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NUCLEAR
Depleted uranium may pose risk to children - study
Iraq seeks steel for nukes
Powell Welcomes N. Korean Statement
Russia Plans Cooperation With Iran
Safeguarding Soviet Weapons
Russia to Build a Second Nuclear Reactor for Iran
Russia Expands Nuke Ties With Iran
Spiked Plutonium Mimics Aging Weapons
Vermont Yankee Cleared for Sale
House Votes Billions for Intelligence
Bush Indicates He Is Ready to Veto Senate's Security Bill
Chemical, Nuclear Security Bills Pass Committee
MILITARY
Al-Qaeda no longer a threat: Karzai
Poland to Buy Israeli Missiles
Southeast Asians Debate Anti - Terror
Scientists Worry Journals May Aid Terrorists
Brazil Unveils Radar System for Amazon
United Defense Profit Up on Crusader Bonus
Argentine to Head Group Seeking to Ban Chemical Weapons
China links separatists to training by al Qaeda
Drug Dogs Sniff Even 6-Year-Olds; Parents Sue
'Iran opening up to UN probe'
Plans to invade Iraq solidifying, aides say
Israel demolishes rocket factories
Palestinian Gunmen Kill Four Israelis in West Bank
US ships Al Qaeda suspects to Arab states
NATO hopeful vows to aid U.S. on ICC
Pact Would Bar Arms Transfers
Aid workers barred from Chechnya
Russia Says Leaky Torpedo Sank Kursk
Russian Spy Agency Accused
Senators Press Ashcroft to Justify Tactics in Terror War
POLICE / PRISONERS
Worker Corps to be Formed to Report Odd Activity
Here's a TIP: We don't want police state
Ashcroft vows no database for citizens' tips
Ashcroft: TIPS Plan Won't Have Central Database
Senate Panel Backs Chemical Safeguards
ENERGY AND OTHER
Honda likely to sell fuel-cell cars this year
TXU, Cielo to build 240 MW Texas wind power plant
ACTIVISTS
About 5,000 women from around Colombia march for peace
Greenpeace goes on the attack
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- depleted uranium
Depleted uranium may pose risk to children - study
REUTERS UK:
July 26, 2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/17041/story.htm
LONDON - Soil contaminated with debris from depleted uranium shells could be putting children in the Balkans and the Gulf at an increased risk of developing cancer and kidney damage, New Scientist magazine said this week.
Youngsters who play in areas where the shells created clouds of uranium dust when they hit their targets are most endangered, according to Italian researchers.
"The Italian team says that children living in areas of conflict that have been bombarded with DU (depleted uranium) could get a dose of radiation above the internationally recognised safety limit," the science weekly said.
Researchers from the University of Florence and the Tuscan Environment Protection Agency (ARPAT) calculated that children could inhale a radiation dose from contaminated soil that would exceed safety levels set by the International Commission on Radiological Protection.
Swallowing contaminated soil would increase the risk further.
"In sites targeted by DU munitions, special measures have to be adopted to reduce exposures," said Daniele Dominici, a physicist at the University of Florence.
Depleted uranium is used to harden the tips of armour-piercing shells.
Others studies, including research from the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, support the Italian findings. A report by Britain's Royal Society, an academy of leading scientists, said soldiers exposed to high levels of depleted uranium could suffer kidney damage and it could pose a risk to civilians through contaminated soil or water supplies.
It suggested topsoil in heavily contaminated areas should be removed and water quality monitored for any contamination.
Concerns about the health effects of DU arose last year after peacekeepers in Bosnia and Kosovo said they had developed leukaemia after exposure to the material.
"Some 270 tonnes of DU have been spread over battlefields in the Gulf and the Balkans during the last decade, the vast majority by U.S. forces," the magazine added.
-------- iraq
[To reply - mailto:letters@washingtontimes.com]
Iraq seeks steel for nukes
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
July 26, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20020726-23093280.htm
Iraq's government is trying to buy special equipment used in producing fuel for nuclear weapons, The Washington Times has learned.
Procurement agents from Iraq's covert nuclear-arms program were detected as they tried to purchase stainless-steel tubing, uniquely used in gas centrifuges and a key component in making the material for nuclear bombs, from an unknown supplier, said administration officials familiar with intelligence reports.
U.S. intelligence agencies believe the tubing is an essential component of Iraq's plans to enrich radioactive uranium to the point where it could be used to fashion a nuclear bomb.
Efforts by Iraq to build nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and missiles are a key reason that the Bush administration has called for the overthrow of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
The covert nuclear-acquisition effort was detected in mid-June, and reports about the activities were then circulated to senior Bush administration policy officials.
"This is only one sign that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear-weapons program," one official said.
Officials say other evidence exists that Iraq is rebuilding its nuclear program, which was to have been dismantled under U.N. sanctions imposed after the 1991 Persian Gulf war.
Earlier this year, Turkish military intelligence informed the Pentagon that Iraq was believed to have at least one nuclear device. Officials said the report could not be confirmed.
A senior Bush administration official said intelligence reports of the efforts by Iraq to purchase stainless-steel tubing were a troubling sign.
"We know they are trying to obtain this material but so far have not been successful," the official said.
A CIA spokesman declined to comment.
Intelligence reports in recent months have stated that Iraq also is building up its chemical and biological weapons arsenal, the officials said. Iraq's missile program also is continuing within U.N. guidelines.
Iraq expelled U.N. weapons inspectors after U.S. bombing raids in 1998, and its nuclear program has been restarted and accelerated. Baghdad recently broke off talks with the United Nations about restarting weapons inspections.
"Although we were already concerned about a reconstituted nuclear weapons program, our concerns increased in September 2000 when Saddam publicly exhorted his 'Nuclear Mujahidin' to 'defeat the enemy,'" stated a CIA report to Congress made public in January. "The Intelligence Community remains concerned that Baghdad may be attempting to acquire materials that could aid in reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."
British Prime Minister Tony Blair said earlier this week that Saddam is attempting to acquire nuclear weapons, saying the evidence of the Iraqi weapons-of-mass-destruction program would be presented "if the time comes for action" to oust Saddam.
"But be in no doubt at all that he is certainly trying to acquire weapons of mass destruction, in particular a nuclear capability," Mr. Blair told Prospect magazine in an interview.
Asked Monday what would provide justification for a military attack on Iraq, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said he would not talk about specific countries but warned about the growing danger of weapons of mass destruction.
"In the 21st century, we're dealing with weapons of mass destruction - chemical, biological, nuclear, radiation - that can kill not just hundreds or thousands, but they can kill hundreds of thousands or millions of people in the case of, for example, contagious biological agents," Mr. Rumsfeld told reporters at the Pentagon.
"Now we're living in a world with weapons of mass destruction proliferating rather rapidly to a variety of nations, a variety of non-state entities potentially that have already indicated their appetite for the weapon," he said. "They've indicated their willingness to kill as many innocent men, women and children through terrorist acts as they can."
The defense secretary said a debate is under way worldwide about whether to wait for an attack that could kill hundreds of thousands of people, or to act pre-emptively in self-defense against the threat.
"I think you're finding people starting to think about it, starting to talk about it, starting to recognize what the benefits and what the burdens are of different courses of action," Mr. Rumsfeld said.
According to the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, Iraq in the past has sought to create enriched uranium through the use of high-speed centrifuges, which spin uranium hexafluoride gas. The spinning separates out uranium isotope gas that is highly enriched and can fuel a crude nuclear bomb.
Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, said in an interview that stainless-steel tubing would be essential to building such gas centrifuges because the radioactive gas is extremely corrosive.
The Iraqi nuclear-arms program had planned to build a 100-centrifuge "cascade" plant, Al Furat, that would be capable of producing 55 pounds of highly enriched uranium per year, enough for about 11/2 nuclear bombs per year, according to a Wisconsin Project report on Iraq's nuclear program.
Mr. Milhollin said that while "not much" is known about Iraq's continuing efforts to build nuclear arms, "we do know that if they were to reconstitute their nuclear program they would need stainless-steel piping."
According to a Wisconsin Project database on Iraq's nuclear program, several German companies attempted to sell special steel and tubing to Iraq for centrifuges in 1990. In 1989, Iraq also obtained Swiss-made equipment used to power centrifuges.
Khidhir Hamza, a former Iraqi nuclear-weapons official who defected in 1994, said Iraq's nuclear program is based on enriching uranium. He said Iraq had about 400 locations in the country where uranium-enrichment work could be carried out in secret.
Mr. Hamza also has said Iraq purchased 130 classified reports from Germany during the 1980s that show how to manufacture centrifuges for uranium enrichment.
-------- korea
Powell Welcomes N. Korean Statement
By George Gedda
Associated Press Writer
Friday, July 26, 2002; 10:09 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A7828-2002Jul26?language=printer
SIGONELLA, Italy -- Secretary of State Colin Powell on Friday welcomed indications by North Korean authorities that they are willing to reopen a long-stalled dialogue with the United States.
The North Korean statement Friday came almost four weeks after an attempt by the two sides to hold high-level discussions fell through, partly because of a clash at sea between vessels of South Korea and North Korea. There were dead and wounded on both sides.
Powell, in Italy for a refueling stop while en route to India, told reporters that the surprise North Korean statement may be significant.
"We have now had another turn of the wheel," Powell said, adding that he plans to take follow-up steps with Pyongyang. He said he did not know whether he will confer with North Korea's foreign minister, who will be present with Powell next week at a meeting of Pacific rim foreign ministers in Brunei.
On Thursday, North Korea sent South Korea an expression of regret over the clash at sea in June and said both sides should take steps to avoid a recurrence of such incidents.
The letter also proposed preparatory talks for the first North-South cabinet-level discussions since a bitter exchange over five days last September.
There have been no substantive talks between the United States and North Korea since the final weeks of the Clinton administration. President Bush proposed a renewal of negotiations in June 2001, but only last spring did Pyongyang indicate any interest.
A U.S. delegation headed by Powell's top aide for East Asia, James Kelly, had planned to meet with the North Koreans during the second week of July in Pyongyang, but that offer was withdrawn.
The main issue for the United States is North Korea's export of long-range missiles to Iran, Syria and other countries. Another concern is what Powell has called the "huge army" that the North has deployed not far from South Korea.
Powell plans meetings Saturday night with Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and other senior officials. He will pursue additional discussions on Sunday in Pakistan with President Pervez Musharraf.
He said he is intent on keeping pressure on the two sides to make peace after backing away from a dangerous confrontation over Kashmir in the spring.
"Ultimately, we have to get to a dialogue or we will be stuck on a plateau," Powell said. India and Pakistan have not had a dialogue at the prime minister level in more than three years. Not long after those discussions, there were bloody clashes in the Kargil area of Kashmir.
Powell said it is critical that any renewed dialogue be held at the proper time. He said he would exchange views with leaders of both sides on the timing issue.
"I really am pleased with what we have been able to do in the last month and a half," Powell said, alluding to the generalized easing of tensions between the two nuclear rivals.
But Indian officials said Thursday that they still have "major concerns" over alleged infiltration of Islamic militants into Indian-held Kashmir.
Powell said will hear out the Indian side but will share with them his own information about infiltration levels.
After his visits to India and Pakistan, Powell will visit six Southeast Asian countries: Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Indonesia and the Philippines.
-------- russia
Russia Plans Cooperation With Iran
By Angela Charlton
Associated Press Writer
Friday, July 26, 2002; 12:18 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A5754-2002Jul26?language=printer
MOSCOW -- Ignoring U.S. opposition, Russia plans to sharply increase cooperation with Iran that includes a proposal to build six nuclear reactors in it's southern neighbor, according to a Russian government resolution released Friday.
The plan also envisages Russian help for Iranian oil drilling and the joint launches of satellites.
The 10-year proposed cooperation plan is certain to complicate Moscow's relations with Washington, which have blossomed since President Vladimir Putin offered his support for the U.S.-led war on terror.
Despite the warmer ties, Russia's completion of a nuclear reactor at the Iranian port of Bushehr has clouded relations with Washington. The United States accuses Iran of sponsoring terrorism and has said Russian assistance is helping Iran develop nuclear weapons.
Moscow has dismissed the accusations, saying the aid only serves civilian purposes. The new cooperation plan takes the nuclear deal even further: It envisages a total of six Russian-built nuclear reactors in Iran, four at Bushehr and two at a yet-to-be-built plant in Akhvaz.
The resolution was approved by Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov on Wednesday but still must be signed by top Russian and Iranian officials.
It was worked out by Iranian and Russian representatives "taking into account the traditionally friendly relations between the two governments," the resolution says.
Russia will also help Iran explore and drill for oil and gas and build pipelines to bring it to market, including a pipeline to India, the resolution says.
Russia and Iran will work together on a global navigation system that the resolution says would be used for geological research and monitoring a transport corridor between their countries.
Russia will help Iran launch communications satellites, and provide Iran with satellite photos for geological research.
The nations will set up a joint venture to produce Tu-204 and Tu-334 passenger aircraft in Iran, and establish a joint investment bank.
The U.S. Embassy had no immediate comment on the resolution, but expressed concern about statements by a top Russian defense official Thursday that Moscow plans to sell more conventional weapons to Iran.
The sales are not new, a U.S. Embassy official said Friday on condition of anonymity, but added, "We do continue to have concern about weapons supplies to Iran because it could lead to imbalance in the region, and we continue to have concern about weapons falling into the hands of terrorists."
Earlier this week, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow said, "Russia has to avoid letting its desire for commercial gain end up hastening the day that (Iran, Iraq and North Korea) can pose a threat that could not only destabilize their own region, but undermine the security of the entire world."
----
Safeguarding Soviet Weapons
Friday, July 26, 2002
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A2922-2002Jul25?language=printer
THERE HAS been considerable progress recently toward forging an international consensus on the need for urgent action to prevent weapons of mass destruction from the former Soviet Union from falling into the hands of terrorists. The problem is that the sense of urgency has not yet penetrated the bureaucracy of the Bush administration or some of the Republican leadership in Congress. At the highest political level, the administration recently recorded an impressive achievement, persuading the other members of the Group of Eight of rich industrial nations to match $10 billion in planned U.S. spending to control and dismantle nuclear, chemical and biological weapons over the next 10 years. But at the more mundane level of implementation, this year's funds for programs in Russia and other former Soviet states were frozen until this week because of lingering resistance within the administration and Congress. At a time when senior administration officials are warning that attempts by terrorists to attack the United States with a weapon of mass destruction are all but inevitable, such roadblocks must be removed.
Though U.S.-funded programs to deactivate or destroy former Soviet weapons and dispose of nuclear materials have been underway for a decade, the scale of the remaining problem is awesome, and terrifying. Sixty percent of Russian nuclear materials still are not properly safeguarded. Of even more serious concern, little has been done about the vast arsenals of chemical and biological weapons still held by Russia. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and former Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), who originally sponsored the disposal and safeguard programs, recently visited a Russian base where 1,971,000 artillery shells filled with deadly chemical agents are stored in dilapidated bunkers; a terrorist who managed to obtain only one shell would have the means to kill as many as 100,000 people.
Destroying that stockpile of chemical weapons is at the top of Sen. Lugar's priorities for new programs to be funded under the recent G-8 agreement. Serious obstacles must be overcome, including winning Russian cooperation for expanding control programs and holding allied governments to their somewhat vague funding commitments. What's remarkable -- and unacceptable -- are the continuing bureaucratic and political snags in Washington. Despite President Bush's strong and repeated endorsement of the Nunn-Lugar programs since 9/11, the State Department blocked disbursement of funds for new programs through the first nine months of the fiscal year by refusing to meet a congressional requirement that it certify Russia's compliance with existing arms control treaties. Though the Clinton administration issued the required certification for eight straight years, Bush administration hard-liners have nixed it on the grounds that Moscow has not opened some biological facilities to inspection. The administration instead asked Congress to pass legislation waiving the certification process; now that proposal is meeting resistance in the Republican-controlled House, which so far has agreed to a waiver only for the last months of this fiscal year.
Serious problems do exist with winning Russia's full compliance with its commitments on weapons of mass destruction. But the proper response can hardly be to hamstring the programs that are working to dismantle or safeguard those weapons so they cannot fall into the hands of rogue states or terrorists. The Bush administration has been arguing that the Russian government should now be regarded as a partner; if it believes that rhetoric, it should issue the certification needed to expedite Nunn-Lugar programs, or press House Republicans for a permanent waiver. The challenge of controlling the threat of the former Soviet arsenal is huge enough; there's no room for obstructionism in Washington.
--------
Russia to Build a Second Nuclear Reactor for Iran
New York Times
July 26, 2002
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/26/international/26AFP-RUSS.html
MOSCOW, July 26 (AFP) - The Russian government voiced its right Friday to build a second nuclear power plant in Iran and engage in long-term nuclear cooperation with Tehran despite fierce US criticism of an existing project.
The announcement of a new 10-year Iranian nuclear development program surprised analysts and some politicians, coming less than a month after the West agreed a confidence-building 20-billion-dollar aid package for dismantling Russia's weapons of mass destruction.
Some noted that Iran may have no intention of buying a second nuclear plant from Russia and read the announcement as a bid by Moscow to up the stakes and win new Western concessions for ending its nuclear relations with a nation identified as a member of an "axis of evil" by Washington.
Moscow's program states that Russia intends to build all four reactors at the southern Bushehr plant -- only one has been completed so far -- along with two more 1,000 megawatt blocks in Ahvaz, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) from the Iraqi border.
A copy of the document obtained by AFP states that Russia wants to "develop a long-term program of cooperation in the sphere of peaceful use of atomic energy" with Iran.
Nuclear analysts said the idea of Russia building a second Iranian plant has floated around since the original Bushehr contract was signed in 1995 but that the plans had recently been all but buried.
"I'm not sure if the 1995 agreement was ever published, but it was an open secret that it said that Russia wanted to build a second plant. The problem is, people forgot it because Russia is barely able to complete Bushehr," said Ivan Safranchuk of Russia's Center for Defense Information.
"Iran does not want a second plant, it wants a mechanism for enriching uranium fuel to weapons-grade," he said. "But if a new contract is ever signed, one can only imagine the heat that will come from the United States."
Some analysts interpreted the announcement as a move in a delicate game of brinkmanship rather than serious declaration of intent.
"Russia seems to be ignoring the will of Washington," said independent military analyst Alexander Golts.
"It's curious, because one of the conditions (for the 20-billion-dollar aid project agreed by the G8 last month) was that Russia abandon cooperation with Iran," he said.
"So either Russia does not want the money, or it is bargaining for more Western concessions for ending its Iranian program," said Golts.
Both the United States and Israel fear that Russian-Iranian nuclear cooperation could enable Tehran to acquire the technology needed to build nuclear weapons.
During a summit in Moscow in May, US President George W. Bush raised Washington's concerns about Russian nuclear aid to Iran, expressing fears that Tehran's "radical clerics" could put the technology to ill use.
While mentioning Bushehr, Bush said he was also concerned that Russian research institutes were supplying Tehran with blueprints for the development of sophisticated long-range missiles that could deliver a devastating nuclear attack.
Russian President Vladimir Putin in May dismissed the charges, arguing that he had evidence that Iran was using Western technology to develop its missile program.
Meanwhile, senior Russia politicians were quick to try and defuse potential tensions over the announcement.
"Neither Russia nor the United States is interested in other countries' use of peaceful nuclear technologies for military purposes," said State Duma lower house of parliament foreign affairs committee chairman Dmitry Rogozin.
--------
Russia Expands Nuke Ties With Iran
July 26, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Russia-Iran.html
MOSCOW (AP) -- Russia wants to build six nuclear reactors in Iran and help its southern neighbor explore Caspian Sea oil fields, the government said Friday in a resolution certain to complicate Moscow's warming relations with Washington.
The government released a 10-year proposal for cooperation with Iran that would dramatically expand ties beyond Russia's much-criticized $800 million contract for completion of a nuclear reactor at the Iranian port of Bushehr.
While U.S.-Russian relations have blossomed since President Vladimir Putin offered his support for the U.S.-led war on terror, the Bushehr deal has remained a sticking point. The United States accuses Iran of sponsoring terrorism and has said Russian assistance is helping Iran develop nuclear weapons.
Moscow has dismissed the accusations, saying the aid only serves civilian purposes and that the construction is under international control. Now, the new cooperation plan takes the nuclear deal even further, envisdaging a total of six Russian-built nuclear reactors in Iran -- four at Bushehr and two at a yet-to-be-built plant in Akhvaz.
Russian Nuclear Energy Ministry spokesman Nikolai Shingaryov said Russia would bid for contracts on the reactors after the first one at Bushehr is completed, likely in 2003 or 2004, according to the Interfax news agency.
The government resolution was approved by Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov on Wednesday but still must be signed by top Russian and Iranian officials. The signing could take place at a meeting in Tehran in September, Interfax reported.
The 12-page document was worked out by Iranian and Russian representatives ``taking into account the traditionally friendly relations between the two governments,'' and is based on principles of international law and ``mutual benefit,'' the resolution says.
It says Russia's oil giant Slavneft and the National Iranian Drilling Company will work together to expand oil drilling in Iran, and proposes Russian help in building pipelines to bring Iranian oil to market, including one from Iran to India.
It also proposes Russian help for Iranian exploration efforts in the Caspian Sea, whose oil and gas reserves -- believed to be the world's third largest -- have attracted attention from the U.S. government and the world's leading oil companies.
Washington has championed pipeline routes to western markets that would skirt the Caspian's biggest players -- Russia and Iran. Moscow and Tehran, meanwhile, have been in dispute with each other and the other three Caspian states over how to divide the sea's resources.
Russia and Iran also plan to work together on a global navigation system that the resolution says would be used for geological research and monitoring a transport corridor between their countries.
Russia proposes helping Iran launch communications satellites, and providing Iran with satellite photos for geological research.
The two countries hope to set up a joint venture to produce Tu-204 and Tu-334 passenger aircraft in Iran.
The U.S. Embassy had no comment on the resolution, but expressed concern about statements by a top Russian defense official Thursday that Moscow plans to sell more conventional weapons to Iran.
``We do continue to have concern about weapons supplies to Iran because it could lead to imbalance in the region, and we continue to have concern about weapons falling into the hands of terrorists,'' a U.S. Embassy official said Friday on condition of anonymity.
Earlier this week, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow said, ``Russia has to avoid letting its desire for commercial gain end up hastening the day that (Iran, Iraq and North Korea) can pose a threat that could not only destabilize their own region, but undermine the security of the entire world.''
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
Spiked Plutonium Mimics Aging Weapons
July 26, 2002
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/jul2002/2002-07-26-09.asp#anchor5
LOS ALAMOS, New Mexico, Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory are "spiking" plutonium with different isotopes to learn more about how the element may age inside the nation's stockpile of nuclear weapons.
Plutonium is the main ingredient of weapons in the U.S. nuclear stockpile. The nation stopped making new weapons in 1989 and stopped underground nuclear testing in 1992.
The results of the study will affect whether the U.S. begins manufacturing additional plutonium pits, which form the core of modern nuclear weapons.
Los Alamos researchers are trying to hurry along the plutonium aging process to learn how long the metal will last and how that might affect the stockpile. Researchers at Los Alamos, which designed five of the seven weapon systems in the U.S. stockpile, play a major role in certifying each year that those weapons are safe, secure and reliable.
Certification depends on understanding how the plutonium cores of the weapons, known as pits, will change with age.
"We have to learn how to predict the properties of plutonium as it ages in the weapons, and to do that we need plutonium that's been around as long as plutonium has been on the planet," said Joe Martz, manager of Los Alamos' enhanced surveillance program.
The experiment involves "spiking" samples of nuclear weapons plutonium, the isotope known as Pu-239, with 7.5 percent of the plutonium-238 isotope, which decays about 300 times faster. Plutonium-238, because of its high decay rate, is used to provide electrical power for deep space probes such as the Galileo mission to Jupiter and the Cassini mission to Saturn.
The hamburger sized spiked samples, cast at Los Alamos on May 13, 2002, should age about 16 times faster than the plutonium-239 in U.S. nuclear weapons.
"Every day that passes, the spiked plutonium will be aging more than two weeks, compared to normal weapons plutonium," said Dave Olivas, the metallurgical engineer who is running the experiment with physicist Franz Freibert. Both work in Los Alamos' Nuclear Materials Science Group.
"When the samples have aged for the equivalent of 60 years, we'll measure all their properties," Olivas explained.
The researchers will not know the results of their efforts for four years, although they plan periodic checks to compare the spiked plutonium to metal inside stockpile weapons.
The impacts of age on stockpile weapons have been subtle so far, and may not help scientists predict longer term effects. Plutonium is the most unpredictable of all the metallic elements, and some aging effects may suddenly appear after years of stable behavior.
The team expects to see some changes in the density of the spiked plutonium and in the growth of helium within its molecular structure, similar to aging effects they have observed in stockpile plutonium.
"Most things age from the outside in, but plutonium is much more unique because it also ages from the inside out," said former Los Alamos director Sig Hecker, a plutonium metallurgist and technical adviser to the experiment.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
-------- vermont
Vermont Yankee Cleared for Sale
By Ross Sneyd
Associated Press Writer
Friday, July 26, 2002; 7:48 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A7421-2002Jul26?language=printer
MONTPELIER, Vt. -- The state Public Service Board cleared the way Friday for the sale of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, rejecting opponents' arguments that negotiated side deals were enough to scuttle it.
Entergy Nuclear of Jackson, Miss., "can and should operate the plant as well as or better than the present owners and, under most reasonably foreseeable scenarios, the transactions will produce an economic benefit for Vermont ratepayers," the board said.
The current owners of the plant said the board's ruling cleared any remaining obstacles to completing the $180 million sale by Wednesday's deadline. "We're on schedule to close by that deadline, the 31st," said Yankee spokesman Brian Cosgrove.
Opponents of the sale said they were hopeful that utility regulators in other states might step in and block the transaction. And they also said they'd appeal the board's various orders to the Vermont Supreme Court.
"We will definitely seek appellate review," said James Dumont, a Middlebury lawyer representing the New England Coalition on Nuclear Pollution.
Another opponent, though, said he saw little likelihood of preventing Entergy from taking over the 510-megawatt power plant in Vernon.
"Frankly, I think this sale now is likely to occur and that is too bad for Vermonters and for our energy future here in the state," said Mark Sinclair, a lawyer with the Conservation Law Foundation.
Friday's ruling turned down appeals by the coalition and Citizens Awareness Network that were supported by the Conservation Law Foundation. They sought to block the sale, arguing that a side agreement required further study by the board.
That agreement dealt with whether Entergy should be allowed to keep any money left over in a decommissioning fund after Yankee closes. The current owners of Vermont Yankee have deposited money into the fund to pay for dismantling the plant when it eventually closes.
Entergy wanted to keep any money that's left over. The Public Service Board ruled that if there's any surplus after the closure, the money had to be returned to Vermont ratepayers.
That threatened to kill the deal until Entergy and the current owners negotiated a side deal calling for Entergy to keep the 45 percent of the fund paid by out-of-state ratepayers whose utilities are minority owners of the plant.
The sale opponents said that deal with the out-of-state utilities undermined the rationale behind the board's refusal to let Entergy keep any excess decommissioning funds paid by Vermont ratepayers.
The rationale, they said, was to make sure Entergy didn't cut any corners in decomissioning the nuclear plant, whose license expires in 2012.
But the board said the deal had satisfied its primary concern that Vermont ratepayers get back any money that's left over. Utilities that operate in other states will have to answer to their own regulators, the Vermont board said.
The board said that out-of-state utilities also were being protected against potentially getting short-changed. That's because the current Vermont owners of the plant have agreed to pay their out-of-state counterparts $1.5 million to cover the amount they had put aside for decomissioning.
That money was coming from what otherwise would go to the shareholders of Central Vermont Public Service Corp. and Green Mountain Power Corp., not ratepayers.
"These (out-of-state) companies thus receive compensation now in place of what they might - or might not - receive at some unpredictably distant future time," the board said.
-------- us politics
House Votes Billions for Intelligence
Panel Says Anti-Terror Fight Creates 'Gaps' in U.S. Coverage
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, July 26, 2002; Page A11
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A61177-2002Jul25?language=printer
The House has approved a multibillion-dollar increase in intelligence spending at the same time its intelligence committee determined that gaps have developed in critical national security areas because so much emphasis is being given to the global war on terrorism.
The House late Wednesday passed the fiscal 2003 intelligence authorization bill containing an estimated $35 billion to fund spending next year for operations at the CIA, National Security Agency and other parts of the federal government's intelligence community.
While the exact numbers are classified, the CIA's share is $4 billion to $5 billion, according to sources. The Pentagon's electronic and imagery satellite collection agencies and the military will get more than $28 billion. Other intelligence units at the departments of State, Energy, Treasury and Justice will receive the rest.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), ranking Democrat on the intelligence panel, described the increase over last year as "many billions of dollars more" and "the largest one-year increase in funding, on a percentage basis, in at least the last two decades."
In another indication of the amounts involved, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence disclosed for the first time in its report on the bill that the fiscal 2002 supplemental appropriations for intelligence amounted to $1.7 billion.
In the report, the committee praised the administration's "substantial increases" for intelligence, with promises that they will be "sustained . . . over at least the next five-to-ten years." But it complained that while the bulk of the new funds is to finance the war on terrorism, most other investments "emphasize collection systems that are of questionable flexibility compared to the needs."
"Significant and inventive" counterterrorism efforts are underway, the panel said, but added they were being achieved by shifting analysts and operational personnel "that create gaps in coverage and understanding in other areas of national security interest."
The CIA, for example, has shifted more than 100 analysts to its counterterrorism center, while others are being sent to help the FBI develop analytical capabilities for the war on terrorism. "Some of those CIA analysts were China or other country experts," one senior congressional intelligence expert said yesterday.
The committee also said that it expects the intelligence agencies to undertake a major reorganization because "investment, alone, without reorganization and/or reform of some basic components and practices" will not address the country's needs.
The House-Senate committee investigating intelligence failures leading to the Sept. 11 attacks is expected to make recommendations on reorganization. The panel, which is having closed sessions over the summer, is not expected to file a report until next year.
On Wednesday night, the House approved the creation of an independent commission to investigate the circumstances surrounding last year's attacks. The additional inquiry would supplement the joint committee effort, "providing fresh eyes" to the material, Pelosi said.
The commission's prospects remain uncertain, although Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.) has said he may attach a similar provision to his version of the president's homeland security bill.
Staff writer Juliet Eilperin contributed to this report.
--------
Bush Indicates He Is Ready to Veto Senate's Security Bill
New York Times
July 26, 2002
By DAVID FIRESTONE and DAVID STOUT
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/26/politics/26CND-SECU.html
WASHINGTON, July 26 - As the House prepared to vote tonight on a bill creating a Homeland Security Department, President Bush personally signaled to Congress that he was ready to veto the Senate version of the bill favored by Democrats.
He told an audience that included the Senate bill's sponsor that the measure would weaken his power to protect the country.
"The bill doesn't have enough managerial flexibility as far as I'm concerned," the president told lawmakers, governors, mayors, police officers and firefighters gathered at the White House. Mr. Bush and his Republican allies in Congress want the new department exempt from some civil service and budget rules. Democrats have objected, on grounds that workers' rights would not be sufficiently protected.
Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, the Connecticut Democrat who is the sponsor of the Senate bill, listened without expression to the president's complaints this morning. "A time of war is the wrong time to weaken the president's ability to protect the American people," Mr. Bush said.
The president sounded conciliatory on a personal level, voicing appreciation for the hard work of Mr. Lieberman and other lawmakers. Mr. Bush pledged to continue working with the legislators, "and, being a modest guy, I'm willing to recognize a good idea even if it comes from Congress."
The House was expected to vote late tonight on its version of the bill. Before the final vote, House Democrats are expected to offer provisions to protect civil service benefits. If the narrow Republican majority in the House remains solid, those provisions appear likely to be rejected.
One indication of how the legislative struggle might play out came at midday, when House Republicans prevailed on a vote to give the president the authority to waive labor protections for homeland-security workers under emergency circumstances. The vote was 229 to 201.
The depths of the White House displeasure over the Democrats' position was signaled on Thursday, when Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, said Senate Democrats wanted to strip the administration of the management flexibility necessary to run the department, making it harder to reward good employees or punish poor performers.
The president himself reasserted that point this morning. "I'm not going to accept legislation that limits or weakens the president's well-established authorities - authorities to exempt parts of government from parts of federal labor-management relations statutes when it serves our national interest," he said.
Mr. Bush said he rejected any suggestion that his position somehow made him anti-labor. "I reject that as strongly as I can state it," he said.
Creation of a Homeland Security Department would amount to the biggest reorganization of the federal government since the National Security Act of 1947, which created the Defense Department, the National Security Council, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. That bill, coincidentally, was signed by President Harry S. Truman 55 years ago today.
When Mr. Bush first signaled the veto threat on Thursday, Democrats said they could not believe that a disagreement over personnel and union issues would truly drive the president to veto a department he proposed just last month. Mr. Lieberman said he was "dismayed" at the White House position.
Later Thursday, a Senate committee approved the bill with provisions opposed by the White House, widening an ideological battle that could engulf a vast new antiterrorism agency.
This morning, Mr. Bush said his administration would continue working for "a bipartisan bill." But he said, "We can't be micromanaged."
The questions over whether many of the 170,000 employees of the new department would have civil service protections have dominated the debate in the House, which has just begun considering a domestic security bill that sharply differs with the Senate version on the personnel issues most important to the Bush administration.
Members of each party said they strongly supported an antiterrorism department. But just as Senate Republicans joined the administration in saying they would oppose the bill, many House Democrats were equally adamant that they could not vote for the proposals made by Republicans.
The swirl of competing proposals has deepened the sense that a homeland security department, once seen as Washington's consensus response to the terrorist threat, had become hostage to the ideological goals of the two sides.
The parties were at odds not on the larger issues of the huge government reorganization, like which agencies would be transferred, but rather on smaller details of personnel management and spending authority, including how easily a laggard employee could be fired or how closely Congress would control the department's spending.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Thursday, Mr. Fleischer said that if the administration did not receive the flexibility it sought to promote and fire department employees, the president's advisers would recommend a veto of the entire department.
Senator Lieberman, the principal architect of the Senate bill approved on Thursday by his Governmental Affairs Committee, said he could not believe that Mr. Bush would really veto the department over personnel issues.
"Our bill gives the president 90 percent of what he asked for," Mr. Lieberman said. "I hope this veto threat is a tactic to encourage continued negotiation."
He noted that the president had never vetoed any bill passed by Congress and doubted that the measure creating the department would be the first.
Mr. Lieberman's bill was approved and sent to the full Senate by a 12-to-5 vote in his committee, with three Republicans joining all nine Democrats to support it. But Senator Susan Collins, a Maine Republican who voted for the bill, said she would oppose it on the floor next week if the administration's personnel language was not included, and Senator Fred Thompson, Republican of Tennessee, predicted that many others from their party would join her.
"The way they have written this bill, it takes away all of the flexibility the president needs to run a department that would respond to the terrorist threat," said Mr. Thompson, the administration's leading advocate for its proposal in the Senate. "I can't vote for it the way it is now."
Mr. Thompson lost virtually every motion he made in the committee to give the department's management greater power to punish or reward workers or transfer them. He and the administration also opposed Mr. Lieberman's plan to create a separate intelligence division in the department, which Democrats said would push the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. to track down terrorist threats more aggressively.
Not wanting to diminish the role of the existing intelligence agencies, the administration prefers a much weaker division of information analysis.
Republicans and administration officials said existing civil service rules were too rigid for an antiterrorism agency that had to respond quickly to an unforeseen panoply of threats. Mr. Fleischer said that if a drunken Border Patrol agent were found to have allowed a terrorist into the country, the agent could not be fired without a 30-day notice. Managers could not deny scheduled pay raises to poorly performing workers, he said, and could not easily be given merit pay increases.
As an indication of the divisiveness that has emerged on the subject, party leaders in the House spent the entire day wrangling over a procedural rule governing how much debate would be allowed on the homeland security bill. Hastening to complete their work before the August recess begins on Saturday, House members did not begin actual discussion of the department until Thursday evening, and planned to spend today on proposals to change the president's plan, mostly from Democrats.
Major battles were also shaping up on the tangential matters of when airports must begin screening bags for explosives and whether companies that make high-technology equipment should be protected from federal lawsuits.
Both matters are close to the heart of House Republican leaders who inserted them in the bill last week, and are opposed by Democrats in both chambers.
----
Chemical, Nuclear Security Bills Pass Committee
July 26, 2002
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/jul2002/2002-07-26-09.asp#anchor1
WASHINGTON, DC, A Senate committee has approved legislation to strengthen security at chemical and nuclear plants.
"These bills address the concerns that all of us have shared since the tragic events of September 11th," said Senator Jim Jeffords, the Vermont Independent who chairs the Environment and Public Works Committee. "We must do everything in our power to make sure that terrorists are not able to turn our own resources against us."
The Nuclear Security Act of 2002 (S 1746) would require a comprehensive review of security at all nuclear power plants, including an evaluation of hiring and training standards, facility security plans, and emergency response plans. The bill would appoint a task force headed by the commissioner of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and including federal experts on security, intelligence and radiological response, to review security at U.S. nuclear power plants.
Under the bill, the White House would establish a federal team aimed at ensuring coordinated protection of air, water and ground access to nuclear power plants, along with a new office of Nuclear Security and Incident Response within the NRC to coordinate and consolidate security functions of the agency.
The Chemical Security Act of 2002 (S 1602) would require chemical plants with a certain capacity to assess their security vulnerabilities and draft plans to respond to any vulnerabilities, including the addition of safer technologies. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Office of Homeland Security would determine which facilities would need to undergo these assessments, and would guide the preparation of assessments and response plans.
Chemical plants would submit their assessments and response plans to the EPA and the Office of Homeland Security for review and certification. Some information about these plants would be kept off limits to the public, at the discretion of the EPA.
EPA records show that a terrorist attacks on any of at least 123 chemical facilities could threaten a million or more nearby residents. The U.S. Army's surgeon general estimates that 2.4 million people could be killed or injured in a terrorist attack at one U.S. toxic chemical plant.
The chemical bill has won the support of a variety of environmental groups.
"The Chemical Security Act of 2002 is an important first step towards making our hometowns safe from terrorist attacks on chemical facilities," said Alys Campaigne, legislative director at the Natural Resources Defense Council. "Once enacted, the legislation will require high priority chemical plants to assess their vulnerabilities and to craft plans to 'eliminate or significantly reduce' the threats."
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
Al-Qaeda no longer a threat: Karzai
AFP
FRIDAY, JULY 26, 2002
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=17161228
KABUL: The al-Qaeda network no longer poses a military threat in Afghanistan although it retains the capacity to launch terrorist attacks, President Hamid Karzai said on Friday.
"No they are not a major threat. They are not a military threat. They may be assassins, they may be terrorists but they are not a military threat," he said.
Karzai expressed confidence in the security situation in Afghanistan despite the recent assassination of Vice President Haji Abdul Qadir.
He said his request this week for close protection from the US military was in response to a long-standing offer and not a result of specific threats.
"The security situation in Afghanistan is quite alright. The overall situation in the country is quite secure," said Karzai.
"The Afghan people have been asking for me to have such help (from the Americans) for a long, long time.
"This is technical expertise. They have already brought a lot of improvement already... It's a very good thing, I think I should have done this a long, long time back. When the offer came we kind of sat on the offer for a long time."
-------- arms sales
Poland to Buy Israeli Missiles
The Associated Press
Friday, July 26, 2002
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A5441-2002Jul26?language=printer
WARSAW, Poland -- Poland's Defense Ministry said Friday it will buy "several thousand" anti-tank missiles from Israeli maker Rafael in an effort to bring its armed forces up to NATO standards.
The deal for the Rafael NT-S "Spike" missiles is worth up $250 million over 10 years, Deputy Defense Minister Janusz Zemke said at a news conference.
Zemke said the ministry had considered bids from companies in South Africa, France and Sweden but the Israeli missiles were the "most effective, although not the cheapest."
The contract is to be signed by Rafael with Polish arms firm Mesko, which will manufacture some of the missiles, after final tests are completed later this year. Poland will receive the first missiles from Israel in 2003 and production at home should begin in 2004, Zemke said.
The Spike missiles have a range of about 2.5 miles and can be used by infantry troops or fired by helicopters. They will replace the Soviet-era missiles still in use by the Polish military.
Poland joined NATO in 1999 along with former Warsaw Pact members Hungary and the Czech Republic.
-------- asia
Southeast Asians Debate Anti - Terror
July 26, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Asia-Better-Defense.html
BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, Brunei (AP) -- Southeast Asian diplomats zeroed in on terrorism Friday in a bid to reverse perceptions the region is a launchpad for attacks, but Indonesia and Vietnam raised objections to a proposed anti-terror accord with the United States.
Senior officials from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations began finalizing the groundwork for next week's meetings between their countries and a dozen others with security interests in the region, including the United States, China, Japan, India, Russia and both Koreas.
Terrorism will top the agenda, with ASEAN expected to sign a memorandum of understanding with the United States.
Officials said Friday that Indonesia and Vietnam had raised objections to the proposed U.S.-ASEAN agreement to cooperate more closely in combatting international terrorism.
Indonesia is concerned that it might lead to the dispatch of U.S. military advisers or ground troops to Southeast Asia and wants to ensure that an accord conforms with United Nations guarantees of national sovereignty, an Indonesian official said on condition of anonymity.
Vietnam has similar concerns and is urging members of ASEAN to stick by its bedrock principle of noninterference in each other's affairs.
Secretary of State Colin Powell, who arrives in Brunei on Tuesday, is expected to press for a tougher approach to terror gangs such as Abu Sayyaf in the southern Philippines and Islamic extremists allegedly linked to al-Qaida who plotted attacks against Western targets in Singapore.
Malaysia and Singapore have arrested scores of militants in the alleged Singapore bombing plot and have urged Indonesia -- where many of the suspects came from -- to take a stronger stand. Indonesia says it is taking steps against terrorism, but won't violate human rights to do so.
In the legally nonbinding accord, Washington is offering technical and financial aid to ASEAN, including training and greater cooperation on intelligence exchanges.
ASEAN is made up of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
The other regional forum members are Australia, Canada, Mongolia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Russia and the European Union.
Talks between North and South Korea are anticipated in an attempt to further ease tensions on the peninsula that followed a deadly naval clash this month. The nuclear showdown between India and Pakistan will also be discussed.
-------- biological weapons
Scientists Worry Journals May Aid Terrorists
New York Times
July 26, 2002
By NICHOLAS WADE
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/26/science/26RESE.html
The leader of a national scientific organization has sought the advice of the National Academy of Sciences on whether scientific journals should withhold information that may aid bioterrorists or countries contemplating biological warfare.
In a letter to the academy, Dr. Ronald Atlas, president of the American Society for Microbiology, wrote, "We are now being asked to allow authors to withhold critical information because of concern that significant data could be misappropriated or abused."
The issue is a hard one for scientific journals; many of them insist that scientific articles must include the information necessary for others to reproduce the findings.
The request to withhold information, Dr. Atlas said, has come from individual scientists submitting articles for publication in the 11 journals published by the American Society for Microbiology.
Though some of the scientists work for government laboratories, the requests were all made on the basis of individual judgment, so far as he is aware, Dr. Atlas said.
Several requests, he said, concerned DNA primers, the snippets of DNA used to extract specific genes from an organism. One application of primers is in sensors designed to quickly detect microbes in a biological attack. An adversary's genetic engineers could foil the sensors if they knew what primers were used.
But Dr. Atlas said he feared that if authors were allowed to withhold information, the journals might find themselves publishing papers that could not be reproduced. He said he was leaning against the proposal but felt it was important enough to bring to the academy, asking that it convene a conference of journal editors.
Dr. Eileen Choffnes, the academy staff member who is planning the conference, noted a precedent in the concern by physicists in the late 1930's over articles about uranium. In June 1940, she said, the academy secured the cooperation of 237 journals in withholding papers on uranium and related matters, resulting in "the almost total cessation of publication on nuclear physics."
The academy, however, circulated the articles privately among American physicists.
Dr. Donald Kennedy, the editor of the journal Science, said he doubted if a conference of journal editors would include the necessary expertise on national security to decide what should or should not be published.
He noted that the government could require prepublication review of any federally financed research that might raise concerns, and universities could then decide if they wished to accept such grants.
-------- brazil
Brazil Unveils Radar System for Amazon
July 25, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Brazil-Amazon-Radar.html
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) -- Brazil unveiled a state-of-the-art radar system Thursday that it hopes will help unlock the mysteries and economic potential of the vast Amazon as well as track down lawbreakers.
President Fernando Henrique Cardoso flew to the jungle city of Manaus to inaugurate the Amazon Surveillance System, a $1.4 billion network of radar stations and computers built by U.S. defense contractor Raytheon Corp. that will track everything from illegal landing strips to climatic conditions to soil composition in the world's largest wilderness.
The system, known here as SIVAM, aims to help protect the Amazon from environmental destruction and drug-dealing guerrillas while providing data to unlock the region's economic potential.
At the command post in Manaus, 1,800 miles northwest of Rio de Janeiro, a wall-sized map of the Brazilian Amazon glows with points of light representing the far-flung radar stations, data collection outposts and surveillance airplanes that make up SIVAM, as the system is known.
``With the advent of SIVAM, we will open up a new frontier of progress and hope in Brazil,'' said Air Force Col. Paullo Esteves, one of the program's directors.
Since the first Spanish conquistadores came searching for the legendary land of Eldorado, the Amazon has thwarted efforts to tap its riches, including gold, diamonds, valuable hardwoods and a cornucopia of medicinal plants that some scientists believe could hold the key to curing diseases such as AIDS.
``Why didn't anyone invest in the Amazon in the past?'' Esteves asks rhetorically. ``Because the state wasn't present.''
Today, the 2 million-square-mile wilderness remains a largely lawless frontier. The government can barely find -- much less catch -- the illegal miners, loggers and drug runners who hop from clandestine air strips through the jungle and across Brazil's border with Colombia, Peru and Bolivia.
But that could change with SIVAM. With 19 ground-based radar sites and five airborne tracking systems aboard AWACS-type surveillance planes, operators can monitor air traffic and even track low-flying drug planes.
Three other planes will monitor events on the ground, such as the construction of landing strips, illegal mining and logging which destroyed more than 6,000 square miles of rain forest last year alone.
Data from the planes and six satellites will be fed into computers, giving Brazil a picture of the Amazon. A technician sitting in front of a screen can monitor remote border outposts hundreds of miles away like Sao Gabriel da Cachoeira, where the radar tower juts above the jungle canopy.
``We can track the entire practice of illicit enterprise,'' says Esteves.
SIVAM is a big change from Brazil's previous efforts to even begin to get a state presence in the Amazon.
In the 1970s, the military dictators then in power carved the Trans-Amazon highway out of the jungle and urged settlers from the arid Northeast to move there. Many eventually abandoned the Amazon, and much of the road today is little more than a muddy track.
A decade later, the armed forces undertook the so-called Northern Rim project, building scores of border outposts to ``protect'' the Amazon but doing little to guard the immense and porous jungle borders.
SIVAM has also been questioned by nationalists who fear that the U.S. government would have access to strategic data. But Brazilian military and government officials say SIVAM will be entirely in national hands.
Environmentalists say that despite claims to the contrary, the main focus of SIVAM is national security -- not protection of the wilderness. Most of the information will be gathered along Brazil's borders where little deforestation has occurred, not in the southern Amazon where the heaviest logging occurs.
``Well, I think we should make use of whatever data that comes from it,'' says Philip Fearnside, an American specialist in deforestation working with the National Institute for Amazon Research in Manaus. ``But if you were going to invest a lot of money in the environment you probably wouldn't invest in SIVAM.''
-------- business
United Defense Profit Up on Crusader Bonus
Arlington Contractor Looks at a Future Without Controversial Artillery Project
By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, July 26, 2002; Page E05
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A2960-2002Jul25?language=printer
United Defense Industries Inc. yesterday reported a 74 percent increase in profit on declining revenue in the second quarter, helped by a performance bonus for its work on the embattled Crusader artillery system.
The Arlington arms producer reported a $27.3 million (52 cents a share) profit for the quarter, compared with $15.7 million (37 cents) in the second quarter of 2001.
Revenue declined 8 percent to $318 million.
United Defense Industries stock closed yesterday at $22.24 a share, up $2.64.
After meeting scheduling and budgetary goals on the Crusader program, the Army gave United Defense a $7.2 million performance bonus. But that was for work performed before the Pentagon announced that it wanted to cancel the program, which is still pending in Congress.
"For planning purposes, we have assumed that the Crusader program will be terminated in the very near term and replaced by a smaller contract award to further develop Crusader technologies," said Francis Raborn, chief financial officer.
That might not be enough to make up for losing the Crusader contract, which accounts for more than 20 percent of its revenue, analysts said. "The vast majority of expected revenues will never be realized," said Brett Lambert of research and consulting group DFI International.
United Defense blamed some of its revenue decline in the quarter on a delay in work on the Navy's next generation of warships to consider a protest by General Dynamics Inc. to the award of the contract to rival Northrop Grumman Corp. Under either contractor, United Defense would supply a gun with an 31-foot barrel that can shoot 250-pound projectiles 100 nautical miles.
The company also raised its earnings forecast for the year. The $305 million acquisition of United States Marine Repair will add $200 million in revenue to the company's results during the second half of the year, company officials said. Also, profit should be boosted by an acceleration of the delivery of new Bradley Fighting Vehicles, the company said.
For the year, company officials said earnings per share would be $2.15 to $2.25, up from its previous estimate of $2.10 to $2.20.
-------- chemical weapons
Argentine to Head Group Seeking to Ban Chemical Weapons
New York Times
July 26, 2002
By JUDITH MILLER
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/26/international/americas/26CHEM.html
The international organization charged with ridding the world of chemical weapons appointed a senior Argentine diplomat today as its new chief, and he immediately pledged to be responsive to the concerns of the agency's members, including the United States.
By acclamation, the 145-member Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons chose Rogelio Pfirter, 53, a lawyer and Argentina's former under secretary for foreign policy, to replace José M. Bustani, a Brazilian diplomat who was voted out as director general of the organization last April after the Bush administration announced it had lost confidence in him. American officials accused Mr. Bustani of "mismanagement," "ill-considered initiatives" and failing to consult with Washington about sensitive issues, including his effort to persuade Iraq to join the organization.
Mr. Bustani had denied the American allegations and fought hard to keep his job, accusing Washington of jeopardizing the group's independence and neutrality. But he was defeated by growing resentment of his unilateral management style and threats from Washington to sever financial support for the organization, which is based in The Hague. Without American financing, which accounts for 22 percent of the group's $60 million annual budget, the agency would most likely be forced to close.
In an interview today, Mr. Pfirter struck a cautious tone, vowing to work closely with the United States and other members to address their concerns about how best to carry out the 1997 treaty that bans chemical weapons. Indeed, he said, his first meeting was with Donald A. Mahley, Washington's chief negotiator on biological weapons and the United States representative to the organization. Mr. Pfirter said that the two of them were "on the same wavelength" with respect to putting the organization on a more secure financial footing.
For its part, the United States quickly applauded Mr. Pfirter's appointment. Richard A. Boucher, the State Department spokesman in Washington, said Mr. Pfirter had "an outstanding record on nonproliferation" and that the Bush administration believed he would do an "excellent job in leading the organization" in a "positive" direction."
Asked in a telephone interview whether he would press Iraq to join the organization, Mr. Pfirter said that while all nations should join, "we should be very aware that there are United Nations resolutions in effect" and that membership in the organization should not be "at the expense" of pledges to other international organizations.
The Bush administration had resented what it viewed as Mr. Bustani's efforts to "meddle" in the United Nations' efforts to persuade Baghdad to honor its disarmament pledges and submit to international arms inspection.
Mr. Pfirter said that his first priority would be to "get the organization back on its feet and make it fully operational."
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, created to verify the treaty that bans chemical weapons, has helped eliminate an estimated 7 percent of the world's chemical agents and 15 percent of its chemical weapons. But the organization is in poor financial shape. Employing about 500 people, it ran a deficit of $4 million in 2000 and managed to conduct less than half the inspections of chemical weapons stockpiles and production plants scheduled for 2001.
Amy E. Smithson, a chemical weapons expert at the Henry L. Stimson Center, a private group in Washington, said that because of budget shortages, the organization had not been able to conduct 35 percent of the planned inspections at chemical weapons storage facilities and 43 percent of those scheduled at production plants last year.
Mr. Pfirter is one of Argentina's most seasoned diplomats. Between 1995 and 2000, he was Argentina's ambassador to Britain under former President Carlos Menem, a sensitive post since the 1982 Falkland Islands War between London and Buenos Aires. He was in charge of nonproliferation issues for Argentina from 1992 to 1994 and again in 2002.
In Washington, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld removed a major obstacle today to the construction of a giant plant in Russia that will enable Moscow to carry out its pledge to destroy the world's largest declared stockpiles of chemical weapons. Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Mr. Rumsfeld announced that the Bush administration "either has or will be asking for" a permanent waiver in a law to permit the construction of a plant at Shchuchye, near the Kazakhstan border, to proceed. Roughly 13.6 percent of all of Russia's declared chemical stockpile of 40,000 metric tons, is stored there.
Congress had approved $50 million for financing for the project for this fiscal year, but it has been delayed by a requirement that President Bush certify that Russia is complying fully with its treaty obligations. The administration has been unwilling to do that.
-------- china
China links separatists to training by al Qaeda
By Katherine Arms
UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL
July 26, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20020726-25469110.htm
HONG KONG - Scores of Islamic separatists from China's northwestern Xinjiang province were sponsored and trained by Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network, China's state-owned television reported.
The official China Central Television station reported that Uighur activists who are campaigning for an independent East Turkestan state in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region were trained by al Qaeda members in camps in northern Afghanistan.
Many Uighurs, the Turkic-speaking, Muslim native people of the region, want to break away from predominantly Han China. Beijing has traditionally kept quiet about the decade-old movement, and some international observers interpret the recent display of attention as an effort to entice U.S. support for moves against Uighur separatists while the war against terrorism is in progress.
The report said that from 1992 until last year, about 100 activists were trained by bin Laden followers and then returned to Xinjiang to carry out attacks on Chinese authorities. The television report said 162 persons died in the attacks.
In an interview with the television station, Awuti Mamuti, an activist said to have trained in Afghanistan, said the camps and training were sponsored by bin Laden. He said that more than 500 people were trained at a tightly secured facility and that bin Laden had paid for the entire venture.
Mr. Mamuti said he spotted bin Laden once in October 1997. He said bin Laden was just a few feet away but they did not shake hands.
The broadcast included videotape believed to have been shot at a clandestine meeting of separatists in the Xinjiang city of Hetan in 1996. Those present wore face masks and spoke about methods of carrying out attacks in the province.
The broadcast said most of the activists were living outside China and were linked with international terrorist groups.
China has generally supported the U.S. war against terrorism and, since the September 11 attacks, has asserted links between the Xinjiang separatists and al Qaeda activities. Human rights observers have decried an authoritarian crackdown in the region.
"Some individual Uighurs have made their way to Afghanistan, but that hardly justifies the broad crackdown now under way," Sidney Jones of New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement in October, during a summit of Asian leaders.
Geological surveys suggest Xinjiang province, once the site of China's nuclear-testing facilities, contains extensive deposits of oil and natural gas. With its economic expansion dependent largely on rapidly modernizing its manufacturing capabilities, China's energy demands are expected to increase dramatically in coming decades.
-------- drug war
Drug Dogs Sniff Even 6-Year-Olds; Parents Sue
New York Times
July 26, 2002
By TAMAR LEWIN
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/26/national/26DOGS.html
The parents of 17 students, some as young as 6, filed a lawsuit yesterday against a South Dakota school board and police department for taking a drug-sniffing dog into a school to check children in every classroom, from kindergarten through high school.
The suit, filed in federal court in Sioux Falls, says the principal of the school, the Wagner Community School, announced in a first-period class in early May that the school was in a lockdown and that students could not leave their classrooms. Wagner police and federal officers then took the dog into classes, the suit contends, frightening some students so badly that they cried and at least one urinated involuntarily.
Kenneth Cotton, the school district's lawyer, said he could not comment on the case because he had not talked to the school board or administrators. "All I know is that I have a sixth grader and a ninth grader," Mr. Cotton said, "and when I asked them about it, they said a dog had come to their classrooms, walked up and down in an orderly way and left after about two minutes. I can't tell you why the dog was brought into the classrooms, but I know there is a drug problem in the community and zero tolerance for drugs in the school."
Last month, the United States Supreme Court upheld random drug tests for students who take part in extracurricular activities, opening the way to more aggressive drug enforcement in schools.
Since the late 1980's, many schools, including Wagner's, have used dogs to search lockers and hallways. Courts have allowed that because the lockers are school property.
Education lawyers said that dogs had searched older students but that two federal appeals courts had found the practice unconstitutional.
Graham Boyd, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Drug Policy Litigation Project and lead lawyer in the South Dakota case, said the use of the dog, a German shepherd, in the classrooms terrorized many of the children.
"This is the first time I've heard of dogs being brought into kindergarten classes," Mr. Boyd said. "It's such a scary disruption for young children. I absolutely share the commitment of school officials to come up with solutions to drug abuse, but I'm concerned that some schools seem to lose all grasp on common sense."
He said the drug searches were especially traumatic to children like Kayedee Deverney, 11, who has been bitten by dogs three times seriously enough to require medical treatment. After the dog went to her classroom, Mr. Boyd said, Kayedee became afraid to attend school, worrying that the dog would reappear - as it did, in a second lockdown a few days after the first search.
In one kindergarten classroom, the suit contends, the dog got away from its handler and chased students around the room, and it put its feet on students' desks several times and strained against the leash. Students were told to keep their hands on their desks and not to pet the dog or make sudden movements. In some classrooms, school officials warned students that sudden movements might make the dog attack.
The lawsuit seeks both compensation and an order barring dog searches in classrooms when school resumes on Aug. 20.
Wagner, population about 1,600 and 85 miles west-southwest of Sioux Falls, is near the Yankton Sioux Reservation, and the children involved in the lawsuit are Indians.
The lawsuit also names the Interior Department's assistant secretary of Indian affairs as a defendant because the drug-detecting dog belonged to the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
The civil liberties union has another lawsuit against the Wagner school board awaiting resolution. It contends that Wagner's election system for the school board discriminates against Indians. Indians make up 40 percent of the district's population, but all members of the school board are white.
-------- iran
'Iran opening up to UN probe'
News International, Pakistan (Jang),
July 26, 2002
http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jul2002-daily/26-07-2002/world/w3.htm
GENEVA: Iran has extended an open invitation for missions by UN human rights experts, reversing a previous refusal to accept such probes, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations said here on Thursday. The move was welcomed by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, who said in a statement that she hoped the Iranian government's move would pave the way for long-term cooperation with the UN's top human rights forum, the Human Rights Commission.
"Visits by the Commission's Special Rapporteurs and working groups could be very effective in improving the protection and promotion of human rights in a given country," she said. Robinson's remarks came after a meeting with the Iranian permanent delegate to the UN in Geneva, Mohammad Reza Alborzi, on Wednesday, which dealt with a future technical cooperation programme with her office. "The open invitation is already extended, now it is up to the rapporteurs to enter into a dialogue with the authorities in Iran," Alborzi told AFP on Thursday. "The new fact is that it is an open invitation to them all without prejudice," he added.
Asked if Iran had given a green light to visits, UN human rights spokesman Jose Luis Diaz said: "Not formally, but they have told the High Commissioner that they are going to extend the invitation". The move would reverse the current stance of Iran's Islamic regime, which led to the exclusion of the former UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Iran from the country for six years, despite previous signs of opening.
The rapporteur, Maurice Copithorne, compiled critical annual reports on the situation in Iran based on testimony from human rights groups, but maintained contact with Iranian diplomats and reformers. His mandate was ended by the 52-member UN Human Rights Commission during its annual session here in April, halting 19 years of scrutiny of Iran's human rights record. The move sparked an angry reaction from the United States and dismay amongst human rights groups, which felt that Iran was being let off the hook.
-------- iraq
Plans to invade Iraq solidifying, aides say
By Warren P. Strobel and Jonathan S. Landay,
Friday, July 26, 2002
Knight Ridder Newspapers
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/134500696_iraq26.html
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is moving forward aggressively with planning to oust Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, laying the groundwork for a possible U.S.-led invasion early next year, according to senior U.S. officials and individuals involved in the planning.
Under one scenario being discussed at the Pentagon, a force of 250,000 to 300,000 U.S. troops would invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam, backed by massive airstrikes. Turkey, Kuwait and Qatar have indicated they would allow their territory to be used for an attack.
But some civilian aides to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld are pushing for a quicker - and, critics say, riskier - thrust in an attempt to catch Saddam off guard. That strategy would involve roughly 80,000 troops and could be in place by this fall.
"If it happened in October, I wouldn't be completely surprised," said one official involved in the planning. He and others spoke on condition of anonymity.
Saddam Hussein's ouster
Proponents of this approach argue that a surprise attack is vital because the Iraqi leader knows that, unlike the 1991 Persian Gulf war, the U.S. goal this time will be his ouster. Thus, he may be tempted to lash out first with chemical or biological weapons.
What Saddam might do is at the center of the debate over which plan to follow. Some could start earlier than others, a senior U.S. official said. Large numbers of Americans and Iraqis could be killed and wounded, especially if there was fighting in Baghdad and other major cities.
President Bush - who has repeatedly declared his intention to get rid of Saddam - has made no final decision on which, if any, plan to execute, the officials emphasized.
And the White House has not yet begun a concerted effort to convince the U.S. public, Congress or American allies of the need to pre-emptively strike Iraq.
"It is absolutely clear to me they have not made the case yet and they know that. They haven't made it to the American people, they haven't made it to our allies, and they haven't made it to the region," said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del. Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, opens hearings on Iraq policy next week.
Washington's two closest Arab allies, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, oppose military action against Iraq, as does virtually every European ally except Great Britain.
These nations argue that Bush should first get the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on a path to resolution. Otherwise, they say, attacking Iraq could ignite the Middle East and endanger pro-Western regimes.
State Department concerns
The State Department shares those concerns. "With all that's going on, with all the uncertainty in the Middle East ... it probably is not a good time," said a senior State Department official.
Nor has the Bush administration sketched out a vision of a post-Saddam regime that could hold together the unruly nation of 23 million Shiite Muslims, Sunni Muslims and ethnic Kurds.
Despite these unanswered questions, the United States appears to be creeping toward war. Some officials worry that Bush may have backed himself into a corner with his bellicose rhetoric.
"I think a widespread assumption is, the U.S. is going to attack. ... There is widespread concern that this will destabilize the whole of the Middle East," said an official at the United Nations.
In one sign of how serious the planning is, top Bush aides are debating whether the president should get Congress' approval for an invasion. His father did so before starting the Persian Gulf War to expel Iraqi troops from Kuwait.
Some Bush aides argue that Saddam, who since 1998 has refused inspections of his weapons-of-mass-destruction programs, is in violation of the U.N. Security Council resolutions that ended the 1991 war, and no further authority is needed.
Others argue that it makes sense to seek Congress' backing since it is virtually assured.
Biden said that going after Saddam without congressional assent and public support "could be a career-ending move" for Bush. The president understands the risk, he added.
"I have specifically inquired about the prospect of an October surprise and have been told there will not be an October surprise," the senator said.
U.N. talks stumble
In another possible sign of Bush's intent, the United States moved this week to shut down U.N. negotiations with Iraq over a return of weapons inspectors.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the Security Council Wednesday that further talks with Iraq would be fruitless unless Baghdad agrees to give inspectors unconditional access. Washington opposed even technical-level talks with the Iraqis, a U.S. diplomat said.
The move prompted speculation that Washington was preparing public opinion for an eventual attack.
No attack is imminent, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said yesterday. "There are many issues to be considered before we are at the point of decision," he said.
But Blair added that "the omens don't look very good, frankly," for a diplomatic breakthrough.
U.S. officials fear that Saddam could undercut any effort to build international support for military action by readmitting U.N. weapons inspectors, while preventing them unfettered access, as he has in the past.
On the military options, some planners and nongovernmental experts argue that the 80,000-member invasion force being pushed by Pentagon hawks is too small, and could lead to a catastrophe if there is widespread street fighting in Baghdad. Many innocent Iraqi citizens could be caught up in the warfare and killed.
Buying time to plan
The post-Saddam era could be a disaster, "if we don't do the take-down right," said the official involved in planning. "Waiting three, four, five more months buys you so much more in terms of doing it right."
Still, he said, "I've never seen a scenario where we lose."
Michael Vickers, a former Army special operations and CIA officer, said a substantial U.S. force would be needed to subdue Baghdad.
"The regime take-down part is where the uncertainty is, once you get to the gates of Baghdad," said Vickers, an analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, an independent Washington defense think tank.
Whatever plan may be adopted, defense officials and experts believe the U.S. military is better trained, equipped and positioned to take on Iraq now than it was in 1991.
"We will go as a much more experienced force," said Gen. John Keane, the vice chief of Army staff.
The Gulf War was the first major engagement for the U.S. military since Vietnam. The forces involved were untested and took six months to deploy at bases that first had to be built in Saudi Arabia.
Rigorous training
Since then, U.S. forces have been seasoned and honed by more rigorous training regimens, an unprecedented number of overseas operations and wars in the Balkans and Afghanistan.
U.S. forces also have been armed with improved tanks, aircraft, unmanned spy planes and precision-guided bombs that can hit targets around the clock and in any kind of weather.
The U.S. military has a network of bases around the Persian Gulf and Turkey that could anchor an assault on Iraq. It has hundreds of aircraft and a carrier battle group in the region and enough tanks and other weaponry permanently stored in Kuwait and Qatar to equip two heavy infantry brigades that could lead an invasion.
U.S. troops could also use new facilities set up in Central Asia to support U.S.-led coalition forces in Afghanistan.
Saddam's military capabilities, meanwhile, have eroded.
Though Iraq's 424,000-man military remains the strongest in the region, it has been prevented by a decade of U.N. sanctions from replacing its largely obsolete Soviet-designed armory with modern weapons systems.
The Iraqi military is believed to lack sufficient spare parts to fight a protracted war, and the loyalty of many troops is highly suspect.
But many experts said that an invasion would still be a high-risk venture that could claim thousands of American lives and hold unforeseen consequences for regional stability.
-------- israel / palestine
Israel demolishes rocket factories
By Joshua Brilliant and Saud Abu Ramadan
United Press International
July 26, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/20020725-053134-7874r.htm
Israeli units Friday demolished three buildings in Gaza that Palestinian militants used to build Qassam rockets, hours after its tanks and bulldozers rolled into Gaza City and clashed with Palestinian militants.
The Israel Defense Forces spokesman said Israeli engineering units backed by armored troops demolished three buildings in Gaza that contained 22 lathes where Palestinians manufactured the rockets.
The forces entered southern Gaza at about 1 a.m., headed for the buildings, blew them up and returned at about 3 a.m., a military source said. There was no fighting there, the army reported.
Earlier, Israeli tanks and bulldozers rolled into the Zaytoon neighborhood of Gaza City and clashed with Palestinian militants, a Palestinian security statement said. Residents said tanks fired several shells at Palestinian houses. Four Palestinians were injured, they said.
A Palestinian security statement also said Israeli tanks and bulldozers supported by attack helicopters raided northern Gaza Strip and drove about one mile into the Palestinian-controlled area.
The military measures came after Palestinian militants fired dozens of mortars at Jewish settlements. No injuries were reported.
Islamic Hamas' armed wing, Izel Dein Al Qassam, claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying it was to avenge the killing Monday in Gaza of the commander of the group's military wing, Salah Shehada. Seventeen others, including children, were killed in that attack.
The Israelis -- including the military -- have repeatedly expressed their regret over the innocent casualties.
Earlier Thursday, an Israeli rabbi and another man were ambushed near the settlement of Peduel in the West Bank. The rabbi, Elimeleh Shapira, 43, a father of eight, was killed and the man with him was wounded and treated under fire, settlers and the army spokesman said.
Israel meanwhile moved to ease economic pressure on the Palestinians. The United States has been pressing for such moves to help hungry Palestinians.
Israel said it would transfer to the new Palestinian finance minister, Fayyad Salam, about $15 million out of some $44 million in Palestinian funds it has been holding.
Israel is reportedly planning to also lift travel restrictions in the Gaza Strip, Hebron, Bethlehem and Jericho so that its residents can go back to work.
(Joshua Brilliant reported from Tel Aviv and Saud Abu Ramadan contributed from Gaza.)
--------
Palestinian Gunmen Kill Four Israelis in West Bank
New York Times
July 26, 2002
By JOEL GREENBERG
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/26/international/middleeast/27CND-MIDE.html
JERUSALEM, July 26 - Palestinian gunmen ambushed two Israeli cars today on a highway south of the West Bank city of Hebron, killing four Jewish settlers and wounding two others. A couple and their son were among the dead.
The attack, coming a day after another settler was shot and killed in the West Bank, was part of a surge in Palestinian violence after an Israeli warplane dropped a bomb into a crowded Gaza neighborhood early Tuesday that killed a Hamas leader and 14 other people, 9 of them children.
Several Palestinian groups have vowed to avenge those deaths, disrupting efforts that had been under way to arrange a cease-fire declaration by the factions.
Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades, a militant group linked to Yasir Arafat's Fatah movement, claimed responsibility for today's ambush, as it did for Thursday's fatal shooting. Fatah's militia, Tanzim, had been preparing to announce a unilateral cease-fire before the Israeli bombing in Gaza, according to Palestinian officials and Western diplomats.
President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt told a news conference today that talks had been held between a Palestinian official and representatives of Hamas and Islamic Jihad about a proposed six-month suspension of violence.
Since the Gaza bombing, there has also been a flare-up of mortar and rocket attacks on Israeli military posts and settlements in and around the Gaza Strip. One rocket landed in a kibbutz in southern Israel on Thursday night, but it caused no harm, and an antitank missile was fired today at a bus carrying settlers on a road southwest of Gaza City, causing damage but no casualties.
The deadly double ambush south of Hebron occurred on a highway bypassing the city that is used by Jewish settlers to reach their communities.
Gunmen who apparently came from the village of Yatta drove to a junction and waited for passing Israeli vehicles, security officials said. The attackers opened fire on a van carrying a family from the Jewish settlement of Psagot, near Ramallah, killing a couple and their teenage son, and wounding two other children.
The attackers then sprayed gunfire at another passing car carrying a settler from Hebron, killing him. A televised report from the scene showed armed settlers mopping up a large pool of blood near the car, whose windshield was punctured with bullet holes. A bumper sticker on the rear of the vehicle read: "Oslo criminals - to trial!" That slogan referred to the Israeli leaders who signed the 1993 Oslo accords on Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Israeli troops pursuing the gunmen carried out searches in the West Bank village of Yatta, which was put under curfew, the Israeli Army said.
Speaking in a radio interview shortly after the killings, Tzviki Bar-Hai, the head of the settlements council in the Hebron area, scoffed at the uproar in Israel this week over the civilian deaths caused by the bombing in Gaza.
"For two years we've been in a war in which mothers and parents and children are being killed," Mr. Bar-Hai said. "The people of Israel have to understand that in a war you don't play nice. Anyone who gets near a terrorist, woman or child, should know that he will bear the responsibility."
Elsewhere in the West Bank, a Palestinian was killed in Kalkilya when Israeli soldiers occupying the town opened fire as they searched houses in his neighborhood, residents said. A bullet struck the man in the head as he stood near a window in the kitchen of his home, a resident reported. The army said it was investigating the incident.
Israeli forces are occupying seven West Bank cities that they entered more than a month ago after back-to-back suicide bombings in Jerusalem. They have imposed round-the-clock curfews, keeping some 700,000 Palestinians confined to their homes with occasional breaks to buy food.
Earlier today, Israeli troops entered Gaza City and blew up buildings the army said were being used to manufacture rockets. The raid into the Zeitun neighborhood was the deepest ground penetration into the city by Israeli forces in nearly 22 months of violence, and it came after what the army said were dozens of recent rocket and mortar firings at Israeli targets in and around the Gaza Strip.
Several Israeli tanks, at least one bulldozer and ground troops took part in the raid. The army said Israeli soldiers blew up three buildings housing 22 metalwork shops used to manufacture Qassam rockets. Gunmen fired at the Israelis, and at least two Palestinians were wounded in exchanges of fire. A Palestinian police post was also demolished, and a few other buildings were destroyed or damaged, according to reports from the scene. Hours later, Palestinian militants fired an antitank missile at a bus carrying Jewish settlers on a road between the settlement of Netzarim and a border crossing into Israel, the Israeli Army said. There were no casualties, but the bus was damaged. It was the first missile attack on a civilian vehicle in the Gaza Strip during the current violence.
Thousands of supporters of Hamas marched in the streets of Gaza, vowing revenge for the deaths in Tuesday's bombing of their leader, Sheik Salah Shehada, an associate, his wife and daughter, and 11 other civilians. "Our response will be like an earthquake," Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi, a Hamas leader, told the demonstrators. Loudspeakers blared threats of suicide attacks across Israel.
Security has been tightened in Israeli malls and other public places in anticipation of possible retaliation, and the police in Jerusalem manned roadblocks on busy streets today.
-------- mideast
US ships Al Qaeda suspects to Arab states
Egypt, Syria, and Jordan may extract information faster, but are their methods legal and reliable?
By Faye Bowers and Philip Smucker,
July 26, 2002
Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0726/p01s03-usju.html
WASHINGTON AND CAIRO - In the war on terror, the US is careful to show how fairly it's treating the hundreds of orange-suited Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters locked behind the razor-wire of the US base at Guantanamo, Cuba. But what the US isn't trumpeting is a quiet practice of shipping key Al Qaeda suspects to the Middle East for interrogation.
One reason for this new approach, US officials privately say, is that in some cases these militants' home countries have a better understanding of Islamist groups, their contacts, customs, and language. But there's another reason, say US sources. These countries - Egypt, Syria, and Jordan, among them - use torture, which, some officials suggest, extracts information much more quickly than more benign interrogation methods.
In a post-Sept. 11 world, where terror threats are received nearly daily, the US faces difficult choices. Can US officials afford to wait for Al Qaeda fighters to spill the goods on their colleagues, or do they need to make them talk as quickly as possible in order to deter additional terrorist attacks? What's the quality of information disclosed through torture? And, what are the costs to US credibility of trading off moral and legal concerns in pursuit of safety?
"This is what you call liaison," says Robert Baer, a former CIA case officer with years of Middle East experience. "And it's not reliable. Before 9/11, the Germans failed us, the British failed us, and I don't think the Syrians will let us sit in on the interrogations." He adds that the US and its allies are so far behind in the intelligence war that "it's catch up ball for everyone."
Since 9/11, according to diplomats, US officials, and press reports, several suspects have quietly been detained and sent to the Middle East:
• Abu Zubaydah, a top Al Qaeda commander, was arrested in Pakistan in March, and moved to an "undisclosed location" by the US, possibly the Middle East.
• Muhammad Saad Iqbal Madni, a Pakistani arrested in Indonesia in January, was bundled aboard a CIA Gulfstream and flown from Jakarta to Egypt.
• Mahmoud bin Ahmad Assegaf, a Kuwaiti citizen and an alleged Al Qaeda financier, was arrested by the Indonesians, and then deported - also at the request of the CIA. The Kuwaiti embassy in Indonesia says it knows nothing about the case, and that it wasn't informed that a Kuwaiti citizen had been detained.
• Mohammad Haydar Zammar, a Syrian-born German believed to have connections to the 9/11 hijackers, was detained in Morocco in June, and reportedly, the CIA arranged for him to be sent to Syria.
• In October, a Yemeni student, Jamil Qasim Saeed Mohammed, wanted in connection with the bombing of the USS Cole was turned over to the US by Pakistan and was flown to Jordan on a US-registered Gulfstream jet.
• Jabarah Mohamed Mansur, allegedly involved in an attempt to bomb the US and Israeli Embassies in Singapore, is currently being held and interrogated in Oman.
Egypt, like the US, won't officially comment on the detainees. Perhaps because these deportations are not done through official channels or according to extradition treaties. But privately US officials confirm the practice. And Ahmed Moussa, an internal security correspondent for the state-supported Al-Ahram newspaper group in Cairo, also confirms the detentions.
"There have been more transfers of Al Qaeda suspects back [from South Asia], but there has been no official announcement of these transfers," says Mr. Moussa. "Just as the US does not divulge information on all its own captives in Cuba, we don't either and there is a benefit to this secrecy."
Moussa goes on to say that all the information obtained by Egypt is shared with both the CIA and the FBI.
Mr. Baer says that the Egyptians have better databases than the US does. "When somebody starts to talk, they will be able to know if he is telling the truth, because they've got all these referral points," he says. "And they have more experience in this than the CIA. But the Egyptians, and especially the Syrians use torture."
There is some debate within the US intelligence community over whether coercive interrogations are effective.
Art Hulnick, another former CIA case officer, as well as Baer, say that a prisoner is liable to "throw up" anything while being tortured, just to stop the torture.
Mr. Hulnick helped interrogate North Korean prisoners crossing the DMZ after the Korean war. He says he believes the ones that were taken by the Americans - given warm clothes, food, and ways to communicate with their family were much more forthcoming than the ones the South Koreans got to first. He says the Koreans beat, tortured, and even sometimes killed the prisoners. And the information they got was not highly reliable.
EGYPT and Syria have their own domestic political motives for interrogating Al Qaeda suspects. In the case of Egypt, several diplomats and officials laud Cairo's efforts to help the US and say that it has essentially become a two-way street. Egypt is helping the US with intelligence and resources, and the US is returning Egyptian nationals wanted for committing crimes in their home country.
"The level of cooperation with Egypt is up on all levels," says a Western diplomat. "In the wake of Sept 11th, they are more eager than ever to cooperate and have more information to provide the West."
Egypt may also extract valuable information from these detainees that may help it defend its own autocratic regime from opposition Islamist voices. It's been cracking down on Islamist groups, which are seen as a threat to the government. Moreover, Egypt's citizens are becoming more sympathetic to Islamist causes, particularly over what they see as Israeli repression of Palestinians, and US support for Israel.
"The government is extremely nervous about giving space to these people," another senior Western diplomat says. "This is not a liberal, tolerant regime."
Egyptian officials have long denied accusations that they torture Islamic militants. But human rights groups say that Egypt makes use of torture on a regular basis.
"We have issued reports [on Egypt's abuses] for decades now," says Carsten Jurgensen with Amnesty International in Brussels. "In the past year, we have also seen an increase in reports of torture. The State Department's human rights report for 2001 also claims there is "credible evidence" that Egyptian security forces, as well as Syria's, use torture.
While facilitating the transfer of detainees to Middle Eastern countries that use torture, the US tried unsuccessfully to block a vote in the United Nations this week on the UN Convention Against Torture, which it has signed and ratified.
The US is concerned that a new protocol in the convention could allow international and independent visits to US prisons and to terror suspects held in Cuba. Conservative Muslim states also don't want outside observers in their prisons. European and Latin American nations are pushing for international oversight.
Syria, like Egypt, has a political motive for cooperating in the fight against Al Qaeda. It views domestic Sunni Islamic militants as a potential threat to the ruling secular regime, which is dominated by adherents of the Alawite branch of Islam.
Furthermore, Syria believes it can score points with the US by cooperating against Al Qaeda-linked Islamist groups to counterbalance its support for hard-line anti-Israel organizations such as Islamic Jihad and Lebanon's Shia Muslim Hizbullah.
"Al Qaeda and its associates are not favored by the [Syrian] regime," says Nizar Hamzeh, professor of politics at the American University of Beirut. "So the Syrians are more than happy to deal with the US against such groups."
The Syrian authorities have refused to publicly confirm that they are holding Mr. Zammar, the Syrian-born German reported to have connections to the 9/11 hijackers. Sources in Damascus say that the CIA has not been granted access by the Syrians to directly question Zammar. But it is perhaps an indication of Washington's resolve in pursuing those behind the Sept. 11 attacks that it permits Syria, with its poor human rights record, to interrogate suspects.
• Nicholas Blanford in Beirut and Dan Murphy in Jakarta contributed to this story.
-------- nato
NATO hopeful vows to aid U.S. on ICC
By Nicholas Kralev
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
July 26, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20020726-92841958.htm
Romania, hoping to join NATO this year, yesterday became the first country to commit to negotiating a bilateral agreement with the United States that would grant immunity from the new International Criminal Court to U.S. peacekeepers on its territory.
The Bush administration, which earlier this month won a one-year exemption from prosecution of U.S. soldiers by the ICC, is seeking separate accords with the court's signatories to secure permanent immunity for U.S. personnel.
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and his deputy, Richard Armitage, "in their meetings have been raising these issues, and we are starting to get responses," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher told reporters.
The Romanian position became clear after Mr. Armitage's meeting yesterday with visiting Foreign Minister Mircea Geoana. Mr. Armitage "expressed appreciation for Romania's willingness to negotiate a bilateral treaty," Mr. Boucher said.
After the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution granting the exemption two weeks ago, "we went out with instructions to all our embassies to approach other governments in key countries about negotiating" bilateral agreements, he said.
The Romanian ambassador to Washington, Sorin Ducaru, who took part in the meeting yesterday, said that when the U.S. message was received in the capital Bucharest, "we did an analysis and were able to respond in a positive manner."
He said an accord would be a "logical consequence" of an agreement that the United States and Romania signed in Washington in November on the permanent status of U.S. forces on Romanian territory. The presence of American troops there previously was legalized on a case-by-case basis.
The most recent mission of U.S. peacekeepers in Romania lasted two months and ended about six weeks ago, Mr. Ducaru said. They underwent training and adaptation to the region before joining the U.N. Kfor mission in Kosovo, he said.
The Bush administration, which opposes the ICC in fear of politically motivated prosecution of U.S. soldiers, failed to secure permanent immunity for them despite its threat to block the renewal of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Although the State Department did not make a direct connection between Romania's stance on the ICC issue and its chances to get a NATO invitation at the alliance's Prague summit in November, U.S. officials have said that nothing remains without consequences.
For example, Bulgaria, another NATO hopeful, shrewdly used its turn as a rotating member of the Security Council to score valuable points with the United States. In the sea of hands raised to support extending the Bosnia mandate, only two were missing. The United States voted against, and Bulgaria conspicuously abstained.
"That vote didn't go unnoticed," a State Department official said. "It certainly doesn't hurt," he added, implying that Washington will remember the gesture as it gets closer to making up its mind on which of the nine applicant nations to support in Prague.
As many as seven former Soviet-bloc nations - Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia - are expected to be offered membership, five years after the first wave of NATO's post-Cold War enlargement. Albania and Macedonia are considered long shots.
The United States has not yet made an official decision on which countries to support, but President Bush has said he favors "more rather than less." Mr. Powell and other officials have called for a "robust" expansion.
-------- philippines
Pact Would Bar Arms Transfers
WORLD In Brief,
Compiled by Virginia Hamill,
Associated Press
Friday, July 26, 2002
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A2928-2002Jul25?language=printer
MANILA -- The Philippines and the United States could use each other's military bases, buy supplies and exchange services under a proposed 10-year military accord but could not transfer major munitions.
A draft of the bilateral Mutual Logistics Support Agreement says its purpose is to make it easier for the two countries' military forces to work together.
It says the accord can be implemented "in times of peace or during combined [military] exercises, international tensions and national emergencies."
The accord would prohibit transfer of guided missiles, naval mines and torpedoes, guidance kits for bombs and other ammunition, chemical and nuclear ammunition, and other nuclear materials.
The accord is expected to be signed this year. Some Philippine nationalist politicians and militant groups have questioned its constitutionality and potential to extend the U.S. war on terrorism around Asia.
-------- russia / chechnya
Aid workers barred from Chechnya
Refugees' return will take place without monitors
By David Filipov,
Boston Globe Staff,
7/26/2001
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/207/nation/Aid_workers_barred_from_Chechnya%2B.shtml
MOSCOW - International relief agencies, which have accused Moscow of pressuring Chechen refugees to return to their embattled homeland, have found their own access to Chechnya restricted by Russian authorities.
President Vladimir Putin of Russia says the war in Chechnya is all but over, and his government has said it wants the 150,000 Chechens living in tent camps outside the region to return home before the end of summer. But Russian security officials, citing increased violence in the region, have warned relief workers not to travel to the war-torn republic.
Relief workers are concerned that the forced return of refugees will create a humanitarian disaster when 150,000 people arrive in a ruined city with few facilities and where mines and nightly gun battles continue to claim lives. And with the Russian military predicting a new offensive by separatist fighters next month, another fear is that the recently repatriated civilians will get caught in heavy fighting.
''It's too dangerous for us, but it's not too dangerous for refugees,'' said Koen Rebrieles, project coordinator of the Northern Caucasus for Doctors Without Borders. ''The [government] is trying to push back people into Grozny into an area where daily incidents take place.''
Chechnya's pro-Moscow administration has insisted that it will not force refugees to return home. But refugees interviewed this month at a camp in the neighboring Russian region of Ingushetia said they felt they have no choice.
''Most people are leaving because the government has threatened to cut off electricity, gas, and water supplies at the camps,'' said Khamzat Visirkhanov, a refugee at the Alina camp in Ingushetia, as he watched other Chechen families pile their goods onto trucks to return to Chechnya. ''They used to give us bread, flower, oil, salt, and sugar once a month, but in June, we didn't get anything.''
Visirkhanov said he would not return. His house in Grozny, like that of most of the Chechen capital's former population, was destroyed in the fighting. As with other refugees with children, his main concern was that they would become targets of the security sweeps Russian troops carry out in search of rebel fighters. Chechens and human rights investigators say hundreds of civilians have disappeared in the sweeps since the Russian Army returned to Chechnya in 1999.
''If you look at the evidence from reliable, nonpartisan human rights organizations, between 50 and 80 people are being murdered every month,'' Aaron Rhodes, director of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, told reporters after a visit to Chechnya.
Stanislav Ilyasov, who as prime minister of Chechnya's pro-Moscow administration is overseeing the return of refugees, angrily dismissed Rhodes's casualty figures. He also repeated that no one would be forced to go home.
But the 2,200 residents of a tent camp in Znamenskoye, a relatively peaceful area north of Chechnya, appeared to have little choice. This month, the camp was closed, and the refugees bused back to Grozny, drawing protests from Doctors Without Borders.
The trouble with returning home, refugees say, is that when they go back to Grozny, they have no valid identification. Registration can take days, even weeks, during which time they have no way to prove to Russian troops conducting security sweeps that they are not rebels.
The Russian government has promised that returning refugees will stay in dormitories it has prepared in Grozny until the city is rebuilt. But only seven of the dormitories have been built to accommodate a few thousand people, according to a report by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
The dormitories lack basic sanitary facilities and running water, according to the report. Other buildings that have been deemed suitable for living are in fact uninhabitable ruins. A random check of two other sites in Grozny deemed suitable produced no dormitories.
Meanwhile, the Federal Security Service, warned relief workers not to travel to Chechnya after a Russian woman working for the Salvation Army was kidnapped on a road north of Grozny that aid workers frequently use and which had been considered safe since 2000.
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Russia Says Leaky Torpedo Sank Kursk
By Vladimir Isachenkov
Associated Press Writer
Friday, July 26, 2002; 11:08 AM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A5368-2002Jul26?language=printer
MOSCOW -- Leaky torpedo fuel caused the explosions that sank the nuclear submarine Kursk with all its 118 seamen, the Russian government said Friday, closing the books on one of the country's worst post-Soviet disasters.
General Prosecutor Vladimir Ustinov said no one was to blame for the torpedo's malfunction during a naval exercise in the Barents Sea on Aug. 12, 2000, and that criminal charges would not be pursued.
Ustinov made the announcements after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered the prosecutor to inform the Russian public about the cause of the blasts that sank the Kursk.
"The disaster occurred ... because of the explosion of a practice torpedo inside the fourth torpedo tube," Ustinov said.
Within two minutes and 18 seconds of the first blast, other combat weapons detonated in a powerful chain reaction of explosions that threw the submarine to the seabed and killed most of its crew.
Russian officials theorized early in the investigation that the vessel was destroyed by a foreign submarine, possibly American or British, or a World War II mine.
But Ustinov said the disaster was triggered by the leak of highly unstable hydrogen peroxide fuel, which contacted kerosene and metal.
"The investigators have decided to close the criminal case since no evidence of crime has been found," Ustinov said.
He denied allegations by some relatives of the Kursk sailors that the crew knew something was wrong with the torpedo. Some Russian media reports claimed the leak occurred because the torpedo had been damaged while being loaded into the submarine.
"There is no evidence and no testimony that the torpedo was dropped" during loading, Ustinov said.
He also insisted the explosion came suddenly as the Kursk was moving close to the surface and preparing for a practice torpedo attack.
He said the recovered ship's log and crew conversation recorders contained no mention of anything awry.
For two years, the Russian government was reluctant to admit that its state-of-the-art submarine was destroyed by an internal malfunction. But earlier this month, a commission investigating the disaster said that was the only possible explanation.
The 23 sailors who survived the initial explosion gathered in the stern of the submarine, but all died within eight hours from carbon monoxide poisoning from fires, Ustinov said.
"Since the submarine was only spotted at 18:15 on August 13, there was no chance to save anyone," he said.
The statement was a defense for the government, which has been criticized for missing an opportunity to save the Kursk crew because of its slow and botched response to the disaster.
Putin has been criticized for failing to quickly end his Black Sea vacation when the Kursk sank. The government also was reluctant to quickly accept Western aid while Russian submersibles spent days vainly attempting to hook up to the Kursk's escape hatch.
When the government finally invited foreign divers, they got inside the submarine within a few hours.
The Russian Navy already has pulled from service all torpedoes of the type that exploded. The torpedoes had a higher speed and range than conventional torpedoes powered by conventional electric engines.
The ruined hulk of the submarine was salvaged and lifted off the seabed last fall.
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Russian Spy Agency Accused
WORLD In Brief,
Compiled by Virginia Hamill,
Associated Press
Friday, July 26, 2002
Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A2928-2002Jul25?language=printer
MOSCOW -- A former Russian security agent offered evidence meant to support his claim that a KGB successor organization, not Muslim militants, engineered a series of deadly bombings that thrust Russia into a new war in Chechnya in 1999.
In a video link with Britain, where he fled two years ago, Alexander Litvinenko said he received the evidence in a statement from Achimez Gochiyayev, who Russia claims was paid $500,000 by a rebel warlord to organize two apartment-building bombings in Moscow.
"The material that Gochiyayev gave us is extremely important for establishing the truth," Litvinenko said.
The purported evidence includes Gochiyayev's statement that he rented space in the two buildings at the request of a childhood friend he now suspects was a Russian security agent. The friend allegedly told Gochiyayev he needed storage space for goods he was selling.
Gochiyayev's whereabouts are unknown, but he is not believed to be in Russia.
Litvinenko said he received the statement through intermediaries somewhere in Europe. He presented it in a television hookup with a meeting of an unofficial Russian commission investigating the bombings, which killed about 300 people.
A spokesman for the Federal Security Service, the KGB successor organization, declined to comment on Litvinenko's accusations.
FOR THE RECORD
The European Court of Human Rights ruled that France had illegally denied Maurice Papon his right to appeal a 1998 conviction for helping deport 1,700 Jews to Nazi camps during World War II. The ruling could give the former Vichy official, who is 91 and ill, a chance for a new trial. . . . Ukraine's Supreme Court said it ordered a new investigation into the murder of investigative reporter Ihor Oleksandrov a year after he became the 11th journalist to be killed in five years.
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Senators Press Ashcroft to Justify Tactics in Terror War
Inquiry: 'The entire United States of America is a target,' the attorney general tells committee, defending White House's wide-ranging measures.
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
LOS ANGELES TIMES STAFF WRITER
July 26 2002
http://www.latimes.com/la-na-ashcroft26jul26.story
WASHINGTON -- Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft came under fire Thursday for his handling of the war on terrorism, as congressional critics charged that the Bush administration has gone too far in detaining immigrants, operating in secret and asking citizens to spy on their neighbors.
But Ashcroft defended the administration's wide-ranging law enforcement tactics and refused to ramp down anti-terrorist rhetoric that even some in the White House believe has become too shrill at times.
"I think the entire United States of America is a target for terrorist activities," Ashcroft told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee when asked about recent reports of terrorist "sleeper cells" operating in the Seattle area and other parts of the Northwest.
He said the threat of terrorists lurking within the United States "should be taken seriously" across the entire country, adding: "I would exempt no city." The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Ashcroft said, revealed a "presence" of terrorist supporters in San Diego, Phoenix, Oklahoma City, Minneapolis and other cities that "might not appear [obvious] to those of us who would say, 'Now, where would you find a terrorist?' "
Ashcroft, a former senator, has faced stepped-up criticism in recent weeks for allegedly using the war on terrorism as his own political bully pulpit, and Senate Democrats at Thursday's hearing--joined by a few Republicans--sought to hold him accountable for the administration's missteps.
Sparking the most controversy was an element of President Bush's homeland security plan that would create a network of millions of American workers to report "suspicious and potentially terrorist-related activity."
The program aims to enlist truck drivers and other workers whose jobs, the administration says, put them in a "unique position" to see suspicious activity.
The Justice Department is scheduled to begin its Terrorism Information and Prevention System, or Operation TIPS, in the fall, but the program has generated criticism from civil libertarians and other groups, and House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) proposed a measure last week that would ban its operation.
Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said the program risks infringing on the privacy rights of all Americans.
"We can be vigilant, but we don't want to be vigilantes," Leahy told Ashcroft.
Leahy asked what the FBI would do, for instance, if a telephone repairman entered someone's home and spotted a photo of the World Trade Center, a book on Islamic terrorism or something else he considered suspicious. "If they call that in," Leahy said, "what happens?"
"Telephone repairmen have the opportunity, just like you have an opportunity, to call the FBI at any time," Ashcroft answered. "Any citizen has the opportunity to call the FBI."
Ashcroft, seeking to ease concerns among committee members, said he has received assurances from the administration that the tips generated by the program will be referred to appropriate law enforcement agencies but will not be stored in any database.
Sen. Orrin G. Hatch of Utah, the ranking Republican on the committee, said he found that position "reassuring to me.... We don't want to see a 1984 Orwellian type situation here where neighbors are reporting on neighbors.
"We want to make sure that what this involves is legitimate reporting of real concerns that might involve some terrorist activity."
Senators also were concerned that the administration has refused to publicly spell out the standards it is using to detai