to Taiwan
Story by Andrea Shalal-Esa,
Reuters
16/1/2002
http://www.planetark.org/avantgo/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=14047
WASHINGTON - The U.S. Navy hopes to present the Taiwanese government with up to four "preferred concepts" in February or March for building eight diesel-powered submarines, a U.S. defense official said this week.
"The U.S. Navy is in the course of evaluating concepts, and next month or the month after we hope to present three or four preferred concepts to the Taiwanese," said David Des Roches, spokesman for the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency.
President George W. Bush in April approved the sale of eight diesel-powered submarines to Taiwan as part of a huge arms deal that drew sharp criticism from China.
The biggest arms deal with Taipei since 1992, it also included four Kidd-class destroyers, 12 anti-submarine p-3 "Orion" aircraft and other high-tech weapons.
U.S. companies have not made diesel submarines since the 1950s. The Netherlands and Germany make diesel submarines but have said they will not be part of a U.S. deal with Taiwan for fear of angering China.
Some defense experts have warned that the cost to U.S. manufacturers of starting from scratch with a diesel submarine design could be prohibitive. Coupled with financial pressures in Taiwan, some have speculated that Taipei could decide against acquiring the submarines after all.
But John Tkacik, a research fellow at the Washington-based Heritage Foundation, said U.S. companies had expressed confidence in their ability to come up with a design for the diesel-powered submarines on their own.
Tkacik said he expected the deal to proceed, despite opposition from the U.S. Navy, which has nuclear-powered submarines and does not want to find itself in the position of having to purchase diesel-powered submarines.
DIESEL OR NUCLEAR POWER?
He noted that diesel-powered electric submarines were far cheaper and quieter than nuclear-powered submarines, which made them useful for special operations missions. But they can only stay submerged for several weeks at a time, instead of the six-month duration for nuclear submarines.
He said Taiwan might have other political priorities, but building submarines was a military must. "This is one thing they can't do without," Tkacik said.
Randy Belote, a spokesman for Northrop Grumman Corp., said his company had presented its "concept paper" for building the diesel submarines to the U.S. Navy and was awaiting word on the program's future.
"We have the capability and the capacity to produce diesel electric subs and we just stand ready to learn the direction of the program and help if we're called upon by the U.S. government," he said.
Defense officials said the Naval Sea Systems Command and the Navy International Program Office are evaluating the concept papers they received from Northrop and six other U.S. and international companies in November.
But some officials remained skeptical, saying Taiwan could well back away from the deal if it becomes too costly, especially if the Dutch refuse to allow use of their design.
"The Taiwanese may have to fund the complete development of diesel submarine from start to finish, and that could be a very, very, very expensive proposition," said one defense official, who asked not to be named.
Northrop's Ingalls Shipyard won a contract in 2000 to build two diesel submarines for the Egyptian Navy, using the Netherland's RDM Moray-class design.
Some experts have said a modified version of that design could be used to build the Taiwanese submarines, although the Netherland's refusal to cooperate could pose a problem.
But Belote said he did not believe the design issue would be a major obstacle. "I don't think the design matter is a show-stopper," he said.
----
Court spurns lawsuit on guns as 'nuisance'
By Stephen Dinan
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
January 16, 2002
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20020116-14696488.htm
A federal appeals court ruled last week that Philadelphia may not sue the gun industry for creating a "public nuisance."
The decision is the most recent action on one of 30 similar lawsuits winding through federal and state courts. Counties, cities and states have sued gun manufacturers to recoup costs they say they've incurred from having to prevent, clean up after, and care for the victims of gun violence. They argue that gun manufacturers failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the violence.
But the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed with Philadelphia, ruling Friday that to link manufacturers to what someone eventually does with the gun is too big a leap.
"The causal chain is too attenuated to make out a public-nuisance claim," Judge Morton I. Greenberg wrote in the unanimous opinion for the three-judge panel.
Instead, he said, someone who was injured, or the family of someone who was killed, may have a better claim - which is exactly the tack taken by gun-control proponents in a case from Chicago, which the Illinois Appellate Court ruled on Dec. 31 could proceed.
Gun-control advocates have high hopes for the Illinois case, which argues that manufacturers have flooded the gun market in the Chicago suburbs, knowing that the firearms will make their way into the city, where their sale is illegal.
The appeals court ruled that the industry as a whole could not be held liable - a victory for gun manufacturers - but also ruled that in cases where a gun is tied to a crime, a victim or victim's family can sue the specific manufacturer.
The firearms industry will probably appeal the decision to the state Supreme Court, while the city of Philadelphia is considering whether to appeal Friday's ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
So far, firearms makers have had some solid successes in defending themselves.
"The great majority of the cases have been dismissed, and those dismissals have been upheld in appellate courts now," said Jeff Reh, general counsel to Beretta USA, one of the defendants in many of the cases. Lawrence G. Keane, general counsel to the Hunting and Shooting Sports Heritage Fund, said the Illinois decision "stands by itself in the wilderness."
But losing just one case could have a major impact on some manufacturers.
"It only really takes one case to go forward and be decided the wrong way," said James Jay Baker, executive director of the National Rifle Association's Institute for Legislative Action. "This is not a cash-rich industry, and they've already spent inordinate amounts of money defending these suits, which is basically one of the reasons these suits were brought in the first place."
For their part, gun-control advocates have hope - and plenty more opportunities for cases - on their side. By their count, they are about 50-50 in getting lawsuits to proceed.
"These are new cases," Brian J. Siebel, a senior lawyer at the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. "It's always difficult in any area of the law when you're breaking new ground, but they're sound cases and a number of courts have recognized that."
To avoid more lawsuits, the industry has convinced legislatures in 27 states to pass laws prohibiting cities and counties from suing gun manufacturers under public-nuisance laws. Opponents say the industry's success in getting laws passed shows they are afraid of what the cases could mean in the hands of a jury.
-------- asia
Powell Says South Asia War Must Be Averted
January 16, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-southasia.html
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (Reuters) - Secretary of State Colin Powell Wednesday hailed Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's weekend peace-making speech and said the United States would assist in talks with India to prevent war if asked.
``We really cannot have a war in South Asia and we have to find a way to work through this crisis,'' Powell told Pakistani state television on the first leg of a shuttle around South Asia aimed at easing military tensions on the Pakistan-India border.
His aim in India and Pakistan is to build on a relative reduction in friction since military ruler Musharraf Saturday met more of India's demands for a crackdown on militant Islamists attacking Indian forces in disputed Kashmir.
Describing that address as ``bold and seminal,'' Powell added that President Bush had invited Musharraf to visit in the near future and foreign ministers were discussing dates.
``We hope that President Musharraf's speech, and action to implement what was in that speech, will go a long way toward lowering tensions in the region,'' Powell said.
He said he had certain ideas to present to India, but was tight-lipped on the details.
``We need a campaign against terrorism, not a campaign with these two countries fighting one another,'' he said, referring to a U.S.-led war on terrorism, which both India and Pakistan support, declared after the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington.
``UNCHARACTERISTICALLY POSITIVE''
Pakistani Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar said he welcomed what he called India's ``uncharacteristically positive'' response to Musharraf's address to the nation, but said the deployment of the armies of the two nuclear powers was reason for anxiety.
Powell's visit was prompted in part by India's deployment of its army along the border after a Dec. 13 attack on its parliament in New Delhi.
``All of us have reason to be anxious because the forces are poised on the border,'' Sattar told a news conference. ``Even a small incident can spark a chain of events that is not in the interest of peace.''
India blamed the attack on the heart of its power on Pakistan-based militants fighting its rule in its portion of Kashmir. Pakistan condemned the raid in which 14 people died.
Their war of words, tit-for-tat sanctions that saw a cut in air, road and rail links and the huge military build-up have brought the two countries close to full-scale war. Their last all-out conflict was in 1971.
A total of 1,957 hard-line militants, most of them from five groups Musharraf outlawed Saturday, have been rounded up and 650 group offices have been shut, according to authorities.
Pakistan wants Indian troops to withdraw. India says the Pakistanis have not yet done enough to warrant a stand-down.
Powell said the challenge facing Pakistan and India was for the neighbors, who have fought three wars since independence in 1947, to resolve their differences through talks.
``I appreciate the minister's statement that they are ready, Pakistan is ready, for such a dialogue to begin,'' Powell told the news conference.
The United States would not mediate, but would do anything ''to get the two sides talking on all issues between them, and one such issue is Kashmir,'' Powell said.
``We stand ready to assist but it has to be a dialogue between the two sides,'' he said, adding that they must ask for such assistance. India has refused to discuss the issue of the Himalayan region of Kashmir with Pakistan at the table.
Islamabad is Powell's first stop on a five-nation trip that includes Afghanistan, India, Nepal and Japan, the venue for an Afghanistan reconstruction conference next week.
INSTANT RESPONSE, NO CHANGE ON KASHMIR
The two sides have been trading almost daily fire across the border in recent weeks and dozens of people on both sides have been killed and wounded.
But a Pakistani army officer said it was quiet along a cease-fire line separating the rivals in Kashmir Wednesday for the second straight day.
Musharraf Tuesday promised an instant response if India eased border tension but insisted Pakistan would never abandon political, diplomatic and moral support for what it sees as a legitimate struggle for self-determination by the people of Kashmir.
``India has to start the de-escalation and Pakistan will respond instantly,'' the official APP news agency quoted Musharraf as saying in a speech to a committee formed to publicize the long-standing Kashmir dispute.
The seemingly intractable Kashmir problem has haunted ties between India and Pakistan since their creation from former British India in 1947. Two of their three wars have been fought over the Himalayan region, India's only Muslim-majority state.
India rules 45 percent of the region, Pakistan just over a third and China the rest. Muslim separatist violence erupted in Indian-ruled Kashmir in 1989, and tens of thousands of people have been killed.
-------- britain
Straw warns US over treatment of Britons in Cuba
War on terrorism
By Jason Bennetto and Andrew Buncombe
16 January 2002
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=114688
At least four more Britons are to be sent to the US military prison on Cuba to join three other British citizens accused of fighting with the Taliban and the al-Qa'ida network in Afghanistan.
The new suspects are due to arrive at the naval base in Guantanamo Bay in shackles, manacles and hoods in the next few days.
The Britons are among several dozen men accused of fighting for Osama bin Laden's terror organisation who are being interrogated by the Americans at Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo Bay.
Officers from the intelligence agencies MI5 and MI6 have already questioned the British prisoners in Afghanistan about their links with the UK, and their recruitment and training.
Human rights groups have voiced concerns that the conditions in the Cuban camp are inhumane, with prisoners being locked in outdoor cages. Amnesty International has called their treatment "cruel, degrading and inhumane".
The American authorities had already passed on the names of three prisoners being held in Cuba who claim to be British. British diplomats based in Washington are being sent to Cuba to interview the Britons to obtain information about their family backgrounds. A spokesman for the Foreign Office said yesterday that this process could take several weeks and refused to disclose any names until the next of kin had been informed.
Jack Straw, the Home Secretary, said: "These people ... are accused of having been members of the most dangerous terrorist organisation which the world has ever seen. That does not mean for a second that they do not have rights, and where they are British citizens it is our responsibility to ensure that they receive those rights.
"Whether or not technically they have rights under the Geneva Convention, they have rights in customary international law, and all of us who are either involved as their representatives as their governments or those holding them have obligations."
Mr Straw said he had told Colin Powell, the American Secretary of State, in a telephone conversation on Saturday that Britain would complain to the US if the conditions the prisoners were being kept in were unsatisfactory.
The Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Michael Moore said: "The British Government must persuade the United States to uphold international law. There is little point in gaining the high moral ground during the conflict only to give it up as we move towards peace."
Senior Labour MPs urged the Government to take a tougher stand. Doug Henderson, a former armed forces minister, said: "If we're representing civilised society, we've got to uphold the norms, rules and legal obligations of civilised society."
Ian Acheson, executive director of Prisoners Abroad, said: "The Geneva Convention is in place to protect prisoners of war against inhuman treatment, yet in this case, the uncertain status of these Britons provides no means to verify international standards of treatment."
The first British prisoner was sent to Cuba from Afghanistan on Friday, with 19 other men captured by the anti- Taliban forces. Two more British men were among 30 who were transported to the base yesterday.
Only a small number of men claiming to be British citizens have been captured in Afghanistan.
Both Britain and America are keen to avoid the sort of frenzied publicity that surrounded the identification of the young American Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh. It is believed that Mr Lindh is still being held on a US warship in the Indian Ocean, where he is being interrogated. There has been a huge debate in America over what should happen to him.
The International Committee of the Red Cross is to be given access to the prisoners in the Cuban camp later this week.
America has rejected reports that all the prisoners were sedated as a security precaution before being placed on the transport planes that brought them from Afghanistan. A spokeswoman said the only prisoners who had been sedated were those who were suffering from injuries causing them pain.
One prisoner required an operation on a month-old gunshot injury. Naval doctors at the base operated to open and drain the wound. A statement released by officials at the base said the procedure took about two hours and "the detainee remained under tight security throughout". It added: "The detainee was alert and stable at the time of surgery, and doctors explained the nature of the procedure to the detainee before performing surgery. The incision and drainage took approximately two hours for two Navy orthopaedic surgeons to complete."
----
Deborah Orr: Is this what we call winning the war?
'Europe, with its bleeding heart whinges about international law, is being seen in America as pathetically liberal'
16 January 2002
http://argument.independent.co.uk/regular_columnists/deborah_orr/story.jsp?story=114629
Before the war on terrorism had started, plenty of people were mustering, asking for it to stop. Before the Taliban had been deposed, people were still shouting, still waving placards. Before Osama bin Laden had dropped off the radar, campaigners were still willing to take to the streets. Now though, just when the exhortation to Stop The War seems to be most persuasive and appropriate, no one is campaigning much any more.
Isn't this a little strange?
While the Taliban were still in power, refusing to hand over Mr bin Laden, fostering al-Qa'ida, oppressing and starving millions, civilian casualties of the coalition bombing were widely reported, and much discussed. Now the Taliban are routed, Mr bin Laden is considered to have fled the country and an interim government is in place, charged with getting a democratic Afghanistan on its feet, and snappily. Yet, the bombs are still dropping and Afghans are still dying.
And the rights and wrongs of the continuing war itself are no longer greatly discussed. Instead the entire focus of those concerned with human rights is trained on the possible rough treatment of the prisoners the US is presently exporting to Cuba. There have been complaints about everything from their lowly status as mere "unlawful combatants" to the possibility that hearsay evidence might be allowed in the military tribunals.
Across the Atlantic, once more, such petty hair-splitting is being greeted with disbelief. America is again outraged by the concern that the world, especially Europe, is showing for these captured terrorists who have been identified, after intensive interrogation by the CIA, as senior figures in al-Qa'ida or the Taliban.
And, indeed, there is mileage in the idea that these questions are sometimes prompted by what can seem like excessive identification with the miscreants rather than their victims.
There is much worry, for example, that some prisoners may have had their beards removed, against their religious beliefs. Culturally insensitive as one could argue that to be, the truth is that it's an unsubstantiated rumour, floating around in a situation characterised by more concrete procedural concerns. Making such a big deal of it at this stage could just as easily be seen as culturally insensitive to Americans, for whom facial hair is simply facial hair, a free choice like so many others in life.
Further, the fuss being made about the human rights of the al-Qa'ida suspects can appear to be so much greater than that afforded not just to Afghan civilians, but to poor wretches around the world all the time. It must almost seem, Stateside, that human rights activists get more steamed up about the treatment of the guilty than that of the innocent. The cage-cells that contravene so many human rights in Guantanamo Bay, for example, were initially built to house Haitian and Cuban boat people. If the world didn't win the argument against the cages then, why should it be so much more important to do so now?
As for some of the dancing-on-the-head-of-a-pin-type debate, it really can seem like winning the argument is more important than the violation of humans. Take the comment by Neil Durkin, of Amnesty International: "There are quite low levels of the definition of torture. Hooding could be a breach of it."
This really must just seem to the Americans like any technicality will be held against them.
These sorts of arguments are too devilishly wrapped up in detail anyway, to concern the US majority. That attitude is summed up in the President's own statement regarding the treatment of prisoners. He said: "Whatever the procedures are for military tribunals, our system will be a lot more fair than the system of bin Laden and the Taliban. The prisoners that we capture will be given a heck of a lot better chance in court than those citizens of ours who were in the World Trade Centre or the Pentagon were given by Mr bin Laden."
And of course this is true. But that doesn't stop the present situation from being murkily confusing and contradictory. A couple of weeks ago, the official line was that John Walker Lindh, the Californian 20-year-old who was captured fighting with the Taliban at Mazar-i-Sharif, was not entitled to access to a lawyer because he was a prisoner of war.
Now, the prisoners in Cuba, including three Britons, are not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Convention because they are not considered prisoners of war.
Clearly the US is making quite a lot up as it goes along, the attitude being that anything goes, since al-Qa'ida is so despicable that anything done in the name of quashing it must be right. This is, once again, an interesting and paradoxical position for the US to take. One must accept that what the US wants to do is Right and that any dissenting voice is Wrong. This is, believe many Americans, the fundamental way in which the world changed after the events of 11 September.
To this nation under fire, Right and Wrong is identified with conservative values, the kind of values which compelled America in its uncompromising response to the atrocities. Moral relativism is what has been displayed by the peaceniks, the enemies of America, the liberals, the lefties, who more than even the Taliban have become the people who must be beaten.
The analysis, US conservatives argue, is borne out by the case of John Walker Lindh himself. America's Taliban member - expected to face trial in the US - is the product of an upbringing so cringeingly liberal that even after his capture his father announced: "We want to give him a big hug and then a little kick in the butt for not telling us what he was up to."
Now this liberal upbringing, with its lack of moral guidance, and its failure to punish wrongdoing, is being held up as some kind of blueprint for breeding a fundamentalist, or at the very least apologists for fundamentalists such as anti-war types.
Europe, with its bleeding-heart whingeing about international law and cavils about capital punishment, is being seen as pathetically liberal. Europe, in America's eyes, wants to give all of the "battlefield detainees" a big hug and a little kick in the butt.
But what's been odd all the way about this war that takes no prisoners of war is that, in general, its prosecutors have been the ones employing moral relativism, not its opponents. Every action has to be judged not on its own moral merits, but with reference to the actions of the Taliban and al-Qa'ida. Even now, the holding up of Mr bin Laden as some kind of benchmark against which President Bush invites the world to judge his treatment of prisoners, is deeply unsettling.
How can all behaviour that is superior to Mr bin Laden's suddenly be imbued with rectitude? It makes no sense for America to judge its actions, and invite them to be judged, in comparison to those of an evil and outrageous enemy.
Instead, it does make sense for a world which is supposed to be engaged in a war against terrorism, rather than wiping out a single criminal gang, to be agreed about how the prisoners of that war should be treated and what kind of status they should be accorded. What has to be thrashed out here is what is Right and what is Wrong. Frank Lindh and Marilyn Walker are charged with having failed to do that with their son. It's quite an irony that the US wants to dodge that issue too.
Treatment of prisoners of war, battlefield detainees, unlawful combatants, whatever it is they're called, is about setting a moral benchmark, agreeing to a standard of humanity that marks those who fall below it as immoral. And "a lot more fair than the system of bin Laden and the Taliban" just isn't good enough.
d.orr@independent.co.uk
-------- chemical weapons
Scepticism grows as chemicals disappear
By Mark Baker, Correspondent in Kuala Lumpur
Sydney Morning Herald,
Thursday, January 17, 2002
http://www.smh.com.au/news/0201/17/world/world2.html
Malaysian authorities admitted they have failed to track down a large stockpile of weapons chemicals amid growing scepticism about the extent of an alleged network of al-Qaeda terrorist sympathisers operating across South-East Asia.
The Deputy Prime Minister, Abdullah Badawi, said four tonnes of ammonium nitrate allegedly smuggled into Malaysia to build bombs by members of a militant group arrested in Singapore last week had now disappeared.
"The police know that the materials were brought into our country, but at this time they are not here. They have been sent out and we don't know where," Mr Abdullah said. He also said it was not known where the chemicals had been stored while they were in Malaysia.
Singapore officials earlier claimed the chemicals had been stockpiled in southern Malaysia by one of 13 members of the clandestine group Jemaah Islamiah arrested in Singapore last week and accused of links with al-Qaeda.
The officials said the group had tried to procure 21 tonnes of ammonium nitrate to build truck bombs to attack the United States embassy and other American targets in Singapore.
Singapore authorities claim Jemaah Islamiah is led by Indonesian Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir and has cells operating in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. But Indonesian officials say they have no evidence of an al-Qaeda network operating in the country.
Malaysia has arrested about 40 people since last August in a crackdown on alleged Islamic militants and Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad claimed on Friday that 50 Malaysians had now been identified as having links with al-Qaeda.
But Mr Abdullah's admission that the alleged stockpile of ammonium nitrate has disappeared, and the Government's failure to detail its case against the arrested terrorist suspects, has reinforced suspicions among diplomats and opposition leaders that the issue is being exaggerated for political purposes. "A lot of sensational allegations are being made but so far there has been no evidence to substantiate any of it," one senior diplomat based in Kuala Lumpur, said.
The leader of the opposition Keadilan Party, Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, said she believed many of the arrests were part of a scare campaign by the Government ahead of a crucial weekend by-election in the northern state of Perlis.
"The events of September 11 have given Dr Mahathir the justification for further oppression and to stifle any dissenting voices. He now has the perfect excuse to take people under the ISA [Internal Security Act]," she said.
Police claim many of those detained under the ISA are members of Kumpulan Militan Malaysia, a previously unknown group linked to unsolved bombings, robberies and the murder of a state MP.
"What we know is these people admitted they were trained in Afghanistan by the Taliban and by the group of Osama bin Laden. As far as we know, their intentions are very bad, namely to create trouble and to try and overthrow the Government by terrorist means," Dr Mahathir said last week. But he admitted the operations of KMM members had not been clearly established. "Whether they have become a cell in Malaysia or not, or whether they have been working independently, we don't know," he said.
One of the men recently arrested in Malaysia had met two of the September 11 plane hijackers less than a year beforehand, a source close to the investigation said last week.
-------- drug war
Afghanistan bans opium poppy cultivation
Reuters Kabul,
January 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR64.asp
Afghanistan, one of the world's main sources of opium, on Wednesday banned the cultivation of opium poppy and trafficking in opium and all its derivatives, including heroin.
The decree renewed a ban issued by the former Taliban leadership in 2000 that effectively disappeared with the collapse of the Muslim fundamentalist movement last November.
"All countrymen, especially peasants and farmers, are informed that, from now on, the cultivation, manufacturing, processing, impermissible use, smuggling and trafficking of opium poppy and all its derivatives is declared illegal," said the statement.
Despite the Taliban ban, which slashed Afghan opium production from 3,276 tonnes in 2000 to a mere 185 tonnes last year, Afghan farmers still have large stocks of opium and heroin that they can supply to the world market for some time to come, United Nations drug officials say.
----
Aerial Herbicide War on Drugs Poisons Land, Water
January 15, 2002
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-15-04.html
SAN FRANCISCO, California, The public interest environmental law firm Earthjustice today called on the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to pressure the United States and Colombia to halt the aerial application of herbicides to eradicate coca and poppy plants and use alternative methods.
Since the spraying began, said Earthjustice, there have been thousands of reports of serious health problems, destruction of food crops and livestock, contamination of surface water, damage to surrounding wilderness areas, and deforestation resulting from the need of peasants to clear forests and plant food crops on uncontaminated lands.
Earthjustice submitted the intervention with the support of the Amazon Alliance, an umbrella group of Amazonian peoples' organizations, and environmental and human rights groups.
The aerial spraying and drift of an herbicide mixture over vast areas of the Colombian and Ecuadorian countryside by private U.S. defense contractors with military protection is harming peasants and indigenous communities, the intervention states.
In the fall of 2000, the United States and Colombia began an intensive aerial herbicide application program to eradicate coca and poppy crops in drug producing areas of Colombia as part of an anti-narcotics initiative called Plan Colombia.
The U.S. Department of State says the decision to use aerial spraying is justified because "herbicide application by airplane is the most cost effective way of coping with the magnitude of the problem and ensuring that eradication operations do not turn violent."
This strategy in the war on drugs deprives the affected residents of Colombia and Ecuador of "their rights to a clean and healthy environment, health, life, sustenance, property, inviolability of the home and family, and access to information," said the petitioning groups. The aerial spraying has also drawn objections from 141 scientists, physicians, environmental and human rights groups from across the United States and around the world. Last August, they wrote an Open Letter to the U.S. Senate which said, "From an environmental perspective, applying a concentrated broad spectrum herbicide over delicate tropical ecosystems is almost certain to cause significant damage. Moreover, human health impacts from a concentrated mixture are obviously more likely."
Scott Pasternack, associate attorney with Earthjustice's International Program, said, "Sadly, the United States and Colombia are saying that this strategy is more important than the health, livelihood, and environment of Colombian and Ecuadorian rural communities."
The Earthjustice statement to the UN Commission on Human Rights lists health harms from the spraying that include "gastrointestinal disorders (e.g. severe bleeding, nausea, and vomiting), testicular inflammation, high fevers, dizziness, respiratory ailments, skin rashes, and severe eye irritation. The spraying may also have caused birth defects and miscarriages."
The spraying has destroyed more than 1,500 hectares (3,700 acres) of legal food crops such as yucca, corn, plantains, tomatoes, sugar cane, grass for livestock grazing and fruit trees, said Earthjustice, and has resulted in the death of cows and chickens.
"Regarding environmental harms," the petition said, "the spraying has parched wilderness areas and caused deforestation and loss of critical habitat to endangered bird species because spray victims relocate to farm their legal crops. Other environmental harms include contamination of surface waters and death of fish."
"The State Department has concealed information about the true toxicity of the spray mixture and has failed to conduct proper environmental and health assessments," said Pasternack.
Earthjustice says the situation provides a clear example of the link between the environment and human rights - severe damage to the air, water, land and biodiversity caused by the spraying is violating various human rights.
-------- india
Fear and Flight in Deadly Kashmir
New York Times
January 16, 2002
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/international/asia/16KASH.html
NEROJAL, Jammu and Kashmir, Jan. 13 - One night two weeks ago, Gulshan Kumar Sharma heard a knock at the door and a voice calling out, "Didi" - older sister, in Hindi. When he answered, the 28-year-old Hindu farmer was gunned down on the threshold of his mud house.
Family members, neighbors and local officials attribute the killing to "militants," members of one of several Islamic outfits that regularly wreak havoc in these craggy, sparsely populated foothills of the Himalayas. Today, having finished the last rites, the others of Mr. Sharma's Hindu clan began a sorry, fearful exodus from this mostly Muslim area, trickling down from their hilltop homes with possessions - bedding, plastic water jugs and trunks - loaded on their backs.
"We have been here 10 generations," lamented the dead man's uncle, P. N. Sharma, 62, a reed of a man and a retired English teacher, as he made the 30-minute trek from his home down to the road. "We have been here during all three wars. We've never migrated."
With India and Pakistan facing the prospect of a fourth war, the story of the subcontinent's 54-year- old division between Hindus and Muslims is being played out in the remote hill towns of the Indian state of Kashmir, not in the epic communal unrest of the past but in small-scale, day-to-day savagery.
During the last 15 days, three members of a family were slain in another village in this district, called Rajouri. Before that, another two were slain in a house perched on a hill, more than three miles from the nearest road. In another village, four members of a family were killed in late December.
Two weeks ago in a village in the Poonch district, a three-hour drive from here, six members of a family, including a 6-month-old baby, were slaughtered just after sundown; a seventh member of the family is being treated in a hospital in Jammu. In another village in the same district, an elected village chief was killed last week.
The civilian administrator of the Poonch district, Ejaz Iqbal, says he hears of an incident every two or three days. Houses have been burned, too, another official said.
India is a mostly Hindu nation, and this portion of Kashmir is the country's only majority Muslim state. India and Pakistan have fought two of their three wars over Kashmir, and India is threatening to go to war again if Pakistan does not clamp down on Islamic insurgents who use Pakistan as a staging ground for a low-level insurgency against Indian forces here.
In the last few years, the militants who roamed the Kashmir valley have made this area their home. Mr. Iqbal believes that many of them come from the Pakistani side of Kashmir, where Pakistan's president has promised to rein in the militant groups. They make their forays through these thickly forested hills, which are nearly impossible to police, sowing mistrust, fear and sorrow for the people who live here, Hindus and Muslims who have lived side by side sometimes for generations.
Often, the victims are Hindus. Other times, they are Muslims, who are, or who are thought to be, sympathetic to the security forces. Sometimes the targets are, like Mr. Sharma, members of village defense committees, a relatively recent invention of the police, in which civilians are armed with rifles. Other times, like the family in the Poonch, the victims are those who have rejected the offer of arms.
Anxiety here has only grown in recent weeks, as soldiers and security officials who had been assigned to patrol these remote hamlets have been moved closer to the border and so-called Line of Control dividing India and Pakistan, said Anil Goswami, the Jammu district divisional commissioner who oversees the entire southern swath of this province.
The militants, whom he described as mostly Pakistani and natives of Pakistan-held Kashmir, had been given a freer reign to terrorize the local residents and foment what he called a communal conflagration. Thankfully, he added, nothing of the sort has happened. "They want to terrorize the Muslims into keeping quiet," he said. "They want to terrorize the Hindus and Sikhs into running away from their homes. That is the game plan."
The village defense committees have only sometimes succeeded at their task. Nor have the police or security forces, even when they are assigned to patrol areas with a vulnerable community, been able to stave off the attacks.
The hamlets in these hills are often four- or five-hour treks from the nearest road. The mud houses, painted turquoise blue in the local custom or adorned with intricate designs, are scattered far from one another amid terraced fields and banana trees. To visit a neighbor is often a long hike through these perilous hills.
"Why do the militants do these things? To create panic," Mr. Iqbal declared. "Sometimes, militants are used by the locals to sort out their problems. Sometimes, militants feel the people are army informants."
Last summer, in Kotdara, another village in Rajouri where members of Mr. Sharma's extended family live, there was a massacre. Sudesh Kumar Sharma, a resident of Kotdara, said the villagers still didn't know who was responsible. But he said a neighbor had given shelter to the gunmen.
Today, as he helped his kinfolk pack up and leave Nerojal, Mr. Sharma said there was "chaos and confusion" in the hamlet where his relatives lived. "Everybody's feeling unsafe in these circumstances," he said.
When the people of Nerojal begged the police for more protection, they were told there was no one available. Today, the police who had been stationed here since the killing joined them in leaving. They said they had received orders to pack up too, though they did not know where they would be sent.
As twilight approached, the Sharma household was frantic with last-minute packing, stuffing clothes into burlap sacks. But the Sharmas had no place to go, they said, save the streets and schoolyards of the nearest town, Rajouri.
Soon the trail through the hills was a sweating caravan of men and women carrying their cherished possessions down to the road, hurriedly. "There is every apprehension of a mass killing here," said the dead man's uncle, P. N. Sharma.
Just as sad, in his eyes, was that no one was leaving the Muslim houses. The Muslim neighbors had not come to the protection of his family, he said. But he bore no enmity. "It was beyond their power, because here, they're also victims," Mr. Sharma said. "If at all they do, they'll be massacred."
Fakiruddin Gujjar, 40, a Muslim farmer who lives on the next hill, had come to pay his respects at the Sharma home. He had urged them not to leave. But he said he knew that he could not protect them either.
"These are our neighbors; this is our home," he said, standing in their courtyard. "We cannot live without them."
----
Indian armed forces fully mobilised: Naval chief
The Times of India Online
AFP
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 16, 2002
http://www.timesofindia.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=1378430206
NEW DELHI: All three wings of the Indian armed forces remain fully mobilised and prepared for any conflict with rival Pakistan, naval chief Admiral Madhvendra Singh said on Wednesday.
"In accordance with the directive received from the government, all three wings of the armed forces are fully mobilised. We are ready," Singh told reporters.
"The ships are armed. The ships are provisioned. The ships are fuelled," he added.
India and Pakistan have been locked in a tense military stand-off since the December 13 attack on the Parliament.
Singh refused to confirm or deny whether his warships were armed with nuclear weapons, but added that for most nuclear capable countries, the most potent nuclear strike force was "hidden, moving and underwater."
Questioned on naval acquisitions, Singh said India was still negotiating the purchase of the Russian-made aircraft carrier Gorchkov.
"Discussions are going on between the Russians and the government of India. If and when both parties are happy a deal might be struck."
In the event a deal cannot be worked out, "we will have to plan indigenous manufacturing, but that will take time," Singh said, adding he knew of no other suitable carrier on the international market.
The Indian navy currently has only one aircraft carrier, Virat, following the decommissioning of its other carrier, Vikrant, five years ago.
Singh also said an anti-ship cruise missile being developed by India and Russia was "on schedule" and should be in service within two or three years.
The missile, which can be launched from a variety of platforms, including mobile launchers, ships, submarines and aircraft, uses propulsion technology from Russia and guidance know-how from India.
The missile was developed by BrahMos, a joint venture company formed between India's Defence Research and Development Organisation and Russia's State Unitary Enterprise NPO Mashinostroyenia in 1998.
It was test-fired in June.
-------- iraq
Russia Is Top Iraqi Importer
Moscow Rewarded for Helping Baghdad Skirt U.N. Embargo
By Colum Lynch
The Washington Post
Wednesday, January 16, 2002; Page A08
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51590-2002Jan15?language=printer
UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 15 -- Six months after Russia blocked a U.S. effort to overhaul U.N. sanctions against Iraq, Moscow has emerged as Baghdad's largest export customer, according to U.N. diplomats.
Russian companies have signed more than $4 billion in business deals with Baghdad as part of a 1996 arrangement that allows Iraq to sell oil to purchase food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies. In the last six months, Russia concluded more than $1.4 billion in trade under the U.N. program, surpassing Egypt and France as the top importers of Iraqi goods during the past five years, the diplomats said, citing confidential U.N. figures.
The expanding trade with Russia is the product of a long-standing Iraqi policy of rewarding companies from countries that help it circumvent an 11-year-old U.N. embargo imposed after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. It poses a major challenge for U.S. diplomats seeking Moscow's support for a plan to strengthen sanctions against Baghdad.
Iraq exported nearly $30 billion in high-quality crude to refineries in the United States, Europe and Asia over the past two years. Although the proceeds from Iraq's oil revenue are controlled by the United Nations, Baghdad retains the authority to choose its trade partners.
Iraq has used its financial muscle to undermine U.S. efforts to tighten sanctions and to guarantee a stream of nearly $2 billion a year in profit from smuggling and illicit oil sales that fall outside the control of the United Nations, according to diplomats. In the past year, it has steered billions of dollars in trade to countries that resist U.S. pressure.
For Syria, which has defied appeals by Secretary of State Colin L. Powell to subject Iraqi oil imports to U.N. control, trade with Iraq has tripled during the past six months, from $300 million in the first half of 2001 to $922 million during the second half of the year, according to U.N. diplomats. Syria imports about 180,000 barrels of Iraqi crude a day, said Walid Khadduri, editor in chief of the Middle East Economic Survey.
Under the oil-for-food program launched in December 1996, Iraq can sell oil and use the proceeds to purchase food and medicine and to rebuild the country's infrastructure. But the United States and other Security Council members can place "holds" on contracts for items they suspect are intended for the Iraqi military.
The United States has used that power to block nearly $5 billion worth of contracts this year, including about $900 million in Russian deals. But it has also demonstrated a willingness to release contracts for countries such as China that have thrown their support behind Washington's sanctions policy.
The Bush administration pledged last month to release more than $200 million in frozen Russian contracts as it sought Moscow's backing for an overhaul of U.N. sanctions policy against Baghdad, a senior U.S. official said.
"We've cleared out a dozen contracts valued at over $200 million," the official said.
The United States unfroze a $147 million deal between the Russian electrical power firm Technopromexport and Iraq on Jan. 9. Washington has assured Moscow that it will release an additional $60 million once it has provided additional paperwork on how the equipment will be used. It has also made it clear that Russian contracts will flow more swiftly if Moscow agrees to endorse a list of items with potential military applications that require Security Council approval before they can be sold.
"The Russians will be rewarded by the Americans if they accept the goods review list," said a council diplomat. "But if they do, they will probably be punished by the Iraqis."
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told Powell last year that the new U.S. sanctions policy was "a major threat to Russian trade and economic interests. We cannot allow it to pass."
Russian companies already control about one-third of Iraq's multibillion-dollar oil export market. The Russian government is trying to recover nearly $7 billion in loans made to Iraq in the 1980s for the purchase of Russian arms. Discussions between Moscow and Baghdad are underway for about $30 billion in future projects. And Russia recently signed a production-sharing agreement to export more than 600,000 barrels a day from the West Qurna oil field, Khadduri said. "At today's prices, that's about $2 billion a year," he said.
----
Iraq, fearing US attack, woos Arab neighbors
AFP Baghdad,
January 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR35.asp
Iraq, fearing a major US military strike, is multiplying overtures to Arab neighbors, including Saudi Arabia, with which it has been at loggerheads since the 1991 Gulf War.
"It is high time a new page was opened in inter-Arab ties and differences were forgotten, or shelved, in order to serve Palestine and the Arab nation," Ath-Thawra, mouthpiece of Iraq's ruling Baath Party, wrote on Wednesday.
Its plea for a thaw comes two days before Amr Mussa is due to become the second Arab League chief to visit Baghdad since the Gulf War.
Conciliation has been the order of the day for some weeks in Iraq, which has signaled its willingness to bury the hatchet even with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, the country it occupied for seven months in 1990-1991.
"There is a daily aggression against Iraq whose starting point is in Saudi Arabia. This is the only bone of contention, there's no other," Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri said earlier this week.
He was referring to the facilities granted by Riyadh to US and British warplanes enforcing a "no-fly zone" over southern Iraq. Sabri also said Baghdad was prepared to play host to Kuwaiti officials to discuss the issue of prisoners and people missing since the Gulf War, in which a US-led coalition evicted Iraqi troops from Kuwait.
On December 18, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein called on Arab leaders to put aside their differences and hold an emergency summit on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, preferably in the Saudi Muslim holy city of Mecca.
His call went unheeded, but Iraq has not tired of reiterating its backing for the regular Arab summit slated for March in Beirut, and whose venue has been put in question by a long-standing dispute between Lebanon's Shiite Muslim community and Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi.
By shelving its grievances against some fellow Arabs, Iraq is seeking to promote pan-Arab causes, said ath-Thawra.
Baghdad's conciliatory attitude "is not due to weakness on the part of Iraq, which has over the years shown its capacity for resistance" despite the UN embargo to which it has been subjected for more than 11 years, the paper said.
In an effort to circumvent the embargo, oil-rich Iraq has played the economic card with its neighbors, signing free trade accords with six Arab countries.
Iraqi Trade Minister Mohammad Mehdi Saleh said on Monday that Baghdad's trade with the six Gulf monarchies within the framework of the "oil-for-food" program introduced in 1996 stands at 6.5 billion dollars, or almost one-third of its trade with all Arab countries.
Total trade with Saudi Arabia topped one billion dollars, he said.
In the wake of the September 11 attacks on the United States, Arab governments have come under mounting US pressure to combat terrorism, and Iraq, widely seen as a potential target of Washington's "war on terror," seems keen to use the opportunity to reintegrate the Arab fold, Gulf analysts say.
"Ending disunity" among Arabs is liable to prompt the United States and Israel to "reconsider their attitude" toward the Arab world, the Iraqi government daily al-Jumhuriya said Wednesday.
-------- israel / palestine
2 Civilians From Israel Killed in Palestinian Militant Attacks
New York Times
January 16, 2002
By JAMES BENNET and JOEL GREENBERG
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/international/middleeast/16MIDE.html
BEIT JALA, West Bank, Jan. 15 - Avi Boaz never gave up his American citizenship after leaving Brooklyn for Israel in 1961, his family said. Mr. Boaz, who was Jewish, became a permanent resident of Israel, but he ignored political lines to design houses in this Palestinian town.
Today, he tried to cross one boundary too many. Palestinian gunmen kidnapped Mr. Boaz, 71, at a Palestinian checkpoint here, hijacking his car and forcing him to a lonely road above a soccer field in nearby Beit Sahur, where they shot him to death, Israeli Army officials said.
A few hours later, two Palestinian gunmen blocked a car as it turned into a gas station outside Givat Zeev, an area of northern Jerusalem that Palestinians consider a settlement. They opened fire, killing a 45-year- old Israeli woman, Yoela Chen, and wounding her aunt, the police said.
The two women were on their way to a wedding, the police said.
The killings were the first of civilians by Palestinian militants since Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader, called for a halt to all attacks on Dec. 16. Mr. Arafat's Palestinian Authority issued a statement condemning the killings and affirming its commitment to a cease-fire.
After weeks of relative calm in the West Bank, Palestinian militants threatened a return to mayhem after a hidden bomb on Monday killed Raed al-Karmi, a militia leader in the West Bank city of Tulkarm. The Israeli Army, which had tried to kill Mr. Karmi in the past, neither claimed nor denied responsibility for his death.
In an apparent effort to fend off Israeli reprisals, Palestinian officials said tonight that they had detained the leader of the group that shot and killed the Israeli tourism minister, Rehavam Zeevi, on Oct. 17. An official of the group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, said his leader, Ahmed Saadat, had been detained after being lured to a meeting with an official of the Palestinian Authority.
On Monday evening, after Mr. Karmi died, Palestinians shot and killed an Israeli soldier in the West Bank. Since then Palestinians have fired on several other Israeli positions in a return to the kind of violence that was chronic before Dec. 16. Today, the Israeli Army tightened its blockade of Tulkarm.
Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, Mr. Karmi's group, claimed responsibility for killing Mr. Boaz. "Our heroic troops in Beit Sahour fired on a filthy Israeli agent, which led to his immediate death," the group said in a statement faxed to Reuters. There was no claim of responsibility for the shooting of the two women.
Mr. Boaz, whose wife died Jan. 5 of cancer, drove to Palestinian-controlled territory today to buy materials for a home he was building, Israeli officials said. A rare act for Israelis, forbidden by their government, it was a routine act for Mr. Boaz. His home most recently was in the Israeli settlement of Maale Adummim, but he lived intermittently in the Everest Hotel in Beit Jala for 20 years and still went there regularly for lunch.
"He always said he was half Palestinian, and he was proud of it, too," said a close Palestinian associate of Mr. Boaz. "He was always proud to be an American. He was proud to be a Jew living among Palestinians."
An architect, Mr. Boaz walked with a cane and was getting on in years, but he was still dreaming up projects for his beloved Beit Jala, a predominantly Christian town. He had family in the United States and was seeking money there for a community development project, his family said.
But his trips here, during the present conflict, worried his family. "We warned him and asked him not to go in," said Evyatar Cohen, Mr. Boaz's son-in-law, who lives in Israel. "But he insisted. He believed in them, and he knew that they wouldn't hurt him - that's what he thought."
Mr. Boaz was accompanied in his car by another Palestinian associate when he stopped today at the checkpoint, said Lt. Col. Sharon Levy, an Israeli officer who coordinates security with Palestinian officials here. He said that four Palestinian civilians who were with four Palestinian police officers ordered Mr. Boaz's companion out of the car and then, when he refused, dragged him out and beat him.
Colonel Levy said he had gotten his information from interviews with Mr. Boaz's Palestinian companion, who alerted officials to the kidnapping. In its statement tonight, the Palestinian Authority said it had arrested the man and was interrogating him as part of a search for Mr. Boaz's killers.
Colonel Levy said that when he learned of the kidnapping, there might still have been time to save Mr. Boaz. But after he informed his Palestinian counterpart about it, Colonel Levy said, the Palestinian police lied about the episode.
"The harsh thing is that when he sent his officers to the checkpoint, his policemen said nothing happened," Colonel Levy said. "That's when they lost track, we lost time, and unfortunately, in the end, he lost his life."
After finishing with Mr. Boaz's Palestinian companion, Colonel Levy said, the Palestinian civilians crowded into Mr. Boaz's silver two-door Rover convertible and forced him to drive downhill through Bethlehem to Beit Sahur.
Issan Kheir, 45, is a Palestinian carpenter who lives beside the soccer field. He said he heard between 10 and 20 gunshots at about 2:30 this afternoon. When he went to investigate, he found the Rover abandoned on Garbage Dump Road, a stretch of asphalt at the edge of Beit Sahur with a view east over the stony hills to Jordan.
"His face was covered in blood," he said of Mr. Boaz.
The attack left several bullet holes in the windshield of Mr. Boaz's car and a crimson puddle in the passenger seat. Blood spattered the dashboard and the inside the windshield, which was cobwebbed with cracks. In the back seat was a jumble of maps, a pair of socks and a box of tissues.
"He lost his life for his name, because his name was Avi," said Mr. Boaz's close Palestinian associate. "He was killed because he had a Jewish name, that's all."
For Israelis, the attack on Mr. Boaz was reminiscent of the killing of two Israeli military reservists on Oct. 12, 2000. After the two men got lost in the West Bank city of Ramallah, they were surrounded by a raging crowd, who stabbed, beat and burned them to death.
Beit Sahur, Bethlehem and Beit Jala, all hilly towns with large Christian populations, are strongholds of Mr. Arafat's faction, Fatah.
In remarks in Jerusalem before the violence today, Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, said he was trying to "run a serious battle against the terror, but not to reach an escalation, not to reach a war." He repeated his oft-stated willingness to "make painful concessions" in return for "true peace that will last generations."
After the death of Mr. Karmi, Palestinians accused Mr. Sharon of trying to provoke Palestinian violence in hopes of avoiding peace talks.
The Israeli government forbids Israeli citizens to drive in Palestinian- controlled areas out of concern for their safety. Colonel Levy said that during the last year about 25 Israelis had been identified by Palestinian police in the Bethlehem area and escorted to his offices, which sit beside those of his Palestinian counterpart.
Relations with his Palestinian counterpart have been good, Colonel Levy said. He described the Palestinian officer as shocked by the killing of Mr. Boaz.
Palestinians in Beit Sahur said they were bracing for violence after they heard on Monday that Mr. Karmi had been killed.
"Everybody is talking about it, that the situation has gotten bad," said Mr. Kheir, the carpenter. "People are afraid that it will be worse than before."
-------- nato
Attacks ally India, Turkey, Israel
By Martin Walker
UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL
January 16, 2002
http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20020116-15935464.htm
Events after the September 11 attacks on the United States have pushed India toward closer military ties with both Israel and NATO-member Turkey in a development that analysts say threatens to alter the military balance in South Asia.
No treaties have been signed, and few specific details of the military intelligence agreements have been made public.
But with the recent tensions between India and Pakistan over the divided territory of Kashmir, the conviction is growing in diplomatic circles that the world is witnessing the emergence of a new triple alliance in Eurasia.
Israel, India and Turkey always have had important interests in common, and Israel and the Turkish military have been cooperating closely for the past five years and more.
The Israeli Air Force uses Turkey's far larger airspace for training.
Israeli special forces also have taken part in Turkey's regular "incursions" into the Kurdish territories of Northern Iraq.
In addition, Israel is seeking American approval to manufacture the joint U.S.-Israeli Arrow 2 anti-missile missile in Turkey.
But the events after the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, and the recent mobilization of more than 1 million Indian and Pakistani troops on the border between the two countries, have brought India into the strategic equation.
India keenly wants to join the Arrow 2 consortium, desperate to acquire a missile that could offer some prospect of destroying Pakistan's own missiles.
The Washington Times reported on Monday that Pakistan was constructing missile-launch sites and moving missiles near its border with India.
With tensions between the two nuclear-armed rivals soaring after last month's attack on India's Parliament building by Islamic militants based in Kashmir, India likewise has deployed its own missiles for a strike against Pakistan.
This week's visit of Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to India, the third such meeting in less than a year, offered a visible sign of the new relationships.
The two countries now have an intelligence-sharing agreement that includes Israeli access to the results from India's own new reconnaissance satellite.
Israeli technicians also are helping India upgrade some of its obsolescent military hardware, ranging from the sights and range finders on tank guns to military communications equipment.
Most important of all is the pending agreement for Israel to sell 3 Phalcon Airborne Warning and Command aircraft - originally intended for China until the United States vetoed the deal - to India in a $1 billion deal.
Believed to be as advanced as or even better than the American AWACS aircraft, the Phalcon would allow the Indian air force to control a series of air battles along the 1400-mile frontier with Pakistan.
Washington asked Israel last week to "maintain a low profile" on the Phalcon sale in light of current tensions in the subcontinent, the Israeli daily Ha'aretz reported recently.
Israel, India and Turkey are all regional military powers, with highly regarded armed forces in dangerous neighborhoods.
-------- pakistan
Fire guts Pakistan government edifice holding extremist records
AFP Islamabad,
January 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR15.asp
A 16-storey government ministry building reportedly containing sensitive records on extremist religious organisations was almost completely gutted in the Pakistani capital, police said Wednesday.
Authorities said it appeared a fire, which started on the upper floors, was caused by a short circuit but were not ruling out other causes.
The Shaheed-i-Millat building housed 15 government departments, including the record-keeping offices of the interior ministry.
Reports said the records included information on extremist religious organisations and firearms.
The fire broke out around 6:25pm (1325 GMT), more than three hours after the offices closed for the day.
"The building is almost completely gutted. There are still some fires in the building that have not been put out," Islamabad police Chief Masir Khan Burrani said on Wednesday.
"We believe the fire was caused by short-circuiting but we are following all aspects for investigation," he said, referring to speculation it was deliberately lit in retaliation for a wave of arrests of alleged Islamic extremists over recent days.
-------- philippines
INTERNATIONAL
U.S.-Philippine Command May Signal War's Next Phase
New York Times
January 16, 2002
By ERIC SCHMITT
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/international/asia/16MILI.html
WASHINGTON, Jan. 15 -- In the first major expansion of the war on terrorism, American and Philippine military officers in Manila began preparing joint operations today against a Muslim extremist group linked to Al Qaeda in the southern Philippines.
An American advance team is on the ground, and officials today created a joint command for the mission. The bulk of the 650-member American force, including 160 Special Operations troops trained in counterterrorism, is expected to be sent this month to train and advise 1,200 Philippine Army soldiers in how to destroy Abu Sayyaf, a terrorist group that is holding hostages, including two Americans.
Sending the United States troops to the southern island of Mindanao, which is near Basilan Island, Abu Sayyaf's base, would mark the largest single deployment of American military might outside Afghanistan to fight terrorists since the Sept. 11 attacks. And it is a further sign that the Philippines may well become the site of the war's next phase.
Having set aside targets like Iraq, at least for now, American officials are working with friendly governments like the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia that are seeking help in stamping out terrorism within their borders. American special operations forces have played a critical role in Afghanistan, calling in airstrikes, assisting anti-Taliban forces and, in some case, engaging in direct combat. But they will have a more circumscribed role in the Philippines.
Though the American forces are expected to be involved initially only in assisting and training Philippine troops, they will also accompany them on patrol in rebel areas, will be armed and will be authorized to fire in self-defense. They could become involved in offensive military action if the Manila government requested it, officials said, though that would require a change in the Philippine Constitution.
"It is not a modest number," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said today, describing the size of the American contingent to a group of radio reporters. "But it is a group of people that are going to be with the Philippine forces for the purpose of training."
Mr. Rumsfeld said military support troops, including logistics and medical specialists, would take part in an effort that formally begins next month. A senior military official said the number of American forces could increase, depending on how the campaign progresses.
Pentagon officials have been loath to describe highly classified details of the mission, but there have been clear hints in recent days that the United States and its longtime ally, the Philippines, are joining in a major effort to wipe out what they consider to be a dangerous terrorist cell in Southeast Asia.
The Abu Sayyaf group has as many as 2,000 members, some of whom have trained in Afghanistan, and is fighting to establish an Islamic state in the southern Philippines. About 5,000 Philippine troops have been fighting the rebels for months.
The group has conducted bombings, killings and a multitude of kidnappings for ransom, using the money to buy weapons and speedboats. It is holding hostage an American missionary couple, Martin and Gracia Burnham of Rose Hill, Kan., and a Filipina nurse in the jungles of Basilan Island.
United States and Philippine forces conduct annual training exercises. But in the aftermath of the attacks on Sept. 11, this year's operation called "Balikatan" or "Shouldering the Load Together" is much different in size, scope and location.
More American troops, especially Special Operations forces like Navy Seals and Army Green Berets, are involved than in previous years.
In a sign of the importance the Pentagon is putting on the mission, the American commander is Brig. Gen. Donald C. Wurster of the Air Force, the head of all Special Operations forces in the Pacific. General Wurster is a former commander of the Air Force's elite 16th Special Operations Wing at Hurlburt Field in Florida.
The operation, which Filipino officials are careful to call an "exercise" to avoid inflaming domestic sensitivities to a large American military presence, is expected to last through June, or possibly the end of the year, officials said.
The Philippine president, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, has walked a political tightrope at home, welcoming American military help in defeating a deadly foe, but careful not to aggravate the same tensions that led to the United States' being forced out of major bases in the country, like the Subic Bay naval base.
A presidential spokesman, Rigoberto Tiglao, said using foreign troops for combat in the Philippines would violate the country's Constitution. The American troops "can only take an expanded role in the sense that they can go to an advanced post to observe our operations, but definitely no combat role," he said.
Philippine military officials have also said they expect shipments of small arms from the Pentagon, and the arrival of at least eight UH-1H Huey helicopters from the United States that would be equipped with night-flying equipment.
"We are not butting into their sovereignty," said Representative Porter J. Goss, a Florida Republican who heads the House Intelligence Committee. "But we are trying to help them in their effort to stamp out blatant terrorism."
Pentagon officials say they are working closely with Philippine officials in the war on terrorists. "There's no question that we believe that if they could clear the Abu Sayyaf group out of Basilan Island, that would be a small blow against an extended Al Qaeda network," Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz said in a recent interview.
But Mr. Wolfowitz said the Manila government is "very anxious to do it themselves," adding, "That's the sort of crucial standard for anything, if they would ask for anything, we would do for them."
Meantime, the fight against terrorists in Afghanistan continued today. American soldiers uncovered a cache of weapons hidden near the airport in Kandahar, while the local Afghan militia continued to hunt down Taliban officials and Al Qaeda fighters who fled as the city fell to anti-Taliban forces last month.
The weapons, including rocket- propelled grenades, were found in buildings and tunnels about 300 yards from the edge of the airport after a group of men were seen in the area Monday evening, Capt. Daniel Greenwood, a military spokesman, said at a news briefing on Tuesday.
While weapons are no longer carried openly in Kandahar by people other than the anti-Taliban militia, few have been surrendered to the fledgling government there, and many are believed to be hidden in the city and surrounding towns.
On Sunday, two heavily armed senior Taliban commanders who worked under Kandahar's Taliban police chief, Hafaz Majeed, were arrested in Maiwand, a town to the west of Kandahar on the road to Helmand Province, an anti-Taliban military official said today.
Muhammad Zali, a commander under Kandahar's current anti-Taliban governor, Gul Agha Shirzai, said his troops had seized the two Taliban officials without a fight at a home in Sangisar, a district of Maiwand.
In London today, British officials turned aside accusations by human rights groups, lawyers and members of Parliament that the treatment of terror suspects being transported to the American military base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, violated international standards.
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw conceded that the men at least three of whom say they are British had not been formally charged. But he said they were considered a threat since they were thought to be members of Al Qaeda.
Mr. Straw told the BBC that he had raised the matter with Secretary of State Colin L. Powell in a phone call on Saturday night. Human rights groups have strongly criticized reports that the were hooded, manacled, shackled and, in some cases, sedated, and that they are being locked up in outdoor wire-fence cells.
----
Special Forces Join Effort in Philippines
Trainers to Aid Anti-Guerrilla Patrols
By Steve Vogel
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 16, 2002; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51681-2002Jan15?language=printer
U.S. Special Forces have begun arriving in the Philippines to assist Philippine troops in their fight against Muslim guerrillas linked to Osama bin Laden, part of a significant expansion of the U.S. war on terrorism outside Afghanistan.
Although the deployment is a training exercise, the U.S. troops will accompany frontline Filipino forces on patrols in guerrilla-threatened areas in the southern Philippines. Approximately 650 U.S. soldiers -- including 160 Special Forces troops -- will take part in the exercise, defense officials said yesterday.
"It is not a modest number, it's several hundred plus," Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said in an interview with radio journalists. "But it is a group of people that are going to be with the Philippine forces for the purpose of training."
Even as Pentagon officials say that the focus of the war will remain on Afghanistan, the dispatch of hundreds of U.S. troops to the Philippines underscores the administration's intention to wage its fight on terrorism on a global scale.
Having put aside such targets as Iraq, at least for now, the administration is working with friendly governments such as the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore that are seeking help in rooting out terrorist groups. It is also looking to such countries as Indonesia, Yemen and Somalia where al Qaeda cells are believed to be located.
The U.S. forces moving to the Philippines will help the Philippine army in the fight against Abu Sayyaf, a terrorist group that Washington says is linked to bin Laden, whose al Qaeda network is blamed for the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
"United States military trainers will be helping the Philippine government and Philippine armed forces to deal with the terrorist threat they have that affects their interests, as well as ours," Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said in an interview yesterday with ABC News.
A shipment of weapons from the United States, including automatic rifles and grenade launchers, arrived in the Philippines in recent days, part of a package of American military assistance. "More of this stuff will be going in," a Pentagon official said.
Over the next 30 days, about 150 troops, primarily Army Special Forces, will arrive in the Philippines and begin accompanying Filipino forces on patrols on Basilan, a rugged and jungle-clad island that is a stronghold of Abu Sayyaf.
"The reason they're doing that is they want to assess what their capabilities are and what type of terrain they're operating in," the Pentagon official said. Based on those assessments, the official said, U.S. forces will offer further training and assistance.
"The only combat they're likely to see would be in a self-protection mode," the official said, adding, "Any time you're accompanying forces in pursuit of terrorists, there are risks involved."
About 5,000 Philippine troops have been fighting on Basilan for months to counter the 1,000 or so Abu Sayyaf guerrillas who have taken many hostages, including a U.S. couple and a local nurse they have been holding captive for more than seven months.
"Some of the hostages have been killed, some have been released, and so they have a very real terrorist problem," Rumsfeld said.
Philippine Defense Secretary Angelo Reyes said yesterday that the U.S. troops would only be in a training and support role. "We will do the fighting. It is the Filipino soldiers who will go out and they will be assisted by the American forces in terms of advice and joint assessment and sharing of expertise and equipment," he said.
Several dozen members of the U.S. Special Operations Command Pacific are in the Philippines preparing for the exercise. "They're doing site survey work to determine the logistical support needed for the U.S. forces coming on for the exercise," said Marine Maj. Sean Gibson, a spokesman for the Pacific Command.
The full contingent will include about 150 U.S. Special Forces personnel -- including Navy SEALs, the Army's Green Berets, Marines with special operations capabilities and Air Force Special Forces. Backing them will be about 500 U.S. support and technical personnel, Reyes told local radio, according to the Reuters news service.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) offered support yesterday for the U.S. effort in the Philippines. "It's limited assistance and it's appropriate," Levin said during a breakfast with defense writers.
But Levin cautioned that more information would be needed if the United States wanted to significantly expand the role. "I'd want to know a lot more about it before I said yes," Levin said.
In Afghanistan yesterday, U.S. Marines discovered and destroyed a cache of weapons hidden near their base at the Kandahar airport, days after coming under attack. Marines at the base suggested that the weapons were evidence that hostile forces were massing for another assault on the base, according to an Associated Press report.
A senior Defense Department official discounted this possibility. "It looks to be more of a strategic reserve," the official said.
"One thing we are finding, in place after place, is arms caches," the official added. "They're everywhere. It's just amazing, the quantity that was stored."
"Very, very sizable arsenals are being discovered," Rumsfeld said yesterday. "Tanks and artillery pieces and surface-to-air missiles and small arms and all kinds of things that they've been in the process of destroying a great deal of it in different locations."
U.S. forces are searching for more al Qaeda complexes such as the one at Zhawar Kili, which was subjected to heavy bombing for much of the last two weeks. On Monday, Rear Adm. John D. Stufflebeem, deputy director of operations for the Joint Staff, said the United States had largely finished destroying facilities and equipment and sealing off equipment at the extensive compound.
There were no airstrikes yesterday, defense officials said.
Much of the U.S. attention is focusing on the region around the towns of Khost and Gardez, north of Zhawar Kili, in eastern Afghanistan where intelligence has indicated is still a haven for al Qaeda and Taliban forces. "It's certainly an area that has our interest," the senior official said.
----
Widening U.S. battle stirs unease
01/16/2002
By Bill Nichols,
USA TODAY
http://usatoday.com/news/attack/2002/01/17/usat-abu.htm
WASHINGTON - U.S. officials say the rationale for sending hundreds of Green Berets and other U.S. troops to the Philippines in coming weeks is to help the government there fight the Muslim extremist group Abu Sayyaf, which they say has deep ties to al-Qaeda and a global reach.
However, evidence for either of those claims is sketchy, terrorism experts say. Rather, they say, the Bush administration appears to be offering a new argument for broadening its war against terrorism - to show its willingness to help friendly governments fight groups that might only marginally threaten U.S. interests.
The administration's decision to increase its support to the government of Philippines President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has caused uneasiness here and in Manila.
Some State Department officials privately express concern that Washington is getting too involved in what is mainly a local fight. Even Arroyo says Abu Sayyaf is "a money-crazed gang of criminals without any ideology."
Arroyo faced harsh criticism in Manila on Wednesday for accepting the U.S. military presence even though the Philippines Constitution bars foreign combat troops.
Terrorism experts say that though the home-grown Abu Sayyaf, which means sword of God in Arabic, doesn't plot global operations like the international terrorists whom President Bush has pledged to root out, it's still worth pursuing.
"They're kind of focused on their own little part of the world," says Islamic terrorism expert Julie Sirrs, a former Defense Intelligence Agency officer. "Nevertheless, they're part of this larger network, making them a legitimate target."
Abu Sayyaf, which has as many as 2,000 members, has waged a terrorist campaign for more than a decade to create an Islamic state in the southern Philippines. The country of 83 million people is predominantly Roman Catholic.
Terrorism experts, including those who support Bush's decision to target the Philippines, say Abu Sayyaf's connections to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda are questionable.
"I'm not sure anyone really knows for sure or has proof of deep ties," says Derek Mitchell, an Asia expert at the Pentagon during the Clinton administration and who is now a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Abu Sayyaf, which has made kidnapping a hallmark of its terrorist tactics, continues to hold two Americans as hostages. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld acknowledged that the kidnappings played a role in the administration's decision to send troops. "Certainly, that adds a dimension to our interest," he said.
Martin and Gracia Burnham, missionaries from Wichita, Kan., are being held by the group, as is a Filipino nurse. Guillermo Sobero, a resident of Corona, Calif., was beheaded by the group last year.
Pentagon officials say 650 U.S. troops are being sent to train Philippine soldiers to battle Abu Sayyaf in the islands of Basilan, Jolo and Mindanao in the southern Philippines. U.S. officials say the U.S. force will advise about 1,200 Philippine soldiers in an exercise set to last about six months.
Administration officials say the U.S. forces will be armed but will have orders to fire only in self-defense.
U.S. officials say the case for Abu Sayyaf's links to the global al-Qaeda network is based on three key pieces of evidence:
Abdurajak Janjalani, the founder of Abu Sayyaf, met with bin Laden's brother-in-law, Muhammad Jamal Khalifa, during Abu Sayyaf's beginnings in the early '90s. Ramzi Yousef, convicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and linked to bin Laden, established a cell in the Philippines and trained members of Abu Sayyaf during the early '90s. Some of the founding members of Abu Sayyaf trained in Afghanistan with Islamic militants, including al-Qaeda leaders.
"There's not a lot of substantive evidence" of links between Abu Sayyaf and al-Qaeda, Heritage Foundation terrorism expert Dana Dillon says.
Nevertheless, Dillon adds, "Abu Sayyaf doesn't deny it either. It's not like they're out beating the drum saying you've got the wrong guys."
Arroyo predicted Wednesday that she would weather mounting criticism of the U.S. mission. "In the end, if we get the Abu Sayyaf, we would have been victorious," the Philippines president said.
Philippines national security adviser Roilo Golez said fewer than 200 U.S. soldiers will be allowed into combat zones. He said most of the U.S. troops will be training Filipinos in flying helicopters at night, psychological operations and intelligence work.
Rumsfeld stressed Wednesday that the U.S. mission in the Philippines isn't as much a new front in the war against al-Qaeda as it is part of a broader campaign against terrorism: "We are interested in a lot more than al-Qaeda." He also said, "There is no question" there have been links between al-Qaeda and Abu Sayyaf.
-------- puerto rico
Admiral never requested to train USS John F. Kennedy group at Vieques
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Washington Times
January 16, 2002
http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20020116-10240922.htm#6
Your readers have been subjected to back-to-back inaccurate accounts of Navy efforts to ensure that the USS John F. Kennedy carrier battle group gets the training it needs to deploy in support of the global war on terrorism ("Carrier barred from Vieques training," Jan 8; "Puerto Rico leader praises decision on Navy's live firing," Jan. 10). Both stories suggest that Secretary of the Navy Gordon England denied a request to train the Kennedy battle group at the Vieques, Puerto Rico, training range. This is simply not the case.
The decision to train the Kennedy battle group off the East Coast rather than near Puerto Rico was appropriately made by the operational commander responsible for training Atlantic naval forces, Adm. Robert G. Natter. America's war on terrorism has already required that the Navy accelerate the deployment of several ships, including the carriers USS John C. Stennis and USS Kitty Hawk, as well as the USS Bonhomme Richard Amphibious Ready Group. It was clear to Adm. Natter that the need for deployed carriers in the war on terrorism would likely require an early departure for Kennedy. Given the superb training already conducted by the crews of the ships and aircraft of the John F. Kennedy battle group, including use of the inner range at Vieques in the fall, Adm. Natter decided to save transit time at sea by conducting the final training close to home port and using the saved days to focus on other pressing pre-deployment issues facing Kennedy. Not surprisingly, Adm. Natter did not ask Mr. England or the chief of naval operations for authority to conduct training of Kennedy personnel at Vieques since Adm. Natter had already decided to do the training closer to home.
It may seem we're pointing out the obvious, but apparently you need that from time to time. Reported claims by others to have influenced a "decision" that Mr. England never made are equally spurious.
Your readers deserve a better understanding of national security issues than they received from these two articles.
S. R. PIETROPAOLI
Rear Adm., U.S. Navy
Department of the Navy
Washington
-------- russia
New law gives Russian president right to declare war
AFP Moscow,
January 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR62.asp
The Russian Federation Council upper house Wednesday granted President Vladimir Putin the right to declare a state of war in case of aggression which would limit the rights of citizens and the press.
The bill, proposed by Putin himself and approved unanimously, would allow the president to declare a state of war nationwide or in one of its regions, but the measure would have to be examined within 48 hours by the senate and ratified by a majority vote.
The Russian president would also have to inform the United Nations and the Council of Europe of the declaration of a state of war.
The state of war can be declared in case of "aggression" or "threat of aggression" against the Russian Federation, defined as an invasion or an attack by a foreign state, or attacks on Russian territory.
Foreign states sending armed troops, regular troops or mercenaries will also be regarded as acts of aggression.
But the law will not be applied in Chechnya, despite the presence of foreign mercenaries fighting alongside rebels in the breakaway republic, stressed Viktor Ozerov, leader of the parliamentary security and defense committee.
"There has not been a direct attack by foreign mercenaries in Chechnya," Ozerov said.
Moscow has accused some of the separatist Chechen rebels of being linked to Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda movement, blamed for the September 11 attacks on the United States.
"To assure the country's security during a state of war, the rights and freedoms of Russian citizens and of foreigners on Russian territory, as well as organisations, must be limited," Ozerov explained.
-------- saudi arabia
U.S. BASES
Dismay With Saudi Arabia Fuels Pullout Talk
New York Times
January 16, 2002
By JAMES DAO
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/international/middleeast/16SAUD.html
WASHINGTON, Jan. 15 - A number of senior officials in Congress and the Pentagon are saying the United States should consider withdrawing military forces from Saudi Arabia because of frustration over what they consider the kingdom's tepid support for the war on terrorism and the restrictions it places on American military operations.
The dismay with Saudi Arabia ranges widely. In Congress, there is a broad sense that the Saudis are not doing enough to rein in Islamic militants. Some lawmakers also hold the Saudi government responsible for a Pentagon requirement that American servicewomen wear head-to-toe robes when traveling outside their Saudi bases, a rule being challenged in a lawsuit brought by a female Air Force major against the United States military.
In the Pentagon, a growing number of commanders are frustrated with the Saudis' refusal to allow American warplanes based at a sprawling airfield south of Riyadh to bomb Iraq and other Islamic countries, except in self-defense. "We're pretty heavily invested in Saudi right now," a senior military official said. "But if the opportunity arose to operate somewhere else in the region we'd be pretty interested."
In the sharpest and most recent expression of frustration, Senator Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat who is chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said today that he had "an uneasy feeling" that the Saudis were not doing enough to crack down on Islamic terrorists and that American forces were "not particularly wanted" there. "They act as though somehow or another they're doing us a favor," Senator Levin told reporters. "And I think the war against terrorism has got to be fought by countries who really realize that it's in everybody's interest to go after terrorism.
"I think we may be able to find a place where we are much more welcome openly," he said, "a place which has not seen significant resources flowing to support some really extreme, fanatic views."
In a statement, Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to the United States, responded to the comments. "Our two nations share the goal of peace and the end of terrorism," he said. "I have great respect for Senator Levin, but I am surprised by his statement."
Senator Levin did not say where the several thousand American forces might be moved. They also use airfields, ports and command posts in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and United Arab Emirates.
But it is widely acknowledged in military circles that the Pentagon would have a hard time replacing a high-tech air operations center it opened last summer at Prince Sultan Air Base outside Riyadh. American commanders directed the air campaign in Afghanistan from Prince Sultan, which is also the command center for the allied fighter jets that patrol the no-flight zone over southern Iraq.
For that reason, some members of Congress say the United States cannot afford to move its forces out of Saudi Arabia, particularly while tensions in the region remain high.
"The kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been a valued partner in the Persian Gulf region for many years, particularly during the Persian Gulf war in 1991," said Senator John Warner, a Virginia Republican who is the ranking minority member on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"While we must periodically evaluate our overseas military presence, at this time, given U.S. commitments to the world in the war on terrorism, it would not be wise to significantly lessen the American military and security relationships with the kingdom."
But Senator Levin's remarks clearly touched on a sentiment shared by many lawmakers who have been disappointed by what they consider the Saudi government's unwillingness to speak out against militant, anti-Western Islamic mullahs.
"They have been good friends over the years, but I'm not sure their whole heart is with us," said Representative Ike Skelton, the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee. "They need to cleanse the place of potential terrorist groups."
Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut, warned in a speech on Monday of a "theological iron curtain" that could isolate Saudi Arabia and other Islamic nations that did not fight radical Islam. Referring to a speech on Saturday in which the military ruler of Pakistan, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, vowed to curb Islamic militants, Senator Lieberman said, "President Musharraf's principled and historic statement over the weekend should serve as an example for other allies of ours in places like Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. Let's hope it does."
Representative Porter J. Goss of Florida, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in an interview today that he and many other members of Congress shared Senator Levin's frustrations with the Saudis, though he was not prepared to support removing American troops from the kingdom.
"He's expressing a frustration that many of us feel about their evolutionary process into a more democratic society," Mr. Goss said. "It's pretty tyrannical there."
-------- us
U.S. may end use of Saudi base
Around the Nation
Washington Times
January 16, 2002
Combined dispatches and staff reports
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20020116-30785608.htm
The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee said yesterday that the U.S. military might need to end operations at a Saudi Arabian air base, given the restrictions on U.S. military personnel there.
Michigan Sen. Carl Levin, the panel's Democratic chairman, said that female service members were uncomfortable in the remote region where the Prince Sultan air base is located and that the Saudis had been less than welcoming. Mr. Levin told reporters there were countries in the region where the United States could have greater use of military facilities "without the restrictions."
--------
Navy says it needs money to modernize fleet
The Associated Press
01/16/2002
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washdc/2002/01/16/navy-ships.htm
ABOARD THE USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT (AP) - The Navy needs a further $10 billion annually to modernize its fleet and meet any "stresses" imposed by a long-running global war against terrorism, the Navy's top official says.
Chief Naval Officer Admiral Vern Clark arrived late Tuesday on the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier, which has been launching attacks on al-Qaeda and Taliban positions in Afghanistan since mid-October.
Clark, who flew in from Bahrain on a two-day tour of U.S. battleships operating in the Arabian Sea, said the Navy needed between $32-35 billion annually to meet the fleet's current wartime needs.
But Clark, who is expected to return to Washington on Thursday, said that the Navy is $8 billion to $10 billion short "by my calculations." He said the Navy was hurt by downsizing during the 1990s.
A spokesman for Clark said the Navy has projected annual needs of 10 new ships and 210 aircraft to meet demands and replace aging equipment.
"This navy has a lot of flexibility and a lot of search capability, as was demonstrated early on where we had four carriers" operating in the Arabian Sea following the Sept. 11 terror attacks," Clark told The Associated Press.
But, he said, "I have every expectation that there is going to be a requirement for us to periodically search and bring more capability to bear (in the global war against terrorism) and that means that we are going to be stressed and there is a limit to what you can do with the sized force that we have."
Last week's U.S. government appropriation of $5.3 billion helped meet the Navy's current wartime needs, Clark said.
He would not speculate on future targets in the U.S.-led war against terrorism. Iraq, Somalia and the Philippines have been mentioned.
Clark praised the crew of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, calling them members of the greatest Navy in history.
"The (U.S.) forces operating here in the Indian Ocean - and part of the coalition of forces that are working to defeat terrorists and deal with the al-Qaeda network - have been extraordinarily successful," said Clark.
The Theodore Roosevelt has been at sea since leaving Sept. 19 on a six-month deployment from its Norfolk, Va., home port for the Arabian Sea.
Clark said the Roosevelt's replacement - the USS John F. Kennedy - had engineering problems during maintenance in the United States and may be three to four days late in getting under way. But the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier remained on schedule to replace the Roosevelt some time in February.
----
Misdirected Defense Dollars
January 16, 2002
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/opinion/16WED1.html
It's axiomatic that military budgets grow in wartime, and this year will be no exception. The Bush administration's planned $350 billion Pentagon budget for the next fiscal year is some $20 billion higher than current spending and a 6 percent increase over the rate of inflation. Events since Sept. 11 have clearly demonstrated the need for a highly flexible military force, adequately paid and housed, maintained in a high state of readiness and equipped with the appropriate high-tech tools of 21st-century warfare.
Unfortunately, the budget prepared by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld shortchanges the Bush administration's earlier promises of a boldly transformed military. While some of the new budget money will go toward improved pay and modernization, the Pentagon is still spending too much on costly weapons systems designed for an earlier era, squandering funds that should be going to more rapid modernization.
Future phases of the war on terrorism, whether in the Middle East, Africa or Southeast Asia, are likely to bear a closer resemblance to the conflict in Afghanistan than to the cold-war clashes for which the latest generation of weapons systems were designed. Afghanistan highlighted the need for pilotless aircraft and long-range bombers that did not depend on the availability of nearby American air bases. It underscored the importance of light, mobile ground forces, special operations teams and Navy surface ships and submarines that can launch planes and cruise missiles.
Military planners must be ready to fight other kinds of wars as well, but the Pentagon ought to discard obsolete assumptions about the most likely enemies or battlefields. The Air Force, for example, remains committed to the F-22, a short-range tactical fighter designed for cold-war dogfights. America's existing fighter fleet of F-15's, F-16's and the newly approved Joint Strike Fighter already assure aerial supremacy over any conceivable foe for the next generation. Air Force dollars should go to unmanned reconnaissance and attack craft like the Predator, long-range bombers and the troop transport planes that are in chronic short supply.
----
Military draft law introduced
From: "Kevin Blair" <kblair@f...>
Date: Wed Jan 16, 2002 11:18 am
[Moderator's Note: This bill was introduced on Dec. 20, 2001, and referred to the House Armed Services Committee. There was no indication if hearings have been scheduled or will be scheduled.]
Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001
(Introduced in the House December 20, 2001)
http://thomas.loc.gov/
HR 3598 IH
107th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 3598 To require the induction into the Armed Forces of young men registered under the Military Selective Service Act, and to authorize young women to volunteer, to receive basic military training and education for a period of up to one year.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
December 20, 2001 Mr. SMITH of Michigan (for himself and Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Armed Services
--
A BILL To require the induction into the Armed Forces of young men registered under the Military Selective Service Act, and to authorize young women to volunteer, to receive basic military training and education for a period of up to one year.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE AND TABLE OF CONTENTS.
(a) SHORT TITLE- This Act may be cited as the `Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001'.
(b) TABLE OF CONTENTS- The table of contents for this Act is as follows:
Sec. 1. Short title and table of contents.
Sec. 2. Definitions.
Sec. 3. Basic military training and education.
Sec. 4. Period of basic military training and education.
Sec. 5. Educational services and prorated Montgomery GI Bill benefits.
Sec. 6. Role of Selective Service System.
Sec. 7. Induction of conscripts and acceptance of volunteers.
Sec. 8. Deferments and postponements.
Sec. 9. Exemptions.
Sec. 10. Military training in branch of member's choice; conscientious objection.
Sec. 11. Pay and allowances.
Sec. 12. Discharge following training.
Sec. 13. Relation to authorized end strengths for active forces.
Sec. 14. Conforming amendments.
Sec. 15. Transitional provision.
SEC. 2. DEFINITIONS.
In this Act:
(1) The term `armed forces' means the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard.
(2) The term `basic military training and education' means a program consisting of--
(A) basic training established by the Secretary concerned for members of the armed forces inducted as conscripts or accepted as volunteers pursuant this Act;
(B) educational services described in section 4; and
(C) such specialty training as the Secretary concerned considers appropriate.
(3) The term `between the ages of 18 and 22' refers to men who have attained the 18th anniversary of the day of their birth and who have not attained the 22d anniversary of the day of their birth.
(4) The term `Director' means the Director of the Selective Service System.
(5) The term `local board' means a county local board or intercounty local board established by the President under section 10(b) of the Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. App. 460(b)).
(6) The term `Secretary concerned' means the Secretary of Defense, with respect to the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force, and the Secretary of Transportation, with respect to the Coast Guard.
(7) The term `United States', when used in a geographical sense, means the several States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and Guam.
SEC. 3. BASIC MILITARY TRAINING AND EDUCATION.
(a) OBLIGATION FOR YOUNG MEN- It is the obligation of every male citizen of the United States, and every other male person residing in the United States, who is between the ages of 18 and 22 to receive basic military training and education as a member of the armed forces unless the citizen or person is exempted under the provisions of this Act.
(b) ACCEPTANCE OF YOUNG WOMEN VOLUNTEERS- Female citizens of the United States, and other female persons residing in the United States, who are between the ages of 18 and 22 may volunteer for enlistment in the armed forces to receive basic military training and education under this Act. At the discretion of the Secretary concerned, the Secretary concerned may accept such volunteers to receive such training and education.
SEC. 4. PERIOD OF BASIC MILITARY TRAINING AND EDUCATION.
(a) GENERAL RULE- Except as otherwise provided in this section, a person inducted as a conscript or accepted as a volunteer pursuant to this Act shall receive basic military training and education as a member of one of the armed forces for a period of not less than six months, but not more than one year, as established by the Secretary concerned.
(b) EXTENDED TRAINING AND EDUCATIONAL SERVICES FOR HIGH SCHOOL DROPOUTS- A person inducted as a conscript or accepted as a volunteer pursuant to this Act who has not obtained a high school diploma or its equivalent, shall receive basic military training and education as a member of one of the armed forces for an additional period of up to six months after the completion of the period established for members of that armed force under subsection (a). The Secretary concerned shall assist such members in earning the equivalent of a high school diploma while receiving their basic military training and education.
(c) OTHER GROUNDS FOR EXTENSION- At the discretion of the Secretary concerned, the period of basic military training and education for a member of the armed forces under this Act may be extended--
(1) with the consent of the member, for the purpose of furnishing hospitalization, medical, or surgical care for injury or illness incurred in line of duty; or
(2) for the purpose of requiring the member to compensate for any time lost to training for any cause.
(d) TRANSFER TO NATIONAL AND COMMUNITY SERVICE PROGRAMS- The Secretary concerned may enter into a cooperative agreement with another Federal agency, a State or political subdivision of a State (including a State Commission on National and Community Service maintained by a State pursuant to section 178 of the National and Community Service Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 12638)), and other entities carrying out a national service program described in section 122 of such Act (42 U.S.C. 12572) to provide for a transfer of a person receiving basic military training and education, upon completion of the initial military training component of the training, to complete the remainder of the person's required service in a national service program.
(e) EARLY TERMINATION- The period of basic military training and education for a person shall be terminated before the end of such period under the following circumstances:
(1) The voluntary enlistment and service of the person in any of the regular components of the armed forces for a period of at least two years. The period of basic military training and education actually served by the person shall be counted toward the term of enlistment.
(2) The admission and service of the person as a cadet or midshipman at the United States Military Academy, the United States Naval Academy, the United States Air Force Academy, the Coast Guard Academy, the United States Merchant Marine Academy.
(3) The enrollment and service of the person in an officer candidate program, if the person has signed an agreement to accept a Reserve commission in the appropriate service if such a commission is offered upon completion of the program.
(4) Such other grounds as the Secretary concerned may establish.
(f) TREATMENT OF BASIC MILITARY TRAINING AND EDUCATION- For purposes of computing the years of service of a member of the armed forces, any period during which the member received basic military training and education shall be counted.
SEC. 5. EDUCATIONAL SERVICES AND PRORATED MONTGOMERY GI BILL BENEFITS.
(a) INSTRUCTION AS PART OF MILITARY TRAINING- As part of the basic military training and education provided under this Act, the Secretary concerned shall include instruction in physical fitness, international relations, military tactics, homeland security, United States and world history, vocational training, and such other topics as the Secretary considers appropriate.
(b) MONTGOMERY GI BILL BENEFITS- Upon the successful completion by a person of basic military training and education as a member of one of the armed forces, the person shall be entitled to the program of educational assistance provided under chapter 30 of title 38, United States Code, on a prorated basis corresponding to the period of basic military training and education completed by the person.
SEC. 6. ROLE OF SELECTIVE SERVICE SYSTEM.
(a) IN GENERAL- The Selective Service System shall administer all matters in connection with the induction of persons subject to the obligation to receive basic military training and education under section 3(a) and the registration, examination, classification, allocation, delivery, and maintenance of records, of such persons.
(b) LOCAL BOARDS- Under rules and regulations promulgated by the Director, the local boards shall have the power within their respective jurisdictions to hear and determine, subject to the right of appeal to appeal boards authorized by the Military Selective Service Act, all questions or claims with respect to determinations of dependency, inclusion for, or exemption or deferment from induction or allocation for basic military training and education under this Act.
SEC. 7. INDUCTION OF CONSCRIPTS AND ACCEPTANCE OF VOLUNTEERS.
(a) IN GENERAL- Every person subject to induction for basic military training and education under section 3(a), except those whose training is deferred or postponed in accordance with this Act, shall be called, inducted, and delivered by his local board to the armed forces for such training at the time and place specified by the Director.
(b) AGE LIMITS- No person may be inducted for basic military training and education under section 3(a), or accepted as a volunteer under section 3(b), who is not between the ages of 18 and 22.
(c) SCHEDULES FOR INDUCTION AND ACCEPTANCE OF VOLUNTEERS- Each Secretary concerned, in consultation with the Director, shall determine schedules to be used for the induction of persons and the acceptance of volunteers under this Act and the number of persons to be inducted or accepted pursuant to such schedules. The Secretary concerned may phase in, over not longer than a 10-year period, the induction of persons subject to the obligation to receive basic military training and education.
(d) VOLUNTARY INDUCTION- A person subject to basic military training and education under section 3(a) may volunteer for induction at a time other than the time at which the person is otherwise called for induction.
(e) EXAMINATION; CLASSIFICATION- Every person subject to basic military training and education under section 3(a) and every person volunteering for basic military training and education under section 3(b) shall, before induction or acceptance, be physically and mentally examined, and the appropriate local board shall classify the person.
SEC. 8. DEFERMENTS AND POSTPONEMENTS.
(a) HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS- A person who is pursuing a standard course of study, on a full-time basis in a high school or a similar institution of learning shall be entitled to have his induction under section 3(a) postponed until he obtains a high school diploma, ceases to pursue satisfactorily such course of study, or attains the age of 20, whichever occurs first.
(b) HARDSHIP AND DISABILITY- Deferments from basic military training and education may be made for extreme hardship or physical or mental disability.
(c) TRAINING CAPACITY- The Secretary concerned may postpone or suspend the induction of persons or the acceptance of volunteers under this Act as necessary to limit the number of persons receiving basic military training and education to the maximum number that can be adequately trained.
(d) TERMINATION- No deferment or postponement of induction for basic military training and education under this Act shall continue after the cause of such deferment or postponement ceases to exist.
SEC. 9. EXEMPTIONS.
(a) ACCEPTED BY ARMED FORCES- No person may be inducted or accepted as a volunteer for basic military training and education unless the person is acceptable to the Secretary concerned for training. The same health and physical qualifications applicable under section 505 of title 10, United States Code, to persons seeking original enlistment in a regular component of the armed forces shall apply to persons to be inducted or accepted under this Act.
(b) OTHER MILITARY SERVICE- No person shall be liable for induction under section 3(a) who--
(1) is serving, or has served honorably for at least six months, in any of the armed forces on active duty; or
(2) is or becomes a cadet or midshipman at the United States Military Academy, the United States Naval Academy, the United States Air Force Academy, the Coast Guard Academy, the United States Merchant Marine Academy, a midshipman of a Navy accredited State maritime academy, a member of the Senior Reserve Officers' Training Corps, or the naval aviation college program, so long as he satisfactorily continues in and completes two years training therein.
SEC. 10. MILITARY TRAINING IN BRANCH OF MEMBER'S CHOICE; CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION.
(a) SELECTION BY MEMBER- Subject to such limitations and standards of qualification and selection as may be established by the Secretary concerned to ensure a proper balance of trained manpower between the ground, air, and naval arms, each person inducted or accepted as a volunteer under this Act shall be entitled to request and receive training in the service of the person's choice.
(b) CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS- (1) Any person who claims, because of religious training and belief (as defined in section 6(j) of the Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. 456(j))), exemption from combatant training included as part of the program of basic military training and education and whose claim is sustained by the local board shall, when inducted, participate in basic military training and education that does not include any combatant training component. The person may be transferred to a national service program, as provided in section 4(d).
(2) A person claiming exemption from combatant training under this subsection shall, if such claim is not sustained by the local board, be entitled to an appeal to the appropriate appeal board established under the Military Selective Service Act. Each person whose claim for exemption from combatant training because of religious training and belief is sustained shall be listed by the local board on a register of conscientious objectors.
SEC. 11. PAY AND ALLOWANCES.
A person inducted or accepted as a volunteer under this Act and receiving basic military training and education shall be considered to be on active duty for purposes of pay and allowances under title 37, United States Code, except that the monthly basic pay of the person may not exceed 35 percent of the basic pay of an enlisted member in a regular component in the pay grade E-1 with less than four months of service.
SEC. 12. DISCHARGE FOLLOWING TRAINING.
Upon completion or termination of the obligation to receive basic military training and education, a person shall be discharged from the armed forces and shall not be subject to any further training or service under this Act. Nothing in this section shall limit or prohibit the call to active service in the armed forces of any person who is a member of a regular or reserve component of the armed forces.
SEC. 13. RELATION TO AUTHORIZED END STRENGTHS FOR ACTIVE FORCES.
The authorized end strengths for active duty personnel of the armed forces do not include persons inducted or accepted into the armed forces to receive basic military training and education.
SEC. 14. CONFORMING AMENDMENTS.
(a) TITLE 10- (1) Section 505(c) of title 10, United States Code, is amended--
(A) by inserting `(1)' after `(c)'; and
(B) by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
`(2) Paragraph (1) does not apply to a person inducted or accepted into the armed forces to receive basic military training and education pursuant to the Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001.'.
(2) Section 691 of title 10, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following new subsection:
`(g) The numbers specified in subsection (b) do not include persons inducted or accepted into the armed forces to receive basic military training and education pursuant to the Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001.'.
(b) MILITARY SELECTIVE SERVICE ACT- (1) Section 4 of the Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. App. 454) is amended by inserting after subsection (g) the following new subsection:
`(h) RELATION TO OTHER INDUCTION AUTHORITY- This section does not apply with respect to the induction of persons into the Armed Forces to receive basic military training and education pursuant to the Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001.'.
(2) Section 17(c) of the Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. App. 467(c)) is amended by striking `now or hereafter' and all that follows through the period at the end and inserting `inducted pursuant to the Universal Military Training and Service Act of 2001.'.
SEC. 15. TRANSITIONAL PROVISION.
A person who has obtained a high school diploma or its equivalent before January 1, 2003, shall not be subject to the obligation under section 3(a) to receive basic military training and education under this Act.
The Army should not be building its future around heavy weapons like the 70-ton Crusader howitzer system. The Crusader has many impressive battlefield features, but the Army's bulky equipment and lack of mobility have limited the service's role in Afghanistan and would have made many Army units unsuitable for action in Kosovo had allied ground troops been needed there.
The Navy and Marine Corps have been doing better at modernization, converting submarines to launch cruise missiles instead of nuclear missiles and delaying production of large and expensive stealth destroyers. Still, there is little justification for the Navy to build a new generation of attack submarines.
The Bush administration is right to press ahead with efforts to improve military pay, housing and health care. Those are dollars well spent. Another useful initiative was thwarted by Congress late last year. Secretary Rumsfeld tried to free more money for modernization through another round of base closings. Although about 25 percent of current bases are militarily obsolete, lawmakers postponed action until 2005.
With the public in a mood to spend more on defense and the conflict in Afghanistan emphasizing the importance of military modernization, this year's budget offered an extraordinary opportunity for Mr. Rumsfeld to call on the various services to update their spending priorities. Instead, he largely bowed to the momentum of familiar weapons programs. It will now be up to Congress to press for more forward-looking budgeting.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS
A Cop in Every Computer
The content and technology industries differ over an initiative that would build infringement-sniffing powers into new computers
Mike Godwin
IP Worldwide
January 16, 2002
http://www.law.com/cgi-bin/gx.cgi/AppLogic+FTContentServer?pagename=law/View&c=Article&cid=ZZZGFPVOGWC&live=true&cst=1&pc=0&pa=0&s=News&ExpIgnore=true&showsummary=0&useoverridetemplate=ZZZHCC0Q95C
There's a war looming in cyberspace over copyright. The war will not be about whether to combat the spread of unauthorized copies of computer programs, music or movies. On that point, the combatants agree. This will be a war about tactics and solutions.
The content industry -- especially Hollywood and the record labels -- wants the solution built into computers and other digital devices, such as Palm Pilots and MP3 players. The industry also wants it built into software, operating systems, Web browsers, and routers -- the devices that guide Internet traffic. It's a solution designed around the assumption that nearly all computer and Internet users are potential large-scale infringers.
In short: The content industry wants to place a copyright cop in your computer. It also wants to station one anyplace else on the Internet where an unauthorized copy might be made.
And if the industry has its way, we all may feel the consequences. Digital videos you shot in 1999 may be unplayable on your computer in 2009. You may no longer be able to move music or video files around easily from one computer to another (from, say, a home desktop to a laptop or to a personal digital assistant).
The content companies, on the other hand, see something different at stake. In a speech before Congress in 2000, Michael Eisner, chief executive of The Walt Disney Co., voiced the worries of the content industry when he said that "the future of the American entertainment industry [and] the future of American consumer" is at stake over the issue.
The content companies, with Eisner in the lead, argue that failure to build copy protection into the very digital environment itself will lead to their industry's destruction.
In previous battles over copyright, Hollywood and the large record labels have received the full support of their powerful friends in the software and computer industry. But this time, many of the high-tech companies are on the other side. They're satisfied that current law -- rather than future Rube Goldberg design mandates -- can do the trick. "We think mandating these protections is an abysmally stupid idea," says Emery Simon, special counsel to the Business Software Alliance (BSA), an antipiracy trade group whose members include the Adobe, Microsoft, Intel and IBM corporations.
A recent legislative proposal floated by Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., chairman of the Senate commerce committee, is the most public manifestation of the content industry's struggle. The Hollings bill, called the Security System Standards and Certification Act (SSSCA), makes it a civil offense to make or sell digital technologies that do not contain what it calls "certified security technologies," built-in systems that prevent the copying of content.
Draft versions of the legislation, which hasn't yet been formally introduced, also would impose criminal penalties -- up to five years in prison -- upon anyone who alters existing security technologies or disables copy protection mechanisms.
There's more than one way to prevent copying of copyrighted content. Various approaches, sometimes referred to as digital-rights management schemes, exist. One general method, called encryption, involves scrambling content in a "digital envelope." Encryption is what protects DVD movie and video game software from piracy. But the content industry wants to do more than just protect content. If encryption is broken -- and hackers are often able to break it -- content is free to be copied. To prevent this, the industry wants content to be labeled or digitally "watermarked," and it wants computers and other devices to be redesigned to look for the watermark, and to limit copying accordingly.
Supporters of the Hollings proposal don't couch the legislation in terms of protecting embattled copyright interests. They frame it as a measure designed to promote digital content and the use of broadband, high-speed Internet services. If Hollywood could be assured that its content would be protected on the broadband Internet, the argument goes, it would develop more compelling programs for the Web and spur greater consumer demand for broadband.
An aide to the Senate commerce committee says there are likely to be hearings on the bill as early as February 2002; hearings that had been set for fall of 2001 were postponed because of the Senate anthrax scare.
Back in 1998, Hollywood, record labels and software and technology companies came together to support the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. That act -- now law -- prohibited the creation, dissemination, and use of tools that circumvent digital-rights management technologies.
There won't be a similar broad-based coalition behind anything like the Hollings bill. Software and technology companies simply aren't ready for a state-ordered restructuring of their entire industrial sector. In remarks made in December at a business technology conference in Washington, D.C., Intel Corp. chief executive Craig Barrett spoke out against legislation like the Hollings bill. Let the private sector work out its own systems for protecting copyright, Barrett said.
A few companies are so big and so diverse that they don't fall easily into the content or technology camp. AOL Time Warner, for example, is conflicted. The movie companies and other content producers under the AOL Time Warner umbrella tend to favor efforts that lock down cyberspace, but AOL itself and some of the company's cable subsidiaries oppose compulsory designs. "We like the DMCA," says Jill Lesser, AOL Time Warner's senior vice president for domestic public policy. "There isn't from our perspective a need for additional remedies of copyright violations."
Broad as it is, the Hollings proposal is only one small part of a global effort to make the digital world safe for copyrighted materials. Standards groups, industry gatherings and global business policy forums are all working to create industrywide standards that don't require the approval of lawmakers.
A group called 4C Entity is promoting a standard for building digital rights management into digital storage devices, such as hard drives and possibly writable CD-ROM drives (the devices that copy CD-ROMs). The 5C Consortium is developing a copy protection standard for digital television, and interindustry forums like the Content Protection Technology Working Group are also working on digital TV.
But the content industry complains that the standard-setting process is proceeding at a tortoise's pace. The Hollings bill is meant to speed up the process, acting as a lever to compel the technology companies to negotiate more and faster.
The movie and TV studios are trying to ward off a possible Napster-like scenario. Though the free music-sharing service is now gone, other file-sharing systems, more decentralized and less easy to sue, remain. And Napster's legacy still casts a shadow over the music industry -- and on the content owners as a whole. A technology expert at News Corporation says that Napster signals the music industry's downfall. Music fans are now accustomed to copying CDs with CD burners, and downloading music from the Internet as MP3 files. "Within five years," the expert says, "music will be a cottage industry."
Rubbish, responds Matthew Gerson, the vice president for public policy at Vivendi Universal S.A., which produces and sells both music (Universal Music Group) and movies (Universal Studios Inc.). "We know that if we build a safe, consumer-friendly site that has all the bells and whistles and features that music fans want, it will flourish," Gerson says. "Fans will have no trouble paying for the music that they love, and compensating the artists who bring it to them -- established stars as well as the new voices the labels introduce year after year."
But maintaining that model -- with the record label serving as the conduit between creation and consumption -- depends both on large streams of revenue and on control of copyrighted works. The Internet and digital technology could cut off the revenue stream by moving music consumers to a world in which trading music online for free is the norm.
The record labels and the movie and TV studios see watermarks -- undetectable yet traceable digital imprints -- as their way to prevent a future world of widespread trading in free music, movies, and other types of content.
How would those watermarks work? For an example, let's use digital television, a nascent technology that transmits high-quality television broadcasts using a digital, rather than an analog, signal. A digital broadcast would include a watermark that identifies the content as copyrighted and might contain certain instructions. Devices and software designed according to the content-industry's mandate would look for the watermark. Those devices, in turn, would have strict limitations built in as to whether, and how often, a copy of that broadcast could be made.
The reverse might also be true: Those components might be designed not to play un-watermarked content. Otherwise, it would only encourage pirates to learn how to strip out the watermarks. In a world in which all consumer digital technology looks for watermarks, our legacy digital videos and MP3 collections might no longer be playable.
Digital television is the most pressing worry. Unlike DVD movies, which are encrypted on disc and decrypted every time they're played, digital broadcast television must be delivered unscrambled. The Federal Communications Commission requires that broadcast television be sent in the clear as a matter of public policy.
The prospect of high-quality, unencrypted content, delivered digitally, scares Hollywood. Without watermarking, consumers could simply record their favorite shows, trade them with friends, or -- worst of all -- make them available on the Internet, ŕ la Napster.
Content owners are also worried about the computer as it becomes not just a stand-alone device but also a component within the overall home entertainment system.
Says the BSA's Simon: "That's the multipurpose device that has them terrified." The fear is that computers will leak copyrighted content all over the world, he says.
And that, says Simon, is why the Hollings legislation is so broadly drafted. It's designed to close up all the leaks that digital technology might pose. In the drafts made available in the fall of 2001, the Hollings bill would make it a civil offense to develop a new computer or related technology that does not include a federally approved security standard preventing the unlicensed copying of copyrighted works. In at least one version, the law would make it a felony to remove a watermark or flag from copyrighted content. It would also outlaw logging onto the Internet with any computer that removes or sidesteps the copy protection technology.
Before the draft legislation was circulated, "we didn't know how broad this was," says one lawyer for cable company interests. Many cable companies are worried that the measure will interfere with their customers' viewing experience.
Although the Hollings legislation is controversial, its supporters are working to garner support. Preston Padden, the executive vice president for government relations for Disney, traces the origins of the bill to the Global Business Dialog on e-Commerce, a public policy group whose members come from a wide range of businesses. The group's IP subcommittee is chaired by Eisner, who, after much give and take with software and computer companies, shepherded through language favoring government "facilitation" of copyright protection standards.
With the group's recommendations in hand, Eisner could go to Congress and say there was a general business consensus favoring the passage of new laws to protect content on the Internet.
But there is a big difference between what that group generally recommended and what the Hollings bill specifically proposes.
The devil will be in the details. IBM, Microsoft and other technology companies are all developing their own ways of protecting copyright. Their digital rights management schemes are generally based on encryption, not watermarks. These companies don't want design mandates, which would effectively kill a market they are poised to exploit.
Moreover, technology companies have a "philosophical problem" with being told how to build their technologies, says Disney's Padden. With the exception of export controls on encryption, the computer and software industry does not have much experience with government mandates.
Not surprisingly, Rick Lane, News Corp.'s vice president for governmental affairs, and the other content industry lawyers think that the computer companies need to get over it. After all, mandates have been a fact of life for the consumer electronics industry -- particularly radio and television equipment -- for decades. Forty years ago, for example, the government told television makers to build UHF-reception capability into all new TVs.
The real problem runs deeper than mere resistance to government control. There's a philosophical difference that separates the content industry from the technology companies. You can see that difference in the way each industry refers to its customers. The content companies refer to "consumers," while the tech industry refers to "users." If you see a world of "consumers," your major concern is setting prices at the right level, so that buyers will purchase your products -- while you still make money. You control access to your merchandise, and do everything you can to prevent theft. For the same reason that supermarkets have cameras by the door and bookstores have electronic theft detectors, content companies want copy protection to prevent theft of their wares. Allowing people to take stuff for free is inconsistent with their business model.
But if you see a world of "users," you want to give that market more features and powers for less money. The impulse to empower users was at the heart of the microcomputer revolution. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, for example, founded Apple Computer Inc. partly because they wanted to put computing power into ordinary people's hands.
Redesigning the world of digital tools so that every device, application and operating system is on the lookout for copyrighted works is at odds with that view.
What gets lost in the debate is the voice of consumers -- whatever they are called. Maybe they are willing to trade away open, robust, relatively simple digital tools for a more constrained digital world in which they have more content choices. But maybe they aren't. The Hollings bill is unlikely to attract them to the debate, pitched as a "security standard" rather than as a new copyright law.
Like the larger philosophical war that is raging around the world in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, the looming war between these two sides has the potential to be a long, difficult fight without a foreseeable conclusion. And if and when peace talks begin between the two sides, there's no guarantee that the rest of us will have a seat at the table.
----
Nepal Maoists attack jail, free 32 prisoners
AFP Kathmandu,
Jan 16
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/160102/dLFOR17.asp
A group of armed Maoists attacked a jail in Nepal releasing 32 prisoners, officials said on Wednesday.
"A group of Maoist terrorists attacked the central jail of Surkhet district, 432 kilometres (270 miles) far southwest of Kathmandu, and helped to free 32 inmates by digging a tunnel at the backside compound of the jail," Home Minister Devendra Raj Kandel said.
"The group of Maoists attacked the jail with guns and kept the security personnel guarding the jail occupied by exchanging fire with them while others helped to get the 32 inmates escape," Kandel said.
He said none of the escaped prisoners had so far been re-arrested.
In a separate incident, Maoists killed a regional president of the ruling Nepali Congress party in the southwestern Dang district, the minister said.
The attackers escaped and no one has been arrested for the killing.
The rebels have been fighting for a communist republic since 1996 and the insurgency has so far claimed the lives of over 2,300 people.
In November the government declared emergency rule to combat the Maoists, who had broken a four-month truce with attacks on police and army posts.
--------
Fake Drugs Force an End to 24 Cases in Dallas
New York Times
January 16, 2002
By ROSS E. MILLOY
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/16/national/16DALL.html
DALLAS, Jan. 15 - Nearly half of the cocaine and nearly a quarter of the methamphetamine that the Dallas police seized last year have turned out to be gypsum from wallboard, a discovery that has led to the suspension of two dozen criminal cases, local officials say.
All the cases involve a single unidentified informer who has received at least $200,000 from the Dallas Police Department over the last two years, officials confirmed last week. The supposed drugs tested positive in field tests after the arrests, they said, but more sophisticated testing done later in preparation for trial found no more than traces of drugs.
The Dallas Morning News, which disclosed the situation, reported this morning that in at least four cases suspects had little money on them when they were arrested.
The Dallas police and the district attorney's office have opened investigations to determine exactly what happened. Among their questions are these: Did the informer fake the drug purchases to obtain money from the police? Was there tampering with the evidence, either by the informer or the police? Was there a problem with the testing process used at the time of the arrests?
Two lawyers involved in the matter said the Federal Bureau of Investigation had made inquiries about the case, but Lori Bailey, a spokeswoman for the agency, said no formal investigation had yet begun.
"It's just a real touchy situation right now," Ms. Bailey said. "The Dallas Police Department has started its own investigation, and we're currently accepting information and looking into the possibility that there may be violations that would fall under our investigative jurisdiction. At this time, we do not have a formal investigation under way."
Janice Houston, a spokeswoman for the police department, said today that at least 70 drug purchases associated with the unnamed informer over the past two years would be reviewed. But Ms. Houston would not comment on the possibility that the evidence in question might have been tampered with while under police custody.
"We have an investigation under way," she said, "and it's just too early to speculate on where the problem might be."
Brady Wyatt, a Dallas lawyer representing a person accused of drug dealing whose case has been dismissed, said he doubted that the police had acted criminally.
"It sounds to me like they've got a bad informant," Mr. Wyatt said.
District Attorney Bill Hill of Dallas County refused to discuss the case today, and his spokesman referred a reporter to a statement last week in which Mr. Hill acknowledged problems with evidence in the disputed cases and said he would review arrests involving the informer.
Investigators have found more than 660 pounds of fake cocaine and at least 22 pounds of fake methamphetamine. Some of those arrested have already spent up to six months in jail and at least four have been deported on charges that could have resulted in sentences from five years to life in prison.
All 18 people named in the two dozen suspended prosecutions have Hispanic surnames, prompting accusations of racial profiling from the Mexican Consulate here and Hispanic organizations.
At least three of the people were arrested under similar circumstances, said Bill Stovall, a former Dallas County district attorney who represents some of the men.
While waiting to be hired at an informal gathering spot for day laborers, Mr. Stovall said, the men were approached by strangers asking if they knew how to drive. The men were then taken to a second car and led to a nearby convenience store to wait for a man who they were told would give them painting supplies. That person, thought to be the informer, then put a black bag in the car's trunk and, while following him to another place, the men were stopped and arrested, Mr. Stovall said.
Lawyers involved in the cases said the defendants were mainly poor, illegal Mexican immigrants.
"They are picking on the poorest of the poor, people just struggling to make a buck to survive," Mr. Wyatt said.
Last year, a new state law reined in the use of unsupervised informers in drug prosecutions after a case in which 12 percent of the black population of Tulia, Tex., was arrested, mainly on the word of an undercover agent. Since last September, informers' testimony must be corroborated by a police officer. But enforcement of that law by the courts is spotty, said Richard Carrizales, another Dallas defense lawyer.
"There's a big problem here with the way the police are conducting oversight of their informants," Mr. Carrizales said, "and it's getting bigger. The informants are leading the narcotics officers around by the nose, setting up people to be busted, so that they can collect bonuses for the number of arrests they get."
-------- OTHER
-------- alternative energy
UTAH BREWERY CHOOSES 100 PERCENT WIND POWER
Environmental News Network,
January 16, 2002
http://enn.com/news/enn-stories/2002/01/01162002/s_46082.asp
A small Utah company brews award-winning beers such as Cutthroat Pale Ale and Kings Peak Porter, and now it's doing it with power generated by the strong winds of Wyoming. Uinta Brewing Company of Salt Lake City announced the opening of its new brewery and the Uinta Brewhouse Pub — the first in Utah to be run on 100 percent pollution-free wind power from Utah Power's Blue Sky Program....
----
ANALYSIS - Biomass power hopes for UK boost in 2002
Story by Margaret Orgill,
Reuters
16/1/2002
http://www.planetark.org/avantgo/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=14044
LONDON - Willows, poplars and grass could one day be used to generate electricity for thousands of homes in Britain, if the biomass industry's hopes of a big boost from the government's renewables policy bear fruit.
Biomass, which uses plant and animal matter to provide power, has been in the doldrums for the last couple of years, hit by high costs and a hiatus in government support for new renewable energy schemes.
Now hopes are rising the industry could be kick started by government plans to introduce a "renewables obligation" in April, forcing electricity suppliers to buy at least three percent of their power from green sources this year.
"Everyone is waiting for the renewables obligation to kick in on April 1. It is an extremely important event," said Melville Haggard, director responsible for financial advice at the Impax Group which specialises in finance for environmental schemes.
"The obligation creates a legally enforceable demand driver," he added.
The rules require companies to buy just over 10 percent of their supplies from green sources by 2010 and will create a renewables market worth around 750 million pounds by the end of the decade.
WIND, BIOMASS SEEN DOMINATION
Analysts expect wind and biomass to be the main winners under the renewables obligation as their technology is proven whereas the costs of solar power are still too high and tide and wave power technologies are in their infancy.
Wood chips, straw and poultry litter already produce small amounts of electricity for Britain's homes. These schemes are backed by the Non Fossil Fuel Obligation system but funding for new schemes stopped three years ago while preparations were made for the renewables obligation.
If biomass takes off, then farmers could plant thousands of acres of land with energy crops like willows and miscanthus, or elephant grass, a bamboo-type grass which would be harvested to fuel small power stations.
Analysts say "bioenergy" will need help if it is to follow the example of wind power where government support, in countries like Denmark and Germany, led to the building of large-scale manufacturing plants and a sharp drop in costs.
"Biomass needs to be encouraged. Wind is nearly there and can just about stand on its own two feet," said Stewart Gray, an analyst at Edinburgh-based consultants Wood MacKenzie.
Wind power generation costs have tumbled to around three pence a kilowatt hour, compared with 10-11 pence when the first turbines started whirring in Britain in the early 1990s.
In contrast, biomass companies need at least five pence a kilowatt hour to make a profit at the moment compared with current wholesale prices of around two pence.
LARGE UTILITIES LOOK AT BIOMASS
Signs are emerging that large utilities, which have announced big investments in wind in the last few months, are also gearing up to pour cash into biomass.
Powergen plans to build 1000 megawatts of renewable generation by 2010, of which 800 MW will be wind power and 200 MW will be for bioenergy, said a spokesman.
The biomass industry says Britain will needs to build about 1000 MW of biomass power stations, up from just over 100 MW today, if it is to meet its target of 10 percent of power from green sources by 2010.
"Biomass has to feature. Hydrocapacity is limited, landfill gas will decline over time and there is only so much land available for (onshore) wind," said Keith Pitcher, strategic development manager at First Renewables, a subsidiary of water utility Kelda Group Plc.
First Renewables runs the eight MW ARBRE wood chip fired power station and has plans for a 38 MW plant but will not be able to complete financing for it until the renewables obligation has come into force, he said.
----
Sanyo, Samsung group in fuel cell tie
Story by Edmund Klamann and Keiko Kanai,
Reuters:
16/1/2002
http://www.planetark.org/avantgo/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=14043
TOKYO/OSAKA - Consumer electronics maker Sanyo Electric Co said yesterday it agreed with South Korea's Samsung Group to jointly develop fuel cells for small-scale home and commercial power generation.
The deal aimed to cut costs and speed up development of non-polluting fuel cell power systems, and Sanyo said collaboration between the two groups' research and development arms would expand to other technological areas as well.
"What's most important is that by combining our technologies we can speed up commercial availability," Fusao Terada, director of Sanyo Electric's research and development centre, told a news conference.
"And by boosting efficiency, we can reduce the cost burden while improving the level (of technology)."
At present, the collaboration would be limited to research and development and would not extend to manufacturing or other operations, he added.
Sanyo and other Japanese electronics makers are aiming to get household fuel cell power systems to the market within the next two to three years.
Fuel cells, which create electricity from a reaction between hydrogen and oxygen, are still largely at the prototype stage but hold promise as a clean, long-lasting energy source for products from cellphones to automobiles, as well as stand-alone or emergency power systems for homes and commercial buildings.
CLEAN COLLABORATION
Last October, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co Ltd, the world's largest consumer electronics maker, demonstrated a 1.3 kilowatt fuel cell cogeneration and water heating system that it hoped to sell for 1-1.2 million yen ($7,600 to $9,100).
It estimated the system, which extracts hydrogen from natural gas supplied by a local utility, would save users up to 50,000 yen ($380) per year on utility bills.
Sanyo Electric is working with Osaka Gas Co Ltd, Japan's second-largest gas utility, to develop its fuel cell system.
It said the collaboration with Samsung would allow it to tap the South Korean group's expertise in miniaturisation and manufacturing processes.
Terada said other potential areas of technological cooperation between the two would include optic and electrical components.
Sanyo is Japan's third-largest consumer electronics maker. The Samsung Group includes Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, the world's fourth-largest chipmaker.
The announcement follows a slew of other deals unveiled by Sanyo Electric over the past week, including the sale of its 55.8 billion yen-per-year vending machine business to Fuji Electric Co Ltd and a marketing tie-up with Chinese consumer electronics giant Haier Group.
Sanyo's shares ended Tuesday trade down 1.3 percent at 607 yen, outperforming a 2.24 percent drop in the benchmark Nikkei average and declines of more than three percent in Japan's other big consumer electronics makers, including Matsushita Electric and Sharp Corp
Sanyo's shares have bounced modestly from a low of 418 yen hit on September 27, but remain well below their 52-week peak of 996 hit last January 25.
Samsung Electric was down 18,000 won at 312,000.
-------- energy
Energy security - 9:30 a.m. -
January 16, 2002
Washington Times Daybook
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20020116-476067.htm
The Mellman Group and the National Resources Defense Council hold a news conference to discuss the politics and policy of energy security. The participants include Deb Callahan, League of Conservation Voters; John Podesta, National Resources Defense Council; Mark Mellman, Mellman Group; and Jason Mark, Union of Concerned Scientists. Location: Holeman Lounge, National Press Club, 14th and F streets NW. Contact: 202/822-5200.
----
REPORT DETAILS PROBLEMS, SOLUTIONS OF OIL DEPENDENCE
January 16, 2002
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-16-09.html
WASHINGTON, DC, A new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) details the security threat posed by America's dependence on foreign oil.
"Dangerous Addiction: Ending America's Oil Dependence" argues that additional domestic drilling will not solve the problem, as America uses a quarter of the world's oil, but has only three percent of known reserves. Drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would increase world reserves by less than one-third of one percent, the report says.
The only way to end the economic and security risks of this imbalance is to use better cars and better fuels, the NRDC report says. It offers a five step plan to cut the oil needed for our cars and light trucks in half, saving five million barrels per day by 2020.
"Washington has been dragging its feet on energy security. Now we face the risk of finishing another war with Middle East origins without a solution in place," said John Podesta, former White House chief of staff, now a senior fellow at NRDC. "It's time for the president and Congress to reverse course, and tackle this national security priority."
The report presents steps that can be taken now, using American technology and know how, to reduce the oil needed to power America's cars and light trucks. Oil demand could be cut in half by 2020, while giving American consumers the best and safest driving choices in the world, by building better vehicles and making better fuels, the NRDC report says.
"Detroit has the technology to end our oil addiction," said Jason Mark, director of the Clean Vehicles Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. "If cars and trucks live up to their technological potential, by 2010 we can save more oil annually than we currently import from Saudi Arabia."
Raising fuel economy standards - would save almost four billion barrels of oil over the next dozen years, the report argues. By 2012, the nation could save almost two million barrels every day - a savings of 18 percent below current projections.
By 2020, savings would grow to almost five million barrels per day, almost twice as much as the nation's current total imports from the Persian Gulf.
"These proposals are the best way to curb our reliance on Middle Eastern oil," said Podesta. "We can regain control over our future by providing American consumers with the safest and best performing passengers vehicles in the world. This is the road to increase our national security, strengthen our economy, and protect our environment."
The full report is available at: http://www.nrdc.org
----
Dangerous Addiction - Ending America's Oil Dependence
Natural Resources Defense Council, http://www.nrdc.org/air/transportation/oilsecurity/execsum.asp
Contents page - http://www.nrdc.org/air/transportation/oilsecurity/securityinx.asp
Executive Summary:
America's oil dependence endangers our national security. America consumes a quarter of the world's total oil production, but has just 3 percent of its known reserves. We import more than half of our oil from some of the most unstable regions of the world. At the root of our heavy reliance on oil imports is the inefficiency of our cars, sport utility vehicles (SUVs), and other passenger vehicles.
This report presents practical solutions we can adopt now, using American technology and know-how, to cut the oil needed to power America's cars and light trucks. We can cut that oil demand in half by 2020 -- and provide American consumers with the best and safest driving choices in the world -- by building better vehicles and making better fuels. We can have better, cleaner transportation for less money while strengthening our safety, security, and freedom.
Fixing a Dangerous Addiction The events of September 11 highlight the danger in continuing to turn a blind eye to our oil dependence. While oil prices are down for the moment, the instability of the Middle East makes for a situation that could change at any moment. New suppliers like Russia and the Caspian region are hardly more stable.
Sixty-five percent of the world's known reserves lie beneath the Persian Gulf states. That stark fact makes a supply-side strategy based on domestic drilling alone into a recipe for continued dependence on these unstable regions. Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would increase world reserves by less than one-third of one percent. To be sure, we can increase production from existing oil fields. But no matter how much we try to drill for new oil at home, Persian Gulf producers will gain more and more of the American oil market -- and limit our ability to conduct foreign policy in the best interests of the American people.
Our oil dependence threatens our environmental security as well. Smog and other toxic air pollutants, constant pressure to drill in pristine wilderness, and growing emissions of the heat-trapping global warming pollutant, carbon dioxide (CO2), all are effects tied directly to the amount of oil we burn.
The best way to turn that around is to reduce our reliance on imported oil by building better cars and making better fuels. The fastest, cheapest, most secure solution is a comprehensive energy security strategy combining near-term fuel-economy improvements in our cars and trucks with longer-term initiatives to develop the fuels of the future.
A Comprehensive Strategy for Cost-Effective Savings This report offers a five-step solution to make better vehicles and better fuels that reduce our oil dependence with no reduction in safety, performance, or choice. Together, these measures could cut passenger vehicle oil use by nearly a quarter by 2012, by half in 2020, and by three-quarters over the next three decades, compared with business-as-usual projections. That translates into big savings at the gas pump: a person buying a 40 mpg car in 2012 would save a net of $2,200 over the life of the vehicle. Total consumer savings from these policies would equal nearly $13 billion per year in 2012, and almost $30 billion by 2020.
Our action plan to curb oil dependence includes:
Improving the fuel economy of new vehicles powered by gasoline-engine technology. Congress should ramp up standards for the combined fleet of cars and light trucks in regular steps to 40 mpg by 2012 and 55 mpg in 2020.
Mass-producing gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles, which get double the mileage of today's cars. Toyota and Honda already have hybrids on the road, and more are coming. Lawmakers should provide consumer tax credits to support the transition to new technology.
Significantly expanding the use of renewable, non-petroleum fuels, such as ethanol made from crop wastes, by steadily increasing requirements for "renewable content" in gasoline.
Putting hydrogen-powered fuel-cell vehicles onto the road using incentives and requirements to ramp up production to 100,000 vehicles by 2010 and 2.5 million by 2020. These vehicles will use one-third the energy of today's cars (none of it from oil) and produce near-zero harmful emissions.
Encouraging "smart growth" instead of suburban sprawl, to increase our transportation choices and make communities more livable with less driving.
The first step alone -- raising fuel economy standards -- would save nearly 4 billion barrels of oil over the next dozen years. By 2012, we could save nearly 2 million barrels every day -- a savings of 18 percent below business-as-usual projections. That is slightly more oil than we imported from Saudi Arabia last year, and three times our imports from Iraq. By 2020, savings would grow to nearly 5 million barrels per day, almost twice as much as total current imports from the Persian Gulf.
Unlike the Freedom Car fuel-cell research exercise recently announced by the U.S. Department of Energy, this report offers a real plan for putting better cars and better fuels on the road before it's too late. Our plan calls for introducing vastly more efficient conventional and hybrid technologies that will significantly reduce oil demand during this decade, and putting real fuel-cell vehicles on the road within this decade.
These measures would cut heat-trapping CO2 and other global warming emissions by more than 400 million metric tons in 2012, and by almost a billion metric tons in 2020. By 2020 we could avoid 240,000 tons of cancer-causing pollution and more than 500,000 tons worth of smog-forming emissions each year.
The High Cost of Oil Imports American drivers used more than 120 billion gallons of gasoline in 2000, costing $186 billion. If fuel economy does not improve, passenger-vehicle fuel use will increase more than 50 percent by 2020, to almost 190 billion gallons per year. Without serious action, the share of that oil that is imported will grow from one-half to nearly two-thirds.
The United States spent $106 billion -- about $380 per person -- importing crude oil and petroleum products in 2000. By 2020, oil-import spending is expected to hit $160 billion, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, an increase of more than 50 percent.
This results in a huge transfer of wealth to oil exporting nations. Over the past 30 years, U.S. consumers have transferred more than a trillion dollars to oil producing countries. And each of the three major oil price spikes of the last 30 years was followed by a recession in the United States.
The Environmental Price Tag The environmental consequences of our oil demand are well known: cars and passenger trucks are the second largest U.S. source of carbon dioxide pollution -- emitting 1.3 billion tons of heat-trapping gases in 2000. Emissions of smog- and cancer-causing air pollutants are also a major problem, especially in urban areas.
Our oil addiction also creates constant pressure to drill unspoiled wilderness areas like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Utah's Redrock canyon country, and lands in the vicinity of Yellowstone National Park. Most federal lands with potential oil resources are already available to oil exploration and development; in fact, federal lands account for 29 percent of U.S. crude oil production. Meanwhile oil spills pose a constant threat to the land, water, wildlife, and coastal livelihoods. Almost 1.5 million gallons of oil were spilled into U.S. waters in 2000.
We Can Do It A safer, more secure energy future is well within the reach of America's industrial prowess. Studies by the National Academy of Sciences, the Union of Concerned Scientists, and other independent analysts have all demonstrated that a 40-mpg fleet average is achievable within a decade or so, using technology that is available today.
America has already proven that such strides are possible. Fuel economy for new passenger cars nearly doubled between 1975 -- when standards were first adopted -- and their peak in 1988. Fuel economy for new light trucks increased by 50 percent. But the rules haven't changed since 1985. Average mileage of our new cars and trucks today is at its lowest level in 20 years.
And today we have the know-how to turn crop wastes into fuel, replace the internal combustion engine with emission-free fuel cells, and practice smart-growth development that increases our transportation choices.
Together these proposals are the best way to curb our reliance on Middle East oil. We can regain control over our future by providing American consumers with the safest and best performing passengers vehicles in the world. This is the road to increase our national security, strengthen our economy, and protect our environment.
-
Frequently asked questions, NRDC
http://www.nrdc.org/air/energy/qsecure.asp
1.How is our country's energy policy related to national security?
2.How can we make our nation less vulnerable?
3.But aren't these fuel-efficient technologies still years away?
4.Will higher gas-mileage standards really save that much oil?
5.In the short term, shouldn't we also start drilling for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other wilderness areas that might hold oil?
6.Is there a connection between energy security and global warming?
7.Sounds like these conservation strategies require action by the government and big business. What can I do?
8.I'm looking for a new car. What should I consider in buying one?
9.Have energy efficiency efforts worked in the past?
-------- environment
Suits Against Power Firms Justified, Justice Dept. Says
Critics Say Stance Masks Retreat on Pollution Rules
By Eric Pianin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 16, 2002; Page A17
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51444-2002Jan15?language=printer
The Justice Department concluded yesterday that the Clinton administration was justified in suing the operators of scores of aging coal-fired power plants that were illegally polluting the atmosphere. Justice officials vowed to "vigorously" pursue those cases.
Under the Clean Air Act, the Clinton administration and states filed lawsuits against operators of 51 older power plants, alleging that they broke the law by expanding their facilities without adding modern anti-pollution devices to combat dangerous emissions. Most of those cases are still pending and involve hundreds of millions of dollars in potential losses for major companies including Cinergy Corp., Southern Co. and Virginia Electric and Power Co. (Vepco).
"The Department takes seriously its obligation to enforce the laws protecting our nation's environment," said Attorney General John D. Ashcroft. "Ensuring cleaner air for the health and well-being of all Americans is critically important."
But because the Bush administration is preparing to unveil proposals to substantially ease air pollution standards for older power plants, critics said that yesterday's announcement provided utilities facing court action with little incentive to negotiate a settlement before the new, more lenient rules are in place.
Even before yesterday, tentative agreements with Cincinnati-based Cinergy and Richmond-based Vepco had been put on hold pending the outcome of the Justice Department review, and a senior Justice official acknowledged yesterday that lawyers for those companies "may not advise clients to go forward."
Moreover, Justice Department officials signaled that, despite their finding, they are under no obligation to bring further legal action against other power plants that violate the Clean Air Act.
"Today's announcement is positive, but industry is waiting for a better deal and we think they're about to get it," said John Walke, a clean air expert with the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The Justice Department's declaration is part of a carefully orchestrated administration effort to balance environmental concerns against the demands of industry lobbyists -- including former Republican Party chairman Haley Barbour and onetime Republican White House counsel C. Boyden Gray -- to dramatically weaken clean air enforcement regulations.
After months of internal bickering over strategy, White House, Environmental Protection Agency and Energy Department officials essentially decided to give industry much of what it is seeking, but to couch that decision by upholding the Clinton era lawsuits and pledging to work with Congress to reduce certain power plant emissions.
In May, a national energy task force headed by Vice President Cheney ordered the Justice Department to review the pending cases as part of a larger effort to determine whether current enforcement policies, known as "New Source Review," were discouraging industry investment and expansion as industry officials contended.
The Justice Department's review concluded that the EPA "reasonably" interpreted the Clean Air Act in filing the lawsuits. However, the department stressed that its finding is "retrospective," applicable only to pending enforcement actions, and that officials expressed no opinion on how the Clean Air Act should be enforced in the future.
State officials and environmental groups that have fought power plant emissions for years had mixed reactions to yesterday's development, with some praising the Justice Department for upholding the cases and others complaining that the decision was a subterfuge to distract the public from the administration's plans to weaken enforcement rules.
"Two successive federal administrations have now endorsed suits to compel power plants and other air pollution sources to reduce air pollution," said New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, a party to the legal action against Midwest power plants whose pollution reaches the Northeast. "If the administration takes a different course and attempts to weaken Clean Air Act regulations, then this positive effect of the [Justice] report will be viewed as only disingenuous camouflage of another capitulation to the president's industry supporters."
"This is the most cynical publicity stunt I have ever seen," declared Philip Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust. "Look good one day by announcing you're going to prosecute polluters -- and hope nobody notices a few days later when you quietly announce that you're gutting the very rules under which the polluters are being prosecuted."
Industry groups said they were generally displeased with the Justice Department action, but stressed that the decision does not bind future actions of the federal government. "I would say the Justice Department did not warmly endorse EPA's current interpretation" of the clean air law, said Scott Segal, a spokesman for the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, one of the main industry lobbying groups. "All they said was that it was 'reasonable' to have brought the lawsuits -- but not smart."
----
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE APPROVES EXPANDED OIL EXPLORATION IN EVERGLADES WATERSHED
Environmental News Network,
January 16, 2002
Associated Press
http://enn.com/news/enn-stories/2002/01/01162002/s_46082.asp
A proposal to search for oil in the Big Cypress National Preserve by detonating dynamite in 14,700 holes and drilling a 11,800-foot exploratory well has won initial approval from the National Park Service. An environmental assessment issued Monday includes dozens of stipulations intended to protect marshes, forests, and wildlife within the 729,000-acre preserve that is a watershed for the Everglades and a home to the endangered Florida panther....
-------- health
Monkey Dies in AIDS Vaccine Test
January 16, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-AIDS-Vaccine.html
In a study that illustrates how cunning a foe AIDS is, a monkey that was given an experimental AIDS vaccine died after the virus changed just one of its genes.
HIV, which causes AIDS, already is known to mutate and grow impervious to standard AIDS drugs in at least half of all Americans being treated for the infection.
Now researchers have seen a similar outcome with an experimental vaccine that tries to stop the virus from multiplying. The mutation occurred in one of eight vaccinated rhesus monkeys in a Harvard experiment.
The findings were published in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.
Scientists who reviewed the results described the monkey's death as ``more disappointing than surprising.''
It does not mean that AIDS vaccines are doomed to fail, they said, but illustrates how the virus will not be easily defeated or even contained anytime soon.
``It is sobering to find that a single-point mutation within the virus can initiate a cascade of events resulting in a clinical vaccine failure and death,'' said Dan H. Barouch, a clinical fellow at Harvard Medical School and lead author of the study.
More than one dozen experimental vaccines using different genetic strategies have been tested in various laboratories. Some have been successful for more than two years.
Unlike a flu shot, AIDS vaccines do not actually prevent infection by the invading virus. That is because HIV comes in many strains and changes rapidly.
Instead, the AIDS vaccines work to hold HIV infection in check. The vaccines are made with genes that carry the code for proteins in the virus. When the immune system sees these codes, it learns to stimulate production of virus-fighting cells known as killer T cells.
Details of one such vaccine program developed Merck & Co. were published in Nature along with the Harvard report. Company researchers discussed their progress at the first-ever AIDS vaccine meeting in September, and they have begun testing the vaccine in people.
In their animal study, the Merck researchers used the simian version of HIV. They said their best results were obtained by loading an SHIV gene for a protein known as gag into a genetically engineered cold virus. It stimulated the monkeys' immune systems to generate different types of killer T cells.
The Merck researchers subsequently injected lethal doses of SHIV into the animals. They said the vaccine has protected the animals, and they have not seen signs of the Harvard problem, known as ``gene-escape.''
``We've gone 500 days and not seen any escape,'' said molecular biologist Emilio Emini, director of the Merck trials. ``It's something to watch for. But if the vaccine elicits a sufficiently broad genetic response, this is going to be an issue that we can deal with.''
The Harvard trial took a slightly different approach. Rather than loading the gag gene onto a cold virus, the Harvard researchers injected gag DNA plus an immune cell growth factor directly into the animals.
Seven of Harvard's vaccinated animals have remained healthy for two years, even after they were injected with SHIV.
But the eighth vaccinated monkey, known as No. 798, responded differently. Six months into the trial, molecular studies showed the virus had started mutating.
Within eight months, virus levels soared within No. 798 and mutated virus was rapidly replacing the original virus. Levels of killer T cell levels plummeted. No. 798 died of AIDS-related complications one year after vaccination.
Federal scientists who reviewed both the Harvard and Merck studies said SHIV strain used in the trials is very aggressive and hard to control. It may not reflect how vaccines will perform in humans, where HIV infection is more gradual.
Developing an AIDS vaccine will be ``an uphill grade for the foreseeable future,'' Jeffery Lifson of the National Cancer Institute and Malcolm Martin of the National Institutes of Health wrote in an accompanying editorial.
On the Net: http://www.nature.com
-------- human rights
War on terror is 'leading to civil rights abuses'
By David Usborne
16 January 2002
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia_china/story.jsp?story=114689
Governments may be using the war against terror in Afghanistan as an excuse to lower their own standards on civil liberties, Human Rights Watch said.
The group, which monitors human rights abuses around the world, issued the warning in its 2002 annual report.
In central Europe and central Asia, it said: "In much the same way as the Cold War once distorted the human rights agenda, the prospects for tackling the region's persistent and newly emerging human rights problems seemed suddenly to dim in light of the competing and overriding anti-terrorism imperative."
The report said Russia, Uzbekistan and Egypt were among countries using the war against terror to step up abusive military campaigns within their borders and to crack down against political opponents.
The organisation is particularly pointed about plans to create military tribunals in the United States to try terrorist suspects. Kenneth Roth, its executive director, wrote: "Imagine the US condemning military tribunals set up by a tinpot tyrant to get rid of his political enemies. That kind of criticism can have real sting.
"But now it will ring with hypocrisy - if the Pentagon does not narrow President Bush's order on military commissions with appropriate guidelines."
Terrorists believed that "anything goes in the name of their cause", Mr Roth wrote. "The fight against terror must not buy into that logic. Human rights principles must not be compromised in the name of any cause. For too many countries, the anti-terror mantra has provided a new reason to ignore human rights."
And Mr Roth warned European governments moving to pass anti-terror laws not to lower their own moral standards in the process. "The fight against terror isn't just a matter of security," he said. "It's a matter of values."
-------- imf / world bank
WEF foes won't nix violence in N.Y.
By Betsy Pisik
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
January 16, 2002
http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20020116-28681275.htm
NEW YORK - Anti-globalization protesters, who have shied from the spotlight in the months after September 11, plan to return in force with a massive display of resistance at a meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) here in two weeks.
At a weekend organization meeting in New York, dozens of self-proclaimed anarchists, radicals and anti-globalization activists agreed that they would not publicly condemn the use of violence by fellow protesters.
Many of those speaking at the three-hour meeting said they did not define as violence the destruction of corporate property, nor measures taken in self-defense.
"The police and the corporate media will try to provoke violence, and I think we will be in an inevitably volatile situation," said one man in his early 20s, a decorative stripe of safety pins trailing down one sleeve.
No one at the meeting of the anti-WEF coalition, called "Another World Is Possible," advocated the use of violence during Sunday night's meeting. But they seemed comfortable with the idea that their protests might turn ugly.
One organizer said he had arranged for 30 "street medics" - volunteers trained in emergency first aid for tear gas, broken bones and other injuries most frequently sustained in demonstrations - to be available during the group's march Feb. 2.
The anti-WEF organization is fairly decentralized, but some facilitators say they expect tens of thousands of demonstrators, including student groups, labor unions, church groups and activists supporting animal, environmental and human rights.
Protesters have disrupted nearly every major international economic gathering since the "Battle of Seattle" shut down the World Trade Organization meeting in December 1999. Demonstrations in Washington; Salzburg, Austria; Genoa, Italy; and other cities have grown increasingly violent.
The 31-year-old World Economic Forum, traditionally staged in Davos, Switzerland, will leave its mountaintop for the first time this year.
WEF conferences have been plagued by protests for the past two years, causing some Swiss politicians and media outlets to question whether it should continue to be held in a small alpine village.
The annual meeting, scheduled for Jan. 31 to Feb. 4 at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York City, will draw some 2,500 corporate, political, religious and academic leaders and media stars - or "fat cats," as the anti-globalization camp calls them.
Those attending the WEF will participate in 300 lectures and seminars, as well as countless meals, receptions and private meetings. It is, as one participant says, an invaluable networking opportunity for people who mostly already know each other.
For anti-globalization forces, the WEF is also an irresistible symbol of entitlement and power among politicians, corporations, academics and mainstream media - entities they blame for recessions, unemployment, environmental abuse and other wrongs.
"They have come to make their plans to increase mass layoffs, to slash education and health services, to reduce wages and working conditions and to assault the civil rights of all who dare to oppose them," one anti-WEF Web site said.
During last year's WEF forum in Davos, police repelled protesters with water cannons and barbed wire, eventually arresting scores of demonstrators throughout the country.
After the September 11 attacks, WEF organizers moved their meeting to Manhattan saying they wanted to show support for the beleaguered city.
The move will cost considerably more than the roughly $13 million spent on a typical Davos event, WEF Communications Director Charles McLean said.
"If it's true that these people are not willing to condemn violence, after all this city has been through, I think they should be ashamed of themselves," he said on Monday. "I don't think New Yorkers will be very receptive to people who come here with violent intentions."
Detective Walter Burnes, a spokesman for the New York Police Department, said it was too soon to discuss arrangements for the WEF meeting. However, he said repeatedly that the department "is the best trained and most experienced in handling demonstrations."
-------- activists
As the bombs continue to fall, another US aircraft lands in Afghanistan.
This time the mission is reconciliation, as victims of 11 September meet civilian victims of the war on terror
By Kim Sengupta in Kabul
16 January 2002
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia_china/story.jsp?story=114711
She listened to how a bomb buried Najiba Shakar Pardes in the rubble of her own home, then 70-year-old Rita Lasar leant forward and gently touched her arm. "I am sorry, I am so very sorry," she said, wiping her eyes.
It was the first time the American, whose brother died in the World Trade Centre, had met an Afghan family bombed by the US and for a while there was awkward small talk and polite smiles over green tea and fruit.
The visit by the Americans is highly contentious in the US. It was organised by the radical human rights group Global Exchange and the visitors had come with sympathy and an avowed aim of trying to rectify what they see as a terrible wrong by their country. In the next few days they will meet visiting members of the US Congress; the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, due here tomorrow; and the interim Afghan leader, Hamid Karzai. The State Department and US diplomats in Kabul are watching with trepidation but are unable to prevent the huge media interest in the visit.
At her tiny flat in Makrayan, Mrs Shakar waited patiently, slumped in a near-bare room, for the visitors. Her once pretty face is now criss-crossed with scars, and she has difficulty standing up or talking.
She was in pain, she said, and wanted to rest. She had suffered extensive injuries to her head, arms and legs in the US bombing raid on 17 October, and spent weeks in hospital. She had also been four months pregnant and there are fears for the unborn baby.
Mrs Shakar, 38, was collateral damage. She had been at home in central Kabul, with her three children, when the bomb punched a hole in it. The children who had, amazingly, escaped harm, watched and cried as her body was scooped out by a bulldozer. Now they help their father Mohammed look after their invalid mother.
Rita Lasar, Derrill Bodley, Eva Rupp and Kelly Campbell sat on the red and black Herat carpet, one of the few valuable things the family have left and brought out in their honour. They handed Mrs Shakar baby clothes and she thanked them profusely.
Under the glare of television lights, Mr Shakar, 40, spoke about his wife, who was a teacher before the Taliban banned her from the job. How she secretly worked for the UN World Food Programme and how she had looked forward to resuming her teaching job when the Taliban went.
"Her life, all her dreams and ambition, had been destroyed. My children and I are just glad that she is alive," he said. "We do not blame you for what had happened, you too have suffered greatly. But no one has ever explained to me why my home, in the middle of a residential area, nowhere near the military, was bombed."
Mr Shakar's son, Mohammed Biyuqra, 15, said: "The Americans are angry because they had one day of war. We have had 23 years of it."
Derrill Bodley, 56, a professor of music from California, spoke of his daughter Deora, who was killed on 11 September. A big, bearded man, he said softly: "My daughter was on an airplane. She was coming to visit me. The plane crashed. She was just 20 years old, I hope your children live a long and happy life. I hope and pray nothing like this happens to them."
Ms Lasar's brother, Abe Zelmanowitz, could have fled the World Trade Centre but he chose to remain with his quadraplegic friend who could not get away. His heroism was praised by President Bush.
"There is no heroism is bombing innocent civilians. So many people, especially politicians, seemed so keen to get angry on our behalf," said Ms Lasar. "It seemed the only people not in a rage were the families of the victims. We had too much grief to cope with for that. And I see the same thing in this family, there is grief but no destructive rage."
Craig Amundson was a soldier killed in the Pentagon attack. His sister-in-law, Kelly Campbell, came here on behalf of Craig's widow, Amber, who is looking after their children.
Mrs Amundson has been outspoken in favour of reconciliation, which some regard as akin to treachery. "My anguish is compounded exponentially by fear that Craig's death will be used to justify new violence against other innocent victims," said Ms Campbell.
The Shakars have been living at a friend's flat. But soon they will have to find their own place. Mr Shakar does not know how they will manage - like other civil servants, he has not been paid for six months.
Mrs Shakar finds speech painful now. "The worst thing is instead of me looking after the children, they now have to look after me," she whispers. To her visitors, she said: "I know how far you have [??.]"
----
"Peace trail" across U.S. starts with A-bomb flame
Wednesday, January 16, 2002
Kyodo News
http://www.japantoday.com/
SEATTLE - More than 30 participants in a "peace trail" to deliver a flame commemorating atom-bombed Hiroshima to the site of the Sept 11 attack on the World Trade Center in New York started from the outskirts of Seattle on Tuesday.
Gyojun Yasuda, 53, a Japanese nun living in the United States, organized the walk to eliminate all forms of violence on earth and to overcome hatred among human beings.
----
Save The Date - March 2 at Swarthmore College Campus
Wed, 16 Jan 2002
Reply-To: brandywine@juno.com
Wage Peace
A Campus/Community Gathering To Educate, Activate, and Organize
A day long event featuring Educational Panels, Discussion Circles, Organizing Workshops, Music, Meals, and Fellowship. Open to all students and community residents in Delaware County and region. Lunch and dinner provided.
Saturday, March 2, 2002 9:00 AM - 9:00 PM Swarthmore College Campus [Exact locations and schedules of events to be announced.]
Keynote Address: Amber and Ryan Amundson
Amber and Ryan Amundson, the wife and brother of a Pentagon employee killed in the September 11th attacks, will be the keynote speakers. Amber and Ryan have gained international attention for their courageous opposition to the war in Afghanistan and plans to expand the war.
Free Concert: Pat Humphries
Pat Humphries is a singer-songwriter who combines the power of music and activism. Pat's internationally acclaimed song "Keep on Moving Forward" opened the 4th U.N. World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995. Nearly
30,000 people sang her song that day and it became the theme of the Conference. People have been singing and celebrating Pat's strong, vibrant songs ever since.
Panelists
Ann Lesch: Professor of Political Science @ Villanova University, Author,
Middle East Scholar George Lakey: Executive Director of Training for Change, Author, Peace Activist Paul Hetznecker: Philadelphia Civil Rights Lawyer Youth Activist: To Be Announced
Local students and activists will lead the discussion circles and organizing workshops.
Sponsored by Delaware County Campaign for Peace and Justice, Swarthmore College Community Service Learning Division, Swarthmore College Progressive Action Committee, and WHY WAR?
For more information: Terry Rumsey @ 610-891-6614 Greenseed2@aol.com
----
Thursday is White House Call-In Day to protect the Clean Air Act!
The Bush administration is attempting to weaken and reverse a key part of the Clean Air Act that requires the oldest and dirtiest power plants, oil refineries and other industrial facilities to install up-to-date pollution control devices when they increase their pollution significantly.
The administration is currently unwilling to provide the public with an official comment period to object to their plans, so tomorrow, Thursday, January 17th, has been designated as "Call the White House Day." Please use the toll-free number below to tell the Bush administration to not roll back the Clean Air Act.
What to do
Call the White House (toll-free!) on Thursday, January 17th at 1-888-552-9406
Tell the operator you want President Bush and his administration to enforce and strengthen, not weaken, the New Source Review rules of the Clean Air Act.
If you like, you can also add any or all of the following points:
The New Source Review program has forced polluting industrial facilities to comply with the law and clean up hundreds of thousands of extra tons of pollution in the air that we all breathe.
The impact on our country's health and environment from weakening these standards would be severe.
President Bush and his administration should not reward polluters (even if they did contribute to his campaign) by rolling back the Clean Air Act, but should instead vigorously prosecute companies that significantly increase pollution without updating their pollution-control devices.
The administration should commit that any changes to the New Source Review program will not allow the air to be cleaned up any less than the current rules require.
Please pass this message on to your friends -- tell them to call the White House at 1-888-552-9406 on Thursday, January 17th!
2. NATIONAL FORESTS PROTECTION Oppose the Bush administration's plan to weaken historic protections for our national forests
In 2000, public comments sent by you and other activists helped achieve the landmark rule adopted in January 2001 by the outgoing Clinton administration that banned logging and roadbuilding in over 58 million acres of wild roadless areas in our national forests. Since then, however, the Bush administration has launched a stealth attack on the rule. Administration officials have delayed implementing the rule, refused to defend a lawsuit brought by industry and its allies challenging the rule, and issued new policies that gut the rule.
Our forest wildlands serve as vital habitat for threatened and endangered species, provide priceless recreational opportunities, and ensure clean drinking water. The Tongass National Forest alone, with more roadless back country than any other national forest, spans 500 awe-inspiring miles of Alaska's coast and is home to towering groves of ancient trees, the world's largest concentrations of grizzly bears and bald eagles, and wild rivers that teem with salmon.
Although many of you submitted comments opposing a Bush administration proposal issued last August that would weaken protections for roadless areas, the administration has now issued a new set of guidelines for the next 18 months that completely disregard those comments and strip protections for roadless areas even further. These new policies would return the Forest Service to its old decisionmaking process and allow unchecked development on millions of acres in the Tongass National Forest.
The Forest Service is accepting public comments on the new guidelines through February 19th.
What to do
Send a message to Forest Service chief Dale Bosworth before the February 19th comment deadline, insisting that the Forest Service reinstate protection for roadless areas in the Tongass and every other national forest.
== Contact information == You can send an official comment directly from NRDC's Earth Action Center at http://www.nrdc.org/action. Or use the contact information and sample letter below to send your own message, and please include your own reasons why protecting these last wild forest lands from logging and other development is important to you.
US Forest Service - Content Analysis Team Attention: Road Policy P.O. Box 221150 Salt Lake City, UT, 84122 Fax: 801-517-1021 Email: roads_id@fs.fed.us
== Sample letter ==
Subject: Interim Directives -- Protect Roadless Areas
Dear Forest Service Chief Bosworth,
I strongly oppose your current Interim Directives, which would exempt roadless areas in the Tongass and other national forests from head office review and from meaningful environmental protections. Exempting our last unprotected wild forests from upper level review sends the message that it's open season on these pristine wild areas, including Alaska's incomparable, world-renowned Tongass rainforest.
I am also concerned that you did not review comments submitted in response to the August 22nd directives before issuing new ones. More than two million Americans have already gone on record supporting the Roadless Area Conservation Rule and protection of roadless areas -- don't ignore this huge outpouring of public sentiment by allowing local decisionmaking for the Tongass or any other national forest. Implement the rule as adopted and protect our last wild forests.
Sincerely,
[Your name and address]
3. WILDERNESS PROTECTION Speak out to protect Utah's canyon wildlands
Some of the most well-known canyons in Utah's redrock canyon country are located in the San Rafael Swell region. To walk through the Navajo sandstone canyons of this two million acre area is to virtually walk through time, down into the layers of rock that have formed the surrounding stark badlands. Home to pronghorn antelope, coyotes and a host of other wildlife, the area contains extraordinary rock art and rock formations as well as spectacular wildlands that are included in America's Redrock Wilderness Act. Understandably, public use (and abuse) of this increasingly popular area has skyrocketed in recent years.
The Bureau of Land Management -- the federal agency in charge of these lands -- is in the process of preparing a new management plan that will control land use and resource decisions, including oil and gas development, off-road vehicle use and livestock grazing, for the area over the next 10 to 20 years. Even prior to the Bush administration, the BLM in Utah was predisposed to promoting energy development, ignoring ORV abuse and maintaining the status quo for livestock -- even at the expense of the environment. The first stage of planning has just begun, and the agency is accepting public comments for this stage until February 1st.
== What to do == Send a message to the BLM before the February 1st comment deadline, urging the agency to protect the outstanding publicly owned resources of this region from key threats.
== Contact information == You can send an official comment directly from NRDC's Earth Action Center at http://www.nrdc.org/action. Or use the contact information and sample letter below to send your own message.
Floyd Johnson Assistant Field Manager Bureau of Land Management Price Planning Area 125 South 600 West Price, Utah 84501 Fax: 435-636-3657
== Sample letter ==
Subject: Develop a strong management plan that truly protects the San Rafael Swell
Dear Mr. Johnson,
I urge the Bureau of Land Management to develop a resource management plan for the San Rafael Swell region that will protect its proposed wilderness areas and other outstanding publicly owned resources for the coming decades. In particular, I urge you to re-inventory all areas in America's Redrock Wilderness Act and to designate all wilderness-quality lands as formal "wilderness study areas."
The BLM should also protect these wildlands from the adverse impacts of roads, powerlines, pipelines and other industrial activities associated with oil and gas development by specifying that all future oil and gas leases contain "no surface occupancy" stipulations. I also urge you to protect the region's critically important riparian areas by prohibiting livestock and ORV use on them (and officially designate the "routes" that ORVs can use in order to minimize their harmful impacts).
This remarkable area belongs to all Americans and should be managed in the interest of its long-term protection and preservation.
Sincerely,
[Your name and address]
== For background == The San Rafael Swell Wilderness http://www.suwa.org/WATE/sanrafael.html
4. EVERGLADES RESTORATION Tell the Army Corps of Engineers not to let miners ruin the Everglades
The recently approved Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan is part of an $8 billion program to protect and restore the vast Everglades wetlands that have suffered from a century of pollution, water diversion and habitat loss. But the US Army Corps of Engineers -- which is in charge of implementing the plan -- wants to actually allow miners to destroy thousands of acres of this natural treasure even before restoration efforts begin.
The Corps is set to issue 10-year permits to the limestone mining industry to turn about 5000 acres of Everglades wetlands into open mining pits. And that's just the first phase: the project would eventually open up a 30-square-mile hole in the middle of the Everglades. The Corps argues that, in theory, decades from now some of the pits could be used as water reservoirs for the Everglades. But experts question whether the pits would be built in such a way as to safely or cost-effectively function as reservoirs. The EPA and Department of Interior also object to the thousands of acres of unique wildlife habitat that would be destroyed, the harm the pits would have on restoring water flows in the Everglades, and the contamination threat the mines pose to adjacent drinking water supplies.
Studies are currently underway that explore these threats, possible solutions, and alternative ways to store and deliver additional water to the Everglades. But the Corps is inexplicably proposing to allow mining to go forward before the studies are completed.
== What to do == Send a message to the Army Corps of Engineers urging the agency to not issue mining permits in the Everglades until environmental studies are completed.
== Contact information == You can send a message to the Corps directly from NRDC's Earth Action Center at http://www.nrdc.org/action. Or use the contact information and sample letter below to send your own message.
Mike Parker Assistant Secretary of the Army (Civil Works) 108 Army Pentagon Washington, DC 20310-0108 Email: mike.parker@hqda.army.mil
== Sample letter ==
Subject: Deny limestone mining permits in the Everglades
Dear Assistant Secretary Parker,
I urge the Army Corps of Engineers to not issue the currently proposed permits for limestone mining activities in the Everglades until a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement has been conducted.
Mining the Everglades would irreversibly destroy critical wetlands and endangered species habitat, harm Everglades restoration, contaminate local drinking water supplies, and cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. Plus, we have no guarantees that the resulting open pits would function safely or effectively as reservoirs in the future.
The Everglades wetlands ecosystem has already been devastated by a century of destructive human activity, and must be protected from further harmful practices. Again, do not allow mining in this area until we know whether it can be done safely and without unacceptable environmental impacts.
Sincerely,
[Your name and address]
cc: Colonel James G. May US Army Corps of Engineers P.O. Box 4970 400 West Bay Street Jacksonville, FL 32232-0019 james.g.may@saj02.usace.army.mil
--
EARTH ACTION is sent biweekly and calls out urgent environmental issues requiring immediate action. To unsubscribe from Earth Action, send an email message to earthaction@nrdcaction.org with REMOVE in the subject line.
LEGISLATIVE WATCH is sent biweekly when Congress is in session and tracks environmental bills moving through the federal legislature. To unsubscribe from Legislative Watch, send an email message to legwatch@nrdcaction.org with REMOVE in the subject line.
The CALIFORNIA ACTIVIST NETWORK ACTION ALERT is distributed monthly to members of NRDC's California Activist Network and provides action tools to Californians and others concerned with protecting the state's natural resources and the health of its citizens. To unsubscribe, send an email message to wildcalifornia@nrdcaction.org with REMOVE in the subject line.
About NRDC
The Natural Resources Defense Council is a nonprofit environmental organization with over 500,000 members nationwide and a staff of scientists, attorneys and environmental experts. Our mission is to protect the planet's wildlife and wild places and ensure a safe and healthy environment for all living things.
For more information about NRDC or how to become a member of NRDC, please contact us at:
Natural Resources Defense Council 40 West 20th Street New York, NY 10011 212-727-4511 (voice) / 212-727-1773 (fax) General email: nrdcinfo@nrdc.org Earth Action email: nrdcaction@nrdc.org http://www.nrdc.org
Also visit: BioGems -- Saving Endangered Wild Places A project of the Natural Resources Defense Council http://www.savebiogems.org
-------
------- OneList (submissions from subscribers)
------- Depleted Uranium Keeps On Killing!