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NUCLEAR
Yucca Mountain could leak nuclear waste, says scientist
Post-9/11 Terrorism Measures Not Applicable
Taiwan president says US missile deal to go ahead
An appalling situation depicted
DU Storage Facilities and Shipment Size Limits
UN nuclear agency sends Swiss list of nuclear suspects
Roots of Pakistan Atomic Scandal Traced to Europe
Pakistan And India Agree to Peace Talks
Questions Raised About Pakistan's Nuclear Arms
Uranium Enrichment Parts Found in Iran, Diplomats Say
U.N. Finds Enrichment Supplies in Iran
Iran Denies Nuclear Activities at Military Base
AP: Accused Nuke Trader Also Helped India
Report: N. Korea Willing to Discuss Nukes
U.S.: N. Korea Must Admit Uranium Program
Russia Tests New Wonder Weapon
Russian might ... might not
Military rot spreads to Russia's nuclear forces
Russia Tests Missile-Defense Proof Weapons
Russia's war games demonstrating 'nuclear fist'?
Russia trains 600 Iranian nuclear experts
Hair-Trigger Planet
Russians Fail for Second Day in Missile Test
Missile Self-Destructs During Russian Military Exercises
Russia Says New Missile Will Beat Any U.S. Defenses
Russia Tests Anti - Missile Defense Device
Groups challenge budget request for N-tests
Nuke Expert Says Yucca Mountain Unsafe
Concerns About Yucca Mt. Leaks Echoed
Bush Plays Bait-and-Switch With 9/11 Panel
President's Science Policy Questioned
Kerry letters supported man who made illegal campaign donations
MILITARY
Taliban Try to Frighten Afghan Voters in Rural Areas
Army Attacks Rebels in Northern Uganda
Firefights near Guinea-Bissau's border with Senegal have ended
60 Minutes Assesses Patriot Missile Defense,
The Patriot Flawed?
Stealth fighter plane may get makeover
MiniSAR Will Aid Reconnaissance And Precision-Guided Weapons
Japan's 'Fortress of Solitude' in Iraq - plus karaoke
Black Death vaccine developed
Recruiting Uncle Sam
Price Tag Jumps for Aircraft
Rules May Be Eased for Iraqi Firms
Hong Kong Reminded That China Is in Charge
Taiwan's Chen Says Ballot Won't Affect Missile Deal
France probing source of leak on diplomatic exchanges on Libya
EU FURY OVER DEAL BY UK, FRANCE, GERMANY
U.S. to Send Military Team to Haiti
Iran denies presence of centrifuges at military base
Iranian Pro-Reform Newspapers Silenced
Chalabi stands by faulty intelligence that toppled Saddam's regime
Bremer Is Firm That Power Transfer in Iraq Will Be June 30
Iraq's Governing Council
U.S. Presidential Politics and Self-Rule for Iraqis
Truck Bombs Kill 11 Iraqis at Army Base Run by Poles
Suicide Attack Kills 10 Iraqis
The Iraq blame game: Israel
Israel receives two new-generation F-16I fighter jets
Live Video Coverage of World Court Hearings on the Internet
Israel Receives Planes From Military Deal
Syria Makes Overture To Israel
Bulgarian defense minister says NATO should be in Iraq
Conditions Must Be Right for Iraq NATO Force-France
2,500 US troops to join Balikatan 2004 in Luzon
USAF Transformation Flight Plan Highlights Space Weapons
Moves to give spy agencies more powers to intercept email
Green Berets take on spy duties
Guardsman Charged With Trying to Spy for Al Qaeda
France, Germany push for new U.N. resolution on Iraq
Annan Is Said to Have Doubt on Iraq Voting
Annan To Back U.S. on Iraq Plan
Suicides in Iraq, Questions at Home
Bush Appears on New Middle East Network
Scientists Say Administration Distorts Facts
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
Jury Sides With Boeing In Employee Dismissal
U.S. to Keep Key Data On Infrastructure
FBI report shows agents punished, fired for crimes
Senator Says Report on Misconduct by F.B.I. Agents
Guardsman Charged in Al Qaeda Case
Detained and tortured by the US military
ENERGY
U.S. extends carmakers' alternative fuel incentive
OTHER
Wake Up Weyerhaeuser. Protect Forests Now.
Kerry hailed as ally of the wider world on environment
ACTIVISTS
Ranking Scientists Warn Bush Science Policy Lacks Integrity
Police infiltration of protest groups upsets rights activists
Quaker deserts as unit deploys
The 9/11 Truth Movement:
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- accidents and safety
Yucca Mountain could leak nuclear waste, says scientist
Thursday, February 19, 2004
By Scott Sonner,
Associated Press
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-02-19/s_13273.asp
RENO, Nevada - The U.S. nuclear waste dump proposed for Nevada is poorly designed and could leak highly radioactive waste, said a scientist who recently resigned from a federal panel of experts on Yucca Mountain. Paul Craig, a physicist and engineering professor at the University of California-Davis, said Wednesday that he quit the panel last month so he could speak more freely about the waste dump's dangers.
Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles (145 kilometers) northwest of Las Vegas, is planned to begin receiving waste in 2010. Some 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste at commercial and military sites in 39 states would be stored in metal canisters underground in tunnels.
"The science is very clear," said Craig before his first public speech about the Energy Department's design for the canisters. "If we get high-temperature liquids, the metal would corrode and that would eventually lead to leakage of nuclear waste," Craig said. "Therefore, it is a bad design. And that is very, very bad news for the Department of Energy because they are committed to that design," he said.
Craig, who was appointed to the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board by President Bill Clinton in 1997, planned to speak Wednesday night at a forum sponsored by the Sierra Club. He said he's convinced the Energy Department will have to postpone the project and change to metal less liable to corrode.
"It would require years of delay and my guess is that is what is going to happen. The bad science is so clear they will be unable to ignore it forever," Craig said.
The 11-member technical review board outlined its concerns about the potential for corrosion in a report to the Energy Department in November about the metal for the canisters, called Alloy-22 - "an upscale version of stainless steel," Craig said. It was the most important report the board has produced since Congress created the panel in 1987, he said, but largely has been ignored by Congress and the department.
"The report says in ordinary English that under the conditions proposed by the Department of Energy, the canisters will leak," Craig said. "It was signed by every single member of the board so there would be no confusion."
Energy Department spokesman Allen Benson defended the design plans for the repository and the metal in the storage casks. "We stand by our work," he said Wednesday in Las Vegas.
In Washington, D.C., officials with the industry's Nuclear Energy Institute did not immediately return telephone calls seeking comment. The board's report in November said the government had failed to take into account "deliquescence" - a phenomenon regarding the reaction of salt to moisture - in its plans to operate the dump at temperatures well above boiling water, or about 200 degrees Fahrenheit (93 degrees Celsius). At those temperatures, the metal canisters would heat up, causing salts in the surrounding ground to liquefy, thus leading to corrosion, Craig said.
"It turns out the metals which look like they act pretty good at temperature levels below boiling water - those same metals act badly with temperatures that could exist" at Yucca Mountain, he said.
Craig, who also has served as a member of National Academy of Sciences National Research Council Board on Radioactive Waste Management, said he sent his resignation letter to the White House in January before his term was to expire in April so he could shine more light on the government's plans.
"When you serve as a member of one of those boards, you cannot talk about the political consequences of the science or the big picture. You are supposed to stick to the science and you should stick to the science," Craig said. "You cannot have the kind of conversation we are having now if I was still on the board."
----
Post-9/11 Terrorism Measures Not Applicable to Duke's Plutonium Fuel
NRC Chooses Secrecy Over Security
Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2004
From: Louis Zeller <bredl@skybest.com>
BLUE RIDGE ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE LEAGUE
http://www.BREDL.org
PO Box 88 Glendale Springs, North Carolina 28629
Phone (336) 982-2691
Fax (336) 982-2954
Email: BREDL@skybest.com
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FEBRUARY 19, 2004
Yesterday, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced that confidential NRC upgrades to the security requirements for nuclear power plants and plutonium processing facilities, imposed after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, have "nothing to do" with a proposed license amendment that would allow Duke Energy Corporation to use bomb-grade plutonium at the Catawba nuclear power plant. Moreover, the NRC stated that "those orders do not impose immutable requirements, but are subject to change depending on updated assessments of the terrorist threat."
The NRC's announcement came as a shock to Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League ("BREDL"), which seeks a hearing before the NRC on a number of safety and security issues, including the adequacy of Duke's security plan to protect the plutonium that will be used at the site.
Janet Zeller, Executive Director of BREDL, called the decision "outrageous." The post-9/11 security standards are "far from irrelevant," she asserted. "Without understanding the NRC's post-9/11 security requirements, our expert cannot evaluate, in any meaningful way, whether the new security measures Duke proposes are adequate to meet those standards and protect plutonium from theft." Added Anti-Plutonium Campaign Director Lou Zeller, "it also causes us grave concern to learn suddenly that the post-9/11 standards could be dropped or changed at any time."
BREDL's security expert, Dr. Edwin Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists, added that Duke Energy is planning to store around 80 kilograms of plutonium, enough for 10-20 nuclear bombs.
BREDL's attorney, Diane Curran, noted that the decision was the result of an attempt by BREDL to gain access to confidential post-9/11 security standards that the NRC has made available only to the nuclear industry. "The NRC is pretending that the events of September 11 are irrelevant, so that it can deny BREDL access to information about the rigor of the post-9/11 upgrades. This decision is a sign that the Commission's greatest motive for the shroud of secrecy that has surrounded its post-9/11 security upgrades is its reluctance to reveal how little it has done to increase the security of nuclear facilities."
CONTACT:
Janet Zeller (336) 982-2691
Louis Zeller (704) 756-7550
Diane Curran (202) 329-3500
Edwin Lyman (202) 223-6133
-------- china
Taiwan president says US missile deal to go ahead
19/02/2004
ABC Radio Australia News
http://www.abc.net.au/ra/newstories/RANewsStories_1049085.htm
Taiwan says it will press ahead with plans to buy anti-missile Patriot PAC-3 systems from the United States, even if a referendum on boosting defence capabilities is rejected next month.
President Chen Shui-bian says the government will not cancel a $US15 billion arms package offered by the US president, George W Bush, three years ago.
The referendum, to coincide with presidential elections on March 20, will ask voters if Taiwan should buy more anti-missile equipment if China does not withdraw nearly 500 missiles pointed at the island.
President Chen says it would not be contradictory for Taiwan to buy the Patriot PAC-3 missiles if the referendum is rejected.
He says the referendum refers to generally boosting national defence and buying anti-missile systems, not on specifically whether Taiwan should buy anti-missile missiles.
China considers Taiwan part of its territory waiting to be reunified, by force if necessary, since the two sides split in 1949 at the end of a civil war.
-------- depleted uranium
An appalling situation depicted
Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2004
From: "Ross Wilcock" <arwilcock@sympatico.ca>
An item from the recent Japan Peace Conference includes photographs taken by a respected Japanese photographer. One aspect is the destroyed health care system of Iraq with blitzed hospitals - and worse.
http://www.envirosagainstwar.org/edit/index.php?op=view&itemid=1111
"Dr Al-Ali practices medicine in Basrah. His description of the health problems in Iraq plus photographs by Japanese photo journalist Takashi Morizumi can be found at: http://www.afsc.org/newengland/pesp/effects-of-wars.ppt
It is 42 Megabytes, so it will take a while to load for most connections."
There are many photographs of advanced tumours, some of bizarre and embryonal type more common in infancy such as Rhabdomyosarcoma. There are apparently untreated lymphomas and unusual tumorous manifestations. Also illustrated are some bizarre developmental anomalies. These testify to destroyed health and health care system that was the pride of the Middle East in the '80s.
It would be difficult to understand what has happen without reference to the Handbook of the European Committee for Radiation Risk, and Dr Busby's prior studies on the effect of radioactive fallout in West Wales as reported in his "Wings of Death."
Perhaps some of us don't think of uranium in this context. Big bangs can be distracting. Particle sizes of uranium produced by weapons impacts can be very small. Nanouranium as ceramic oxide particles enters the body by lung, GI tract, mucus membranes and wounds. Particles cross the placenta, and emit alpha particles at random according to quantity. Smog sized particles are invisible as air.
This mechanism of atomic fallout and incorporation into creatures great and small caused more than 60 million cancer deaths since 1945 (See ECRR 2003) . It caused loss of 70% of fish stocks in the Pacific by 1970 (effects on the food chain and fish eggs and larvae) Sternberg 1971. World fisheries are now in crisis and plankton are down 70%.
True, the uranium process does not result from a chain reaction but from atomic fission decay. In this process, some decay chain daughters are more radioactive than parent 238U. This is not soluble uranium capable of being excreted.
There is no big bang - but examine these photographs and consider if sanctions and deprivation could possibly cause what you can see. Iraq had half the level of female breast cancer a thirty years ago but rates have been climbing to approach those of the polluted west.
The dosage of uranium smog in Iraq 2003 appears to be five times what it was in 1991. (Williams quantitative estimates based on published US Iraq invasion plans and weapons data). The future consequence is grim to contemplate.
Ross Wilcock
arwilcock@sympatico.ca
--
EFFECTS OF WARS AND THE USE OF DEPLETED URANIUM ON IRAQ
http://www.traprockpeace.org/jawad_al-ali_iraq.html
By Dr. Jawad Al-Ali
Director of the Oncology Center Basrah, Iraq
Japan Peace Conference Naha, Okinawa
January 29 - February 1, 2004
During the last 50 years, Iraq passed through many wars. The more destructive one is the 1991 war (gulf war 2). In this war the infrastructure of Iraq has been destroyed completely. The war targeted the military as well as the civilian targets. The factories, government buildings, bridges, and hospitals were destroyed. During this war and for the first time in the history the allied forces used Depleted uranium containing weapons extensively at the west parts of Basrah City (more than 300 tons were delivered at that area). The estimated delivery of depleted uranium all over Iraq was 800 tons. This Depleted uranium led to the increased levels of radiation in the battlefield and the nearby cities and countries. The levels of radiation in the area, measured by the department of environmental engineering (college of engineering, university of Baghdad ) reached hundreds to thousands times the normal background levels in the Iraqi soil which is 70 Bq/kg of soil. This radiation and other factors like chemicals and poor nutrition caused many diseases (cancers, congenital malformation in children, kidney diseases and infections?etc.), then the economic sanction is added to increase the suffering of the Iraqis.
We were lacking food and medicines. The death rate among children is increased because of poor nutrition and infections (more than 5 millions of children died within the last 12 years). Although the Iraqi government accepted the memorandum of understanding (oil for food and medicines), the committee 661 of the Security Council has crippled this memorandum in many ways. The committee delayed contracts, partially accepting contracts and sometimes delaying payments to the companies with which the contracts are signed.
The Iraqi people were deprived from the recent advances in different sciences and technology. The newly issued journals and published books were not allowed to enter and to reach the Iraqi universities. We were pushed backward years behind the fast development of technology and we are now suffering the great lag of that period.
The damaged factories, hospitals and bridges were reconstructed by the Iraqi people but still unable to provide our requirements. The electricity, the water supply, and the industries are not sufficient.
In addition, our own government (Saddam regime) assaulted our people by low payments at work, which led to the low income of the families and poor financial capabilities specially for those who have simple jobs. This low financial income (2-5 dollars/month) led to the appearance and the increase in the low social classes of population and low educational levels. Children left their schools to work in order to increase their families' income and to maintain their lives. We could say all aspects of life have been affected by that war and it could be described as the most destructive war against Iraq. It was dirty war because of the use of weapons containing depleted uranium against military as well as civilian targets.
The recent war (gulf war 3) in 2003 was a violation of the international law and against the will of the international community, which opposed this war. The reasons were unbelievable (the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction which till now have no evidence).
During this war, again the depleted uranium was used extensively around the city of Baghdad, city of Babylon, city of Karbala, city of Najef and in the city of Basrah, which is still suffering the effects of the depleted uranium of the gulf war 2 (1991). According to a report from the Guardian newspaper 1000-2000 tons were delivered on 51 local areas in different Iraqi cities. I witnessed the A-10 planes for three days delivering the depleted uranium rounds against the tanks and armor vehicles near Basrah airport and at the southern parts of Basrah city. The estimated amount of this weapon of mass destruction is exceeding the amount used in gulf war 2 (1991).
Again the infrastructure of our country is destroyed to greater extent. More buildings were destroyed, libraries and other government buildings were burned, the banks were robbed, and the occupation forces did not take any action to protect these buildings, the schools and hospitals from damage. Unknown people had stolen the Iraqi museum. All the Iraqi army forces were released and no more army to protect the Iraqi cities. In my opinion the aim of this war is the destruction of the Iraqi structure, its history and its role in the civilization of the world. Also to secure the oil of Iraq and Gulf States and to control all the energy sources of the world and not merely the weapons of mass destruction, which are not detected till this moment.
The rate of crime is increased to a dangerous level. Many people were killed in the streets, at their homes and in their cars. Children and girls were kidnapped from their schools. Doctors were killed at their clinics. In spite of all these crimes the occupation forces did nothing to stop it. Till now we have no elected government, and we have weak police offices and no army to protect the people and their properties. The electricity is not available and no healthy drinking water supply. No security but we hope this situation will improve in the near future.
The resistance against the occupation forces is increasing and stills active even after the capture of Saddam Hussein. This is mainly at the middle and northern parts of Iraq, while at the south the resistance is slight and nearly negligible. This is because the middle and northern parts are more loyal to Saddam regime than the southern regions. The aggressive behavior of the American soldiers worsens the situation in their occupied areas. The more calm British soldiers made the resistance less in the south. As revenge the Americans destroyed the houses and killed many Iraqi people blindly without differentiation between innocent people, terrorists and resistance militias. Thousands of people were captured and put in prisons. In my opinion the Iraqi people dislike occupation and will continue to fight until they extract their sovereignty and to have their own elected government, which represents all the parties and the different slices of community.
The health consequences of these wars affected mainly the people in the south of Iraq. The rate of cancers is increased more than ten times (that is 12 years after the gulf war 2) the rate in 1988. The death rate from cancers increased 19 times the rate of death in 1988. The congenital malformations in newly had borne babies increased 7 time the rate in 1990. New and strange phenomenon of cancers appeared like clustering of cancer in families, the double and triple cancers in one person. The death rate among children is increased as a result of malnutrition and infections. Lack of medicines and medical equipment worsens the health situation.
The causes of all these health problems are multifactorial. The most important factors are the radiation, the chemical, nutritional and infection.
The victims are mainly the children who were affected by cancers, malnutrition and congenital malformations.
The following pictures are the evidences of the effects of the wars and the use of depleted uranium in the gulf war 2(1991).
We have many reasons to blame the radiation as a cause for all the health problems in the south of Iraq:
- Significant increase in cancer rates after 1991.
- Significant increase in death rate from cancers after 1991.
- Increased rate of congenital malformations in children borne after 1991.
- Cancer clustering in families is noticed only after 1991.
- Double and triple cancers are seen only after 1991.
- The only cancer-producing factor that is added to our environment after 1991 is the radiation factor.
We need to confirm the cause (the radiation) by testing the soil for levels of radiation, confirming the uranium particles in the tissues and urine of patients, chromosomal analysis and cytogenetic studies of the affected people and patients. In that case we could confidently prove the causal relationship between the cancers, congenital malformations, other diseases and radiation due to depleted uranium. We are lacking the equipment for investigations and no body is allowed to find evidences and to prove that there was great crime committed by those who are supposed to protect the world.
At the end of my talk I hope that every nation will fight for freedom and sovereignty, to strengthen the solidarity with other nations for the sake of peace and freedom. This conference is one of the means by which we build the good and solid relations between the different nations.
I hope that the Iraqi people and other people elsewhere will live peacefully in a world free of nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction. No for occupation by strangers and yes for sovereignty and self-ruling of nations.
Thank you
Dr. Jawad Kadhim Al-Ali Basrah, Iraq
----
DU Storage Facilities and Shipment Size Limits
Thu, 19 Feb 2004
Glen Milner <gkaajm@juno.com> wrote:
Below is a section of the Army's NRC license from 1997.
Glen Milner Seattle, WA DU Storage Facilities and Shipment Size Limits
The Department of the Army's Nuclear Regulatory Commission Materials License dated December 24, 1997 (expired on November 30, 2002) discusses DU storage facilities and shipment size limits.
Bulk Storage
Section 2-2, paragraph 2.1.4 states:
There are two categories of storage covered by this application: bulk storage and non-bulk storage. Bulk storage represents long-term storage of large amounts of ammunition. Bulk storage installations can store a maximum of 10 million kilograms of DU. Authorized bulk storage installations are listed below:
Anniston Army Depot, Anniston, AL
Bluegrass Army Depot, Richmond, KY
Crane Army Activity, Crane, IN
Hawthorne Army Depot, Hawthorne, NV
Letterkenny Army Depot, Chambersburg, PA
McAlester Army Ammunition Plant, McAlester, OK
Red River Army Depot, Texarkana, TX
Seneca Army Depot, Romulus, NY
Sierra Army Depot, Herlong, CA
Tooele Army Depot, Tooele, UT
(Note that 10 million kilograms is over 11,000 tons.)
Non-bulk Storage
Section 2-3, paragraph 2.1.5 states:
Non-bulk storage covers any Army installation that has a requirement to store lesser amounts of DU ammunition in support of military operations. Non-bulk storage installations can store a maximum of 50,000 kilograms of DU. Although not considered an all-inclusive list, typical examples would be installations that store DU ammunition in support of deployment, retrograde, shipment consolidation, or repair of military vehicles. Storage of DU ammunition under this category can range from a few days to long term.
Shipment Size Limits
Section 2-5, paragraph 3.2 states:
Transportation: The anticipated quantity of DU in a single road or rail-transport vehicle is based upon the gross weight limitation imposed on the vehicle. Rail transport vehicles could contain as much as 40,000 pounds of DU, while road transport vehicles could contain up to 15,000 pounds of DU. Typical peacetime shipments of DU ammunition by an ocean vessel could involve between 300,000 and 900,000 pounds of DU.
-------- europe
UN nuclear agency sends Swiss list of nuclear suspects
BERN (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219212415.z8wpuoeq.html
The UN nuclear agency has given Bern a list naming two Swiss companies and 15 Swiss nationals suspected of helping advance secret nuclear programs in Iran and Libya, the government said Thursday.
The state planned to launch an inquiry to verify the information from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) but would not reveal the names, secretary of state for the economy Othmar Wyss told the Swiss news agency ATS.
Wyss stressed there was no proof that any laws on nuclear transfers had been broken.
"No violation of the law on the export of military materiel, nor of that on the control of dual-use goods, has been indicated," the official said.
The transfer of dual-use technology -- which can be used for civilian and military purposes -- is overseen by the Swiss government.
"The names of 11 people on the list sent by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are unknown to us", he said.
However, Wyss acknowledged that the IAEA had already asked for information from the Swiss government about two of the 11 "unknown" men, during an investigation seven years ago.
On Wednesday the New York Times reported that a Swiss father-son duo had been identified as having transferred sensitive technology to Iraq, Libya and Pakistan.
Urs Tinner, an engineer, monitored the production of centrifuge parts destined for Libya, and his father Friederich Tinner, also an engineer, was involved in exports of uranium-enrichment technology to Pakistan and Iraq, according to the Times' sources.
"We are once again going to look into" the Tinner's company, Wyss told the Swiss French-language daily Le Temps.
He said dual-use technology exports to Iran were minimal, representing only 1.2 percent (4.0 million euros, 5.1 million dollars) of all such controlled exports.
Last year Switzerland sold a total of 345 million euros worth of goods to Iran. "This puts the commercial volume of dual-use business into perspective," Wyss said.
Diplomats in Vienna said Thursday that UN nuclear inspectors in Iran have found components of an advanced uranium enrichment centrifuge, prompting the United States to repeat its claim that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons.
-------- india / pakistan
Roots of Pakistan Atomic Scandal Traced to Europe
February 19, 2004
By CRAIG S. SMITH
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/international/europe/19NUKE.html?pagewanted=all&position=
PARIS, Feb. 18 - The Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan has been demonized in the West for selling atomic secrets and equipment around the world, but the trade began in Europe, not Islamabad, according to court documents and experts who monitor proliferation.
The records show that industry scientists and Western intelligence agencies have known for decades that nuclear technology was pouring out of Europe despite national export control efforts to contain it.
Many of the names that have turned up among lists of suppliers and middlemen who fed equipment, materials and knowledge to nuclear programs in Pakistan and other aspiring nuclear nations are well-known players in Europe's uranium enrichment industry, a critical part of many nuclear weapons programs. Some have been convicted of illegal exports before.
The proliferation has its roots in Europe's own postwar eagerness for nuclear independence from the United States and its lax security over potentially lethal technology. It was abetted, critics say, by competition within Europe for lucrative contracts to bolster state-supported nuclear industries. Even as their own intelligence services warned that Pakistan could not be trusted, some European governments continued to help Pakistan's nuclear program.
"It was an economic consideration," said Paul Stais, a former Belgian member of the European Parliament who lobbied unsuccessfully for tighter export controls.
One name to emerge from the international investigations of Dr. Khan's nuclear trade was that of Urs Tinner, a Swiss engineer who monitored production of centrifuge parts at a factory in Malaysia. The parts were intended for Libya. Mr. Tinner's father, Friedrich Tinner, also an engineer, came under scrutiny by the Defense Department in the 1970's and again by Swiss export control authorities and the International Atomic Energy Agency in the last decade, because he was involved in exports to Pakistan and Iraq of technology used in uranium enrichment.
In the 1970's, Friedrich Tinner was in charge of exports at Vakuum-Apparate-Technik, or VAT, when the company was identified by the Defense Department as shipping items with possible nuclear-related uses to Pakistan, according to documents and VAT company officials. He later set up his own company, now called PhiTec AG, which was investigated by the Swiss in 1996 for trying to ship valves for uranium enrichment centrifuges to Iraq. The Tinners were never found to have broken any laws, Swiss officials said.
"Most of these people were heavily investigated in the 1970's, 80's and 90's," said Mark Hibbs, the European editor of the technical journal Nucleonics Week, published by McGraw-Hill.
The problem began with the 1970 Treaty of Almelo, under which Britain, Germany and the Netherlands agreed to develop centrifuges to enrich uranium jointly, ensuring their nuclear power industry a fuel source independent of the United States. Urenco, or the Uranium Enrichment Company, was established the next year with its primary enrichment plant at Almelo, the Netherlands.
Security at Urenco was by most accounts slipshod. The consortium relied on a network of research centers and subcontractors to build its centrifuges, and top-secret blueprints were passed out to companies bidding on tenders, giving engineers across Europe an opportunity to appropriate designs.
Dr. Khan, who worked for a Urenco Dutch subcontractor, Physics Dynamic Research Laboratory, was given access to the most advanced designs, even though he came from Pakistan, which was already known to harbor nuclear ambitions. A 1980 report by the Dutch government on his activities said he visited the Almelo factory in May 1972 and by late 1974 had an office there.
After Dr. Khan returned to Pakistan with blueprints and supplier lists for uranium enrichment centrifuges at the end of 1975, American intelligence agencies predicted that he would soon be shopping for the items needed to build the centrifuges for Pakistan's bomb. They soon detected a flow of equipment from Europe to Pakistan as Dr. Khan drew on Urenco's network of suppliers using a trusted group of former schoolmates and friends as agents.
The Dutch government report found that in 1976, two Dutch firms exported to Pakistan 6,200 unfinished rotor tubes made of superstrong maraging steel. The tubes are the heart of Urenco's advanced uranium-enriching centrifuges.
In 1983, a Dutch court convicted Dr. Khan in absentia on charges of stealing the designs, though the conviction was later overturned on a technicality. Nonetheless, in the late 1980's, Belgian ministers led delegations of scientists and businessmen to Pakistan, despite warnings from their own experts that they were meeting with people involved in the military application of nuclear technology. "Every well-informed person knows the inherent danger of an intense collaboration with a country such as Pakistan," wrote René Constant, director of Belgium's National Institute of Radioactive Elements in February 1987, chastising Philippe Maystadt, then the country's minister of economic affairs, after one such visit.
That same year, despite American warnings to Germany that such a sale was imminent, a German firm exported to Pakistan a plant for the recovery of tritium, a volatile gas used to increase the power of nuclear bombs. The company simply called the plant something else to obtain an export license.
"The export control office didn't even inspect the goods," said Reinhard Huebner, the German prosecutor who handled the subsequent trial of the company's chief, Rudolf Ortmayers, and Peter Finke, a German physicist who went to Pakistan to train engineers there to operate the equipment. Both men were sentenced to jail for violating export control laws.
But there were clues that the technology had spread even further: a German intelligence investigation determined that Iraq and possibly Iran and North Korea had obtained uranium-melting expertise stolen from Urenco in 1984, Mr. Hibbs reported in Nucleonics Week several years later.
In 1989, two engineers, Bruno Stemmler and Karl Heinz Schaab, who had worked for Germany's MAN New Technology, another Urenco subcontractor, sold plans for advanced uranium enrichment centrifuges to Iraq. They went to Baghdad to help solve problems in making the equipment work.
In 1991, after the first Iraq war, international inspectors were stunned to discover the extent of Saddam Hussein's hidden program. Mr. Schaab was later convicted of treason but only served a little more than a year in jail. Mr. Stemmler died before he could be tried.
David Albright, a former weapons inspector for the International Atomic Energy Agency, said he helped retrieve a full set of the blueprints from Iraq after the major combat operations ended last year. United States inspectors have not found evidence that Mr. Hussein had restarted his nuclear program, but Mr. Albright said there were still drawings unaccounted for.
"It's an unnerving issue," said Mr. Albright, who is president of the Institute for Science and International Security. "A lot of nuclear weapons design stuff could be missing in Iraq."
As recently as last year, German customs agents seized high-tensile-strength aluminum tubes made by a German company and bound for North Korea. The tubes matched the specifications for the housings of Urenco's uranium-enriching centrifuges.
One name on a list of suppliers to Iran that came to light in recent investigations was Henk Slebos, who studied with Dr. Khan at Delft Technological University in Leuven, Belgium, in the late 1960's.
In the early 1980's, Mr. Slebos was arrested for shipping an oscilloscope, used in testing centrifuges, to Dr. Khan in Pakistan. He was convicted and sentenced to a brief prison term in 1985. Mr. Slebos declined to comment for this article.
In 1998, he withdrew five Pakistan-bound shipments that the Dutch authorities had stopped in the Netherlands, Belgium and Austria because they contained "dual use" items, which could be used for uncovventional weapons as well as civilian purposes.
Last September, Mr. Slebos was among the sponsors of an international symposium on advanced materials in Pakistan organized by Dr. Khan. Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, who was then the Dutch foreign minister and is now NATO's secretary general, told Dutch members of Parliament that Mr. Slebos was still doing business with Dr. Khan, though he did not elaborate.
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Pakistan And India Agree to Peace Talks
By John Lancaster
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52739-2004Feb18.html
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Feb. 18 -- Indian and Pakistani officials agreed Wednesday to a "basic road map" for peace negotiations aimed at resolving their historic and often violent differences over Kashmir and other matters.
Wrapping up three days of talks, senior diplomats outlined a schedule for parallel negotiations on a range of subjects over the next five months, after which the Indian and Pakistani foreign ministers would meet to assess progress and decide on their next steps.
Talks on the status of Kashmir -- the divided Himalayan region claimed by India and Pakistan, both of which possess nuclear arms -- will start in May or June, after India holds national elections in April, officials said.
Other topics to be discussed at various levels and among different groups of experts include nuclear security, water sharing, maritime boundaries, trade relations, drug trafficking and confidence-building measures to ease border tensions.
"We do have before us now a sort of a basic road map for a Pakistan-India peace process to which we have both agreed," Pakistani Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokar said at a news conference after a two-hour meeting with his Indian counterpart, Shashank, who uses one name. "We hope this road map will eventually lead to the settlement of all outstanding disputes between India and Pakistan and in the direction of durable peace."
The announcement added to the sense of optimism and goodwill that has been building in South Asia since Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, agreed on Jan. 5 to resume peace negotiations after a gap of more than two years.
Before the two leaders met, Indian officials had resisted reviving direct talks, accusing Pakistan of backing Islamic insurgents in the part of Kashmir that India controls. But the Indians relented after Musharraf agreed to a joint statement pledging that he would "not permit any territory under Pakistan's control to be used to support terrorism in any manner."
The challenge Musharraf faces in fulfilling that pledge was vividly demonstrated Wednesday afternoon, when the former leader of the banned Islamic guerrilla group Lashkar-i-Taiba turned up in the heart of the capital to attend a public memorial service for an Islamic militant killed last month by Indian security forces in Kashmir.
"It's ironic that jihad has been labeled as terrorism and our Pakistani leaders are saying the same things that Western leaders are saying," Hafiz Sayeed told the crowd of about 500 men in a park festooned with militant slogans such as "Beat infidels so harshly that they run away."
"Pakistani leaders are using their entire machinery to curb jihad, and this is the worst form of state terrorism," continued Sayeed, a former engineering professor with a henna-tinted beard who came late to the service in a van with tinted windows. "Jihad in Kashmir will continue at any cost, and Kashmiris will be freed one day."
Founded in 1989, Lashkar-i-Taiba, or Army of the Righteous, is one of the main Pakistani militant groups fighting Indian forces in Kashmir. Some of its members trained in Afghanistan during the Taliban era and have been linked by U.S. intelligence to al Qaeda. India has identified the group as one of two that orchestrated a December 2001 attack on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi, which brought the two countries to the brink of their fourth war.
In January 2002, Musharraf banned the group, along with a number of others, but it has since reconstituted under a different name, Jamaat ul-Dawa, which organized Wednesday's memorial service. Sayeed spent several months under house arrest but was released early last year after a court ruled that the government had no grounds to continue holding him.
In an telephone interview Wednesday night from London, where he is traveling on official business, Pakistani Interior Minister Faisel Saleh Hayat said Jamaat ul-Dawa had not been banned "because there is no credible substantive evidence that it is indulging in activities against the interest of Pakistan or using Pakistan as a base to harm the interest of people or governments or countries outside" Pakistan.
He added, however, that Jamaat ul-Dawa is on Pakistan's terrorism "watch list" and said he would inquire into the nature of Sayeed's speech to determine whether any laws had been violated. "Obviously jihad in the strict Islamic sense is not violative of the law, but if it promotes violence, then anything in that context does call for the rule of law to come into force," he said.
Sayeed's fiery words, in any case, were sharply at odds with the generally upbeat atmosphere surrounding Wednesday's announcement of a schedule for talks, some of which will begin next month. Indian and Pakistani diplomats used words such as "cordial" and "constructive" to describe this week's preparatory session, showing just how far the two governments have traveled since their armies faced each other across the border in 2002.
The warming trend began last April, when Vajpayee extended a "hand of friendship" to Pakistan during a speech in Kashmir, and has accelerated with the restoration of transportation links and so-called people-to-people exchanges involving trade delegations, politicians and artists. At a private function in Karachi on Tuesday night, a popular Indian singer, Jagjit Singh, entertained an audience of about 2,000 people, including a number of senior military officers, in a scene that would have been unimaginable as recently as six months ago.
But the two sides remain far apart on Kashmir, a mostly Muslim region that India claims as an integral part of its territory. And as Wednesday's memorial service made clear, Musharraf faces fierce internal resistance to anything that smacks of compromise.
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Questions Raised About Pakistan's Nuclear Arms
February 19, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-pakistan-nuclear-usa.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - After the revelations about Pakistan's role in the nuclear black market, Islamabad is seen as primarily responsible for ending the arms trade but the United States is not pushing it to have its facilities inspected and cooperation is limited, U.S. officials and experts say.
While most experts agree Washington should not press President Pervez Musharraf, target of two assassination attempts, so hard that he may be ousted, some are concerned that the Bush administration is not demanding enough action from the Pakistani leader to combat the nuclear threat.
``We do have interests in not putting the kind of pressure on Musharraf that would compromise his domestic position, but the leakage of nuclear material is transcendent,'' said Selig Harrison of the Center for International Policy.
The real danger is not just the scandal of disgraced Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan confessing to selling nuclear secrets to Libya, Iran and North Korea.
More ominous is the possibility that nuclear material may fall into the hands of terrorist groups.
In what some analysts call a ``see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil'' approach, the administration has given Musharraf ``a pass'' by accepting his insistence that he and his government were not involved in Khan's network.
In the 1980s, Washington adopted a similar stance, ignoring Pakistan's nuclear weapons program because it needed Islamabad as an ally against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.
BACKING AN ALLY
U.S. officials consider Musharraf a critical ally in the war on terrorism and the best leader for Pakistan at this time.
But Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute finds a contradiction in Pakistan claiming it has control of its nuclear arsenal while denying it knew about Khan. ``Those two statements don't jibe. One must be untrue,'' she said.
After the recent disclosures, Pakistan at a minimum must give the United States direct access to Khan, so it can unravel the nuclear network, and satisfy Washington that its nuclear weapons and technology are secure, she said.
According to several U.S. officials, however, Washington may not yet have direct access to Khan.
``I don't think we've gotten the full story from Khan yet from Pakistan,'' one senior U.S. official told Reuters.
``We had some discussions with the Pakistanis but basically we've asked them for a more thorough (briefing). As Pakistan proceeds with its own investigation, we expect them to share. They've shared some with the IAEA (U.N. nuclear watchdog) and we'll look for them to share more,'' he said.
Pakistan is proud of its nuclear arms, which were tested in 1998. Because of the political damage it could do to Musharraf, U.S. officials might not acknowledge if they had interrogated Khan. The CIA declined to comment.
With 48 deployed nuclear weapons and fuel for 52 more, Pakistan should install, under supervision of U.S. scientists, new protective measures at its nuclear laboratories; permit regular inspection of these labs by U.N. experts; and radically strengthen export controls, Harrison said.
But another senior U.S. official said: ``This is not a country which has agreed to give us access to their nuclear weapons facilities'' and it would be unrealistic to ask. ``We don't have a lever,'' he insisted.
U.S. officials have acknowledged general discussions with Pakistan on nuclear safety but have not provided details. U.S. laws limit cooperation with Pakistan's nuclear program.
NBC Television recently reported that since the September 2001 attacks, U.S. nuclear experts have spent millions of dollars to safeguard Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, including secret authorization codes for the weapons. A U.S. official did not deny the report but insisted: ``We ... won't go over the edge of our law and the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.''
-------- iran
Uranium Enrichment Parts Found in Iran, Diplomats Say
February 19, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-nuclear-iran.html
VIENNA (Reuters) - The U.N. nuclear agency has found undeclared components in Iran compatible with advanced uranium centrifuge designs, stoking Western concerns that it may be developing nuclear weapons, diplomats said on Thursday.
Iran insists that it made a full declaration of its nuclear technology to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in October, and that its programs are purely peaceful.
A discovery of undeclared equipment might suggest it has something to hide, possibly a weapons program.
The diplomats said the parts that had been found were compatible with the ``P2'' uranium-enrichment centrifuge, which is a Pakistani version of the advanced Western ``G2'' design, and can produce material for use in reactors or bombs.
``This stuff should have been declared,'' one Western diplomat said. The IAEA declined to comment and Iranian officials could not immediately be contacted.
The daily USA Today reported that the parts had been found at the Doshen-Tappen air base -- suggesting military use -- and quoted one unnamed source as saying a system had been built and tested.
Iran said this week it had held blueprints for the G2 system, but denied allegations from Western diplomats that it had committed a serious offence by failing to declare them.
``(This) is not something the agency has discovered, Iran has informed the agency about it...It's a sheer lie that Iran is manufacturing G2 centrifuges,'' Hossein Mousavian, head of foreign relations at Iran's Supreme National Security Council, said in a newspaper published on Monday.
IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei is expected to circulate two reports next week on U.N. inspections, one on Iran and the other on Libya, which admitted in December to pursuing weapons of mass destruction and agreed to give them up voluntarily.
Iran agreed in October, in a deal brokered by Germany, France and Britain, to allow snap inspections of its atomic facilities by the IAEA and to suspend uranium enrichment.
The discovery of the G2 designs led some arms experts to speculate that Iran may have a secret enrichment facility apart from one at Natanz in the center of the country, which is being built to accommodate older G1 centrifuges.
Several diplomats and arms experts have said they believe the Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, who has admitted leaking nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea, offered Iran his centrifuge designs on the black market.
Gas centrifuges spin at supersonic speeds to separate fissile uranium-235 from the non-fissile uranium isotopes.
--------
U.N. Finds Enrichment Supplies in Iran
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Nuclear-Agency-Iran.html
VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- U.N. inspectors probing Iran's nuclear program have found equipment that can enrich uranium for weapons use and is far more advanced than anything Tehran has previously acknowledged, diplomats said Thursday.
The find of the advanced centrifuge system is the second piece of evidence uncovered this month that casts new doubt on Iran's commitment to prove it does not want atomic weapons.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the reported discovery raises ``serious concerns.''
``A country with the vast oil and gas resources of Iran has no legitimate need for nuclear energy,'' McClellan told reporters. ``And full confidence about Iran's nuclear program requires Iran to abandon uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities.''
A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, called the latest find ``the second dramatic disclosure'' in a row. ``We knew that the Iranians were not completely clean, but we were willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.''
Iran insisted its intentions are peaceful and that its centrifuges are to process uranium for nuclear power, not warheads. Without explicitly acknowledging the discovery, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said any advanced ``P-2'' centrifuge system in the country was not in use but rather at a research stage.
One of the diplomats said the centrifuge was apparently located at an Iranian air base outside the capital -- which would strengthen the arguments of the United States and other nations that Tehran is trying to make weapons.
But several other diplomats said they did not know where the equipment was found, and the Iranian government said there were no nuclear projects on any military base in the country.
Confronted by evidence last year, Iran acknowledged hiding nearly two decades of nuclear activity.
--------
Iran Denies Nuclear Activities at Military Base
February 19, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-nuclear-iran-denial.html
TEHRAN, Iran (Reuters) - Iran Thursday denied reports it was conducting sensitive nuclear activities at a military base.
``Iran's nuclear activities are entirely peaceful and Iran has not had and nor does it have military nuclear activities,'' the Foreign Ministry said in a statement faxed to Reuters.
Diplomats told Reuters Thursday the U.N. nuclear watchdog found undeclared components in Iran compatible with advanced uranium centrifuge designs, stoking Western concerns Tehran may be developing nuclear weapons.
USA Today reported Thursday that parts for advanced ``P2'' uranium centrifuges -- a Pakistani version of the advanced Western ``G2'' design -- had been found at the Doshan Tapeh military base in Tehran.
It quoted an unidentified source as saying a system at the base had been assembled and tested. Uranium centrifuges can be used to make fuel either for nuclear reactors or atomic bombs.
The Foreign Ministry said, ``In none of Iran's military centers is a nuclear program being pursued and P2 centrifuges do not exist in such centers.''
``The P2 centrifuges are entirely a research project and have not been commissioned,'' it added.
Iran insists it made a full declaration of its nuclear technology to the International Atomic Energy Agency in October, and that its programs are purely peaceful.
A discovery of undeclared equipment might suggest it has something to hide, possibly a weapons program.
-------- israel
AP: Accused Nuke Trader Also Helped India
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Trader.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- An Israeli businessman accused of being a middleman in the nuclear black market worked to supply not only Pakistan but also its archrival India, court records indicate.
South Africa-based Asher Karni faces felony charges of exporting nuclear bomb triggers to Pakistan. But court files in the case also include e-mail exchanges between Karni and an Indian businessman who was trying secretly to buy material for two Indian rocket factories.
``Be careful to avoid any reference to the customer name,'' warned one message from Karni's Indian contact, Raghavendra ``Ragu'' Rao of Foretek Marketing (Pvt.) Ltd.
The messages offer a rare glimpse into such dealings. Federal prosecutors filed them in court as part of their attempts to persuade a judge to keep Karni behind bars before his trial.
After conferring with U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan Kay on Thursday, lawyers for both sides agreed to postpone a bond hearing for Karni until next Tuesday. L. Barrett Boss, one of Karni's lawyers, declined comment after the hearing.
Karni, 50, has pleaded innocent. Federal agents arrested him on New Year's Day when he arrived in Denver for a ski vacation.
Authorities accuse Karni of using front companies and falsified documents to buy nuclear bomb triggers in the United States and ship them to Pakistan.
The United States is pressuring Pakistan to shut down the black-market network it used to supply its nuclear weapons program and in turn to supply Iran, North Korea and Libya with nuclear technology. A key scientist in Pakistan's nuclear program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, said this month that he ran the network but insisted Pakistan's government was not involved.
Rao's e-mails from India ask Karni to procure three kinds of high-tech equipment while concealing that they were meant for the two rocket labs. The United States restricts exports of missile-related material to the two organizations, the Liquid Propulsion Systems Center and the Vikram Sarabhai Space Center.
An August 2002 e-mail from Rao to Karni warns Karni to conceal the final customer of an accelerometer to the LPSC, noting its export is restricted because of its ``possibility of being used in guidance systems for missiles.''
Rao did not respond to AP e-mails seeking comment Thursday.
Prosecutors said they found his e-mails while searching a laptop computer and six computer discs Karni had when he was arrested.
The court files also include records of other deals Karni made with his contact in Pakistan, Humayun Khan of the company Pakland PME. One involved Khan's urgent request last May for Karni to buy infrared sensors for AIM-9L Sidewinder missiles -- which Pakistan uses on its F-16 fighter planes for air-to-air combat.
While it is unclear whether that deal went through, the request shows Karni must have known Khan had ties to the Pakistani military, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Bratt argued in court documents.
Another deal which apparently was completed was Humayun Khan's request for a sophisticated oscilloscope, a measuring device that could be used in nuclear weapons programs. For that deal, the documents indicate, Karni used the same U.S. intermediary he used for the bomb triggers: Giza Technologies Inc. of Secaucus, N.J.
In an August e-mail to Giza head Zeki Bilmen, Karni said he had a ``new project'' for Giza. ``It is very important that they will not know it is coming to S.A. (South Africa),'' Karni wrote.
Karni in May had asked the oscilloscope maker, Tektronix Inc., if he could buy an oscilloscope for Pakistan, but the company told him to ask for a U.S. export license first, court records indicate. There is no indication Karni contacted Tektronix directly again.
Bilmen has declined comment. Neither he nor his company have been charged, though Bratt wrote that agents searched Giza's offices in December at the same time South African police raided Karni's offices in Cape Town.
The criminal case against Karni centers on his efforts to buy devices called triggered spark gaps from PerkinElmer Optoelectronics of Salem, Mass. The devices can be used in machines to break up kidney stones, but exports are restricted because they also are key to triggering nuclear detonations.
A PerkinElmer representative in France rebuffed Karni's efforts to buy spark gaps last spring, saying Karni had to certify they would not be used in nuclear weapons. Khan urged Karni to try harder, writing in an e-mail: ``I know it is difficult but that's why we came to know each other.''
Karni then used Giza as a front to buy 66 spark gaps from PerkinElmer, prosecutors allege.
Giza said on shipping documents the spark gaps were destined for a South African hospital, but Karni repackaged them and sent them on to Pakistan, court documents allege.
A court filing from Karni's Colorado lawyers includes a letter purportedly from the Pakistani user of the triggers, saying they had been sent to ``Agha Khan Foundation University & Hospitals'' in Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
The Aga Khan Foundation does not have any hospitals in Sri Lanka, however. Its hospital in Karachi, Pakistan, has only one of the kidney stone treatment machines. PerkinElmer executives told U.S. authorities that even the largest hospital would need only two or three of the triggers for a kidney treatment center, not dozens of them.
-------- korea
Report: N. Korea Willing to Discuss Nukes
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Koreas-Nuclear.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea is willing to discuss allegations it has a uranium-based nuclear weapons program, a media report said Thursday, as Washington warned progress at six-nation talks will hinge on the North's willingness to abandon its atomic ambitions.
The disputed uranium program is a key stumbling block in next week's nuclear talks in Beijing involving the United States, the two Koreas, China, Russia and Japan.
North Korea has denied a U.S. contention that it has a secret uranium program in addition to its program using plutonium. But the communist government conveyed to a ``third country'' its willingness to discuss the matter with Washington, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said.
In Tokyo, U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton said North Korea's alleged uranium-based and plutonium programs should both be up for discussion.
``To get all the issues on the table ... is going to be a very important diplomatic aspect of the talks,'' he told reporters at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo.
Bolton added that the success or failure of the talks will hinge on whether North Korea expresses willingness to give up its nuclear weapons programs. Earlier, he warned that the dispute over the highly enriched uranium, or HEU, program could derail chances of a peaceful resolution.
The six-nation talks begin Wednesday. A first round of meetings in August made little progress.
China appealed Thursday to governments taking part in the talks to remain diplomatic, saying ``a solution to the nuclear issue can only be achieved through dialogue and political negotiations.''
``It's very important to stick to that consensus,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhang Qiyue said.
Questions about North Korea's nuclear capabilities are expected to overshadow the talks.
Gen. Leon J. LaPorte, commander of U.S. forces in South Korea, described the North as a world threat.
``What would happen if North Korea sold nuclear technology or weapons-grade plutonium or uranium to a terrorist organization that could take that any place in the world and detonate a nuclear weapon?'' he said Thursday.
But LaPorte said U.S. forces were planning no pre-emptive strike and that the nuclear standoff with Pyongyang must be resolved diplomatically.
Washington claims Pyongyang admitted to running an HEU program -- in addition to the plutonium program -- when U.S. officials visited the communist country in October 2002. North Korea accused the United States of making the claim to flare the nuclear crisis.
``We understand that North Korea recently told the government of a third country that it is willing to discuss the HEU issue with the United States,'' Yonhap quoted an unidentified high-ranking South Korean government official as saying. ``There is an indication that North Korea is changing its position.''
The official said North Korea did not admit having an HEU program.
``But its position was different from the old position of complete denial,'' the official said. ``Both the United States and South Korea are paying attention to the change in the North Korean attitude.''
The six-nation talks are also expected to discuss North Korea's proposal to freeze its nuclear activities, as a first step to resolving the standoff, in return for economic concessions from the United States.
Washington has demanded that North Korea first start dismantling its nuclear programs.
--------
U.S.: N. Korea Must Admit Uranium Program
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-US-North-Korea.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- No nuclear agreement with North Korea is possible until the Communist nation agrees to eliminate the uranium-based program it has refused to acknowledge, a senior State Department official said Thursday.
Heading into six-nation talks next week, the United States is looking for a strategic commitment from North Korea to end its bomb-making capability with the same clarity and commitment shown by Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Also Thursday, President Bush and South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun spoke about those talks during a 25-minute call. The talks start Wednesday in Beijing and include China, South Korea, Japan and Russia. Similar discussions in August ended inconclusively. Roh's office said in a statement that the two leaders agreed the talks ``should make concrete progress and provide a turning point for peacefully resolving the North Korean nuclear problem.''
White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the presidents agreed to work toward making the discussions a success. ``They share the view that they will approach the talks in a constructive and sincere manner,'' McClellan said.
The State Department official said the Bush administration is willing to show patience should a commitment not come next week from North Korea.
There is no evidence yet that North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Il, is ready to follow the actions of Gadhafi, the official said. U.S. official say Gadhafi has been fulfilling a December commitment to disclose and dismantle all unconventional weapons.
The United States has claimed since 2002 that it has concrete evidence that North Korea, in addition to its publicly acknowledged plutonium-bomb program, is developing a uranium-based weapons capability.
North Korea has denied any such intention. Some experts believe the North's position has been undercut by recent disclosures that the founder of Pakistan's nuclear weapons program, A.Q. Khan, had assisted the communist state's uranium program.
U.S. officials also maintain that a senior North Korean official acknowledged the existence of the uranium program during a meeting with American diplomats in Pyongyang, the North's capital, in October 2002.
North Korea has denied making any such statement and has suggested that a translation problem was to blame.
The United States is seeking the ``complete, verifiable and irreversible'' elimination of North Korea's programs.
North Korea initially placed high priority on receiving security assurances in exchange for disarmament. More recently, North Korea has shown interest in compensation and ``tangible benefits,'' an apparent reference to aid programs, according to the U.S. official.
-------- missile defense
Russia Tests New Wonder Weapon
Associated Press
Feb. 19, 2004
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,62350,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_7
MOSCOW -- Russia has successfully tested a hypersonic anti-Star Wars weapon capable of penetrating any prospective missile shield, a senior general said Thursday.
The prototype weapon proved it could maneuver so quickly as to make "any missile defense useless," Col.-Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, the first deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces, told a news conference.
He said that the prototype of a new hypersonic vehicle had proved its ability to maneuver while in orbit, thereby making it able to dodge an enemy's missile shield.
"The flying vehicle changed both the altitude and direction of its flight," Baluyevsky said. "During the experiment conducted yesterday, we proved that it's possible to develop weapons that would make any missile defense useless."
Baluyevsky's comment followed a statement by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who said Wednesday after attending rocket launches from the Plesetsk launch pad in northern Russia that experiments conducted during the military maneuvers had proven the country could build new strategic weapons that would be unrivaled in the world.
Putin said that the development of new weapons was not directed against the United States, and Baluyevsky reaffirmed the statement, saying that the experiment shouldn't be seen as Russia's response to U.S. missile defense plans.
"The experiment conducted by us must not be interpreted as a warning to the Americans not to build their missile defense because we designed this thing," Baluyevsky told The Associated Press.
In Washington, Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was asked by reporters about the Putin statement.
"If you're in that business -- intercontinental ballistic missiles and warheads -- you want them to be survivable, and maneuverability is one way to increase their survivability against any potential defenses," he said.
Putin said that Russia has no intention of immediately deploying new weapons based on the experimental vehicle. "We have demonstrated our capability, but we have no intention of building this craft tomorrow," he said.
Baluyevsky said that Russia had informed the United States about its intention to conduct the experiment and added that U.S. officials issued no objections.
He said that the new vehicle had "ceased to exist" after the experiment -- presumably burning up in the atmosphere.
Baluyevsky refused to comment on what kind of engine the vehicle had, how long its flight lasted or how exactly it maneuvered. He said that it had been designed by several Russian companies, but refused to name them.
As part of this week's massive military maneuvers described as the largest in more than two decades, the Russian military launched a Molniya-M booster rocket with a Kosmos military satellite from the northern Plesetsk launch pad, and launched two ballistic missiles -- a Topol from Plesetsk and an RS-18 from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Baluyevsky refused to say which of the rockets had carried the vehicle into the orbit.
------- russia
Russian might ... might not
Decline: Missile failures during what was to be a display of nuclear potency reveal how far the former superpower has fallen.
By Douglas M. Birch,
Baltimore Sun Foreign Staff
February 19, 2004
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.missile19feb19,0,3814031.story?coll=bal-nationworld-headlines
MOSCOW - It was meant to be an impressive display of military might. Instead, Russia wound up looking like the former superpower that couldn't shoot straight.
A missile launched from the Karelia, a nuclear-powered submarine in the Barents Sea, veered off course yesterday and automatically self-destructed, Russian wire services reported.
It marked the third time during the exercises for Russia's nuclear forces, billed as the largest since the Soviet era, that a missile launch went awry.
On Tuesday, another nuclear-powered sub, the Novomoskovsk, was scheduled to fire two RSM-54 missiles. But the first reportedly failed to clear the launch tube properly and broke up just above the surface. The second launch was canceled as a precaution, according to the newspaper Kommersant.
By some Russian news accounts, yesterday's test was the navy's attempt to save face in the wake of Tuesday's failure.
It was all the more distressing, perhaps, because Russian President Vladimir V. Putin had a front-row seat. On Tuesday, he strolled on the deck of the nuclear submarine Arkhangelsk in the Barents Sea in a submariner's sheepskin-lined leather jacket.
Yesterday, wearing a green Strategic Missile Forces uniform, he watched his nuclear forces at the Plesetsk launch pad in northern Russia.
The problems of Russia's military are by no means limited to its strategic forces. In four years of bloodshed, Russian ground forces numbering in the tens of thousands have failed to subdue a few thousand Chechen rebels. The Russian soldiers have made an impression only for being poorly trained, poorly equipped and poorly motivated.
But this week's exercises were supposed to show that, despite its troubles, Russia was still a country to be reckoned with because it could still deliver a long-range nuclear strike.
"It's certainly an embarrassment, particularly because of the fact that this was billed to be such a big event," said Thomas G. Mahnken, acting director of strategic studies at the Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies in Washington. "These things do go wrong even for the U.S. military. But I think it's a concrete example of how far the Russian military has fallen."
In an interview with the daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Eduard Baltin, a retired Russian admiral, seemed to share that view.
"The trouble is that there are few experts left and the crews are badly trained," he said. "We failed to show a potential aggressor that Russia's nuclear forces are in full combat readiness."
The navy had told reporters in advance of the two planned missile launches. But after the test fizzled, the navy chief, Adm. Vladimir Kuroyedov, claimed that the service had planned an electronic simulation rather than an actual test firing.
Several newspapers compared the Russian navy's refusal to acknowledge the failure of Tuesday's test to the lies that high-ranking officers told in the days after the sinking of the submarine Kursk in August 2000.
Navy officials insisted that the Kursk sank as the result of a mysterious collision, not a technical failure aboard the state-of-the-art sub. But the tragedy, which cost the lives of all 118 sailors on board, was eventually blamed on a faulty torpedo.
Mahnken said this week's missile failures support the view that, with or without a formal arms-control agreement with the United States, Russia's strategic nuclear arsenal will inevitably shrink.
"The systems are getting old and not great shape, and will be withdrawn," he said. "This is more evidence of that."
Overall, he said, the misfires - which caused no injuries - are welcome news.
"The quote-unquote problem is that the Russians are not devoting the resources to keep their strategic nuclear forces at high readiness," he said. "But, frankly, I don't consider it a problem. It's a symbol of something good."
Putin made no mention yesterday of the launch failures, and neither did Russia's television networks - all to some degree state-controlled.
Instead, Putin told television reporters that Russia would develop a new generation of nuclear weapons "capable of hitting targets continents away at hypersonic speed, high precision and the ability of wide maneuver." He also hinted that Russia might develop a missile defense system, according to the Itar-Tass news agency.
Putin is seeking re-election to a second term March 14. While Putin seems all but certain of victory, nationalist parties calling for a revival of Russia's military strength made a surprisingly strong showing in December's parliamentary elections.
A decade after the demise of the Soviet Union, many Russians say they want their country to regain some of its former power and prestige. Many are uneasy with the expansion of the NATO alliance into Eastern Europe and the establishment of U.S. military outposts in former Soviet states, including Georgia.
Not all of this week's exercises failed, of course. Yesterday in Plesetsk, Putin watched the successful launch into orbit of a military satellite, as well as the firing of an RS-18 ballistic missile from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakstan.
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Military rot spreads to Russia's nuclear forces
MOSCOW (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219164634.xjhfrdy2.html
Moscow's latest bid to flaunt its military might backfired dramatically when three failed missile tests revealed that even Russia's final line of defense -- a fearsome nuclear arsenal -- was not immune from the rot eroding the post-Soviet military.
Russia this week staged its biggest war games in 20 years aimed primarily at demonstrating that its powerful nuclear force could penetrate a missile defense shield being built by the United States.
Their launch only a month before Vladimir Putin's expected re-election on March 14 were also due help the president's tough guy image that has played so well among voters traumatized by Russia's loss of international prestige.
But little went according to plan in the Arctic waters this week.
Putin went out to sea in a nuclear submarine Tuesday to witness two failed launches of missiles that could theoretically deliver a nuclear strike on the United States.
A third missile veered off course and self-destructed the next day. It was the first such accident in 36 tests.
"Our fictitious enemy won" the war games, the popular Gazeta.ru Internet site scoffed.
"The navy's defense shield of Russia blew up over the Barents Sea," the centrist Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily agreed. "The naval exercises ended in complete failure."
The disintegration of Russia's ground and air forces -- equipped by Soviet tanks that no longer work and with planes grounded because there is no cash to pay for fuel -- has been an open secret since the military got bogged down in the first 1994-96 Chechen war.
The navy's troubles came to prominence with the August 2000 Kursk nuclear submarine disaster. But Russia has in fact not been sending more than a few ships out to sea for years. It has only one functioning airplane carrier.
Meanwhile morale among soldiers has largely collasped. Recruits regularly complain of brutal hazing, or initiation ceremonies, and corrupt generals who force them out into the Siberian cold in threadbare outfits. Food is limited and teenagers try almost anything to avoid the draft.
But Russia's nuclear arsenal has always served as a defensive backbone that keeps politicians here referring to their country as a "great power."
That backbone appeared to develop an unpleasant crack this week.
"These mishaps tell us one clear thing: We have little money and a lot of weapons. And these weapons are growing old," said Ivan Safranchuk of the Center of Defense Information.
"This shows that these weapons are reaching the end of their lifetimes and should not be further used."
Maxim Pyadushkin of the Center for the Analysis of Strategies and Technologies agreed that "what happened shattered all illusions that our nuclear and rocket forces are the most battle-ready element of our armed forces."
Russia's main problem is that it has been churning out only a handful of missiles a year while keeping in service rockets which were built as far back as the early 1970s.
Analysts urge the military to carry out an urgent re-think of their strategy.
But the official Krasnaya Zvezda defense ministry daily announced proudly that the missile that exploded Wednesday -- first constructed in 1979 -- would be "exploited for another 10 years, and possibly 20 or more, serving as our nuclear backbone."
And Russia's deputy chief of staff general reported Thursday that a new class of ballistic missiles would not be introduced until 2010.
"I wish that we had these rocket complexes yesterday -- but we fully understand the government's financial means," Yury Baluyevsky said.
Meanwhile analysts scorned the military's effort to cover up their embarrassment by initially denying and then giving conflicting accounts over the accidents.
The national state-controlled television stations refused to report on the test failures and instead focused on three other successful ground-based missile tests.
Military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer said the navy was trying to confuse foreign intelligence services which were closely following the war games.
"But if the most modern ballistic missile available to our navy really did misfire, any serious foreign intelligence service will eventually find out about it," Felgenhauer wrote in Novaya Gazeta.
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Russia Tests Missile-Defense Proof Weapons
Thursday February 19, 2004
By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV
Associated Press Writer
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3765949,00.html
MOSCOW (AP) - Russia has successfully tested a hypersonic anti-Star Wars weapon capable of penetrating any prospective missile shield, a senior general said Thursday.
The prototype weapon proved it could maneuver so quickly as to make ``any missile defense useless,'' Col.-Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, the first deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces, told a news conference.
He said that the prototype of a new hypersonic vehicle had proved its ability to maneuver while in orbit, thereby making it able to to dodge an enemy's missile shield.
``The flying vehicle changed both the altitude and direction of its flight,'' Baluyevsky said. ``During the experiment conducted yesterday, we proved that it's possible to develop weapons that would make any missile defense useless.''
Baluyevsky's comment followed a statement by President Vladimir Putin, who said Wednesday after attending rocket launches from the Plesetsk launch pad in northern Russia that experiments conducted during the military maneuvers had proven that Russia could build new strategic weapons that would be unrivaled in the world.
Putin said that the development of new weapons was not directed against the United States, and Baluyevsky reaffirmed the statement, saying that the experiment shouldn't be seen as Russia's response to U.S. missile defense plans.
``The experiment conducted by us must not be interpreted as a warning to the Americans not to build their missile defense because we designed this thing,'' Baluyevsky told The Associated Press.
He said that Russia has no intention of immediately deploying new weapons based on the experimental vehicle. ``We have demonstrated our capability, but we have no intention of building this craft tomorrow,'' he said.
Baluyevsky said that Russia had informed the United States about its intention to conduct the experiment and added that U.S. officials issued not objections.
He said that the new vehicle had ``ceased to exist'' after the experiment - presumably burning up in the atmosphere.
Baluyevsky refused to comment on what kind of engine the vehicle had, how long its flight lasted and how exactly it maneuvered. He said that it had been designed by several Russian companies, but refused to name them.
As part of the massive military maneuvers described as the largest in more than two decades, the military launched a Molniya-M booster rocket with a Kosmos military satellite from the northern Plesetsk launch pad and two ballistic missiles - a Topol from Plesetsk and an RS-18 from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Baluyevsky refused to say which of the rockets had carried the vehicle into the orbit.
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Russia's war games demonstrating 'nuclear fist'?
By Sergei Blagov
Feb 19, 2004
Asia Times
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/FB19Ag02.html
MOSCOW - Russia's military has begun large-scale war games - its largest military maneuvers in two decades - involving the test-firing of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and the massive deployment of long-range strategic bombers. The exercises are intended to deter unnamed aggressors and they appear to reflect Russia's increasingly assertive foreign policy, what some call a "nuclear fist" - yet questions remain about Russia's first-strike capabilities.
The exercise is reminiscent of Soviet-era war games held back in 1982, dubbed the "seven-hour nuclear war". Russia recently indicated the possibility of a first-strike war, if necessary, to defend Russian interests. Yet military experts question whether Moscow could indeed strike first if it felt threatened, and if so, what would be the target. No potential aggressor was identified this time, but in previous maneuvers Russian generals said the obvious target was the United States.
Some observers and critics said the war games signaled the opening of Russia's election campaign, a charge vigorously denied. Some said the games already flopped when a missile failed to fire, another charge vigorously denied.
On the day of the apparent flop, President Vladimir Putin boarded the Northern Fleet Arkhangelsk submarine where he armed 20 ballistic missiles to observe first-hand the strategic drill on Tuesday. However, Putin's ride on a nuclear submarine turned a bit uncomfortable as another Akula-class submarine, the K-407 Novomoskovsk, did not launch its RSM-54 missile. It was supposed to be test-fired Tuesday morning and its dummy warhead was to hit its target at the Kura missile-receiving facility on the far eastern coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula.
Novomoskovsk's failure to launch the missile is likely a great disappointment to the military, as the submarine previously had a good record of missile launches - in 1998 it became one of the first submarines to launch a satellite into space.
Meanwhile, Russia's Northern Fleet command dismissed speculation there had been any incidents and denied that any ICBM launches had been planned for the day. Navy Commander Vladimir Kuroyedov claimed it was supposed to be a mock launch, involving just an electronic order to fire an ICBM, without the missile leaving its launch tube. Kuroyedov did not elaborate on the value of a mock launch or clarify why the Russian President was invited to witness it.
But some Russian media outlets did not subscribe to the official point of view. The influential Izvestia daily reported on Wednesday that the drill ended in failure. On Wednesday, daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta ridiculed the official version of the war games, suggesting that Russia basically "asked a potential aggressor to wait for another day" until the actual missile launch.
Retired admiral Eduard Baltin, former commander of the Northern Fleet's division of nuclear submarines, commented that Russia failed to demonstrate to a potential aggressor that its nuclear forces remain in full and constant combat readiness.
Yet despite the problems, the drill was clearly designed to send a message. The February war games scenario included the testing of the missile defense system protecting Moscow, ICBM test launches and launches of military satellites in a simulation of the replacement of those satellites lost in military action. Among other maneuvers, units of the Siberian Military District and the Volga-Urals Military District are being deployed westward, while airborne units are being dispatched by air and rail to unspecified destinations.
The maneuvers also involved Tupolev-195 and Tupolev-160 Blackjack long-range strategic bombers test-firing cruise missiles over Russia's Arctic regions. The supersonic Tu-160 is designed to strike distant targets with up to 12 missiles. In mid-January the Tu-160s flew again for the first time since the entire fleet was grounded after a crash last fall.
The strategic drill was designed "to forestall a forceful aggression against Russia", Colonel-General Yury Baluyevsky, first deputy head of general staff, has announced. The maneuvers "are not the opening of the election campaign or a demonstration of a nuclear fist", Baluyevsky said. Russia can not abandon test-firing ICBM, Baluyevsky said, although he conceded that each launch costs Russia 300-600 million rubles (US$10-20 million).
It is speculated the February war games are intended to further boost Putin's popularity as the March 14 presidential election approaches. The maneuvers may also serve to back up Russia's increasingly assertive foreign policy.
The drill was supposed to end in a victory that would repel potential "aggressors". Yet such talk of "aggressors" highlighted the Soviet-style of the war games. The drill demonstrated that a nuclear conflict with the United States is still seen as a possibility in Moscow, hence plans call for it.
But unlike Soviet-era war games, this time none of the 250 generals involved in the drill would reveal who the virtual enemy was. However, some of Russia's top military officials recently voiced concerns over US missile defense plans. The fact that units of the Siberian Military District were being deployed westward during the drill also indicates that Moscow still sees a threat in the West, and not in East Asia.
The war games are the latest in Moscow's series of recent moves designed to exhibit its strategic deterrent. Last December, the fourth regiment of Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missiles was put on combat duty in Tatischevo, central Russia. Topol-M has been described as a cornerstone of Russia missile-nuclear shield. The single-warhead RS-12M Topol-M, which the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has nicknamed SS-X-27, can be fired from silos or from mobile launchers. Eventually, Topol-M mobile missiles are due to replace 270 silo-based missile complexes, according to one Russian expert, who conceded that the Russian army was recently receiving just six Topol-M missiles a year.
Russia has also moved to make dozens of previously stored multi-warhead SS-19 ICBMs combt-ready. Last October, President Putin stated that Russia has SS-19 ICBMs that had been stored without fuel and had never previously been deployed - and as such were not part of past disarmament negotiations. Russians believe that the UR-100N UTTH, also known as the SS-19 Stilleto, could function for up to 25 more years and gradually replace decommissioned missiles.
- When the START-I treaty was signed in 1991, the Soviet Union had a total of 300 SS-19 missiles. According to the START-II treaty, signed in 1993, Russia was to dismantle all ground-based ICBMs with multiple warheads. Under the treaty provisions, a total of 105 of the SS-19 missiles can be retained provided they are downloaded to carry only one warhead instead of six.
In May 2002, Putin and US President George W Bush signed the so-called Moscow Treaty that requires the two countries to cut the number of warheads on combat duty to between 1,700 and 2,200 on each side. It allows both countries to store, rather than dismantle the warheads. It is the scrapping of the START-II strategic arms reduction treaty, however, that has allowed Russia to keep SS-19s on combat duty.
Russia's RT-23UTTH or SS-24 rail missile systems were subject to elimination under the START-II. However, following the demise of START-II, after the US backed out, Russia has reportedly indicated plans to retain one division of the SS-24 rail mobile missiles. The SS-24 is cold-launched with 10 warheads each with a yield of 550 kilotons.
Russia now has three missile armies and 16 divisions that have a total of 735 ICBMs armed with 3,159 nuclear warheads, according to Russian media reports.
On October 9, 2003, Putin said that Russia "retains the right to launch a preemptive strike, if this practice continues to be used around the world." Defense Minister Ivanov said Moscow can use preventive military force in cases where a threat is growing and is "visible, clear, and unavoidable". Ivanov added a key detail, saying that military force can be used if there is an attempt to limit Russia's access to regions that are essential to its survival.
Russia also indicated it would act to defend regions beyond its own borders, encompassing large parts of the former Soviet Union, now the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Defense Minister Ivanov has said that, in case of "instability in the CIS" or a "direct threat" to Russian citizens, Russia can "hypothetically" use force if other means of coercion, like diplomatic and economic sanctions, fail.
In a practical demonstration of this approach, Moscow held naval maneuvers in the inland Caspian Sea August 8-15, 2002. Although Russia presented the war games as an important measure to safeguard regional stability, some littoral states remained wary. The coastal Caspian states were shown that Moscow retains the growing ability to order its fleet without notice into theirs waters.
However, East Asia has not disappeared from the radar screens of Russia's emerging doctrines of preemption. In July 2003, Russian media have been speculating about possible military involvement in North Korea should another war erupt. "Russia's best response to a possible nuclear conflict on the Korean peninsula would be a preemptive missile strike against North Korean nuclear facilities, carried out by the Russian Pacific Fleet," said an editorial in Izvestia. It quoted Pacific Fleet sources as saying the nuclear facilities could be destroyed using cruise missiles launched from a Russian cruiser.
Meanwhile, Russian officials have pledged that the country's doctrine differs from the American doctrine. Under no circumstances would Russia be the first to strike with nuclear weapons, according to Defense Minister Ivanov. Nonetheless, the West became concerned about the "Ivanov doctrine", in which the minister warns that Russia will be forced to change its nuclear strategy if NATO continued its "offensive" doctrine. Therefore, circumstantial evidence indicates that Russia is attempting to draft its own preemption concept.
The notion of preemption - the use of military and / or covert force to disarm an enemy before it can launch a strike of its own - has resurfaced since President Bush declared it a viable approach to the war on terrorism. Only the US has recently made use of first-strike military action, or "preemption", against emerging threats abroad - an explicit part of its foreign policy - in Iraq.
Russia now seems to follow the US' lead and reserve the same preemption rights. What remains to be seen is whether proliferation or the escalation of preemption could eventually ensue.
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Russia trains 600 Iranian nuclear experts
Thursday February 19, 2004
News International, Pakistan
http://jang.com.pk/thenews/feb2004-daily/19-02-2004/main/main9.htm
MOSCOW: Russia has trained 600 Iranian experts to work on its first nuclear power station, which Washington fears is being used to develop atomic weapons, the ITAR-TASS news agency reported on Wednesday.
An Iranian nuclear official told the agency that the experts had undergone training at the Novovoronezh Centre in Russia, which is to prepare some 700 specialists for work in the Bushehr plant. Russia faced intense pressure from the United States over helping Iran in construction of the Bushehr reactor.
The US fears that Iran could use fuel from the reactor for a programme for developing nuclear weapons. Washington has, however, toned down its criticism in the past several months.
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Hair-Trigger Planet
Old nukes don't die. They just sit around and wait to be launched.
by Alexander Zaitchik,
February 19, 2004
NY Press
http://www.nypress.com/17/7/news&columns/feature.cfm
When the U.S.S.R. collapsed, American public interest in nuclear weapons disappeared under the rubble. People boxed up their fears and hauled them down to the basements of their souls like some hideous secret, never to be looked upon again. Thirteen years later, we're still willful strangers to thermonuclear dread, carrying on as if the nuclear stockpiles amassed during the Cold War had all been converted into solar panels and parakeet swings under Boris Yeltsin's kindly gaze.
Of course, they weren't. Most of those warheads are still live, still scattered under prairies, under seas, on roving flatbed trucks, ready to launch at a moment's notice. Right now, thousands of them are aimed at you, your family and your favorite television and sports personalities.
Against a backdrop of nuclear proliferation, both Russia and the U.S. continue to maintain and refine their own arsenals. They are also lowering the thresholds for their use. As Washington pushes forward with missile defense and a bonus round of NATO expansion, Russian generals are bristling, while Russia's command and control system continues to deteriorate, increasing the chance that misjudgment, error or sabotage could trigger a missile launch against, say, New York City, which is still targeted for a couple hundred megatons. According to those analysts who never took their eyes off the nuclear threat, the danger of a missile exchange between U.S. and Russia is actually greater today than during the more stable periods of the Cold War.
Last week, Russia held a wide-ranging exercise simulating a nuclear war with America. Old Soviet Tu-160 strategic bombers launched cruise missiles over the North Atlantic and ICBMs were tested over Russia's far northern region. Military satellites were launched under simulation battlefield conditions, and Russia's beleaguered early warning system was put through the ringer.
Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, first deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian military, told reporters in Moscow that the military exercise reflected Russian concerns over U.S. plans to research and develop new classes of nuclear weapons, including so-called "bunker busters."
"The [U.S. is] trying to make nuclear weapons an instrument of solving military tasks [and] lower the threshold of nuclear weapons use," Baluyevsky said. "Shouldn't we react to that?"
Days before the exercise, Russian defense minister Sergei Ivanov had a testy exchange with Senator John McCain at NATO's annual security conference in Munich. The two clashed over Moscow's "meddling" in the Baltics, Ukraine and the Caucuses. McCain charged neo-imperialism; Ivanov reiterated Russia's right to secure its "near abroad."
It is an argument that is just getting started. As the two nuclear superpowers vie for influence and oil routes, U.S.-Russian tensions will rise. In a sign of the changing times, nostalgic Cold Warrior William Safire blurted out in his Feb. 9 syndicated column something that has rarely been said in polite company since 1989: that the central mission of NATO is still to "contain the Russian bear."
The clash at the Munich conference was certainly a chilling moment for those unenthusiastic about another Cold War. But it was far from the first such moment since the dismantling of the Berlin Wall. In fact, the entire post-Cold War period could be accurately described as one long series of huge, underreported chilling moments, during which the threat of nuclear war has persisted and grown amid public apathy and ignorance.
Call it the dirty little open secret of nuclear planning: Neither Russia nor the U.S. ever stopped viewing preparation for war against the other as the central organizing principle of its nuclear policy. February's extensive war game wasn't Russia's first such drill since the end of the Cold War, and the U.S. military performs similar drills annually.
Driving the Russian side of U.S.-Russian nuclear politics is the General Staff. The Russian General Staff is made up of officers from the various branches of the military, including the Strategic Rocket Forces. It is the generator and keeper of Russian nuclear policy. These senior generals, who maintain de facto independent control over the country's nuclear weapons, are proud, tough bastards who came of age during the heyday of Soviet military prestige. It is said that Gorbachev just barely prevented some of them from launching an invasion of Eastern Europe to prevent the collapse of the Warsaw Pact. Even now, many remain deeply bitter about the dissolution of the U.S.S.R., which deprived Russia of the eastern buffer it acquired in World War II, when the Red Army beat back and crushed the Nazi Wehrmacht at the cost of 20 million lives.
The memory of Hitler's June 1941 invasion lives deep in the General Staff's collective military mind, fueling a determination that Russia will never again be taken by surprise. This determination is today reinforced by Russian weakness and what these generals perceive as the growing NATO "threat." Faced with economic ruin and the collapse of the conventional military, they have concentrated attention and resources on the world's second-greatest deterrent: Russia's remaining massive nuclear arsenal.
American military planners are naturally unnerved by the continued existence of this arsenal, and lingering mutual suspicions have led both sides to maintain their nuclear forces on a constant alert, launch-on-warning footing. This means that American and Russian rocket-mounted nuclear weapons remain armed, fueled, loaded and kept at hair-trigger readiness 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
The dangers of keeping nuclear forces on a high-alert, launch-on-warning footing were real enough during the Cold War, when U.S. and Russian command and control systems were reliable and followed a strict line of authority. This is no longer the case. Not only do Russian generals today have the power to launch Russian missiles independent of their political masters, Russia's ability to accurately detect incoming missiles has eroded badly since the early 90s, adding to Russian insecurity and increasing the likelihood that confusing radar data could lead to a nuclear launch order.
The most famous example of this danger occurred on Jan. 25, 1995, when Norway launched a weather research rocket to explore the Northern Lights phenomenon. When Russia's radars picked up the missile trajectory, it seemed to have been fired from a U.S. submarine in the Norwegian Sea-long suspected by the Russians as a likely first move in a U.S. surprise attack. Russian nuclear forces scrambled into position and bunker commanders inserted their launch keys, awaiting the order to turn them. Yeltsin, reportedly fuming drunk at the time, opened his nuclear briefcase and consulted with the frenzied General Staff. With their nerves screaming, together they watched the missile trajectory slowly turn away from any conceivable Russian target. When the crisis finally ended, they had less than two minutes to make a decision. (U.S. submarine-launched missiles can reach Moscow in 10 minutes.)
The Norwegian government had warned the Russian embassy in Oslo in advance about the test, but the information never made it to the Russian General Staff. As described by former CIA analyst Peter Vincent Pry in his book War Scare, it was "a clerical error" that brought the world closer to nuclear war than at any time since October 1962.
This is only one of the instances that we know about.
According to Bruce Blair, a former U.S. nuclear launch commander and current president of the Center for Defense Information in Washington, blips that could be mistaken for incoming missiles appear on Russian (and U.S.) radar screens every day. Says Blair: "Everything from peaceful satellites to space shuttles to wildfires present possibly confusing information for early warning systems."
Of the technology that makes up Russia's early warning system, an estimated 60 percent is past its service life. Most worrisome of all, Russia's global radar coverage-think of the "big board" in Dr. Strangelove-has deteriorated to the point where it is only fully operational between eight and 16 hours per day, leaving enormous holes in Russia's view of what is happening in its air space and over U.S. missile silos.
During the Norwegian crisis, the knowledge that no ICBMs had been launched from U.S. silos helped the Russians keep somewhat cool. Had the Russians been "blind," as they often are, they might have assumed that they were about to get slammed by a full strike. In another possible scenario, terrorists detonate a nuclear weapon on Russian soil during a period of radar blindness. Decision-makers, unable to trace the blast's origin, would likely assume it was a hostile missile strike.
Recognizing the gravity of this threat, Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin in 1998 announced plans to build a Joint U.S.-Russia Data Exchange Center. The project snagged on NATO's 1999 war in Kosovo, and today remains held up by the Pentagon's insistence that its radar data be filtered through U.S. Strategic Command before going to Moscow. As last reported by the Washington Post in 2001, the unfinished facility "sits empty and unrenovated in a leafy residential neighborhood in Moscow...serv[ing] mostly as a clandestine hangout for young beer drinkers."
The failure of the Joint Data Exchange Center has left experts on both sides shaking their heads. "This initiative is of the utmost importance," says Valery Yarynich, a retired colonel formerly with Russia's Strategic Rocket Forces.
"No serious technical problem [stands in the way] of coordinating data exchange," he says. "Any level of such cooperation would be useful in preventing accidental missile launches. The [Joint Data] initiative is being held up at present only because of mutual distrust between [the U.S. and Russia] in the nuclear area, in spite of repeated declarations about friendship, understanding, etc."
A more recent attempt to help Russia shore up its early warning system, the Russian American Observation Satellite Program (RAMOS), has also stalled. The plan originally called for the U.S. and Russia to develop its own observation satellite to be launched into low earth orbit. Each country would then be responsible for constructing a ground control station that would receive shared satellite data. After numerous fits and starts, the project now appears dead, as it's widely expected to be denied funding in President Bush's 2005 budget. Further dimming its prospects, a U.S.-Russian meeting scheduled to resolve technical legal issues surrounding RAMOS was abruptly cancelled by the Pentagon earlier this month. Some U.S. analysts point to the same mistrust mentioned by Yarynich.
"Despite President Bush's reminders that Russia is our friend, there is a residual Cold War group still hanging out in the Pentagon," says G. Wayne Glass of the University of Southern California. "The Missile Defense Agency in particular is competing with RAMOS for funding and has a motive for subterfuge. There is enough funding in the current budget to keep [RAMOS] going, but the [Republican] Senate won't fight for anything the White House doesn't include in [future] budgets. It is a lost opportunity."
Meanwhile, America's command and control system has its own problems. The network connecting U.S. launch centers to its Minuteman missiles is still in some cases powered by Eisenhower-era computers. Nor are the U.S. launch systems foolproof. In 1979, a training tape simulating a Russian surprise attack somehow made its way into the real system at the U.S. Strategic Air Command inside Cheyenne Mountain. Luckily, the officer in charge that day suspected the mistake and tracked it down. More recently, according to Bruce Blair, a classified Pentagon study found a back door into a military radio network that could be exploited to transmit phony launch orders.
These are just a few of the lapses and loopholes that have been reported. As U.S. and Russian officials dither about in distrust, the risk of launch by accident, sabotage or radar misreads continues to grow.
The possibility of Russia or the U.S. misinterpreting a situation has led many experts and planners in both countries to push for a policy of "launch-after-attack." This means attack orders would only be given after a nuclear detonation is recorded on the ground and its launch trajectory confirmed beyond doubt.
Another way to reduce the chance of accidental nuclear war is "de-alerting." This would entail taking missiles off a hair-trigger footing and adding steps to the physical launch procedure, thus lengthening the minimum response time to any attack. The argument for doing this rests on the assumption that both sides have enough missiles to absorb a first strike and still guarantee the destruction of the enemy after the facts are in. This would provide an enormous margin of safety against starting a war over a suspicious weather balloon, as well as reduce the risk of accidental or terrorist launch.
But the Pentagon's declaration of its intent to achieve decisive U.S. military advantage-"full spectrum dominance"-over any conceivable adversary does not encourage the kind of thinking that leads to de-alerting and other trust-building measures, in Russia or anywhere else. Quite the opposite. And this is where U.S. policy after the Cold War enters into the picture.
Russian hypersensitivity about U.S. intentions doesn't exist in a vacuum. While the paranoia and bitterness at the highest levels of the Russian military are partly a result of history and disposition, U.S. policy can modulate how this paranoia and bitterness translates into policy.
In 1991, a recently retired member of the General Staff named General Yuriy Kirshin gave a talk in Washington, DC, in which he discussed the dilemma of overwhelming U.S. power in the face of Russian weakness. "The most important thing the U.S. can do to contribute to world peace," he said, "[is] convince the [Russian] General Staff that the U.S. does not want to conquer the world."
Since the end of the Cold War, the dialectic has been clear: Whenever the U.S. flexes its military muscle in breach of international law, announces hegemonic ambitions or presses for strategic advantage, Russia (and, increasingly, China) has responded with sharp rhetoric and a recalibration of its nuclear doctrine. Operation Desert Fox, the bombing of Belgrade, the expansion of NATO eastward, the declaration of America's intent to "own" and weaponize space, the proposed building of a missile defense system and other high-tech weapons that threaten the effectiveness of Russia's nuclear deterrent-all are instances in which U.S. policy after the Cold War has sharpened tensions with Russia and increased the risk of nuclear war.
(Bill Clinton's decision to begin the bombing of Yugoslavia while Russian foreign minister Yevginy Primakov was en route to Washington for emergency talks is a particularly brazen example. The bombing sent the General Staff into a frothing rage and seemed to confirm their worst suspicions. NATO-Russian relations have yet to fully recover from the Kosovo war.)
And on it goes into the future. The Iraq invasion, President Bush's stream of imperial white papers, NATO's imminent "big bang" and plans to develop a new generation of bunker-busting "mini-nukes" have all quickened the pattern in which U.S. policy sweats up the palms of an already nervous and distrustful Russian General Staff, not to mention the rest of the world. Cap it off with the recent announcement that the number of interceptors in the U.S. national missile defense system will be doubled while a new generation of nuclear weapons is pursued, and one is forgiven for wondering if anybody at the Pentagon or the White House has any appreciation of how foreign threat perception can adversely affect U.S. national security.
Despite the growing risk of accidental launch based on bad information and jittery launch commanders, there is in this country no significant public discussion about nuclear policy or the massive arsenals on both sides of the old Cold War divide. Beneath the silence, the nuclear bureaucracy within the Department of Energy continues to be lavishly funded, fueling an inherently innovative system of research and development.
Under the multi-billion-dollar Stockpile Stewardship Program, the U.S. nuclear arsenal is today being upgraded and expanded, keeping government scientists and engineers busy designing new generations and classes of missiles. Plans are being discussed for the weaponization of space and funding is slated for new plutonium "pit" factories in several locations, including Los Alamos, where the hearts of future hydrogen bombs will be constructed. (California senator Dianne Feinstein is leading the battle to delay the appropriation of funds.)
In short, America's nuclear weapons program is back to mid-1980s levels of funding and activity, while public interest is stuck at mid-1990s levels.
At the same time, a political sea change in nuclear thinking has been occurring in Washington, where it was once universally accepted that nuclear weapons were horrible things and that disarmament was a noble, if distant, goal. This was implicit in our signing of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which paid lip service to the promise of eventual major power disarmament.
No more. For today's right wing, there is no such thing as a bad weapon-there are only bad countries. This thinking is represented starkly in American threats to use nukes against non-nuclear enemies, as stated in 2002's official Nuclear Posture Review.
Even if the current administration can restrain itself from acting on this new philosophy, such thinking could already be percolating down through the defense establishment. At a conference last month sponsored by the Nuclear Policy Research Institute, General Charles Horner of the U.S. Air Force warned of "a danger of creating a generation in the military that sees nuclear weapons as an acceptable form of warfare."
That the nuclear firewall is being lowered even before it is breached is evident in Russia's evolving nuclear doctrine as well. The Russians have made it clear that they now reserve the right to use nuclear weapons even in the face of conventional threats. This is a post-Cold War development for both countries.
In the realm of bilateral arms control, Bush and Putin share a common lack of interest. The only treaty on nuclear arms they have signed so far is the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty (SORT), a convention with no verification provisions that does not require the destruction of a single warhead or weapon. It simply states that by Dec. 31, 2012, neither side will deploy more than 2200 strategic nuclear warheads. If even five percent of this number were exchanged, it would mean the total destruction of both countries.
The Bush administration's disdain for meaningful arms control measures even spreads into a lack of concern for securing Russia's nuclear materials from sabotage and theft, a crucial component of any honestly fought "war on terror." The Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, created to help the countries of the former U.S.S.R. guard and destroy nuclear materials, is viewed by the White House and the Republican majority in Congress as just another liberal foreign aid program; its funding was slashed in the 2003 budget. Former senator Sam Nunn, one of the program's creators, is currently out raising his own private funds to implement the program.
Any Democrat that replaces Bush in 2004 will have his hands full just rolling back the minute hand on the nuclear clock to where it stood in 2000. Pushing it back further will be a more difficult project still, but that doing so is an urgent and front burner task there can be no doubt. In averting nuclear disaster after the Cold War, we've all been very lucky. But the thing about luck is, it eventually runs out.
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Russians Fail for Second Day in Missile Test
February 19, 2004
New York Times
By STEVEN LEE MYERS
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/international/europe/19RUSS.html
MOSCOW, Feb. 18 - President Vladimir V. Putin oversaw one of Russia's largest strategic military exercises in years for a second day on Wednesday, and, for a second day, something went wrong.
An intercontinental ballistic missile fired from the nuclear submarine Karelia in the Barents Sea veered wildly off course 98 seconds after the launching and self-destructed, a navy spokesman, Capt. Igor V. Dygalo, said. The cause of the malfunction, he said, would be investigated.
The missile was supposed to have crossed the Arctic and landed in a missile range in Kamchatka in the far eastern region, but instead exploded in the upper atmosphere over the Barents.
On Tuesday, two missiles from the submarine Novomoskovsk in the Barents also failed to launch - for reasons that are still in dispute - as Mr. Putin watched from the deck of another submarine.
Officials had described the planned launchings on Tuesday as a centerpiece of the exercises, which involved Russia's strategic nuclear forces. On Tuesday, Adm. Vladimir I. Kuroyedov denied initial reports that the missiles had malfunctioned.
He said that the missile tests had always been planned as simulations, not as live fire exercises. But Kommersant and Izvestia both reported Wednesday that the launchings were aborted because of a malfunction in one of the missiles. Both newspapers reported that the navy was trying to cover up an embarrassing failure.
Mr. Putin's visit to the exercises - much publicized and intensely covered by state television - came three and a half weeks before the presidential election on March 14 and appeared intended to highlight his role as the commander-in-chief of a revived Russian military.
Pavel Felgenhauer, a military analyst and journalist, said the glitches in the exercises reflected the aging of Russia's ballistic missiles, many of them nearly 30 years old.
"With such old missiles, mishaps do happen," he said. "They have happened before. This time the P.R. surrounding the president and the presidential campaign meant more attention was paid. They demonstrated quite the opposite of what the Kremlin wanted."
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Missile Self-Destructs During Russian Military Exercises
By Peter Baker
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A20
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52744-2004Feb18.html
MOSCOW, Feb. 18 -- A ballistic missile launched during strategic exercises designed to showcase Russian military power suddenly veered off course Wednesday and self-destructed in midair. It was Russia's second missile mishap in as many days.
The RSM-54 missile deviated from its assigned trajectory 98 seconds after it was fired from a nuclear submarine, the Karelia, in the Barents Sea, triggering its self-destruct mechanism, Russian officials said. The missile broke apart high in the atmosphere, and fragments burned up during reentry or fell into the water, the officials said.
The botched test launch came a day after a nuclear submarine failed to fire two ballistic missiles while President Vladimir Putin watched from the bridge of another submarine. The breakdowns, just four weeks before the March 14 presidential election, undermined Putin's attempt to reassert Russian international influence and instead highlighted the problems plaguing the post-Soviet armed forces.
"I'm worried about that," retired Gen. Vladimir Dvorkin, director of the Strategic Nuclear Forces Center at Russia's Academy of Military Sciences, said in an interview after the second failure. "Our navy is not prepared enough." Crews aboard nuclear submarines rarely go to sea because of a lack of funds, he said, which "doesn't allow these teams to learn the necessary skills."
Retired Adm. Eduard Baltin said the problems pointed to the urgency of appointing more officers to the military's top command who understand the needs of Russia's strategic nuclear forces. "The personnel structure of the general staff needs to be changed," he said.
Neither Putin nor state-run television mentioned the problems Wednesday. Putin, wearing a green camouflage uniform, spent the day at the new cosmodrome at Plesetsk in northern Russia watching the launch of a Molniya-M booster rocket carrying a satellite into orbit and, via television hookup, the launch of an RS-18 ballistic missile from Russia's leased Baikonur facility in Kazakhstan.
At a news conference afterward, Putin promised to provide "the newest technological systems" to Russian strategic missile forces. "These systems are able to destroy intercontinental targets, moving with supersonic speed and great accuracy and with high maneuverability," he said in televised remarks.
In a single oblique reference to the failed tests, Putin said the military exercises had shown pluses and minuses. "We shall draw conclusions from the minuses," he said.
After the failure Tuesday, the navy denied that a launch had actually been scheduled, calling the event a "virtual launch." This contradicted statements by military officials in previous days. In compliance with treaty obligations, Russia had also notified the United States that there would be a launch, according to a Western official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
However, Russian officials acknowledged Wednesday's test failure and told Russian media that it could have resulted from a guidance system that malfunctioned after sitting too long in storage.
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Russia Says New Missile Will Beat Any U.S. Defenses
February 19, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-russia-missile-shield.html
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia has developed ballistic missile technology that can outwit any defensive system, a top Russian general said on Thursday, in a clear challenge to the United States' planned $50 billion anti-missile shield.
The declaration came a day after President Vladimir Putin, eyeing nationalist votes for elections next month, promised to equip his armed forces with a new generation of long-range weapons matching those of the United States.
First Deputy Chief of Staff Colonel-General Yury Baluyevsky said that during large-scale military exercises on Wednesday, Russia had test-launched a missile system that could maneuver in mid-flight, allowing it to dodge defenses.
``The test carried out yesterday confirmed that we can build weapons which will render any anti-missile system defenseless against an attack by Russia's strategic forces,'' he told a news conference.
``It's part of our unilateral response to the creation or future creation of a missile defense system by any state or bloc of states,'' he said.
Moscow and Washington agreed not to develop large-scale missile defenses in the Cold War, but President Bush pulled out of the treaty in 2002, saying the United States had to ward off threats from terrorists and ``rogue states.''
Washington appeared unperturbed by the Russian missile test.
``I don't think it has any impact on U.S.-Russian relations. They've got to design a missile force that they think is sufficient for deterrence, just like we do,'' Air Force General Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters in Washington.
MISSILE SETBACKS
Baluyevsky said Russia was not opposed to missile shields and reiterated remarks by President Putin, who said on Wednesday that Russia was not too worried about the U.S. plan and cooperation between the two countries was good.
Russia's maneuvers have not gone entirely smoothly over the last week.
A Russian ballistic missile self-destructed after a failed test launch from a submarine in the Arctic north on Wednesday. On Tuesday, two ballistic missiles failed to take off in a test on another nuclear submarine.
The U.S. defensive shield remains in its early stages.
The initial system, being built by Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin and Orbital Sciences, is designed only to protect against a limited attack.
Critics of the U.S. effort, budgeted at $50 billion over the next five years, worry it could trigger an international arms race to overwhelm anti-missile defenses. They also say it faces an impossible task, likened to ``hitting a bullet with a bullet.''
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency said last month the system being built would be able to defend all 50 states against a limited ballistic missile attack by the end of 2004.
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Russia Tests Anti - Missile Defense Device
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Russia-Star-Wars.html
MOSCOW (AP) -- Russia successfully tested a space vehicle that could lead to weapons capable of penetrating missile defenses, a senior general said Thursday. He insisted the device was not meant to counter U.S. efforts to develop an anti-missile shield.
Analysts said the device may be part of a campaign to bolster Russia's global clout and burnish President Vladimir Putin's image ahead of March elections he is expected to win. It could also be an effort to restore prestige to the country's military, which has suffered near collapse since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Col.-Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, first deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces, gave few details about the device tested Wednesday, but said it was a hypersonic vehicle -- one that moves at more than five times the speed of sound -- that could maneuver in orbit.
A weapon based on the craft could use that maneuverability to dodge missile defense systems, he said.
``The flying vehicle changed both altitude and direction of its flight,'' Baluyevsky said at a news conference. ``During the experiment conducted yesterday, we have proven that it's possible to develop weapons that would make any missile defense useless.''
The Russian news Web site www.gazeta.ru, citing unnamed General Staff officials, said the vehicle was a warhead with engines that would direct it as it approached a target, rather than going into free fall.
Phil Coyle, a senior adviser to the Washington-based Center for Defense Information, said Russia had been working on such a system for years and ``it would not be surprising if they finally succeeded.''
Baluyevsky's statement followed Putin's claims a day earlier that Russia could build unrivaled new strategic weapons. Putin made the statements during military exercises that were described as the largest in more than 20 years.
Russia's announcement comes after Washington withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 to develop a missile shield. After fervently protesting the plans, Russia was quiet when the United States abandoned the treaty, though U.S.-Russian relations have soured again lately.
Putin said that the weapons development wasn't directed against the United States, and Baluyevsky reaffirmed the statement.
``The experiment conducted by us mustn't be interpreted as a warning to the Americans not to build their missile defense because we designed this thing,'' Baluyevsky told The Associated Press. ``We have demonstrated our capability, but we have no intention to build this craft tomorrow.''
The United States reacted calmly to the Russian plans.
``If you're in that business -- intercontinental ballistic missiles and warheads -- you want them to be survivable, and maneuverability is one way to increase their survivability against any potential defenses,'' Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said when asked about the statements Putin made Wednesday.
``They've got to design a missile force that they think is sufficient for deterrence, just like we do.''
The Russian military's widely reported troubles -- including severe funding shortages, low morale, poor conditions for servicemen and the Kursk nuclear submarine disaster of 2000 -- have undermined Putin's push for Russia to reassert itself as a military power. Underscoring that, the exercises were marred this week by two failed missile launches from nuclear submarines.
Alexei Arbatov, an expert on Russian military programs, said that boasting about future weapons was part of the Kremlin's efforts to bolster Russia's global clout and Putin's popularity at home.
``Putin has sought to make an impression on both domestic and global public and show that Russia has some major new projects in its fold,'' Arbatov told The Associated Press.
Alexander Pikayev, an independent military analyst, said Putin was catering to the military and nationalists ahead of the March 14 presidential election.
Baluyevsky also said that Russia was developing a new, submarine-based ballistic missile and a new nuclear submarine equipped to carry it that would enter service this decade. And he said the military was developing a new ground-based missile.
Russia had informed the United States about its intention to conduct the experiment and U.S. officials didn't complain, he said.
Baluyevsky refused to comment on what kind of engine the vehicle had, how long its flight lasted, how exactly it maneuvered and what combat load it may carry in the future. He said that it had been designed by Russian companies, but refused to name them.
As part of the current exercises, the military on Wednesday launched a Molniya-M booster rocket with a Kosmos military satellite and two ballistic missiles -- a Topol and an RS-18.
It wasn't clear which of the rockets carried the new vehicle into orbit.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
Groups challenge budget request for N-tests
By Christopher Smith
February 19, 2004
Salt Lake Tribune
http://www.sltrib.com/2004/Feb/02192004/utah/140296.asp
WASHINGTON -- Nuclear arms control groups are challenging the Bush administration's argument for spending more money in 2005 to get the Nevada Test Site primed for resumption of nuclear weapons testing.
The Department of Energy's new budget recommendation submitted to Congress calls for a $200 million increase in federal spending on "stockpile stewardship," the program to maintain and refurbish America's arsenal of nuclear weapons and certify the reliability of the warheads and missiles.
Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said that as the weapons age during the current moratorium on nuclear testing, scientists have a "phenomenally complicated" job certifying they will work effectively.
"If someday in the future it were determined that we had an uncertainty, it would take us a minimum of three years to conduct a test to determine whether or not the stockpile was reliable," Abraham said in a budget briefing with reporters this month. "That is too long."
The $6.5 billion budget request for DOE's nuclear weapons programs in 2005 is a 5.4 percent increase over the current year and includes funding to ensure the Nevada Test Site could execute an underground nuclear weapons test within 18 months upon orders by the president.
But arms control researchers and activists say the three-year time frame is a gross exaggeration by DOE.
"The idea that it would take us three years to field a test is ludicrous and stupid," said Chris Paine, senior nuclear weapons analyst with the Natural Resources Defense Council. "If we wanted to do a stockpile confidence test, it would take a matter of weeks. This is just a pretext to step up the capabilities to resume an arms race."
According to DOE's 2005 budget documents, the Nevada Test Site would receive a 14 percent increase in its "science campaign," with some of the money improving test readiness by "maintaining critical personnel, equipment and infrastructure." With the funding, DOE says the Nevada proving ground would be in an 18-month readiness posture by September 2005.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
-------- nevada
Nuke Expert Says Yucca Mountain Unsafe
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Yucca-Mountain-Critic.html
RENO, Nev. (AP) -- The nation's nuclear waste dump proposed for Nevada is poorly designed and could leak highly radioactive waste, a scientist who recently resigned from a federal panel of experts on Yucca Mountain told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Paul Craig, a physicist and engineering professor at the University of California-Davis, said he quit the panel last month so he could speak more freely about the waste dump's dangers.
Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is planned to begin receiving waste in 2010. Some 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste at commercial and military sites in 39 states would be stored in metal canisters underground in tunnels.
``The science is very clear,'' Craig told the AP in an interview before his first public speech about the Energy Department's design for the canisters.
``If we get high-temperature liquids, the metal would corrode and that would eventually lead to leakage of nuclear waste,'' Craig said.
``Therefore, it is a bad design. And that is very, very bad news for the Department of Energy because they are committed to that design,'' he said.
Craig, who was appointed to the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board by President Clinton in 1997, spoke to about 100 people later Wednesday night at a community forum in Reno sponsored by the Sierra Club.
``I would never say Yucca Mountain won't work. What I would say is the design they have won't work,'' he said Wednesday night. He said he's convinced the Energy Department will have to postpone the project and adopt a different design.
``It would require years of delay and my guess is that is what is going to happen. The bad science is so clear they will be unable to ignore it forever,'' Craig told the AP.
The 11-member technical review board outlined its concerns about the potential for corrosion in a report to the Energy Department in November about the metal for the canisters, called Alloy-22 -- ``an upscale version of stainless steel,'' Craig said.
It was the most important report the board has produced since Congress created the panel in 1987, he said, but largely has been ignored by Congress and the department.
``The report says in ordinary English that under the conditions proposed by the Department of Energy, the canisters will leak,'' Craig said. ``It was signed by every single member of the board so there would be no confusion.''
Energy Department spokesman Allen Benson defended the design plans for the repository and the metal in the storage casks.
``We stand by our work,'' he said Wednesday in Las Vegas. He said the department was preparing a formal response to the board's November report. He had no further comment.
In Washington, D.C., officials with the industry's Nuclear Energy Institute did not immediately return telephone calls seeking comment.
The board's report in November said the government had failed to take into account ``deliquescence'' -- a phenomenon regarding the reaction of salt to moisture -- in its plans to operate the dump at temperatures well above boiling water, or about 200 degrees.
At those temperatures, the metal canisters would heat up, causing salts in the surrounding ground to liquefy, thus leading to corrosion, Craig said.
``It turns out the metals which look like they act pretty good at temperature levels below boiling water -- those same metals act badly with temperatures that could exist'' at Yucca Mountain, he said.
Craig, who also has served as a member of National Academy of Sciences National Research Council Board on Radioactive Waste Management, said he sent his resignation letter to the White House in January before his term was to expire in April so he could shine more light on the government's plans.
``When you serve as a member of one of those boards, you cannot talk about the political consequences of the science or the big picture. You are supposed to stick to the science and you should stick to the science,'' Craig said.
``You cannot have the kind of conversation we are having now if I was still on the board.''
--------
Concerns About Yucca Mt. Leaks Echoed
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 19, 2004
RENO, Nev. (AP) -- New data the past year substantiate decade-old concerns an independent U.S. panel of scientists have raised about potential leaks at a proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, the board's top administrator said Thursday.
The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board documented the new evidence of potential dangers in a report to the Energy Department in November and is still waiting for DOE's formal response, said William Barnard, the board's executive director.
Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is planned to begin receiving waste in 2010. Some 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste at commercial and military sites in 39 states would be stored in metal canisters underground in tunnels.
Barnard's comments come in support of criticism leveled Wednesday by Paul Craig, a University of California-Davis scientist who said he quit the panel last month so he could speak more freely about problems with DOE's design for Yucca Mountain, especially the potential for high-temperature waste to corrode steel waste canisters.
``The board always has had concerns about the uncertainty at these high temperatures and now that the data is coming it, it looks like there is a problem,'' Barnard told The Associated Press.
``Those concerns date all the way back to the early 1990s,'' Barnard said.
In the past year, data have been gathered indicating a good possibility of corrosion on most of the canisters during the first 2,000 or 3,000 years of the repository's life ``where temperatures are up in the 160 to 180 degree Centigrade range,'' he said.
Craig told the AP on Wednesday that the November report ``says in ordinary English that under the conditions proposed by the Department of Energy, the canisters will leak.''
The Energy Department is still preparing a response to the board's report in November. DOE spokesman Allen Benson said from Las Vegas on Wednesday that the agency stands by its design but had no further comment.
Margaret Chu, director of DOE's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management, said in a letter to the board on Dec. 17 she was concerned about the board's conclusions.
``Our analyses do not suggest such results and I do not believe that the data presented in the board's report support such strongly stated conclusions,'' she said.
Barnard said from board headquarters in Arlington, Va., that Craig is raising ``valid concerns.''
``How you interpret those, the information and what it means for the overall program, is the Department of Energy's decision. The board is waiting for a response,'' he said.
Craig, who was appointed to the board by President Clinton in 1997, ``no longer speaks for the board,'' but remains a respected scientist with a record of accurately portraying the board's work, Barnard said.
``He may be on a mission, but he certainly is not a disgruntled board member,'' Barnard said.
Industry leaders said there's still much disagreement over whether the design must be altered.
``The board's view, among the scientific community, is a minority,'' said Rod McCullum, senior project manager for waste management at the Nuclear Energy Institute in Washington, D.C.
The institute has no position on Yucca Mountain's design but does not believe the licensing application should be delayed regardless of whether corrosion concerns prompt revisions, he said Thursday.
``Even if the board is correct about this corrosion mechanism, the answer would not be that the repository would have to be delayed. If a concern comes up in the licensing process, it gets modified,'' he said.
On the Net:
Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board: http://www.nwtrb.gov
Yucca Mountain project: http://www.ymp.gov/
Nuclear Regulatory Commission: http://www.nrc.gov/
Nevada's Agency for Nuclear Projects: http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste
-------- us politics
Bush Plays Bait-and-Switch With 9/11 Panel
February 19, 2004
Newsday
http://www.newsday.com/news/columnists/ny-vpcoc193677317feb19,0,5083103.column?coll=ny-news-columnists
Let us finally put to rest a widely circulated and grossly inaccurate story that's been making the rounds: Rumors of President George W. Bush's cooperation with the panel probing the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, are unsubstantiated.
Unlike those Internet rumors that pop to electronic life and die quickly without fingerprints, this one is traceable directly to the con artist-in-chief. The world thinks Bush is cooperating with the 9/11 commission because he says he is.
"We have given extraordinary cooperation" the president told NBC's Tim Russert in his Sunday Meet the Press chat. "I want the truth to be known."
The truth?
"I've experienced two political bait-and-switches since I've been on the commission," said Bob Kerrey, the former Nebraska senator and current president of the New School University in New York. And that's only about a month. "The bait-and-switch in politics is a technique that is intentionally designed to lead the public (to believe) that you're going to do something that you're not going to do."
The latest subterfuge involves the president's agreement to be interviewed by the 9/11 commission, as its chairmen, former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean and former Indiana Congressman Lee Hamilton, requested. The White House announced with some fanfare that well, certainly, the president would oblige. Then the backtrack began.
Administration officials said any interview would be done in private. What's more, the president would not submit to questions from the full bipartisan panel, only from selected commissioners. Which ones? Only his damage-controllers know for sure.
Erin Healy, a White House spokeswoman, refused to answer "yes" or "no" when asked to state whether the president wants to limit the commissioners who would be allowed to question him. "Those details are being worked out," she said.
Ah, the details.
Negotiated "details" have constricted the commission's access to the president's daily brief - a digest of intelligence for the commander-in-chief. Previous probes of 9/11 already have revealed that, in the months before the terrorists struck, the intelligence community screamed loudly about a planned attack meant to inflict mass casualties. Bush bragged in his NBC interview about giving the commission access to these briefings.
In fact, the full commission hasn't seen them.
The White House negotiated a convoluted agreement under which a handful of panel representatives were allowed to see the briefs and take notes. Then it tried to block these few from sharing their notes with other panelists. Finally - after the commission contemplated a subpoena of its own members' notes - a 17-page summary of the briefings, edited by the White House, went to all commissioners.
The summary, according to two commission sources, raises more questions for Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser. Still more could be put to former Federal Aviation Administration chief Jane Garvey and to Sandy Berger, national security adviser to former President Bill Clinton.
"When somebody stands up and says 'well, there's nothing in those PDBs,' that's not true," Kerrey said. Well, that's just about what Rice said publicly when the existence of a key briefing from Aug. 6, 2001, came to light.
Never mind. The public won't hear from Rice because her interview with the commission was private. And the panel is running out of time to complete work before its May deadline.
In one of those heralded announcements of cooperation, the White House has said it's willing to give the panel two months more. Curiously, neither the House nor the Senate - both controlled by the president's party and heretofore happy to oblige Bush - has rushed to take the action needed to extend the panel's life.
Does the president understand the dimension of failure that 9/11 represents? It shook his presidency and changed its course. He has led the nation to two wars to avenge the attacks and, he says, prevent another.
Still he obstructs the full and fair accounting that the people are due. This must be counted as another failure of 9/11. It is an indignity to history that is, somehow, imposed without shame.
----
President's Science Policy Questioned
Scientists Worry That Any Politics Will Compromise Their Credibility
By Guy Gugliotta and Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A02
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53137-2004Feb18.html
In two independent reports released yesterday, groups of prestigious scientists raised concerns about the role of politics in the formulation of Bush administration science policy and urged greater oversight by independent organizations.
A National Research Council report praised the administration for its revised climate-change research plan, but it questioned whether new initiatives would receive adequate funding and warned that participation of political appointees in the program could cause it "to be influenced by political considerations."
"Having high-level administration officials in management is a double-edged sword," Anthony C. Janetos, an NRC committee member and senior fellow at the Washington-based H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics and the Environment, said in a telephone news conference. "It's positive because scientists are talking to people that make decisions and create funding, but it creates a challenge in maintaining scientific independence and credibility."
That was precisely the concern raised by 60 leading scientists and former federal agency heads who released a statement yesterday accusing the Bush administration of systematically suppressing and distorting scientific information to further its political goals. The statement's signers -- and an accompanying report compiled by the Union of Concerned Scientists, a Washington-based advocacy group -- claim that politicization of science by the administration has seriously undermined the integrity of the nation's research enterprise and has misled the public about the implications of recent policy decisions.
"Across a broad range of issues, the administration has undermined the quality of the scientific advisory system and the morale of the government's outstanding scientific personnel," said UCS Chairman Kurt Gottfried, an emeritus professor of physics at Cornell University. "Whether the issue is lead paint, clean air or climate change, this behavior has serious consequences for all Americans," Gottfried said.
The statement -- whose signatories include 12 Nobel laureates, 11 winners of the National Medal of Science, three recipients of the prestigious Crafoord Prize, the heads of some of the country's leading universities and biomedical research institutes, and two former presidential science advisers -- calls for congressional hearings to look into the issue and a renewed administration commitment to public access to objective scientific information.
In a hastily called telephone news conference yesterday afternoon, John H. Marburger III, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, addressed the claims of politicization made by the scientists and sought to minimize the document as being more political than scientific.
That so many prestigious scientists seem to feel that politics is trumping science in this administration, he said, is not evidence that the claim is true, but is "evidence that we are not communicating with them as well as we should on these issues."
He referred to the Union of Concerned Scientists report's 37 pages of examples -- including incidents in which administration officials changed Web sites, revised or eliminated wording in reports, or altered the makeup of advisory committees in ways that appeared to bolster political priorities -- as "a collection of more or less disconnected cases."
Asked whether he would raise the issue with the president at their next meeting, Marburger said he did not expect to.
The two reports refocused attention on the administration's science policy, frequently criticized by environmentalists and other advocacy groups for being overly beholden to its political supporters:
"Across the board there is an attempt to muzzle and silence scientists who disagree with either the administration's ideological agenda or the agenda of its corporate constituents," said Philip E. Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust.
But the National Research Council, a branch of the independent National Academies of Science, acknowledged in the introductory pages of its report, "Implementing Climate and Global Change Research," that the final strategic plan for the administration's 10-year U.S. Climate Change Science Program has "set a high standard" that could "effectively guide research on climate and associated global changes over the next decades."
The report praised program directors for including new agenda items, such as the effects of climate change on ecosystems and humans, but expressed concern that these endeavors would lack funding.
"If you have a program that is adding substantial new components and not eliminating some other components, it either requires a higher level of funding or [a change in] prioritization," said Yale University industrial ecologist Thomas E. Graedel, chairman of the NRC study committee, during the news conference.
Assistant Commerce Secretary James R. Mahoney, director of the program, agreed that the newer programs needed more money, and suggested officials could achieve this by reallocating existing funds: "We need to keep alert to those areas where the goals have been achieved and where we should be refocusing money," Mahoney said.
Mahoney said he "may well accept the suggestion" that the program install an outside review board to mitigate political influence. He noted, however, that "we are already committed to having the National Academies of Science do things for us on a repeated basis."
----
Kerry letters supported man who made illegal campaign donations: press
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219155128.4wj5vfj2.html
Democratic presidential front-runner John Kerry sent 28 letters on behalf of a California defense contractor who recently pleaded guilty to making illegal campaign donations to the Massachusetts senator and other US lawmakers, the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday.
Kerry wrote the letters between 1996 and 1999 for defense contractor Parthasarathi "Bob" Majumder who was seeking federal funds to build a guided missile system for US warplanes.
Kerry was one of several lawmakers who participated in a letter-writing campaign to free up federal funds for Majumder's firm, Science and Applied Technology Inc.
During the 1990's the company was paid more than 150 million dollars to design and develop the guided missile system. But after the program ran into obstacles at the Pentagon, Kerry sent letters in support of the company to fellow members of Congress, as well as to the Department of Defense.
At the same time, the Los Angeles Times reported, Majumder and his employees were donating money to the senator, citing court records.
During the three-year period, Kerry received some 25,000 dollars from Majumder and his employees the daily wrote, citing Dwight L. Morris and Associates, a firm which which tracks campaign donations.
Last week Majumder, 52, an India-born US citizen pleaded guilty to two counts of illegal campaign contributions, punishable by up to six years in prison.
The revelation is a blow to Kerry, who has presented himself as a politician who is not beholden to campaign contributors and special interests.
"It obviously raises questions about whether the campaign contributions bought action from Kerry," said Steven Weiss, communications director of the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks campaign finance issues, in a comment to the Times.
"It also poses a situation that all elected officials face: raising questions about what effect, if any, campaign contributions have on the actions of lawmakers," Weiss said.
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
Taliban Try to Frighten Afghan Voters in Rural Areas
February 19, 2004
By CARLOTTA GALL
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/international/asia/19AFGH.html
KABUL, Afghanistan, Feb. 18 - After a relatively dormant winter, Taliban insurgents are waging a violent campaign in the countryside to frighten people from cooperating with the American-backed government and from taking part in elections scheduled for the summer.
In Zormat, a district in southeastern Afghanistan, the police recently detained three men carrying Taliban leaflets warning people not to register for the vote, a process being overseen by the United Nations that is months behind schedule.
"You should not take an election registration card," the leaflets read, according to the local deputy police chief, Zazai Kamran. "If anyone does, his life will be in danger." The leaflets also call on people to fight against the government.
The leaflets were discovered three weeks ago, and the three men were handed over to the American forces based there. But the message continues to circulate.
Similar warnings have been going around the southern provinces of Kandahar and Helmand, residents say. The campaign has been accompanied by a series of bombings and suicide attacks in Kandahar and Kabul since November.
"People want to register for elections, but they are scared," said Rahmuddin, security chief of the Kandahar office of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission. Like many Afghans, he uses one name.
The United Nations, which began getting voter roles together in December, has registered only 1 million of an estimated 10.5 million eligible voters, half of what it had planned by this time.
Registration of women is proving especially problematic. They are only 23 percent of those registered, a reflection of the insecurity in the country, but also of a deeply traditional culture in which many women never leave the home.
Only one registration office has opened in southern Afghanistan, in Kandahar, and it has registered barely 45,000 people. A second office, for women, opened this week, but no other southern province has even started registrations.
President Hamid Karzai's mandate as leader of the transitional government ends in June, and under an agreement sponsored by the United Nations, national elections should be held to elect a new leader by then.
American and United Nations officials said they were trying to keep to that timetable, to build on the success of the new Constitution adopted in January, and to cement the fragile progress in the country.
The newly appointed United Nations special representative to Afghanistan, Jean Arnault, said Wednesday that since the constitutional assembly, he had detected a new momentum among the population to take part in the political process. "Something has happened," he said. "We now have a process of social mobilization."
But the pattern of violence, not only from the Taliban and Al Qaeda, but also from warlords who maintain well-armed militias, is such that United Nations officials acknowledge that the elections may miss their June target date.
A number of government and foreign officials voiced doubts that elections could or should go ahead this year. Even if they did, large parts of the country might be excluded, which would jeopardize the legitimacy of the vote, they warned.
"I am concerned about the nonregistration of large numbers in the country, and the people's feeling that these are not free elections," said Sarah Chayes, coordinator of Afghans for Civil Society, a nonprofit organization in Kandahar.
The United Nations plans to open 4,200 registration offices around the country in May for three weeks, and then to begin polling two weeks later. But without greater progress in combating the Taliban, officials fear, offices in the south and southeast could present potential targets.
American military commanders have been meeting with the Afghan government and United Nations officials in Kabul in recent weeks on how to tackle the security problems.
Efforts to build a new national army and police force are moving painfully slowly. They are so far behind schedule that the United States military announced a stopgap measure to train an Afghan guard force of 2,000 to 5,000 men to bolster security.
The Afghan National Army this week sent three battalions to the provinces to help with disarmament and to inhibit activities by the Taliban and Al Qaeda, a spokesman, Maj. Muhammad Arif Anas, said.
In addition, diplomats in Kabul said this week that NATO countries would send extra peacekeeping troops during the voter registration and polling. Some are optimistic that the elections, even if flawed, will go according to plan.
"Even if some districts or provinces do not hold elections," a diplomat said, "the overall result could be accepted as broadly representative, especially if Mr. Karzai emerges as a clear winner."
-------- africa
Army Attacks Rebels in Northern Uganda
Thu Feb 19, 2004
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=515&ncid=721&e=9&u=/ap/20040219/ap_on_re_af/uganda_fighting
KAMPALA, Uganda - Government soldiers backed by helicopter gunships attacked a group of rebels in a remote village in northern Uganda, killing 36 insurgents, an army spokesman said Thursday.
The attack occurred Wednesday in Ngora, about 242 miles north of Kampala, after the army pursued a group of rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army who had raided a nearby camp for displaced people, said Lt. Chris Magezi.
Besides killing 36 rebels, the army also rescued 22 children who had been abducted, Magezi said.
It was not possible to independently verify the information. The rebels, who rarely make contact with the outside world, could not be reached for comment.
"These rebels had attacked a nearby camp for displaced people. We followed them. It was simply good battle planning and we first encircled the enemy and pinned them down and we destroyed them using ground forces and helicopters," Magezi said by telephone from the region.
He said no government forces were killed in the fighting.
Led by Joseph Kony, who claims to have spiritual powers, the Lord's Resistance Army is a shadowy organization that has been fighting President Yoweri Museveni, a southerner, since he came to power in 1986 after a five-year bush war.
The rebels have wreaked havoc across northern and northeastern Uganda, forcing an estimated 1 million people to flee their homes. The group replenishes its ranks with children it abducts to use as fighters, porters or concubines.
----
Firefights near Guinea-Bissau's border with Senegal have ended: general
LISBON (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219160907.exvhg2h0.html
Guinea-Bissau's army chief of staff said Thursday border clashes with presumed separatist guerrillas from Senegal's southern Casamance region had ended, the Lusa news agency reported.
General Verissimo Correia Seabra confirmed to the agency four Guinea-Bissau soldiers were killed, and 14 were injured, in the fighting which ended on Wednesday, nine days after it began.
He added the suspected rebels had suffered a "huge" number of casualties which had not yet been tallied.
Seabra said the border region with Senegal was now "clear" and the "armed bandits" linked to the Casamance Democratic Forces Movement (MFDC) had returned to their bases in the south of Senegal.
Officials in the former Portuguese colony had previously denied reports that troops from the country had either been killed or injured in the border firefights.
When asked why the government had remained silent on the conflict, Seabra said "we thought all of this was insignificant."
MFDC separatist rebels, who are fighting Senegal for their region's independence, have often sought refuge in neighbouring Guinea-Bissau.
Casamance, once a former tourist hotspot, has been plagued by low-intensity conflict between rebels and government forces since 1982.
The largely Christian and animist region is nearly cut off from the rest of mostly Muslim Senegal by Gambia.
-------- arms
60 Minutes Assesses Patriot Missile Defense,
Featuring Philip E. Coyle, III, CDI Senior Advisor
Center for Defense Information
February 19, 2004
http://cdi.org/program/document.cfm?DocumentID=2079&StartRow=1&ListRow
This Sunday, CBS' 60 Minutes is running a piece analyzing the Patriot missile defense program's performance in Iraq last year. This controversial system is claimed by the military to have engaged nine Iraqi ballistic missiles. While this still is to be determined, what is certain is that the Patriot shot down two friendly aircraft, killing one American and two British pilots.
CDI Senior Advisor Philip E. Coyle, III was interviewed for the piece and will be featured on 60 Minutes this Sunday, February 22nd. He explains that the system had been struggling with serious technological problems prior to being fielded in Iraq.
Tune into 60 Minutes this Sunday to see Phil and hear a CDI expert on this controversial subject.
For more information on the Patriot weapon system or missile defense in general, please visit CDI's missile defense website at www.cdi.org/news/missile-defense/.
----
The Patriot Flawed?
Feb. 19, 2004
(CBS)
(see 60 Minutes broadcast re friendly fire and mis-identifying planes since 1991 2/22/04)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/19/60minutes/main601241.shtml
"It's clear that the failure to correct some of the problems we've known about for 10, 12 years led to...fliers dying needlessly." Joseph Cirincione
In the Pentagon's multi-billion dollar arsenal of weapons, one weapon the government has already spent more than $6 billion on has not only had trouble doing what it was designed to do --bring down enemy missiles -- it also does something it was not designed to do.
That weapon is the Patriot missile system. And the thing it's not supposed to do is bring down friendly aircraft.
The Patriot was originally built nearly 40 years ago to shoot down aircraft. But just before the 1991 Gulf War, its manufacturer, Raytheon, modified the Patriot to shoot down tactical ballistic missiles.
When the U.S. and its allies invaded Iraq again last year, the U.S. Army deployed Patriot crews across the battlefield. And it wasn't long before those crews knew they had a problem. Correspondent Ed Bradley reports. On March 23, a British Tornado fighter jet with two men aboard took off from Kuwait. It was the third day of the war, and there was no Iraqi opposition flying.
Their flight should have gone off without a hitch, according to retired Air Vice Marshall Tony Mason, who is advising a British Parliamentary inquiry into what happened next: "They had fulfilled their mission and they were returning without weapons back to base."
Mason says the aircraft was in friendly airspace when it was destroyed by a Patriot missile.
The explosion lit up the sky over Kuwait and killed the two airmen aboard the Tornado. The next morning, soldiers recovered their bodies, and what was left of their plane. U.S. Army commanders explained the Patriot had mistaken the Tornado for an enemy missile, and said the cause might be a computer "glitch."
"If the system is confusing missiles with planes, that is just not just a minor glitch," says Mason. "The two are so different, that it's difficult really to imagine a system could do that."
But the Patriot isn't like most weapons systems: it's almost completely automatic. Its radar tracks airborne objects. Its computer identifies those objects, and then displays them as symbols on a screen. And if the Patriot displays the symbol for an incoming ballistic missile, its operator has just seconds to decide whether to override the machine, or let it fire.
But Patriot computers were doing some strange things in this war, as reporter Robert Riggs from the Dallas station KTVT was surprised to learn when he was embedded with Patriot batteries.
"This was like a bad science fiction movie in which the computer starts creating false targets. And you have the operators of the system wondering is this a figment of a computer's imagination or is this real," says Riggs.
"They were seeing what were called spurious targets that were identified as incoming tactical ballistic missiles. Sometimes, they didn't exist at all in time and space. Other times, they were identifying friendly U.S. aircraft as incoming TBMs."
And it wasn't only Riggs' battery that had this problem. A U.S. Army report says "various Patriot locations throughout the theater" were identifying "spurious TBMs" -- tactical ballistic missiles that didn't exist.
Usually, the Patriot computers corrected these mistakes on their own. But sometimes they didn't.
"We were in one of the command posts. And I walked in and all the operators and officers are focused intently on their screens. And so you know something's going on here," says Riggs. "And suddenly the door flies open, and a Raytheon tech representative runs in and says, 'Don't shoot! Don't shoot!' Well, that got our attention real quick." On March 25, a U.S. Air Force pilot flying an F-16 fighter jet got a signal that he was being targeted by radar he believed was coming from an enemy missile system. He fired one of his own missiles in self-defense and hit the system that was tracking him -- not an enemy, but the Patriot battery where Riggs was reporting.
"Suddenly, my whole field of vision is just-becomes white light. We all thought we were under Iraqi mortar attack," says Riggs. "We had no idea this is the good guys shooting at us."
"There was no way that Patriot system should have still been up and running, targeting aircraft. They should have stood down, knowing that they had a fatal problem on their hands," says former Congressional investigator Joseph Cirincione.
Cirincione says the Army has known the Patriot had serious problems since at least 1991, when Congress appointed him to lead an investigation of the Patriot's performance in the first Gulf War, a performance that had looked spectacular on network news programs.
"I saw the pictures. I thought this is amazing. This system is exceeding expectations," says Cirincione. "And all during the war, that's what I thought. This was what all the newscasters said it was -- a Scud buster, a miracle weapon."
And it wasn't just newscasters who said so. This is what President George Bush had to say when he visited Raytheon headquarters during the First Gulf War: "The Patriot works because of Patriots like you, and I came again to say thank you to each and every one of you!"
"A lot of money started flowing into the Patriot right after the Gulf War, because everybody thought it was a success," says Cirincione.
But it turns out, that wasn't true. Almost none of the Patriots had worked. Some of them had failed to hit the incoming Scuds. Some had shot at missiles that didn't even exist. But most of them still exploded in the sky, leading everyone to believe they'd scored a kill, when in fact they hadn't.
"The best evidence that we found supports between two and four intercepts out of 44," says Cirincione. "About a 10 percent success rate."
Cirincione said the Army responded angrily to his findings: "The Army insisted that they knew they had some problems with the Patriot, but it didn't serve any purpose to make these public. We would just be aiding the enemy. And that they would take care of it in the course of normal product improvement."
But why would the Army do this? Why is this system so important to them that they would ignore evidence presented by a committee sent by the Congress to investigate it?
"The Patriot is a multi-billion dollar system. There's a lotta money involved. There's a lotta careers involved," says Cirincione, who says the Army continued to claim that the Patriot was a success after he presented them with his findings.
And they kept claiming success until 2001, when the Pentagon finally admitted the Patriot hadn't worked in the First Gulf War. By then, the Patriot had an even more disturbing problem. On the test range, it kept targeting friendly planes. And the man who oversaw those tests from 1994 to 2001 was former Assistant Secretary of Defense Phillip Coyle.
The tests, according to Coyle, included pilots flying real planes and soldiers operating the Patriot missile system. And Coyle says that if they had been using real missiles, they would have shot down friendly planes. Pentagon, Army and Raytheon officials all declined to talk with 60 Minutes on camera, but a 1996 Pentagon report said the Patriot had "very high 'fratricide' levels" in the early '90s. In other words, in tests it often tried to shoot down friendly planes.
And the military has since confirmed news reports that Patriots with simulated missiles had problems with "friendly fire...in exercises in 1997, 2000, and 2002" -- including one instance when a Patriot with simulated missiles would have, if its missiles had been real, "shot down an entire four-ship formation of F-16's."
Would the people who ran the Patriot system have been aware that there were problems in misidentifying planes?
"They certainly should have been. I believe they were. But the focus was on hitting a target. Other issues, such as friendly fire, didn't get the same -- either spending, or priority, as the first priority of hitting a target," says Coyle.
Cirincione says that's not surprising: "There's a tendency in all our weapons systems to try to play up the good news and get it through its performance evaluations, and then try to fix the problems later on."
Even if it threatens American and coalition lives?
"Well, they never think of it that way. They think that it's a problem with the system that they can fix down the line," says Cirincione. But they didn't fix it. Yet, when the U.S. declared war on Iraq last spring, U.S. Army commanders said the Patriot was ready for combat.
"What's so disheartening about this is the very things we warned about came to pass in this war," adds Cirincione. "It's clear that the failure to correct some of the problems that we've known about for 10, 12 years led to soldiers dying needlessly. To flyers, dying needlessly."
On April 2, U.S. Navy Pilot Lt. Nathan White took on his 14th mission of the war. It had been 11 days since the Patriot had shot down a British Tornado fighter jet, and nine days since it had threatened an F-16.
Lt. White took off from the deck of the U.S.S. Kitty Hawk into skies being scanned by Patriots. Navy officials told his father, Dennis White, what happened that night.
"They had finished their mission and had climbed out and were flying back to the Kitty Hawk," says White.
Lt. White's mission was finished and he was on the way home when a Patriot system, on the ground below, identified his plane as an enemy missile and fired two missiles.
"He radioed the lead that he saw them. And as he turned he said they're tracking," recalls White. "He turned. They turned. They followed him ... They told me it was probably within four seconds when it was all over with."
It was a direct hit. Lt. White's body was recovered 10 days later.
The Patriot had 12 engagements in this war -- three of them with our own planes. Since then, U.S. military commanders have often claimed the Patriot hit "nine for nine" of the enemy missiles it targeted. But they still haven't produced a report explaining the incidents of friendly fire.
"You don't get promoted for reporting bad news," says Cirincione. "What that means is people turn aside -- and I mean just about everybody in the program will turn aside from the bad news in order to keep the program going, keep the appearance of success."
This year alone, the Pentagon will spend more than a billion dollars on the Patriot program. And Raytheon is selling more and more Patriots to countries in Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.
----
Stealth fighter plane may get makeover
Washington Times
Around the Nation,
February 19, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/national/aroundnation.htm
HOLLOMAN AIR FORCE BASE - The F-117A fighter jet, the radar-eluding stealth plane known for its angular design and charcoal black color, may be getting a makeover in a new shade of gray.
The U.S. Air Force has painted one of its stealth fighters at Holloman Air Force Base in Alamogordo, to see if the plane called the Nighthawk might be harder to spot when it flies during daylight hours in a color other than black.
"Obviously, if you can see it less during the day, you can fly it more," said Col. Jim Carter, vice commander of the 53rd Wing at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, which is overseeing the test.
The $45 million fighter plane first rolled off the assembly lines about 20 years ago and is painted a sleek black.
----
MiniSAR Will Aid Reconnaissance And Precision-Guided Weapons
SAR is changing the way the battlefield is seen
Feb 19, 2004
Space Daily
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/radar-04d.html
Albuquerque - Within a year the National Nuclear Security Administration's Sandia National Laboratories will be flying the smallest synthetic aperture radar (SAR) ever to be used for reconnaissance on near-model-airplane-sized unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and eventually on precision-guided weapons and space applications.
Weighing less than 30 pounds, the miniSAR will be one-fourth the weight and one-tenth the volume of its predecessors currently flying on larger UAVs such as the General Atomics' Predator. It is the latest design produced by Sandia based on more than 20 years of related research and development.
The new miniSAR will have the same capabilities as its larger cousins. Like the larger class of Sandia SARs, it will be able to take high-resolution (four-inch) images through weather, at night, and in dust storms.
The only difference will be range. The larger SAR can produce an image in the 35 kilometer range due to its larger antenna and higher transmitter power, compared to the miniSAR, which is expected to get a range of about 15 kilometers - more than adequate for small UAV applications. SARs are commonly used for military reconnaissance purposes.
MiniSAR is a revolutionary step forward in this long tradition that will open up a whole new class of applications, says George Sloan, Sandia project lead for miniSAR development.
Sloan and fellow Sandia researchers Dale Dubbert and Armin Doerry created the current approach for miniaturized SARs years ago. The effort incorporated a number of key technologies, including mechanical design, digital miniaturization, RF miniaturization, and navigation expertise.
Last November, after the gimbal and electronics teams got the miniSAR down to its diminutive 30 pounds, they introduced it at a UAV conference. Since then, more than 30 potential customers, including intelligence agencies, UAV manufacturers, and major radar vendors, have visited Sandia to discuss possible licensing and use of the miniSAR.
The new miniSAR consists of two major subsystems: the Antenna Gimbal Assembly (AGA) - the pointing system that consists of the antenna, gimbal, and transmitter - and the Radar Electronics Assembly (REA) - the signal generator, receiver, and processors. The AGA beams the radio frequency, and receives it back. The REA is the electronics package that generates the radar signals, controls the system, processes the data, and transforms it into an image.
Through the creation of new ultra-lightweight antennas and miniaturization of the gimbal, the miniSAR team was able to reduce the AGA portion from 60 pounds, as in current UAV systems, to 18 pounds. Through novel adaptation of state-of-the-art digital and RF technologies, the REA was reduced from about 60 pounds to 8.
Future versions of miniSAR are planned that will shrink the total weight to less than 10 pounds by leveraging both in-development and yet-to-be developed Sandia microsystems technologies.
The miniSAR will have two primary applications. It will be used for reconnaissance on small UAVs, such as the AAI Corp. Shadow. This class of small UAVs can carry a payload of 50 pounds, which is considerably less than existing radars can carry. Thus, current small UAVs are limited to carrying video or infrared cameras. A 30-pound miniSAR will allow the small UAVs to carry additional sensors that together will provide a very detailed reconnaissance picture.
The second application is for precision-guided weapons. Current guidance systems for these weapons rely on target designation methods that are subject to jamming and have trouble operating in bad weather and dust storms. MinSAR is resistant to these problems. Previously SAR versions were too big, too heavy, and too expensive to use in precision-guidance applications.
"We look forward to making the miniSAR small, light, and affordable," Sloan says. He says the researchers are now very close to having a miniSAR compatible with the small UAV requirements for cost, size, and weight. They are "a little farther away" for precision-guided weapons, but are on the path to making it possible.
Sloan says the miniSAR is near to being flight-tested. The principal remaining tasks include the integration of the radar subsystems and the completion of the system software. Then the first version of miniSAR will be ready to go.
Sloan anticipates that in about a year the miniSAR will be flight-tested on a Sandia test-bed aircraft. Then UAV vendors will demonstrate it on their own UAVs. The transfer of the technology to industry will follow.
But even as all this happens, the Sandia researchers will continue to make improvements and help miniSAR evolve into something even better and smaller. "We fully expect miniSAR to be the next big splash," Sloan says.
SPACEWAR Northrop Grumman-Led Team to Compete For Space Based Radar Program Redondo Beach - Feb 11, 2004
Northrop Grumman has assembled a best-of-industry team to develop the Space Based Radar (SBR) system. SBR is a transformational program designed to bring global, persistent surveillance to military and intelligence community users. The system will be an integral component of the nation's future integrated intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) network.
-------- asia
Japan's 'Fortress of Solitude' in Iraq - plus karaoke
By J Sean Curtin
Feb 19, 2004
http://atimes.com/atimes/Japan/FB19Dh05.html
It's been almost a month since Japanese troops went to the southern Iraqi city of Samawah on a humanitarian mission that is taking place in a dangerous country where guerrillas target troops allied with the United States. So far so good for Japan, despite a couple of mortars fired downtown - although fortunately not at Japanese troops. Yet, in order to protect them, Japan will confine many soldiers to one of the most high-tech and expensive military camps ever constructed, one that includes a karaoke bar, massage parlor and gymnasium. Some of the facilities and gadgets in the ultra-advanced base will rival those used by the fictional hero Superman in his futuristic hideout, the Fortress of Solitude.
It may well be one of the most formidable military camps planet Earth has ever seen. And those given to hyperbole might say Iraq will not have witnessed the erection of such an extraordinary structure since King Nebuchadnezzar II began building the biblical Tower of Babel in what is now Babylon.
About 120 Japanese troops are already in Iraq, staying with Dutch troops, but the total could eventually reach 1,000 ground, marine and air defense forces. About 550 ground troops will live in the fortress - complete with moat, barricades, winding access roads, radar, sensing devices and other security "amenities" - far away from the town that has been relatively quiet, so far. In addition, Japan is sending about 300 maritime forces and 150 air defense forces.
For a staunchly pacifist nation, the deployment of Japan's Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF) in war-torn Iraq is a potentially traumatic experience. It is the first time since World War II that the country's military has been on what is considered by many to be an active battlefield and public opinion is deeply divided. If there are major troop casualties, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's administration might fall. In an apparent response to domestic tensions, military policy has been focused on ensuring that Japanese troops are kept out of harm's way. And, in hopes of buying good will and protection, Japan is spreading around large quantities of yen for the construction of schools, hospitals, roads and other infrastructure projects in Iraq - as well as providing jobs to a population desperate and jobless.
The government's strategy is to place Japanese troops inside their barracks cocoon - but the term "barracks" hardly begins to describe the heavily fortified and guarded walls of their isolated luxury compound. Many of its soldiers will not be allowed to venture beyond the perimeter of the base. Prime Minister Koizumi is banking on the construction of an ultra-secure fortress to drastically decrease the chances of any casualties and ease some of the political pressure on his administration.
Very slight increase in public approval
Koizumi recently has been under fire domestically for the failure of the US and Britain to find any Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Despite this growing problem, the prime minister can draw some comfort from a slight increase in support for his deployment policy.
Prior to the dispatch, the majority of people were opposed to sending the Self-Defense Forces to Iraq, but since the troops have actually arrived in the country, opinion has been much more evenly divided. This shift has been reflected in several recent national opinion surveys. A poll taken by Nihon Hoso Kyokai (NHK) for February showed 46 percent in favor of the dispatch and 47 percent opposed, while the respective figures in the same poll in January were 42 percent and 51 percent. The Kyodo News survey for February gave a similar result, with 48.3 percent saying they support the dispatch while 45.1 percent said they were against it. The previous month's figures were 42.8 percent and 51.6 percent respectively, again, illustrating a shift. All mainstream media polls, however, show public opinion as roughly divided.
Under such circumstances, the prime minister is carefully calibrating his Iraq policy. The overarching objective of Koizumi's military strategy is to protect his troops at all costs; everything else, including the much-trumpeted humanitarian mission, is of secondary importance.
The primary task of the contingent of Japanese soldiers already deployed in Iraq, augmenting advance troops, is to construct the super-fort that will house up to 550 men. The ultra-modern base is being built on a muddy site about 10 kilometers outside Samawah. The isolated location was chosen in order to make the camp less vulnerable to attacks by suicide bombers and other insurgents. Many locals have been hired as construction workers and special machinery has been transported from Japan to help build the super-fort, which will cover about 2.5 square kilometers.
Once the foundations are finished, a one-meter-wide, two-meter-deep trench will be dug out around the camp to create a moat, which will be framed by barbed wire. This area will also be fitted with a special radar system for detecting ground movement in the vicinity, in hopes of minimizing the risks from mortar and artillery attacks. A concrete barrier will be erected around the inner circumference of the moat and car-stopping concrete blocks will be placed at intervals along roads near the camp to deter car bombs. The roads will also be constructed along non-linear paths in order to further minimize the risk of suicide car bomb attacks, in which bombers usually drive straight toward a target. Utilizing a feature of Superman's and other modern impregnable retreats, the camp will only have one massively fortified entrance, monitored by infrared surveillance cameras and high-tech security sensors.
All the comforts of home - karaoke, massage, Internet
Inside the protective web of electronics and concrete, Japanese troops will live comfortably in pre-fabricated buildings that will include a high-tech gymnasium, karaoke bar, massage parlor, state-of-the-art audiovisual facilities, computer and Internet rooms, a well-stocked Japanese library and the latest satellite and telecommunications equipment for daily contact with families back in Japan. Japanese troops will not suffer the language difficulties that befell the builders of Babel - inside their gleaming prefabricated towers only Japanese will be spoken.
Further, the government says off-duty Japanese troops will not be allowed to go into Samawah because of the risk of terrorist attacks. As a result, many troops will probably spend their entire tour of duty inside the heavily fortified compound. Although precise military details have not been released, the media has quoted government sources as saying that between 30 percent to 40 percent of the troops will be assigned to security duties related to guarding the camp. And any deterioration of public order in Samawah could mean that more troops would be assigned to security, more than 50 percent, thus severely curtailing troops' humanitarian work.
Until now order largely has been maintained. Although just last last week two mortars were fired into downtown Samawah, breaking a few windows, and on Tuesday a bomb damaged a video shop. No one was injured in either attack, and compared with the horrific series of suicide attacks in Iraq this month, the attacks in Samawah were insignificant. In Japan, however, these minor incidents dominated the media and Japanese military officials promised to review security measures. Koizumi has emphasized on several occasions that if the troops come under any form of attack, they will immediately retreat and temporarily suspend operations. Presumably, if real trouble flares up in Samawah, Japanese troops will barricade themselves inside their remote high-tech fortress.
In a recent NHK interview, Defense Agency chief Shigeru Ishiba tried to shift attention away from Koizumi's Fortress Japan policy and focus instead on the slight shift in public opinion toward supporting the deployment. He claimed it was a sign that voters were beginning to accept the government's arguments about the need for troop deployment. He also predicted that support for this policy would steadily increase. However, a deeper analysis of the poll data does not back up these claims and underscores the precarious position of the Koizumi administration.
Japanese still doubt rationale for deployment
While there has definitely been an increase in support for the dispatch, the overwhelming majority of Japanese are dissatisfied with the explanation given for sending the troops, which partially explains why the government is carefully keeping them out of harm's way. In the NHK poll for January, 82 percent of respondents stated that Prime Minister Koizumi had provided an insufficient explanation for dispatching the troops. Despite an intensive government campaign, the same February poll revealed that 77 percent of people still remained unconvinced, with just 19 percent of the public believing that Koizumi had offered a sufficient explanation to justify sending troops to Iraq.
Support for the Koizumi cabinet has also dropped in most polls. NHK now puts it at 49 percent while Kyodo News records 48.8 percent. Both surveys register about 41 percent of people as saying they were against the policy-making cabinet. This is an extremely exposed position for Koizumi as it leaves him highly vulnerable to the mounting political fallout arising from American and British failure to find any weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The WMD threat was the primary reason given for launching a pre-emptive strike on Baghdad.
It hasn't happened yet, but if it begins to look as though the Iraq war is threatening regime change in both London and Washington, it will be impossible for Koizumi to avoid the political shock waves - even if no Japanese troops are injured. As such a staunch supporter of the Anglo-American position on a pre-emptive war against Iraq, any rocking of the Bush-Blair boat would destabilize Japan's prime minister. Koizumi's confidence has already been dented by the WMD woes of his American and British counterparts. Last week, he had a tough time responding to questions during a Diet session of a special committee on Iraq reconstruction. He was forced to concede that WMDs may never be found, observing, "So long as the person who has been hiding these weapons refuses to talk, then it may be difficult to locate them."
Koizumi now finds himself in the unenviable position of having his own political fate inextricably linked with those of President Bush, and to a lesser extent, Prime Minister Blair. Recent polls underscore his predicament and mean that the Fortress Japan policy is unlikely to change anytime soon. Koizumi's main hope for political survival is that the current downward swing in Bush's popularity is just a temporary blip and not a long-term trend. If it begins to look like Bush will lose the White House, then Japanese troops are going to have ample time to sample all the wonderful facilities their high-tech desert fortress has to offer.
J Sean Curtin is a GLOCOM fellow at the Tokyo-based Japanese Institute of Global Communications.
-------- biological weapons
Black Death vaccine developed
Fleas transfer the plague from rats to humans UK researchers have made a crucial breakthrough i
Thursday, 19 February, 2004
(BBC)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3502361.stm
In the development of a vaccine against the "Black Death".
The bubonic plague, which killed millions in Europe in the Middle Ages, is now one of the most deadly agents available to terrorists.
Researchers at the Ministry of Defence's Porton Down laboratory say a vaccine could be licensed "within one to two years".
Around 2,500 cases of plague occur naturally each year across the world.
It is caused by the Yersinia pestis bacterium that can infect rodents. It is usually transferred to humans by fleas.
After someone has been infected, symptoms including fever, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and swollen lymph nodes which ooze blood, develop within two to eight days.
If it is untreated, bubonic plague kills around 60% of victims.
A vaccine could be used to protect troops against the dangers of biological warfare, and to protect people living in areas where the plague is rife
Terrorist capability
Porton Down researchers, led by Professor Rick Titball, recently carried out safety tests of the vaccine in humans.
They showed the vaccine produced no side-effects, meaning larger scale trials can go ahead.
A spokeswoman for Porton Down said: "This is a crucial stage, in that we have had one successful step to show the safety of the vaccine. Now we can move onto larger scale trials."
Professor Titball and his team identified two harmless proteins on the surface of plague bacteria which were capable of triggering an immune response against the disease.
He said work on a vaccine was even more significant now, as international terrorist organisations such as al-Qaeda could try to use non-conventional forms of attack, such as chemical or biological weapons.
Professor Titball warned a terrorist with a degree in microbiology would be capable of constructing a device using plague bacteria.
He said it was "one of the bio-terror agents about which we are most concerned."
Scientists at Porton Down have been working on a vaccine for bubonic plague since the 1991 Gulf War, when it emerged that Iraq had been developing stocks of chemical and biological weapons including plague, anthrax and botulinum toxin.
Troops fighting in the 2003 Gulf War were given a vaccine against anthrax.
Other scientists around the world are also working to develop a plague vaccine.
But Professor Titball said: "The Americans are very keen on our programme because we are well in advance of any other research projects developing a vaccine elsewhere in the world."
-------- business
Recruiting Uncle Sam
The Military Uses a Revolving Door to Defense Jobs
By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page E01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52789-2004Feb18?language=printer
George K. Muellner spent more than 30 years in the Air Force, rising eventually to the position of deputy acquisition chief. Now he's the senior vice president of Air Force Systems for Boeing Co.'s defense unit. E.C. "Pete" Aldridge, the Pentagon's chief weapons buyer, resigned in May 2003 and joined the board of the nation's largest defense contractor, Lockheed Martin Corp., a month later.
General Dynamics Corp. got a prized recruit in David Heebner, who was hired in 2000 after more than 30 years in the military, most recently as the Army's assistant vice chief of staff. The company was so pleased to have snagged a member of the top brass that it announced Heebner's hiring a month before his official retirement.
Earlier this month, General Dynamics, which counts the Army among its largest customers, reeled in another veteran: John M. "Jack" Keane, who was named to the company's board. Keane spent 37 years in the Army before retiring as the vice chief of staff.
The career moves of these military veterans created barely a ripple in Washington. Traffic between the Pentagon and the nation's big defense contractors has been busy for as long as anyone can remember. Not until someone gets stuck in the revolving door -- as an Air Force official recently did -- does the debate about its propriety heat up again.
Boeing hired Darleen A. Druyun, the deputy acquisition chief for the Air Force, in January 2003 and then fired her in November for allegedly holding job talks while she was still supervising Boeing contracts. Her role at the Air Force included weighing the government's lease and purchase of Boeing tanker jets potentially worth $17 billion to $18 billion. Boeing also fired its chief financial officer for allegedly concealing the improper discussions and violating its hiring policies.
The Druyun case has put the revolving door under its sharpest scrutiny in years.
Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld has ordered an examination of the Pentagon's rules on post-government employment for senior officials to ensure they are stringent enough -- and that they are being followed. At least two congressional hearings on the hiring practices of defense contractors are expected this year.
The General Accounting Office has formed a team to conduct a broad study of the operation of the revolving door throughout the government and industry. At the same time, the White House has ordered federal agencies to stop issuing waivers that permit presidential appointees to negotiate jobs with private companies while they still make decisions on issues important to their potential employers. The White House must now approve all such waivers.
The rules that allow Pentagon officials to accept defense industry jobs are complex and vary depending on seniority and position. Before government officials can begin negotiating jobs in the private sector, they must recuse themselves from making decisions that could have a financial impact on their potential employers. Also, officials who take jobs with contractors are prohibited from representing those companies on projects they supervised or worked on while in the government.
But the defense companies are so huge and the rules so elastic that loopholes exist. For instance, in most cases, if a contracting official has awarded a significant deal to a company, the official can't accept compensation from that company for a year after leaving the government. But the official can avoid the restriction by taking a job at an unrelated unit of the same company, industry analysts say. Also, senior government officials who move into the business world are prohibited from lobbying their former agencies for a year, but they can work behind the scenes to help a company develop strategies to pursue federal contracts.
"I was really shocked at how lax the law was," said Sen. Peter Fitzgerald (R-Ill.), chairman of the Governmental Affairs subcommittee on financial management, the budget and international security. "Clearly there is the potential for procurement officers to give contracts to companies and then go cash in by getting lucrative jobs."
Critics want to lengthen the time a Pentagon official must wait before joining a contractor and plug loopholes. They also question whether it's appropriate at all for a Defense Department official to move to a contractor whose projects the official oversaw.
But a host of factors are working against any significant revamping of the revolving door, industry, congressional and watchdog observers say. The defense industry has come to depend on a regular flow of highly experienced government officials into its top ranks. The companies are willing to pay top dollar to recruits who can instruct them in the ways of the Pentagon and help focus their contracting efforts. Pentagon officials often have high-tech knowledge that contractors crave.
"In many cases, individuals with critical technical expertise have gained this unique experience in government positions," said Randy Belote, a spokesman for Los Angeles-based Northrop Grumman Corp. "To dismiss these people from consideration just because they once worked for the government would be doing our customers and shareholders a disservice."
The new hires often have dedicated themselves to public service in the expectation that one day they will be able to turn their expertise into lucrative salaries, said some industry officials. Some industry and government officials worry that an overhaul could diminish the attractiveness of the government work.
"I have met a number of people who really want to serve the public and they go into the government because they want to serve their country," said Stuart Gilman, president of the Ethics Resource Center, a nonprofit group. "But they wouldn't want to do this if they thought they couldn't get a job to support their family when they left the government. To make the post employment rules too restrictive would discourage people from ever coming into government."
Countries such as Russia and Japan that forbid government employees from ever working in the private sector provide rich retirement packages that the employees can tap into at any age, Gilman said.
Congress may find itself unwilling to push the issue too hard because it could raise questions about the movement of its own employees into the private sector, industry officials said. In 2002 Capitol Hill veteran Eric Womble was hired by Northrop Grumman, and Northrop later trumpeted his appointment to the position of vice president of programs, noting that Womble "was instrumental in setting and passing legislation and appropriations that positively impacted the Department of Defense, its service members and families" when he was an assistant for Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.).
President Bill Clinton tried to take on the issue but ultimately backed off. On his first day in office in 1993, he barred senior government officials from lobbying their former colleagues for five years. But in 2000 -- weeks before leaving office -- he lifted the ban, restoring the one-year waiting period. Clinton was pressed to change the rule by former and current employees who complained about the difficulty of getting another job in government after the Republicans won the White House.
The scandal involving Boeing's Druyun has put the revolving door at the top of the agenda for some critics. "In the Boeing case we have seen compelling evidence that there is an incestuous relationship between the defense industry and defense officials that is not good for America," said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee.
Druyun's attorney has declined to comment and Michael M. Sears, Boeing's ousted chief financial officer, has denied any wrongdoing.
Druyun was able to go to work directly after her retirement from the Air Force because she signed on with Boeing's national missile defense unit, instead of the company's air systems business with which she had dealt closely while in the military.
Fitzgerald points to Druyun's example as evidence that the restrictions need revision. "That's such a big exception that it seems to make the general rule meaningless. If the statute doesn't prevent Darleen Druyun from going to Boeing, it doesn't mean anything," he said. "Some could interpret the job offer to her as a payoff for help while at the Air Force."
The current rules are largely remnants of a tightening that began during the 1980s, when the defense industry was hit by a rash of corruption cases. General Dynamics, then the country's largest defense contractor, was suspended by the Navy twice. In one case, the company was accused of slipping country club dues and kennel fees for an executive's dog into overhead costs of a submarine contract. A Justice Department investigation of procurement scandals -- known as Operation Ill Wind -- resulted in more than 60 convictions.
By the end of the decade, Congress had imposed the first comprehensive rules on the revolving door, said Jonathan Etherton, associate vice president of legislative affairs for the Aerospace Industries Association, an industry group. The Procurement Integrity Act went into effect threatening criminal charges for those accused of negotiating private sector jobs while still making decisions that could financially benefit potential employers.
But on the whole the rules were inconsistent and confusing, Etherton said. Under the requirements, the Pentagon was supposed to collect data on the movement of its staff into industry, including salary levels. A 1989 General Accounting Office report found that only 30 percent of former Defense Department personnel were complying with the reporting requirement, and in 1991 the rule expired. Etherton said that even when the Pentagon collected the data it wasn't sure what to do with it.
A longtime rule forbade retired military officers from lobbying the Pentagon on behalf of a private contractor for two years. That rule was repealed in 1996 because it singled out retired military officers while civilian Pentagon employees had to wait only a year, Etherton said.
The revisions to the rules also coincided with a Clinton administration push to streamline government and simplify the procurement process, said Christopher R. Yukins, associate professor of government contract law at George Washington University. The government and the contractors began working more closely together as the government sought to outsource jobs and draw on industry expertise in making procurement decisions, Yukins said. Contractors became partners, creating a symbiotic relationship that further encouraged the movement between government and industry, he said. Meanwhile, a massive defense industry consolidation left fewer choices for retiring workers.
"You don't win contracts by writing great proposals, you win contracts by knowing your customer really well," Yukins said. "That makes the revolving door more attractive to both sides. The reality is if there are only two or three contractors that you can go work for, that has to shade the relationship with the contractor community."
Today, the whittled-down rules and intense industry competition have fed a thriving marketplace for Pentagon officials who can provide contractors with knowledge of the Defense Department's inner workings.
The list of employees transferring to industry is long.
At General Dynamics, half of the board members are retired from the military, including Lester L. Lyles, former commander of the Air Force Materiel Command, who joined the board last year, and Paul G. Kaminski, the Pentagon's chief weapons buyer until 1997.
At Lockheed, the newest board recruits include Joseph Ralston, who retired as commander of NATO's European command last year. Eleanor Spector retired as the Pentagon's director of defense procurement in 2000, a position she held for more than 10 years, and became Lockheed's vice president for contracts.
John A. Lockard, who spent 36 years with the Navy, became a senior vice president of Naval Systems for Boeing Integrated Defense Systems in 2000.
Last month, Arlington-based United Defense Industries Inc. announced that it had appointed Adm. Robert J. Natter to its board; Natter relinquished command of Fleet Forces Command and Atlantic Command in October 2003 after 41 years in the military.
Druyun, whose hiring set off the revolving door's reexamination, was among industry's most highly sought recruits. After more than 30 years in the military, she had a reputation as a hard-nosed negotiator with an unparalleled understanding of the procurement process. In an acknowledgement of her power, Druyun's boss, Marvin R. Sambur, the Air Force acquisition chief, did not replace her when she retired in November 2002.
"I felt that the position had taken on a lot more power than it deserved. I wanted to get more intimately involved in the decision-making process, and that layer of management did not allow me to," Sambur said in a December interview.
Druyun held employment discussions with the industry's four largest contractors -- Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon Co. and Lockheed Martin -- before accepting her position at Boeing. Northrop said it talked with Druyun once but made her no offer. Raytheon said it has no record of employment discussions with her, while Druyun's attorney has said the two sides did have talks.
Sambur said he advised Druyun not to talk with Boeing because she was a chief negotiator with the company on a controversial plan to lease, then buy its refueling tankers, a plan criticized in Congress as too costly. "I felt at the time that it was not a particular company she should pursue because of the highly visible nature of the tanker program," said Sambur, who managed the $1.5 billion defense business of ITT Inc. before being appointed to his position. "When I leave the Air Force I am not going to be working for Boeing, that's for sure. There is no contract activity that has had as much scrutiny."
--------
Price Tag Jumps for Aircraft
Joint Strike Fighter To Be Delayed
By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page E03
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53184-2004Feb18.html
The cost of developing the Joint Strike Fighter aircraft will reach about $40 billion, $7 billion more than estimated, because the Pentagon wants a one-year delay and to refine the design, a senior Navy official said yesterday.
About $5 billion of the increase will cover a one-year delay in the program; an additional $750 million will be set aside for anti-tampering technology, said John J. Young Jr., assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition.
The military has also changed some of the planes' requirements, adding about $155 million to the cost, he said. "It's killing me, to be honest with you, to see this program grow" by this much, Young said.
"I think there is a lot of anxiety here [but] it's based on a program that has very big numbers so any adjustment tends to be very big numbers," Young said. "But the reality is it's a well managed program, it's a well planned program."
The development of the Joint Strike Fighter, also known as the F-35, was budgeted to cost about $33 billion and is in its early stages. Last summer, prime contractor Lockheed Martin Corp. began building the first test model of the plane, which is to be used by the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Navy and Britain's navy. The JSF will replace several existing fighter planes, including the F-16 and some versions of the F-18.
"This is the most complex fighter aircraft ever developed and because of the complexities the maturity of the airframe is not progressing at the rate that we had hoped," said John Smith, a Lockheed spokesman.
The Pentagon is designing three versions of the plane. All are heavier than originally planned. That has not affected expected performance on two of them, Young said. But the third version has been more problematic, he said. "On planes that weigh 30,000 pounds empty, roughly we're missing by 1,300 to 2,300 pounds, not an excessive miss," Young said. "The driving factor in slipping the program one year was that we would like to work the weight down."
The anti-tampering technology is also turning out to be more expensive than Lockheed expected. Lockheed projected the scope of the needed technology at a much lower level than the military does, Young said. If a plane falls into enemy hands "we don't want people to be able to recover hardware and exploit it," he said.
--------
Rules May Be Eased for Iraqi Firms
U.S. Wants to Award More Reconstruction Contracts to Nation's Companies
By Jackie Spinner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page E04
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53172-2004Feb18.html
U.S. authorities are trying to make it easier for Iraqi businesses to compete for reconstruction projects, the official in charge of rebuilding Iraq's private sector said yesterday.
Since there is no insurance market in Iraq and many companies there can't meet strict U.S. bid specifications, some insurance and other requirements may be waived in certain cases, Tom Foley, director of private sector development for the Coalition Provisional Authority, said in an interview at the Pentagon.
Last week the Iraq Governing Council's top representative in Washington criticized the U.S.-led occupation authority for passing over Iraqi firms in awarding billions of dollars worth of reconstruction contracts. Rend Rahim Francke, the U.S.-appointed council's ambassador-designate to the United States, said the CPA had allowed foreign firms to bring in workers from Asia and had broken a pledge to give preferences to Iraqi businesses.
Foley said private Iraqi companies, many of which were ravaged by economic sanctions and Saddam's reliance on state-owned enterprises, would get a substantial portion of the subcontracts awarded in the second round of reconstruction of funding.
"They're not going to qualify as prime contractors," he said. "But the real meat and potatoes will be subcontracts."
He also said the CPA, in coordination with Iraqi ministries, would discourage contractors from importing labor from other countries "by making it difficult for foreign workers to get visas."
"I want Iraqis to get those jobs," Foley said.
U.S. agencies are preparing to award more than $10 million in contracts next month from the $18.6 billion in funding that Congress approved last fall.
Foley said one unresolved issue is to what extent Iraq's state-owned enterprises will be able to compete for contracts.
"The cost structure of the state-owned enterprise is much lower, and state-owned enterprises could considerably underbid the private firms," he said. "It wouldn't be fair."
He also said that a new Iraqi government ultimately will decide which private firms get to compete, based on their involvement with the former regime.
"There aren't really any large companies in Iraq," he said. "The larger ones were nationalized. We're not trying to help any particular company. The Iraqi government, once there is a changeover and sovereignty, will probably decide which businesses earned their money legitimately and which ones didn't."
-------- china
Hong Kong Reminded That China Is in Charge
Beijing Issues Warnings Against Direct Elections
By Edward Cody
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A14
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52717-2004Feb18.html
BEIJING, Feb. 18 -- China's central government has issued a string of increasingly blunt reminders that it retains the final say over how Hong Kong is governed, seeking to douse activists' hopes for rapid accession to full democracy in the former British colony.
The latest warning came Monday in the form of an interview attributed to a senior Chinese official in which he warned that Beijing would be forced to act if the Legislative Council gained a pro-democracy majority in upcoming elections. Wen Wei Po, a newspaper that relays official Chinese views in Hong Kong, said the unnamed official declined to specify whether that meant dissolving the 60-member legislature, leaving the possibility open and reinforcing the gravity of his warning.
"I have a knife," Wen Wei Po quoted him as saying. "Usually it is not used, but now you force me to use this knife."
The warning was interpreted by Hong Kong democracy advocates not as a realistic threat but as part of an escalating campaign to stop their attempt to have the territory's chief executive chosen by direct elections in 2007 and the Legislative Council by a similar vote the following year. Ostensibly a constitutional argument, the struggle has swelled into a broader and sharp-edged debate about Hong Kong's status in the "one country, two systems" arrangement put into place when Britain returned the colony to Chinese rule in 1997.
"At the moment, I can't say one country, two systems is failing, because it is too early to say, but it is extremely worrying," Martin Lee, a legislator and member of the Democracy Party pushing for direct elections, said Wednesday in a telephone interview from Hong Kong.
Aside from the stakes for Hong Kong, the confrontation has been closely watched as a model for what Taiwan might face should it, too, integrate with the mainland. Chinese authorities, who consider the self-governing island as much a part of China as is Hong Kong, have suggested "one country, two systems" could also be a solution for Taiwan.
Mindful of the comparison, Chinese officials have been careful not to say they are against universal, direct elections in Hong Kong, only that the territory's constitutional system does not allow for them as soon as 2007. But since the ambition to stage direct elections gained momentum, they have reasserted in increasingly plain language that they have the power to decide the pace of political reform in Hong Kong as part of what they call "gradual and orderly progress."
In a statement last week issued through the official New China News Agency, government authorities in Beijing recalled the admonition of the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping that Hong Kong must be ruled by "patriots," meaning politicians loyal to the central government. At the same time, again speaking through an official news agency statement, Chinese authorities explained that "one country" is the premise on which "two systems" depends, suggesting Beijing's authority has to come first in any disagreement.
In addition, the statement said autonomy for Hong Kong, promised in the Basic Law negotiated on Britain's departure, meant autonomous government under Beijing's sovereignty. It said the former colony must thus "listen to the views of the central government when studying ways of electing its chief executive and the Legislative Council."
The Chinese statement was issued Saturday night as Hong Kong Chief Secretary Donald Tsang flew back to the territory after two days of consultations in Beijing. In Hong Kong, the statement was seen as a way to make clear to democracy activists and their followers -- even before Tsang landed -- that, for now at least, Beijing will decide how the chief executive and Legislative Council are chosen.
Despite the thickening atmosphere, Ng Hon-man, a Hong Kong deputy in the Beijing government's National People's Congress, said Wednesday that the Wen Wei Po threat did not mean Beijing was likely to resort to dissolving the Legislative Council even if democracy activists push forward with their demand for direct elections.
The current chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, was chosen by an 800-member committee appointed by Beijing. In the current Legislative Council, 24 of the 60 seats were filled by direct elections and the rest by business and professional groups whose leaders often take their cues from Beijing. In this September's legislative elections, the number of seats filled by direct elections is scheduled to rise to 30.
The Basic Law agreed on by Britain and China provided that overall direct elections can begin after 2007, but only if two-thirds of the Hong Kong legislature, the chief executive and the Beijing government agree. So even after next September's elections -- and even assuming democracy advocates win all 30 directly elected seats -- such a two-thirds majority would be difficult to attain.
Since 500,000 people turned out in July to demonstrate against a proposed national security law, however, democracy activists have raised the level of their hopes -- and the government in Beijing the level of its concern. The size of the protest, which surprised officials in Hong Kong and Beijing alike, was interpreted in both cities as an indication of enthusiasm for swift democratic reform and a harbinger of trouble for Beijing and its Hong Kong supporters.
"We know Beijing is paying a very high level of attention to what is happening in Hong Kong," said Christine Loh, a former Legislative Council member and pro-democracy activist. In a telephone interview, she added, "No doubt Beijing is thinking of all sorts of ways to help those people and parties it feels comfortable with."
Special correspondent K.C. Ng in Hong Kong contributed to this report.
--------
Taiwan's Chen Says Ballot Won't Affect Missile Deal
February 19, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-arms-taiwan.html
TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan will press ahead with plans to buy advanced weaponry from the United States even if a referendum on boosting anti-missile capabilities is rejected next month, President Chen Shui-bian said Thursday.
Facing a rapid arms build-up by rival China, Chen said the government would not cancel an arms package offered by President Bush three years ago, the largest for the island in a decade.
``Whether or not this referendum is passed will not affect our ongoing research. Likewise, ongoing arms purchase items listed under existing annual and special budget will go ahead,'' Chen told the local UFO Radio in an interview.
Chen was referring to a proposed T$500 billion ($15 billion) special budget to help buy eight diesel-engine submarines, four Kidd Class destroyers -- second-hand but powerful air-defense vessels -- 12 P-3C Orion submarine-hunting aircraft, and Patriot PAC-3 anti-missile missiles.
Taiwan and China have been military and political foes since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949. Beijing views Taiwan as a breakaway province and has threatened to attack if the island declares independence or drags its feet on reunification talks.
Tensions have been simmering after President Chen said he would hold the island's first-ever referendum alongside the presidential election on March 20 -- a move Beijing sees as a dangerous step toward independence that could lead to war.
The referendum would ask voters whether Taiwan should buy more anti-missile equipment if China fails to withdraw nearly 500 missiles pointed at the island.
A second question would ask if Taipei should open talks with Beijing to set up a framework for peaceful ties.
OPPOSITION CRITICISM
Opposition parties, which have described the referendum as meaningless and illegal, said Chen's latest comments proved the ballot was unnecessary.
``Chen Shui-bian keeps stressing the importance of the referendum, but now he says a decision has been made (on arms purchases) no matter what the outcome is,'' said Hwang Yih-jiau, lawmaker for the People First Party (PFP).
``It's an anti-democratic and bogus referendum.''
The PFP has submitted a joint bid with the main opposition Nationalist Party to unseat Chen.
Chen denied that it would be contradictory for Taiwan to buy the Patriot PAC-3 missiles if the referendum were rejected, saying the ballot referred to generally boosting national defense and anti-missile systems rather than specific deals.
The United States, Taiwan's top arms supplier, has criticized the island for not spending enough on boosting its own defense.
``This referendum to some extent will show the will and determination of Taiwan's 23 million people under the threat of missile and force'' from China, said Chen.
``It will show we have the determination to boost our self-defense capabilities,'' he said.
In the interview, Chen also reiterated that if he won a second term, he would abide by a pledge he made four years ago not to declare independence from China unless the mainland attacked Taiwan.
``It's impossible for me to say one thing on May 20, 2000 and another thing on May 20 this year. The wording may be different, but the spirit and essence will not change,'' Chen said, referring to his inaugural speech four years ago.
``We are already an independent, sovereignty country. Declaring independence is not an issue.''
-------- europe
France probing source of leak on diplomatic exchanges on Libya: report
PARIS (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219182840.40ahlw5g.html
France's foreign ministry and intelligence services are probing a leak of confidential embassy communications that showed Paris was aware of the US-British negotiations with Libya on weapons of mass destruction despite its assertions to the contrary, an online publication said Thursday.
The ministry and one agency, "probably" the domestic counter-espionage directorate, the DST, were looking into how an investigative and satirical newspaper, the Canard Enchaine, came into possession of the cables, extracts of which it published in its December 31 edition, the site, geopolitique.com, said.
The documents were from France's ambassadors in Canada, Libya and the United States and spoke about the negotiations between Britain, Libya and the United States which led to Tripoli's announcement December 22 that it was abandoning its efforts to make weapons of mass destruction.
France's government gave out conflicting reactions immediately after the news, with Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie saying Paris had been kept informed of the talks while Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin insisted that his ministry had not been in the loop.
Alliot-Marie eventually changed her public statements to agree with de Villepin.
But the Canard Enchaine's report, with the cable extracts, raised questions over how much Paris knew and whether it was covering something up.
A foreign ministry spokeswoman, Cecile Pozzo di Borgo, said of the geopolitique.com report that it was the ministry's policy to look into every leak of confidential information.
The Canard Enchaine declined to comment on the matter.
----
EU FURY OVER DEAL BY UK, FRANCE, GERMANY
Feb 19 2004
UK Mirror
From Paul Gilfeather, Whitehall Editor In Berlin And James Hardy In London
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/content_objectid=13965659_method=full_siteid=50143_headline=-EU-FURY-OVER-DEAL-BY-UK--FRANCE--GERMANY-name_page.html
TONY Blair hatched a secret deal with France and Germany last night to create a new ruling elite in Europe.
The Prime Minister swept aside angry smaller European Union nations and tabled proposals which would effectively see Europe's big guns seize control of the faltering institution.
Talking at the historic trilateral summit in Berlin, Mr Blair attempted to reassure critics - including Italy and Spain - that he was not plotting to establish a ruling Big Three.
But behind the scenes Mr Blair, German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and French president Jacques Chirac, signed a deal which will see the EU's most powerful nations stage up to six meetings a year - effectively cutting their smaller partners adrift.
A senior Government source said: "Nobody should underestimate the significance of the Berlin summit
"The Italians have been kicking up a real fuss, accusing Britain, France and Germany of forging closer ties while excluding other EU nations.
"Well, they can complain all they want but nothing is going to stop this deal which puts Britain right at the heart of Europe. This is just the first of many meetings where the bigger picture is thrashed out before being put before the European Council."
The new process has been accelerated by plans to admit 10 new countries - mostly from the former Eastern Bloc - into the EU in May.
But the three leaders hotly denied they were seeking to achieve a "stitch-up" on key EU issues before the union is enlarged to 25 countries.
However, even before the summit yesterday Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi denounced the three-hour meeting as a "mess".
And Italian minister for Europe Rocco Buttiglione, blasted: "Europe is made up of 25 countries, not of three."
The new pact is all the more dramatic as it comes after a year of frosty relations between Britain and European allies over the Iraq war. And Italy and Spain are almost certain to accuse the UK of abandoning them just months after relying on their backing for the toppling of Saddam Hussein.
Mr Blair said: "If these countries, which comprise of almost half the population with more than half the total wealth, if we come to clear agreements on how we make our economies work better then I don't think we need to be apologetic."
-------- haiti
U.S. to Send Military Team to Haiti
President Aristide Sayd He Is Ready to Die to Defend Country
The Associated Press
February 19, 2004
http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20040219_1103.html
WASHINGTON Feb. 19 - The Bush administration said Thursday it would send a military team to Haiti to assess the security of that country and its embattled leader, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
The Pentagon announcement came as Aristide declared he was "ready to give my life" to defend Haiti, indicating he was not prepared to give up power.
Earlier this week, Secretary of State Colin Powell said the United States was reluctant to send military personnel to Haiti to help resolve the bloody uprising against Aristide.
The military team is expected to consist of three or four experts from U.S. Southern Command, the military command with authority over the Caribbean, Pentagon spokesman Lawrence Di Rita told reporters at a press conference.
"The ambassador in Haiti has asked for that kind of assistance," Di Rita said. The U.S. ambassador to Haiti is James Foley.
-------- iran
Iran denies presence of centrifuges at military base
TEHRAN (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219145353.ghwbulid.html
Iran's foreign ministry denied "in the strongest possible terms" Thursday reports from diplomats at the UN's nuclear watchdog that components of an advanced uranium enrichment centrifuge had been found by international inspectors at a military base here.
"The reports that there are centifuges of this type in a military base are without any basis or foundation and we deny them in the strongest possible terms," spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said in a statement.
Asefi asserted that Iran's research into advanced centrifuges was "a purely scientific project", in other words only the subject of research, and that such centrifuges had "never been put into service".
"There is no nuclear activity and no centrifuges of this type in any military bases," he insisted, asserting that the Islamic republic had "never carried out any nuclear activity for military purposes."
Diplomats at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna said Thursday UN teams in Iran had found components of an advanced uranium enrichment centrifuge of a type Tehran had failed to declare while claiming to provide full disclosure on its atomic program.
A diplomat close to the IAEA said inspectors had found "design components of a G-2 centrifuge," an advanced model of what is the crucial machine used in configurations of hundreds of gas centrifuges to enrich uranium for either civilian power use or for making an atomic bomb.
The diplomats were confirming a report in the newspaper USA Today Thursday which quoted US and foreign sources as saying IAEA inspectors had found sophisticated uranium-enrichment machinery at an air force base outside Tehran.
The machinery, described as a gas-centrifuge system that had been constructed and tested, was found at Doshen-Tappen air base, said the daily.
--------
Iranian Pro-Reform Newspapers Silenced
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Iran-Elections.html?hp
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Two reformist newspapers did not appear Thursday as hard-liners reined in the media on the eve of elections in which they are expected to regain control of parliament.
The muzzling of the last big liberal dailies in circulation -- Yas-e-nou and Sharq -- has been seen as the possible shape of things to come after Friday's elections, which most reformist politicians plan to boycott.
The ruling theocracy has barred more than 2,400 candidates who sought greater political and social openness -- effectively sending the 290-seat parliament back under the wing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a hard-liner.
The only real drama is how many people will choose to vote on Friday.
Liberals have called for a mass no-show to embarrass the Islamic leadership and weaken the credibility of the new parliament. They have also broken a major political taboo and directly criticized Khamenei, whose backers believe he is answerable only to God.
The powerful judiciary -- controlled by Khamenei -- closed the two newspapers after they published portions of a statement from pro-reform lawmakers that attacked the supreme leader and said freedom was being ``trampled in the name of Islam.''
But some reformers saw the crackdown in broader terms: a possible pre-emptive strike in anticipation of a low voter turnout and a hint of strong-arm tactics to come.
``Banning papers is essential for those who plan to commit a parliamentary coup,'' said Hamidreza Jalaeipour, a columnist for Yas-e-nou and editor of three other newspapers that were banned earlier.
Yas-e-nou and Sharq were among the few survivors after a hard-line backlash against the liberal press that began in the late 1990s. Dozens of newspapers and publications have been shut and editors and journalists jailed. The liberal papers that remain do not have the circulation and influence of Yas-e-nou and Sharq.
Yas-e-nou, or New Lilac, was considered the voice of the pro-reform Islamic Participation Front, whose leaders include Mohammad Reza Khatami, the deputy speaker of the outgoing parliament who was disqualified from Friday's elections. Reza Khatami is the younger brother of President Mohammad Khatami, who was once described as a lilac.
Sharq, or East, gained a reputation as a forum for smaller reform groups.
Judiciary officials said the ban was temporary, but in the past similar closures were never lifted. A judiciary statement accused the papers of various charges including ``undermining the Islamic Republic.''
The expected election outcome will put reformists back to where they were before they won a landslide in parliamentary polls four years ago: seeking to pressure the leadership from outside the system.
Some dissidents see the loss of parliament as an opportunity to sharpen their protests to mount more demonstrations and other acts of civil disobedience.
``We could be seeing efforts to try to provoke a social and economic crisis,'' said Saeed Madeni, a member of the reformist group National Religious Front.
However, Mohammad Reza Khatami told the AP on Wednesday that it was ``too risky for the time being'' to try to organize mass demonstrations as people were not ready for them.
Much hinges on the turnout.
Liberals hope for a major rebuff, especially in the big cities that are the core of their support. Parliament elections in 2000 attracted 67.2 percent of voters nationwide and 46.9 percent in province of the capital, Tehran. Reformists hope the turnout on Friday will be about half those figures.
Hard-line media have pulled out all the stops to try to counter the boycott. Conservative newspapers ran editorials stressing voting as a civic duty. Television broadcast statements from the leader of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, equating voting with patriotism.
The reformers, however, insist that casting ballots is also a vote in favor of ``undemocratic'' elections and the unlimited controls wielded by Khamenei and his flanks of non-elected clerics.
The reformists seek to give elected officials a greater voice. Their other targets include guaranteeing more Western-style openness in political and business affairs, and accelerating the easing of Islamic social restrictions that President Khatami began after his first election in 1997.
Khatami's second and final term expires next year. Reformers have suggested they plan to put forward candidates for the office -- whose limited power would be mostly neutralized by a hard-line parliament.
``There is just one way to maintain the system of the Islamic Republic,'' said one of the barred lawmakers, Mohsen Armin, this week at a meeting to criticize the elections. ``There is just one way: to apologize to the nation and seek forgiveness from God.''
-------- iraq
Chalabi stands by faulty intelligence that toppled Saddam's regime
By Jack Fairweather in Baghdad and Anton La Guardia
19/02/2004
UK Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;$sessionid$5RM3YWKKUZDFXQFIQMGSFFOAVCBQWIV0?xml=/news/2004/02/19/wirq19.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/02/19/ixworld.html
An Iraqi leader accused of feeding faulty pre-war intelligence to Washington said yesterday his information about Saddam Hussein's weapons, even if discredited, had achieved the aim of persuading America to topple the dictator.
Ahmad Chalabi and his London-based exile group, the Iraqi National Congress, for years provided a conduit for Iraqi defectors who were debriefed by US intelligence agents. But many American officials now blame Mr Chalabi for providing intelligence that turned out to be false or wild exaggerations about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Ahmad Chalabi: 'we've been entirely successful'
Mr Chalabi, by far the most effective anti-Saddam lobbyist in Washington, shrugged off charges that he had deliberately misled US intelligence. "We are heroes in error," he told the Telegraph in Baghdad.
"As far as we're concerned we've been entirely successful. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important. The Bush administration is looking for a scapegoat. We're ready to fall on our swords if he wants."
His comments are likely to inflame the debate on both sides of the Atlantic over the quality of pre-war intelligence, and the spin put on it by President George W Bush and Tony Blair as they argued for military action.
US officials said last week that one of the most celebrated pieces of false intelligence, the claim that Saddam Hussein had mobile biological weapons laboratories, had come from a major in the Iraqi intelligence service made available by the INC.
US officials at first found the information credible and the defector passed a lie-detector test. But in later interviews it became apparent that he was stretching the truth and had been "coached by the INC".
He failed a second polygraph test and in May 2002, intelligence agencies were warned that the information was unreliable.
But analysts missed the warning, and the mobile laboratory story remained firmly established in the catalogue of alleged Iraqi violations until months after the overthrow of Saddam.
America claimed to have found two mobile laboratories, but the lorries in fact held equipment to make hydrogen for weather balloons.
Last week, US State Department officials admitted that much of the first-hand testimony they had received was "shaky".
"What the INC told us formed one part of the intelligence picture," a senior official in Baghdad said. "But what Chalabi told us we accepted in good faith. Now there is going to be a lot of question marks over his motives."
Mr Chalabi is now a member of the Iraqi Governing Council, but his star in Washington has waned.
----
Bremer Is Firm That Power Transfer in Iraq Will Be June 30
February 19, 2004
New York Times
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/international/middleeast/19CND-IRAQ.html?hp
The chief American administrator in Iraq made it clear today that the United States would not budge on a plan to transfer sovereignty to Iraqis on June 30, but he said that there could be changes in the way an interim government was formed.
The remarks by the administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, drove home the message of the American position on handing back power to the Iraqis on the same day that the secretary general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, was to meet with his special envoy to Iraq to discuss the country's political future.
"There are 133 days before sovereignty returns to an Iraqi government on June 30," Mr. Bremer said at a televised news conference in Iraq. "Changes in the mechanism for forming an interim government are possible. But the date holds. And hold it should."
Mr. Bremer noted that the American coalition officials and the Iraqi governing council agreed on Nov. 15 to return sovereignty to the Iraqis on a certain date, "and we will give it to them."
Senior United Nations diplomats said on Wednesday that Mr. Annan would endorse the view that the interim Iraqi government that is to take office this summer could not be chosen by direct election, but that he would not announce his recommendation on Iraq's political future for at least a week.
The diplomats, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Mr. Annan would consult today with his special envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, who is returning from a weeklong examination of the political situation in the country. Afterward, Mr. Brahimi is to discuss his findings in a meeting with the Security Council.
The diplomats said that Mr. Brahimi had concluded that it would not be feasible to set up credible elections by the June 30 deadline that the United States set for returning sovereignty to Iraq. But they also said that Mr. Brahimi would need more time to develop clear options for Mr. Annan to consider for the transfer of power.
Mr. Brahimi met Iraqi leaders, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, to work out some sort of consensus on the shape of an interim government.
The United States wants that government to be already in place while elections are held later in the year or in 2005 for a constitution-writing legislature. Eventually, elections would be held to ratify the constitution and establish a permanent Iraqi government.
Mr. Bremer declined to comment on the United Nations position until Mr. Annan made public his views, but he said that there were a number of ways in which a transitional government could be selected, noting that a process of caucuses had been proposed.
Asked whether he did not want Islamic law as the main source of law in Iraq, Mr. Bremer said that the Islamic character of the Iraqi people should be recognized and freedom of religion enforced.
Asked what "business is it of yours" to define Iraq's future laws, Mr. Bremer said that the American-led coalition authority had an "obligation" to ensure that an appropriate democratic structure was put into place in the country.
----
Iraq's Governing Council
A dangerous place between B and C
Having tasted power, the 25 members of Iraq's Governing Council quite like it
Feb 19th 2004
The Economist print edition
http://www.economist.com/world/africa/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2442073
IN THEORY, nothing much has changed. Though the violence continues-on February 18th suicide bombers killed at least 11 Iraqis and wounded nearly 60 coalition soldiers in a base at Hilla, south of Baghdad-the plan America announced last November still stands. Under that plan, America intends to transfer power to an Iraqi provisional government by July 1st. In practice, as all of Iraq knows, the details of this transfer of power are looking increasingly foggy.
The November plan was itself a Plan B, a much faster procedure than the one Paul Bremer, America's proconsul in Baghdad, had originally mapped out for giving Iraqis power over their own affairs. But Americans and Iraqis are now awaiting yet another plan, this time from Kofi Annan, the United Nations' secretary-general. This one, the Americans hope, will enable them to stick to their timetable while keeping the foremost spiritual leader of Iraq's majority Shia community, Ayatollah Ali Sistani, reasonably happy.
Mr Annan has the advantage that his own emissary to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, was at least able last week to meet Mr Sistani in Najaf. Mr Bremer was never granted that honour and had to treat with the reclusive cleric via intermediaries. But squaring the differences between the ayatollah and the proconsul will still be hard. Mr Sistani had wanted the provisional government to be directly elected. Mr Bremer, insisting that Iraq lacks the machinery to organise such elections in time for the July handover, has stuck to the idea that a legitimate enough provisional government can be selected by local caucuses, with no proper elections until 2005.
No one is yet sure what the UN will propose. But rumour says the proposed compromise might be to bring those proper elections forward to the end of this year. The Americans, who in desperation have been signalling their flexibility, would then have to decide whether to adopt this as their plan C. And they would still have to work out how, when and indeed whether to create an Iraqi provisional government before then.
One complication is that Mr Bremer and Mr Sistani are not the only people who need to be satisfied by a plan C. There are Sunni and Kurdish sensitivities to take into account as well. And on top of this is the vested interest of the existing Governing Council, the 25-member body that Mr Bremer himself appointed and which is the nearest approximation Iraq has right now to a government of its own.
When Mr Bremer produced Plan B in November, the council seemed happy enough to go along with it. Its co-operation was deemed crucial in making Mr Bremer's programme of caucuses work. But now that a Plan C is in the air, its members' enthusiasm for the caucuses is waning. Having tasted power, they are not in a hurry to give it up. If the new idea is going to be to hold earlier elections, some of the councillors ask, why should they not stay in charge of things until then?
Why indeed? Though appointed and not elected, the council is reasonably representative of Iraq's various groups. But it also has its flaws, one of which is a growing allergy to criticism. Its members say they believe in a free press but have shut down, albeit temporarily, the Iraqi operations of two of the Arab world's most popular satellite channels. They have formed a committee to investigate complaints of corruption, but have yet to name its head, its location or the sanctions at its disposal.
The councillors' nepotism rankles, too. Sons, nephews and cousins abound in ministries and on committees. And there are growing signs of authoritarianism. As before the war, senior officials honk furiously through the traffic jams of Baghdad, their convoys bristling with gun muzzles like hedgehogs. The chairman of the council's security committee, Ayad Allawi, has begun creating a new version of the feared secret police. Iraq may well need a counter-insurgency force, but Mr Allawi's rivals accuse him of recruiting former torturers to man a new apparatus of oppression.
Some council members are now calling for elections as soon as possible, starting in the more stable north and south, including ten mainly Shia provinces and three mainly Kurdish ones, but excluding the five provinces of Baghdad and the "Sunni triangle" where violence is concentrated. It may be that a proper democratic spirit animates such calls. But, this being Iraq, there are those who see the councillors' haste as a complex ruse to stymie any alternative to their own continuation in office.
----
NEWS ANALYSIS: THE TRANSFER
U.S. Presidential Politics and Self-Rule for Iraqis
February 19, 2004
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/politics/19DIPL.html
WASHINGTON, Feb. 18 - In the Bush administration, it is considered heresy to suggest postponing the planned return of sovereignty to Iraq. Turning over control by June 30, administration officials say, is crucial to assuaging Iraqi distress over living under American occupation.
Yet in recent weeks, diplomats and even some in the administration have begun to worry that the date reflects more concern for American politics than Iraqi democracy. Their fear is that an untested government taking power on June 30 may not be strong enough to withstand the pressures bearing down on it.
"When we went into Iraq, our plan was to have a government, build a structure and write a constitution that would be a source of longterm stability," said an administration official. "Now that's out the window."
Many in the administration say that while they have no proof that the urgency to install a government is politically motivated, it feels to them like part of a White House plan to permit President Bush to run for re-election while taking credit for establishing self-rule in Iraq.
"I can make all kinds of arguments about why we need to establish democracy in Iraq on an urgent basis," said another administration official. "But when you hear from on high that this is what we must do, and there can be no questioning of it, it sounds like politics."
This week, the administration is in the odd position of insisting on Iraqi self-rule by June 30, while awaiting a recommendation from the United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan, on how the interim government should be chosen and the form it should take.
Mr. Annan's special envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, went to Iraq to meet with Iraqi leaders, including Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, to work out some sort of consensus on the shape of an interim government.
The United States wants that government to rule while elections are held later in the year or in 2005 for a constitution-writing legislature. Eventually, elections are to be held to ratify the constitution and establish a permanent Iraqi government.
Administration officials say that Mr. Brahimi was told that one option he must not accept is postponement of the June 30 date for the transfer of power.
"It is holy writ," said an administration official.
Yet many experts, including some in the administration, also say they are worried that such a rapid transition entails enormous risks. What happens, some worry, if a major crisis were to occur, resulting from an assassination or bomb explosion in which many Iraqis die?
What happens, moreover, if by accident American forces - which are still likely to retain wide autonomy and authority over security throughout the country - kill a large number of Iraqi citizens? Would a shaky Iraqi government lacking in perceived legitimacy survive a blow like that?
It makes no sense, many experts say, to set a fixed date to hand over sovereignty before having any idea of what sort of government will be given power on that date.
"This is entirely a schedule dictated by Karl Rove," said an Arab diplomat who maintains close contacts with the administration, referring to the White House's political director. "Anyone who thinks otherwise is naďve."
One of the paradoxes of the situation is that France, Germany and other European countries were among those who last year pressed for an early transfer of power to an interim Iraqi government and for the United Nations to take over the political process of moving to a permanent democracy.
Now these countries are likely to insist that if the United States hands over power early, it must fulfill the other side of the bargain by agreeing to a central role for the United Nations.
Last year, the administration insisted that there should be no rush to transfer sovereignty to Iraq, citing the need to get a constitution written first. That plan changed on Nov. 15, when L. Paul Bremer III, the American administrator in Baghdad, set the June 30 date.
Administration officials bridle at the suggestion that politics have played a role in Mr. Bremer's announcement.
"All these people who think that not moving the deadline helps Bush politically are just wrong," one official said. "I can't understand why everybody thinks that if the handover is as messy as some say, that would be advantageous to the president."
According to administration officials, the early date was chosen by Mr. Bremer last fall because of his frustrations at not persuading the American-picked Iraqi Governing Council to agree on a procedure to write a new constitution. The deadline, he is said to have reasoned, would light a fire under the council.
Mr. Bremer, an aide said, telephoned Condoleezza Rice in the fall, reaching her at a Washington Redskins football game on a Sunday, and she urged him to come back to confer with President Bush on changing the date.
"Arbitrary deadlines in Middle East diplomacy are a bad idea, especially when they correspond, however coincidentally, to our electoral schedule," said Noah Feldman, a law professor at New York University, who has advised the Iraqi Governing Council on writing its constitution.
"It's not as if the Iraqis don't have television," Mr. Feldman added. "Everybody in Iraq believes that these deadlines are chosen by American electoral politics. Regardless of whether the June 30 deadline originated in Baghdad or Washington, it clearly reflected a coordinated administration policy to jump-start the process. That's an extremely high risk strategy."
-------
INSURGENCY
Truck Bombs Kill 11 Iraqis at Army Base Run by Poles
February 19, 2004
By DEXTER FILKINS
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/international/middleeast/19IRAQ.html
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Feb. 18 - Suicide bombers attacked a Polish military base south of Baghdad on Wednesday morning, killing 11 Iraqis and wounding more than 100 others, including soldiers and civilians.
The attack began when two trucks packed with explosives raced toward the military compound in Hillah, about 60 miles south of the capital. Guards fired on the vehicles, causing one to explode. The other crashed into a concrete barrier and blew up, Lt. Col. Robert Strzelecki, commander of the Polish base, told The Associated Press.
Preliminary reports indicated that the 11 people killed were Iraqis. American officials in Baghdad said 102 people were wounded, including 58 soldiers at the base. It was unclear if any of the wounded were Americans. A spokesman for the American military in Baghdad said only 6 of the 58 wounded soldiers remained hospitalized. The extent of the injuries to the Iraqis was unclear, but officials said women and children were among them.
The suicide attack was the third such bombing in eight days, after more than 100 people were killed in back-to-back bombings: of a police station south of Baghdad on Feb. 10, and at an army recruitment center in the capital on Feb. 11. In all three attacks, the overwhelming majority of the dead were Iraqi civilians.
The wave of attacks appears to be aimed at alienating Iraqis who may support the American-led occupation and at the countries supporting the effort with troops on the ground. A multinational force of about 9,000 soldiers is stationed in south-central Iraq, including troops from Poland and Hungary.
"The enemy's strategy is fairly clear," Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, an American commander, told reporters on Wednesday in Tikrit. "They plan to isolate us from the Iraqi people."
A senior coalition officer said that while it was not clear who carried out the bombing, the technique was similar to that used by Al Qaeda. The officer said that in suspected Qaeda bombings last year in southern Iraq and in Saudi Arabia, two cars were used, the first one to punch through barriers protecting the target and the second to move in without obstruction.
That the Polish forces were able to largely thwart the attack was a measure of how heavily fortified the occupiers' bases are.
Hillah is a predominantly Shiite Muslim area that has been relatively calm since Saddam Hussein's government fell last April. But American officials are worried that the violence could spread out of the Sunni Muslim-dominated area north and west of Baghdad, which has been in the scene of most of the violence, into the predominantly Shiite areas.
Earlier this month, American officials captured a document they attributed to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a suspected Jordanian terrorist. The document outlines a strategy for setting off a "sectarian war" in Iraq by striking Shiite targets.
-------
Suicide Attack Kills 10 Iraqis
More Than 100 Wounded in Explosion at Polish-Run Base
By Sameer N. Yacoub
Associated Press
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A19
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52742-2004Feb18.html
HILLA, Iraq, Feb. 18 -- Suicide bombers detonated explosives outside a Polish-run military base Wednesday, killing 10 Iraqis and wounding more than 100 people, more than half of them occupation soldiers.
The attack in Hilla, the third suicide bombing of security targets in two weeks, was part of a wider effort "to isolate us from the Iraqi people," the commander of occupation troops in Iraq, Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, told reporters in Tikrit.
Military officials said at least 106 people were hurt in the blasts, which occurred in the Hayy Babil neighborhood near Camp Charlie. The wounded included 32 Iraqis and 26 Poles, as well as Hungarians, Bulgarians, Filipinos and an American.
Most of the wounded were hurt by flying debris and glass. The injuries were not life-threatening.
The death toll could have been much higher had guards not opened fire on the bombers and prevented them from entering the camp. One truck exploded while under gunfire and another blew up after hitting a concrete barrier.
The 7:15 a.m. blasts from 1,540 pounds of explosives flattened 11 homes nearby and blew down the sides of several other houses in this town about 55 miles south of Baghdad.
Earlier Wednesday, U.S. troops arrested seven people believed to have links to al Qaeda in the turbulent city of Baqubah, north of the capital, the military said. It gave no details on the nationalities of those detained.
Troops from the 4th Infantry Division carried out the raid early in the day, targeting an "anti-coalition cell" that may have ties to Osama bin Laden's terrorist group, a statement from the U.S. command said.
Suicide attacks have killed 300 people, mostly Iraqis, since the beginning of the year. They have fueled speculation that Islamic extremists, possibly linked to al Qaeda, were playing a greater role in the anti-occupation insurgency than previously thought. U.S. military officials have said they believe the attacks have been spearheaded by Iraqis loyal to ousted president Saddam Hussein.
Two suicide bombings killed more than 100 Iraqis last week. Polish Gen. Mieczyslaw Bieniek, commander of the 9,500-member Polish military contingent, said Wednesday's bombings were a "well-coordinated terrorist attack."
Mohyee Mokheef, 50, a cafe owner who lives in the neighborhood, said he was having breakfast when he heard a faint first explosion and a second, louder one that shattered the windows in his home.
"I saw dead and injured Iraqis lying on the ground," he said. "I suspect that Ansar al-Islam and al Qaeda were behind these operations because they want to create strife between Sunnis and Shiites and between the Shiites and Americans. They want to derail the elections process."
-------- israel
The Iraq blame game: Israel
19 February 2004
Janes
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jid/jid040219_1_n.shtml
As the US and Britain prepare for independent inquiries into their intelligence services' performance prior to the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, a special panel of Israel's parliament, the Knesset, is putting the final touches to a report on whether their country's intelligence services had deliberately overstated Saddam Hussein's military capabilities.
Most of the findings of the lengthy probe are expected to be classified, but sources close to the proceedings have indicated that the report will note "serious shortcomings" in Israeli intelligence gathering, especially in countries such as Iraq beyond the country's immediate neighbours. Some intelligence analysts regard these flaws as part of the lingering fallout from the near-disaster of the 1973 Middle East war that has haunted Israel for the last three decades.
Amid great secrecy and considerable opposition from senior figures in the defence and intelligence establishments, the chairman of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee, Yuval Steinitz of the Likud Party, launched an investigation seven months before US President George W Bush was pressured into appointing a committee to investigate why US intelligence agencies bungled their assessment of Saddam's capabilities. The investigation has held 50 sessions and some 70 witnesses have testified before it. They include Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz, Israel Defence Force (IDF) chief of staff Lieutenant-General Moshe Yaalon, Military Intelligence director Maj Gen Aharon Zeevi, Mossad director Meir Dagan and Shin Bet chief Avi Dichter.
Steinitz insists that the investigative committee, which he heads, is essential because "there has been no committee that has seriously investigated the intelligence services" since the commission set up after the 1973 war under the president of the supreme court, Shimon Agranat. The final report, published on 30 January 1975, was scathing in its criticism of the inefficiency of Israeli Military Intelligence, known by the Hebrew acronym Aman. The main recommendation was a move to break Aman's monopoly on the evaluation of intelligence and to introduce "pluralism in the various types of intelligence evaluations".
With the perceived post-Cold War threats to Israel changing once again, following 11 September 2001 and the US-led regime changes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and with Iran in particular being seen as a growing danger to Israel's security, such imperfections in the intelligence establishment are causing considerable concern.
Other allegations have been surfacing in the US that the ad hoc intelligence review cell made up of pro-Israel neo-conservative hawks within the Bush administration, overseen by undersecretary for defence policy Douglas Feith, prior to the US invasion of Iraq in March 2003 co-operated with Israel in pushing for the war against Saddam. The entire team involved in the Office of Special Plans (OSP) championed by US vice-president Dick Cheney were political appointees.
The OSP operated outside inter-agency channels and has been accused of doctoring intelligence assessments on Iraq presented to the White House, while other neo-cons have pressured the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to tailor its analyses to buttress the findings presented by the OSP.
Domestic critics of Israel's intelligence establishment contend that the data it provided to the US to enhance their pre-war assessment of Saddam's WMD programmes - pointing to a threat that now appears not to have existed - has damaged both many Israelis' trust in their intelligence establishment and its credibility in the eyes of Israel's allies and friends.
----
Israel receives two new-generation F-16I fighter jets
RAMON AIR BASE, Israel (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219123543.3lb51rbr.html
The Israeli air force took delivery Thursday of the first two of more than 100 US-built F-16I jets, a new generation of warplane which will soon make up the backbone of Israel's fleet.
Experts say the ultra-sophisticated development of the battle-tested F16 Fighting Falcon, to be named Sufa (storm in Hebrew), sports a much-increased range of 1,500 kilometres (around 930 miles), allowing them to reach anywhere in the Middle East without needing in-flight refuelling.
Media reports said this new capability could allow the Israeli Air Force (IAF) to hit suspected nuclear targets in Iran, as it did in Iraq in June 1981 when it bombed the Osirak reactor near Baghdad.
Built by US aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, the two planes left the contractor's plant in Fort Worth, Texas late Wednesday and set down at the Ramon air base in the southern Negev desert on Thursday afternoon after a stop-over in Portugal's mid-Atlantic Azores islands.
The two craft were being officially handed over at a ceremony at the base attended by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz, army chief Moshe Yaalon and his IAF counterpart Dan Halutz.
The US ambassador to Israel, Dan Kurtzer, was also present.
The procurement of 102 of the two-seater jets at an estimated cost of 4.5 billion dollars is the biggest defence deal in Israel's history.
For its part, Lockheed Martin is committed to 2.6 billion dollars worth of reciprocal procurements, of which 1.1 billion has already been made.
Funding for the contract comes from US military aid to Israel which totals around two billion dollars per year.
Israel placed its first order for 50 aircraft in 1999, with a second order made in 2001. Delivery is slated for completion by 2009.
With the 102 new Sufa jets, and another 230 Fighting Falcons, Israel will command the second largest F-16 fleet in the world behind the United States.
Although the IAF refuses to give details of the new jet's range ability, it describes it as "very significant".
Powered by a Pratt and Whitney F100-PW-229 engine, many of its multiple systems are produced by the Israeli aerospace industry.
Two internal regular fuel tanks are supplemented by two jettisonable wing-mounted tanks which significantly increase the radius of action, experts say.
With a special head-mounted visor showing all the flight data, the pilot can aim a missile by fixing his gaze at the target.
It is equipped with the new Python 5 infrared-guided air-to-air missile produced by the Israeli defence firm Rafael, which is claimed to be unstoppable if the target is within the pilot's vision.
It is also fitted with the radio-controlled advanced medium-range air-to-air missile (AMRAAM), and laser-guided precision bombs.
The craft is equipped with an "outer protection" shield against any external threat including from a surface-to-air missile as well as a number of other secret features.
Other systems have been kept under wraps.
The first model was shown to Mofaz at a ceremony at Lockheed Martin's Fort Worth plant in November last year.
Two days later, while on a trip to Washington, Mofaz aired Israel's fears about Iran's alleged nuclear programme during talks with US Secretary of State Colin Powell and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
"Concentrated efforts are needed to delay, to stop or to prevent the Iranian nuclear program," he said, warming that Iran would reach a "point of no return" within a year unless there were concerted efforts to stop it.
Iran, which refuses to acknowledge Israel's right to exist, denies it has a nuclear weapons programme.
----
Live Video Coverage of World Court Hearings on the Internet
Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Request for advisory opinion)
2004-02-19
UN Observer
http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout5.php&id=1458&blz=1
THE HAGUE, 19 February 2004. The public hearings before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), principal judicial organ of the United Nations, to be held from 23 to 25 February 2004 in the case concerning the Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (request for advisory opinion), will be broadcast live and in full on the Court's official website ( http://www.icj-cij.org ).
The Court has decided to provide video coverage of its hearings on the Internet in response to the exceptional interest in this case shown by the general public, civil society and the media worldwide, and in view of the Court's very limited seating space for members of the public and journalists at the Peace Palace in The Hague. The Court intends to provide such webstreaming in the future for cases of a similar nature.
The hearings will be filmed by the Court's permanent network of cameras in the Great Hall of Justice at the Peace Palace. Audio streaming will be available only in the Court's two official languages, English and French.
The programme of hearings scheduled by the Court can be found under Press Release 2004/9. The names of the various speakers will not be indicated on the viewing screen for technical reasons. You will hear the name announced by the President when the speaker takes the floor or you can check the list of members of delegations elsewhere on the Court's website (click on "Docket" then on the hyperlink for the case and lastly on "Oral Pleadings", where you will find a list of the transcripts (CR references) of the oral statements arranged by half-day session. Each transcript starts with a list of the members of the various delegations).
Practical information
To ensure that the webcast hearings reach the widest possible audience, it has been decided to provide for two streaming options that will be suitable for different types of Internet connection:
1. audio and video streaming for fast broadband connections;
2. audio and video streaming for slower ordinary telephone connections.
To follow the webcasting of the Court's hearings in the best possible conditions, we recommend the use of a recent model of computer and an up-to-date version of the Windows Media Player software.
It is still possible that there may be temporary pauses in the live video coverage due to high traffic on the Court's website. We recommend in such cases that you try again later, either during the hearings or afterwards, when the same footage will be available via the archive link.
If you miss the live hearings (for example, because of website congestion or of the time difference with your country) you can always click on "Video Archive". Here you can retrieve the completed webcast hearings which will be archived after every half-day session, like the written transcripts.
International Court Of Justice http://www.icj-cij.org
----
Israel Receives Planes From Military Deal
February 19, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Israel-Fighter-Jets.html
JERUSALEM (AP) -- Guided to ground by American pilots and Israeli navigators, the first two of a new fleet of the most advanced F-16 fighter jets landed Thursday at a dusty desert airbase in southern Israel.
The warplanes, the first of 102 to be supplied by the American company, Lockheed Martin, at a cost of $4.5 billion, represent Israel's largest-ever military purchase and a counter to a possible Iranian nuclear threat.
The U.S. aeronautics giant created the F-16I specifically for the needs of the Israeli military. At an air force ceremony, officials said it was an example of the high level of cooperation between the two countries.
The major modification on the Sufa (Storm), as the jet is called in Hebrew, is a pair of external fuel tanks above the central fuselage, extending the range of the jet -- and the reach of the Israeli air force -- by 25 percent.
Despite deep budget cuts, the military defended the hefty price tag by saying it was imperative to be able to defend against threats from more distant enemies -- especially Iran.
The military would not disclose the exact range of the jet, but one senior air force officer said, ``it can reach the capitals of all the countries in the region.''
During the first Gulf War, Iraq lobbed 39 Scud missiles at Israel. The head of the Mossad intelligence agency recently identified Iran's nuclear and missile programs as the top threat to Israel.
But with U.S. forces occupying Iraq, and Libya making moves to reconcile with the West, Iran will be the main focus of the Storm. ``For practical purposes this comes to defend against the threat from Iran,'' said Zeev Bonen, a military expert from Bar Ilan University.
Israel is particularly concerned with the Iranian nuclear program. U.N. inspectors have recently discovered high-tech enrichment equipment on an Iranian air force base, the first known link of Tehran's suspect nuclear program to its military.
Faced with a similar threat, Israeli warplanes bombed an Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981. That operation required a complicated midair refueling operation. Because of its extended range, the F-16I would not have that problem.
Israeli military commanders have hinted that Israel might take pre-emptive action against Iran if threatened, but there is no indication that such plans are in the works.
``This is a qualitative step up in building the ... deterrent capabilities of the Israeli armed forces,'' Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said before pasting the squadron decals onto the tails of the new jets -- the same squadron that bombed the Iraqi reactor.
Much of the funding for the jets comes from American military assistance to Israel.
The Storm is meant to be the backbone of the Israeli air force, replacing the aging A-4 Skyhawks and F-4 Phantoms. Earlier model F-16s and F-15s carry much of the air force burden now.
The fighter has more space for weapons, its radar has five times the processing speed and 10 times more memory than earlier F-16 models and the plane has a more advanced satellite navigation system. Many of the new technologies were designed by Israeli companies.
U.S. Military Attache Col. Timothy Murphy called the jet a ``perfect example of the synergy that comes from the collaboration between our nations.''
After the U.S. military, the Israeli air force is the second-largest customer of Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co., a unit of Bethesda, Md.,-based Lockheed Martin Co.
-------- mideast
Syria Makes Overture To Israel
Associated Press
Thursday, February 19, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52743-2004Feb18.html
DAMASCUS, Syria, Feb. 18 -- Syria has sent messages to Israel through Turkey offering to restart stalled peace talks between the two countries, Syria's first vice president, Abdul Halim Khaddam, said Wednesday.
The messages carried by Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul expressed "Syria's readiness to resume peace talks from where they broke off" in January 2000, Khaddam said.
They also said that Syria was "still committed to the peace process in accordance with U.N. Security Council resolutions."
In 2000, the previous Israeli government accepted a withdrawal from almost all the Golan Heights, seized by Israel in 1967. But Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has insisted any further negotiations begin from scratch.
Raanan Gissin, Sharon's spokesman, said that he did not know of any message that had been passed to Israel from Syria.
He said that Israel was prepared to negotiate with Syria without preconditions, "and that does not mean starting where the talks left off." He said that first, Syria must pass "the test of actions," cutting off support for Hezbollah and other terrorist groups.
While Israeli officials have not rebuffed the Syrian overtures, the Sharon government never indicated it would return all of the captured Golan Heights to Syria in exchange for peace, as offered by a previous, moderate Israeli government before talks broke down.
Gul, in an interview with the London-based Arabic-language Al Hayat newspaper, said Turkey had received letters and documents from the Syrian side and delivered them to Israel and the United States during his recent visit to Washington.
Turkey, which enjoys warm relations with Israel, recently said it was also willing to act as an intermediary between Israel and Syria.
-------- nato
Bulgarian defense minister says NATO should be in Iraq
SOFIA (AFP)
Feb 19, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040219185842.bc9wjo9i.html
Bulgarian Defense Minister Nikolai Svinarov said Thursday he was "categorically in favor" of a NATO engagement in Iraq.
In an interview with AFP, he said: "I am categorically in favor of NATO's engagement in the operation in Iraq. There is no doubt this will happen, the question is to know when. Let's hope it will be soon."
He said a UN Security Council resolution was necessary for NATO to embark in Iraq and "a local government would seem to needed for such a resolution to be adopted."
France said Thursday that NATO forces could be sent to Iraq, but only if an Iraqi government made the request and other Middle East countries did not perceive a deployment to be a threat.
Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin raised the possibility in an interview with Paris's Le Figaro newspaper in which he reaffirmed his government's position that the priority for Iraq was to regain its sovereignty after nearly a year of US-led military occupation.
In Ankara, NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said NATO was prepared to assist Spain should it agree to take over the command of the multinational military contingent in Iraq, which is currently headed by Poland.
"Spain could do that and if Spain would ask for NATO assistance NATO will certainly give it," de Hoop Scheffer told a press conference following talks with Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul.
Spain, a NATO member serving in Iraq, currently has 1,300 troops in the war-torn country.
Bulgaria, which is set to join NATO later this year, also has some 400 troops in Iraq.
----
Conditions Must Be Right for Iraq NATO Force-France
Reuters
Thursday, February 19, 2004
By Mark John
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A53980-2004Feb19?language=printer
PARIS (Reuters) - France could envisage a NATO force in Iraq if approved by a sovereign Iraqi government and the United Nations, Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin said in a newspaper interview published on Thursday.
France led opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq and until now Villepin has said it was premature to discuss any NATO presence, which alliance members are likely to discuss at a summit in Istanbul at the end of June.
"First, NATO can only be involved at the behest of an Iraqi government and with the prior agreement of the United Nations," Villepin told Le Figaro newspaper in an interview.
"Great care is needed over what some countries in the region could regard as an act of aggression. Nothing would be worse than triggering a feeling of confrontation between the Arab world and our countries, between the West and Islam," he said.
Villepin did not say whether France would offer troops for any future NATO mission, reiterating only that Paris was ready to offer police training after power is handed back to Iraqis around a scheduled date of June 30.
"There is a question of principle," Villepin said. "Would the arrival in the Middle East of NATO itself be a stabilizing or complicating factor?"
The United States has asked NATO to play a greater role than the support it now provides to a 23-nation force led by Poland.
After initially sharing France's reticence, Germany, which also opposed the Iraq conflict, has said it would not stand in the way of a NATO mission.
RESPECT FOR POWER TRANSFER DEADLINE
The United States has set June 30 as a deadline for handing over power. Villepin said that timeframe should be respected despite the United Nations' conclusion that fair elections to form an Iraqi government were not feasible before then.
"A return of sovereignty was envisaged for June 30. We must respect this timeframe," he said.
Asked whether France, a veto-holding member of the U.N. Security Council, believed a new Council resolution was needed for any future U.N. involvement in Iraq, he said Paris was "open and in discussion with our main partners."
Villepin also used the interview to launch ideas aimed at helping the Middle East peace process. He suggested that sending international peacekeepers to the Gaza Strip could pave the way for the creation of an independent Palestinian state.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has announced plans to remove most Jewish settlements in Gaza.
"After this (the dismantling of Gaza settlements), why not then imagine the creation of a peacekeeping force in Gaza with an international conference allowing us to move on to the second stage of the road map?" Villepin said.
Drawn up by the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia, the road map plan outlines steps to end violence and create an independent Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank.
European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana has said the EU would be ready to consider a call by Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie for peacekeepers in Gaza, but the United States has poured cold water on the idea.
-------- pacific
2,500 US troops to join Balikatan 2004 in Luzon
By Minerva Zamora-Arceo and Chris Navarro
Thursday, February 19, 2004
Pampanga Sun-Star
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/static/pam/2004/02/19/news/2.500.us.troops.to.join.balikatan.2004.in.luzon.html
CLARK ECOZONE -- About 2,500 United States military personnel are expected to participate in the slated annual bilateral combined military exercise between the US and Philippines dubbed as Balikatan 2004.
At least 100 US army and marines already landed at the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) last week in preparation for the upcoming Balikatan war games on February 23 to March 7.
The US troops brought with them military equipment and aircraft, including five Cobra helicopters, five Huey helicopters, seven Humvees and spare engines.
The US troops, along with 2,300 Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) soldiers, are scheduled to conduct air, ground and naval exercises in Clark, Subic, Crow Valley in Tarlac, Fort Magsaysay in Nueva Ecija, Tarnate in Cavite, and Palawan.
According to Capt. Burrell Parmer, US contingents' public affairs officer, Palawan was added in their regular place of exercise after it was approved by the mutual defense board. "Conducting exercise in various locations provides a variety of training opportunities," he said.
Parmer said the Balikatan 2004 exercise aims to improve combined planning combat readiness and interoperability of US and Philippine armed forces.
In a primer issued to reporters, Balikatan officials said the exercise will be conducted in three phases simultaneously. Phase One is a combined task force (CTF) seminar and command post exercise while Phase Two is cross training and field training exercise. Meanwhile, Phase Three is humanitarian and civic assistance that is seen to improve US-RP military civic action cooperation.
Parmer added that this year's exercise has a counter-terrorism aspect but it does not involve ongoing operations in Iraq.
He also denied that US is reestablishing bases in the country.
"There are no plans to permanently base U.S. forces in the Philippines. US forces are present at the request of the Philippine government, as we continue our commitment to train, advise and assist the AFP," he said.
But exercises like the Balikatan, he said, would continue even after March 3 since the US Pacific Command has an established and ongoing training relationship with the AFP, which is under the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA).
"Accordingly, there will be a US military presence throughout the years as we continue our security assistance and bilateral training programs with AFP," he added.
-------- space
USAF Transformation Flight Plan Highlights Space Weapons
February 19, 2004
Center for Defense Information
http://cdi.org/program/document.cfm?DocumentID=2080&StartRow=1&ListRows=10&appendURL=&Orderby=D.DateLastUpdated&ProgramID=68&from_page=index.cfm
For the first time in recent history, the U.S. Air Force has formally published a list of planned space weapons programs, including both anti-satellite weapons (ASATs) and terrestrial strike weapons. The "U.S. Air Force Transformation Flight Plan," dated November 2003 but only recently posted on the Air Force web site (www.af.mil) cites space as a major capability for enabling "transformation" of the service from its Cold War past to a modern force capable of meeting the threats of today and tomorrow.
While previous Pentagon and Air Force planning documents issued have focused on space as a critical future mission area since the inauguration of President George W. Bush, past documents have stopped short of calling for ASAT and space-strike weapon capabilities. Instead, documents such as the "U.S. Air Force Space Command Space Master Plan for FY 06" have spoken only of requirements for types of capabilities in space, using terms such as "space control" and "offensive and defensive counterspace." Indeed, U.S. Air Force officials up to now have repeatedly stressed that there are no space weapons programs currently being funded.
While the Transformation Plan is looking ahead, and does not contain budget estimates for the programs identified as requirements, it does make it clear that space weapons are indeed envisioned as part of the future U.S. arsenal - and further that technologies to enable these weapon systems are now being researched and developed. The plan breaks out planned programs via time of desired deployment: near-term, defined as prior to 2010; mid-term, 2010-2015; and long-term, 2015 and beyond. ASAT capabilities, including destructive kinetic energy missiles and lasers, and space-strike weapons fall in the latter category.
Interestingly, the Air Force plan comes ahead of any formal change in the U.S. National Space Policy, last updated in 1996 by President Bill Clinton. While the Bush administration in 2002 launched a review of space policy, this effort so far has focused only on a few individual elements and has not addressed the larger question of the weaponization of space or U.S. space security strategy. However, there are numerous signs that the U.S. Defense Department is now using a different lens to interpret the standing policy. While the Clinton policy itself is vague - and some would argue even more forward leaning with regards to keeping U.S. options for space weapons development open -- it widely has been interpreted up to now as requiring a presidential decision to allow any deployment (some would argue that the policy also was seen as embodying even a strong presumption against space weapons testing) of space weapons.
Recent Air Force pronouncements, however, have put forward what seems to be an alternate interpretation. The Space Master Plan (on p. 35) states that the National Space Policy actually requires development of counterspace capabilities, but with the caveat that a decision would be needed by either the president or the secretary of defense to employ (not deploy) such systems. It is unclear if this interpretation is now considered the official U.S. government policy, or simply an Air Force construction.
The section in the main body of the Transformation Flight Plan on protection of space assets and "negation" of the enemy assets includes a section called "Developing Transformational Capabilities," that discusses program requirements to meet the plan's overarching goals. These include:
:: "active, on-board" protection capabilities - which generally can be read as satellite systems equipped with some sort of "shoot-back" capability;
:: "full spectrum, sea, air, land and space-based offensive counterspace systems capable of prevention of unauthorized use of friendly space services and negating adversarial space capabilities from low earth up to [GEO] orbits" - this would obviously include space-based ASAT capabilities. This section goes on to note that: "The focus, when practical[, PRACTICAL,] will be on denying adversary access to space on a temporary basis." The caveat of "when practical" obviously leaves open the option for development of debris-creating kinetic energy ASATs, despite an obvious Air Force bias against such systems in the past. Most of the actual ASAT and space weapon projects are being designed for deployment in the 2015 and beyond timeframe, apparently based on technology research being started over the next five years. The programs of most potential concern include:
:: Air Launched Anti-Satellite Missile
:: Ground Based Laser
:: Orbital Transfer Vehicle
:: Space-Based Radio Frequency Energy Weapon
:: Space Maneuver Vehicle
:: Space Operations Vehicle
:: Hypervelocity Rod Bundles
Descriptions of the various programs are contained in Appendix D of the document. Those that don't give a timeframe for deployment are mostly being envisioned for the long-term, i.e. after 2015. They include:
:: "Air Launch System: Would be a dedicated, all azimuth, weather avoiding, on demand (within 48 hours) system capable of launching a Space Maneuver Vehicle, Common Aero Vehicle or a Conventional Payload Module.
:: Air-Launched Anti-Satellite Missile: Would be a small air-launched missile capable of intercepting satellites in low earth orbit.
:: Common Aero Vehicle: Will be an unpowered, maneuverable, hypersonic glide vehicle deployed from a possible range of delivery vehicles such as an expendable or reusable small launch vehicle to a fully reusable Space Operations Vehicle. It will guide and dispense conventional weapons, sensors or other payloads world wide from and through space within one hour of tasking. It would be able to strike a spectrum of targets, including mobile targets, mobile time sensitive targets, strategic relocatable targets, or fixed hard and deeply buried targets. The Common Aero Vehicle's speed and maneuverability would combine to make defenses against it extremely difficult. (Mid-term)
:: Counter Satellite Communications System: Will provide the capability to deny and disrupt an adversary's space-based communications and early warning. (Near-term)
:: Counter Surveillance and Reconnaissance System: Will provide offensive counterspace counter surveillance/reconnaissance weapon acquisition program to deny, disrupt and degrade adversary space-based surveillance and reconnaissance systems. (Near-term)
:: Evolutionary Air and Space Global Laser Engagement (EAGLE) Airship Relay Mirrors: Will significantly extend the range of both the Airborne Laser and Ground-Based Laser by using airborne, terrestrial or space-based lasers in conjunction with space-based relay mirrors to project different laser powers and frequencies to achieve a broad range of effects from illumination to destruction.
:: Ground-Based Laser: Would propagate laser beams through the atmosphere to Low-Earth Orbit satellites to provide robust defensive and offensive space control capability.
:: Hypervelocity Rod Bundles: Would provide the capability to strike ground targets anywhere in the world from space.
:: Orbital Deep Space Imager: Will provide a predictive, near-real time common operating picture of space to enable space control operations. (Mid-term)
:: Orbital Transfer Vehicle: Would significantly increase the flexibility warfighting utility and protection of U.S. space assets while enabling on-orbit servicing of those assets.
:: Rapid Attack Identification Detection and Reporting System: A family of systems that will provide the capability to automatically identify when a space system is under attack. (Near-term)
:: Space-Based Radio Frequency Energy Weapon: Would be a constellation of satellites containing high-power radio-frequency transmitters that possess the capability to disrupt/destroy/disable a wide variety of electronics and national-level command and control systems. It would typically be used as a non-kinetic anti-satellite weapon.
:: Space-Based Space Surveillance System: Will be a constellation of optical sensing satellites to track and identify space forces in deep space to enable offensive and defensive counterspace operations. (Near-term)
:: Space Maneuver Vehicle: Would be a rapidly reusable orbital vehicle deployed from the Space Operations Vehicle or Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle that is capable of executing a wide range of space control missions.
:: Space Operations Vehicle: Would enable an on-demand spacelift capability with rapid turn-around, multiple standardized payloads, space vehicle maintenance, ISR, offensive and defensive counterspace, and space surveillance capabilities. The Space Operations Vehicle would also be one of the vehicles that would deploy the Common Aero Vehicle."
Obviously, not all these planned systems are "weapons" per se, and some, particularly those programs related to space surveillance and tracking, have both capabilities beneficial both in peacetime and wartime, for both military and commercial satellites. Improved space surveillance is critical to tracking dangerous space debris, and helping spacecraft avoid potentially destructive collisions. Others of the systems could not be in fairness described as space weapons; for example, the Counter Satellite Communications System is essentially a modernized jamming system, and would not destroy a targeted satellite.
Others, however, are more worrisome. The Air-Launched Anti-Satellite Missile, for example, is obviously not going to have a "reversible and temporary" effect - a missile is either a kinetic kill vehicle or equipped with a payload (conventional explosives). As noted, such a system could backfire in creating dangerous space debris that could cause "fratricide" of U.S. military assets in space, or damage commercial satellites. Hypervelocity Rod Bundles, often dubbed "Rods from God," are highly problematic both technically and cost-wise, but also because of their first-strike, preemptive nature.
Of most concern, however, is not the plan itself nor the specific programs included therein. It is the fact that the U.S. military is proceeding apace down a path toward space weaponization in what is essentially a public policy vacuum. There has been little debate among policy-makers and law-makers about the enormous strategic implications of a world with space weapons, and a unilateral U.S. move to become the first to acquire them. While many would argue that space weapons could give the United States an undeniable near-term edge in war-fighting, many others would argue that space weapons pose far too many risks and costs to be worth what would likely be only a temporary benefit. In its Transformation Plan, the U.S. Air Force has made it clear that the time for that debate to begin was yesterday.
Author(s): Theresa Hitchens
-------- spies
Moves to give spy agencies more powers to intercept email
The Age (Australia)
Thursday February 19, 2004
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/02/19/1077072767625.html
Canberra - The federal government today moved to give greater powers to spy agencies to intercept people's emails.
The Telecommunications (Interception) Amendment Bill 2004 also allows warrants to be sought in connection with the investigation of a wider range of serious offences, including terrorism.
The bill, if passed by parliament, will allow recording of calls to ASIO public lines.
It will also amend the definition of interception to ensure that the protections conferred by the Interception Act keep up with technological developments.
Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said as a result of recent advances in technology many communications passing over the telecommunications system now take the form of written words or images, not covered by current legislation.
"The bill will allow the definition of interception to include reading and viewing, as well as listening to and recording, a communication in its passage over the telecommunications system," he told parliament.
"The amendment will ensure that the protections afforded by the Act extend to all forms of communication passing over the Australian telecommunications system."
Other amendments allow for agencies to obtain warrants to assist in investigating terrorism offences involving firearms and state and territory cybercrime.
Debate on the bill was adjourned to a later time.
----
Green Berets take on spy duties
February 19, 2004
By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040219-123000-1473r.htm
The Pentagon will start using the Army's storied Green Berets as spies in addition to their traditional combat roles.
The training is part of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's overall goal of developing more "actionable intelligence" to find terrorists. Some senior Pentagon officials also believe Green Berets, officially called Special Forces, can do a better job than the CIA in preparing the battle space for insertion of Green Beret "A-Teams."
In all, the new spy training will enable more Green Berets to enter countries undercover to survey urban or rural settings and set up networks of informants, missions normally executed by CIA paramilitaries. There are also plans to put them under diplomatic cover at U.S. embassies abroad, according to military sources.
Fort Bragg, N.C., home to U.S. Army Special Operations Command, opened an intelligence-training school in 1986 for a select few Green Berets. They would in turn train other A-Team members in intelligence techniques.
Now, the Army is quietly opening a second intelligence training center at Fort Lewis, Wash., near Tacoma, home to the 1st Special Forces Group.
"You're not supposed to know what they do," said a military source of the planned training site. "They say it's an advanced intelligence course. It's kind of like the 'Farm' in Virginia," referring to the CIA training center for the clandestine service.
With two schools, the Army will at least double the number of intelligence-savvy Green Berets and broaden their skills in intelligence collection and preparing the battle space.
The courses now focus on how to create a network of sources and then plan meetings that do not endanger the informant's life. Soldiers are also taught how to handle money that is paid to informants.
According to several military sources, the Green Berets will undergo far more extensive training. They asked that the exact name of the course not be disclosed.
Soldiers quote Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Lambert, the former commander of Army Special Operations Command, as saying intelligence training was a key to success in Afghanistan,where Green Beret teams organized and led anti-Taliban locals.
Sources described the more sophisticated intelligence training as a top priority of U.S. Special Operations Command (SoCom) in Tampa, Fla.
Mr. Rumsfeld has given SoCom new powers to plan and execute kill-or-capture missions against terrorists. To do it, SoCom needs intelligence on where al Qaeda operatives are hiding. The hope is that broader training and deployment of Green Berets is one more step toward that goal.
The secretary also created the Pentagon's first-ever undersecretary of defense for intelligence who has met with SoCom officers to coordinate and improve military intelligence collection.
"For too long, the shooters have left intel for the spooks to do," a Pentagon official said. "Our philosophy is: Everybody's an intelligence agent."
The end result, this official said, is that Green Berets will play a larger role in preparing the battle space - a chore largely left up to CIA officers and paramilitaries.
Such preparation involves the insertion of small teams into a denied area to recruit agents and setting up landing zones and safe houses.
A confidential briefing chart obtained by The Washington Times shows the Pentagon's thinking on having Green Berets perform preparation of the battle space. The Green Berets would recruit locals who would help them infiltrate the country, and arrange transportation and shelter for soldiers, and organize the local resistance.
The CIA would "gain access to protected information" and conduct covert operations.
One benefit of having the Green Berets do battle space preparation is that it would not require the administration to submit a "finding" or notification to Congress.
Under Title 50 of the U.S. code, which controls CIA operations, the administration would have to notify Congress if the agency took on that mission.
--------
Guardsman Charged With Trying to Spy for Al Qaeda
February 19, 2004
By SARAH KERSHAW
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/national/19SPY.html
SEATTLE, Feb. 18 - The Army has charged a member of the Washington State National Guard with attempting to supply intelligence of Army organizations and weapons systems to the Qaeda terrorist network, Army officials said on Wednesday. The intelligence included details about military personnel, troop movement, tactics and "vulnerabilities," the charges said.
Specialist Ryan G. Anderson, 26, a Muslim convert who Army officials said also went by the name Amir Abdul Rashid, was charged on Feb. 12 at the Fort Lewis base south of here with four counts of attempting to supply information to the enemy, but the charges were not made public until Wednesday.
Specialist Anderson was taken into custody at Fort Lewis last week after an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Justice Department and the Army found that he had used a computer to try to contact Qaeda cells in the United States, Army officials said. According to the charges made public on Wednesday at Fort Lewis, Specialist Anderson provided extensive information to military personnel posing as members of Al Qaeda, both in person and via the Internet.
"I wish to meet with you," the charges quoted Specialist Anderson as saying on the Internet, to people he thought were members of Al Qaeda. "I share your cause."
Specialist Anderson, whose tank brigade is scheduled next month to deploy to Iraq for one year, was raised by a Christian family in Everett, north of here.
Specialist Anderson's case is the latest example of an American military soldier being formally charged with espionage, but military experts said the charges were the result of the kind of sting operation not seen since the cold war. The charges, officials said, stemmed from conduct that occurred from Jan. 22 to Feb. 11. They could carry the death penalty if Specialist Anderson is convicted, according to military Code of Justice.
Members of Specialist Anderson's family declined to comment on Wednesday. A man who answered the telephone at the house of his father and stepmother in Everett said family members would not speak "for at least four weeks," and messages left at the home where Specialist Anderson lived with his wife, Erin, in Lynnwood, a Seattle suburb, were not answered.
Army officials said Specialist Anderson had been assigned a defense lawyer, but they declined to provide the lawyer's name Wednesday night in response to a faxed request.
Specialist Anderson converted to Islam five years ago, people who know him said. He graduated from Cascade High School in 1995 and received a bachelor's degree in history from Washington State University in Pullman in 2002.
While at the university, he attended a local mosque and occasionally participated in a student Muslim group, said Irshad Altheimer, a member of the Muslim Students Association.
Mr. Altheimer described Specialist Anderson as nice and curious about Islam.
Jennifer Seratte, a classmate of Specialist Anderson's at Cascade High School, said he was on the debate team and described him as "very serious," and a very active practicing Christian.
"This whole thing just totally blew my mind," she said.
Ms. Seratte added: "He was on the debate team, he was always debating about government and politics and the laws. He knew the ways the government worked, and he was patriotic. If you were going to go up against him in a debate, you had better know what you were talking about."
Muslims in the Seattle area said that Specialist Anderson joined a local Muslim e-mail group two years ago, using the Internet names Abdul Rashid and Gunfighter and bragging about being an expert marksman.
The charges against Specialist Anderson said that he had tried to "aid the enemy" with sketches of the M1A1 and M1A2 tanks, offering the investigators a computer disk containing his passport photograph and military identification card.
The charges also said he tried to provide detailed information to investigators posing as Qaeda operatives about weaknesses in the military and "means of killing U.S. Army personnel and destroying U.S. Army weapon systems and equipment."
Legal experts said the charges were among the most serious they had heard of since the cold war.
"There have been a number of sting operations over the years, but I don't think any have been similar to this," Philip Cave, a former military lawyer, said. "Looking at the charge sheet, it certainly reads as extremely serious."
-------- un
France, Germany push for new U.N. resolution on Iraq
By Seattle Times news services
February 19, 2004
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2001860685_iraq19.html
WASHINGTON - Even as the Bush administration says it is considering a major shift in its plan for transition to Iraqi self-rule, France and Germany said yesterday that they believe a new U.N. Security Council resolution on the world body's role in Iraq is needed.
The United States has been urging the United Nations to take a greater role in Iraq, but a new resolution might set up another confrontation between the United States and two leading opponents of the war.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan today will give the Security Council recommendations on how a new Iraqi government should be selected.
He is expected to agree with the United States that direct elections - which have been sought by Iraq's leading Shiite cleric in defiance of a U.S.-backed transition plan based on a system of caucuses - were not possible before the scheduled June 30 power transfer but would be desirable by the end of the year.
The United States and Iraqi Governing Council last November agreed to use a system of representative caucuses rather than direct elections to form a government in June.
U.S. officials hope the U.N. involvement in the transitional government will earn the mission greater acceptance by Iraqis and its neighbors and will lead other countries to contribute more money, troops and political support.
But some countries have been skeptical about the way the U.S.-led coalition has organized the occupation and given out contracts to rebuild the country.
The United States has so far barred French, Russian and German companies from bidding for $18.6 billion in U.S.-funded prime reconstruction contracts after those nations opposed the war.
Annan is expected to delay his recommendations on the sensitive question of how to choose a provisional government, officials said.
His decision today might pave the way for a new U.S.-U.N. collaboration on an alternative transition plan.
Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani and a majority of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council have rejected the Nov. 15 plan to hold regional caucuses. Among the ideas under consideration, a U.N. official said, is organizing a national conference of tribal, political and religious leaders that reflects Iraq's disparate population to select a provisional government - similar to the Afghanistan's loya jirga.
Another possibility is expanding the current 25-member Iraqi Governing Council, say U.S. and U.N. officials. Such a modified council would hold sovereignty until Iraq's first democratic elections.
Over the past two months, a growing number of senior U.S. foreign-policy officials and military officers have become convinced that the transition will succeed - and have the widest support among Iraqis - only if the United Nations crafts a plan and then oversees selection of a provisional Iraqi government, with help from the United States and other coalition partners.
But key U.S. officials in the offices of Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld oppose handing over significant authority or control of the pivotal process, preferring to keep the United Nations in an advisory or support role, according to U.S. and congressional officials.
"They say, 'Can the U.N. really do it better than we can?' These are not guys who think the U.N. is capable of assuming a massive undertaking like Iraq. They argue that we've invested billions of dollars, hundreds of lives, and the reputations of a nation and a president. We can't fail. But if we turn it over to others, we lose control of Iraq's destiny," a well-placed U.S. official said.
Compiled from The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and Reuters reports.
----
Annan Is Said to Have Doubt on Iraq Voting
February 19, 2004
New York Times
By WARREN HOGE
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/international/middleeast/19NATI.html
UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 18 - Secretary General Kofi Annan will endorse the view that the interim Iraqi government to take office this summer cannot be chosen by direct elections, but he will not make his recommendation on Iraq's political future for at least a week, senior United Nations diplomats said Wednesday.
The diplomats, who did not want to be quoted by name, said that Mr. Annan would consult Thursday with his special envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, who is returning from a weeklong examination of the political situation in the country. Afterward, Mr. Brahimi is to discuss his findings in a meeting with the Security Council.
The diplomats said that while Mr. Brahimi has concluded that setting up credible elections by the June 30 deadline the United States set for returning sovereignty to Iraq is not feasible, he will need more time to develop clear options to pass along to Mr. Annan for the transfer of power.
The task of coming up with a recommendation for Iraq's political future is a crucial one for the United Nations, which the Bush administration excluded from participation in the postwar transition. Iraqi leaders complained about the American plans for transferring power and requested United Nations intervention.
Mr. Annan sent in Mr. Brahimi, a 70-year-old former Algerian foreign minister whose reputation for resolving conflicts in the Muslim world was enhanced by his just completed two years' service as the top United Nations diplomat in Afghanistan.
Among those Mr. Brahimi saw in Iraq was Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the spiritual leader of the Shiite Muslim majority, whose demands for direct elections instead of the American formulation for indirect, caucus-based voting caused the Bush administration to rethink its initiative.
The Americans approached the United Nations after Ayatollah Sistani refused to deal directly with them but said he would drop his objections if a United Nations team went to Iraq and decided that direct elections were not feasible in the existing time frame.
While in Iraq, Mr. Brahimi suggested strongly that he thought that was the case, citing the dangers of setting up logistics too hastily.
"Conducting elections without adequate preparations could lead to even more disagreements," he said in a news conference before leaving Baghdad.
Carina Perelli, the head of the Election Assistance Division, and her team of experts returned Tuesday from 10 days in Iraq and are preparing a separate report on the technical aspects of holding elections. Officials said it would become an explanatory annex to Mr. Annan's final report.
United Nations diplomats say that they expect the report to conclude that it is important for all sides to stick to the June 30 date. Though the date was once suspect at the United Nations as one directed in part by administration interest in removing Iraq as an issue in the presidential election, diplomats now believe that Iraqis themselves have given the date such symbolic importance that it would be unwise to change it.
A senior American official said Wednesday that the administration would consider nearly any recommendation of Mr. Brahimi as long as it had broad support among Iraqis.
Among the options Mr. Annan will be exploring is a June 30 transfer of sovereignty to an expanded Iraqi Governing Council that would add members in an effort to be seen as more representative by Iraqis who question the legitimacy of the panel appointed by the Americans.
Such a plan would have the advantage of providing political continuity as the country passes into Iraqi control, but Mr. Annan is telling associates that it would only work if the new body looked distinctly different from the present one.
The administration has resisted keeping the council in place, but a senior administration official said that if Mr. Brahimi declares it acceptable, and the council would be in power for only a short time, the United States would not oppose it.
Another option under consideration is advancing the date of full national elections now scheduled under the American plan for the end of 2005 to a point earlier in the year.
The current American transition proposal calls for provincial caucuses to to select an assembly, which would in turn form an interim government. United Nations officials believe that plan has been discredited in Iraq and should be replaced.
Mr. Annan's challenge is to come up with a new plan that guarantees that the interim government reflects Iraq's ethnic disparities while not giving dominant power to the Shiite majority, leaving the Sunni minority, which ruled for years, feeling disenfranchised, or underrepresenting the autonomous Kurds and spurring secessionist sentiment among them.
The United Nations diplomats said the earliest they foresaw a final decision was the end of next week.
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Annan To Back U.S. on Iraq Plan
U.N. Chief to Urge Delaying Elections, Senior Officials Say
By Colum Lynch and Robin Wright
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52759-2004Feb18?language=printer
UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 18 -- U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan will endorse the U.S. position that direct elections cannot be held in Iraq before the United States hands over political power to Iraqis on June 30, senior U.N. officials said Wednesday.
But Annan, scheduled to brief the Security Council and other U.N. members Thursday, will delay for at least another week his recommendations on the sensitive question of how to choose a provisional government, officials said.
Annan's decision is a major boost for the Bush administration, which has struggled to address the demand of Iraq's leading cleric that direct elections be used to select an interim government, rather than the complex system of regional caucuses that the United States had proposed. Washington has turned to the United Nations to adjudicate the issue.
The U.N. move paves the way for a new U.S.-U.N. collaboration on an alternative transition plan that will allow the United States to end its formal occupation by June 30.
"We look forward to working with the United Nations to help the process along, to add some international legitimacy to what the Iraqis think is necessary to move the process toward a new constitution and elections of people," President Bush said in an interview Wednesday on the Middle East Television Network.
The Bush administration and Annan now have to tackle the difficult issue of how to choose an interim government.
Among the ideas under consideration, a U.N. official said, is organizing a national conference of tribal, political and religious leaders that reflects Iraq's disparate population to select a provisional government -- similar to Afghanistan's loya jirga.
Another possibility is to expand the current 25-member Iraqi Governing Council, say U.S. and U.N. officials. Such a modified council would hold sovereignty until Iraq's first democratic elections.
One U.N. official said the "least unacceptable" proposal that emerged from the talks held last week by U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is to have an "enlarged, more representative governing council, which would be limited in its power and its duration."
Bush administration officials appear interested in this option. "The general buzz here is that we may end up handing over to an expanded governing council," said a State Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The official said that Washington would still prefer a political transition that resembles the U.S.-backed plan for 18 regional caucuses but that "we recognize the constraints."
State Department spokesman Richard A. Boucher said there are "at least a dozen, maybe a score," of ideas for a political transition in play.
"I'm not going to lean towards any particular one or start throwing darts at the list," he said. "I think it's important for us all to remember that we have very similar goals in Iraq. We all want Iraq to have a democracy."
The U.N. chief's decision comes after both Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and a majority of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council rejected the Nov. 15 plan to hold regional caucuses.
Annan plans to outline Brahimi's preliminary conclusions in a meeting Thursday with officials from more than a dozen countries that make up the "friends of Iraq" group and later at a luncheon with representatives of the 15 Security Council member nations.
Besides crafting a detailed blueprint for the political handover, the Bush administration has yet to decide how much power to share with the world body in implementing the plan.
Intense discussions are expected to take place behind the scenes in New York over the next week to 10 days as U.N. officials draw up proposals and try to determine the role to be played by the Security Council.
Despite the Bush administration's increased reliance on the United Nations, senior administration officials are wary of involving the Security Council in Iraq policy.
One State Department official voiced concern about the possibility that member nations might call for a Security Council resolution to formally approve a new plan for Iraq's transition, which could complicate and delay the process with just over four months remaining.
"There's ample opportunity to hijack this in the Security Council and take it down a road we don't want to see it go," said the official, speaking on the condition that he not be named.
"It may be that some want to use it . . . for their own gains in Iraq."
France and Germany, the council's two toughest critics of the U.S.-led war against Iraq, said today that the Security Council should adopt a new resolution.
Germany's ambassador to the United Nations, Gunter Pleuger, said previous resolutions on postwar Iraq would not be sufficient to reflect the dramatic political changes in Iraq.
"It would also be desirable to have a new resolution to draw [in] those countries who are really needed, not so much the Europeans but also Arab-speaking countries and Islamic countries," he said.
Annan, who is scheduled to fly to Japan on Friday, is not expected to provide a formal set of recommendations on Iraq's political future until after he returns to New York on Feb. 25, according to U.N. officials.
Wright reported from Washington.
-------- us
Suicides in Iraq, Questions at Home
Pentagon Tight-Lipped as Self-Inflicted Deaths Mount in Military
By Theola Labbé
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52735-2004Feb18?language=printer
LUFKIN, Tex. -- Two-year-old Jada Suell tumbled out of the car and ran ahead of everyone -- her grandmother, her mother, her cousins and her 4-year-old sister, Jakayla -- toward the grave of Joseph Dewayne Suell.
"Dada," said the little girl. In the Sunday afternoon quiet of Cedar Grove cemetery, her toddler voice reverberated like a shout.
"Yes, we're going to Daddy's grave," her grandmother Rena Mathis said reassuringly.
The silver grave cover bore colorful wreaths and American flags -- a nod to Suell's three years of military service. He was deployed to Iraq in April 2003 as an Army petroleum supply specialist out of Fort Sill, Okla. Less than two months later, he was dead.
A report provided to the family at their request says that the 24-year-old died of a drug overdose on Father's Day, one of 22 suicides reported among troops in Iraq last year.
According to William Winkenwerder Jr., assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, who discussed the suicides in a briefing last month, that represents a rate of more than 13.5 per 100,000 troops, about 20 percent higher than the recent Army average of 10.5 to 11. The Pentagon plans to release the findings of a team sent to Iraq last fall to investigate the mental health of the troops, including suicides.
The number Winkenwerder cited does not include cases under investigation, so the actual number may be higher. It also excludes the suicides by soldiers who have returned to the United States. For instance, two soldiers undergoing mental health treatment at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington reportedly committed suicide there, in July 2003 and last month. In its weekly report on the treatment of returning battlefield soldiers, the hospital never mentioned the deaths. An official at Walter Reed said the deaths are "suspected" suicides and are being investigated by the Army's criminal division.
Stephen L. Robinson, who visits the hospital regularly and is executive director of the National Gulf War Resource Center, a nonprofit advocacy group for veterans and soldiers, said there was no public record of the deaths. "They just covered it up," he said.
The military's emphasis on honor, valor and courage makes suicide perhaps one of its last taboos. The Pentagon does not publicly identify a soldier's death as a suicide but may classify it as a "non-hostile gunshot wound," or death from "non-hostile injuries," which can also include accidents such as negligent discharge of a weapon. In comparison, the Pentagon will release a description of the cause of death -- enemy fire, a land mine, a car crash -- for a soldier killed in action or as a result of an accident.
The Washington Post contacted more than a dozen families of soldiers whose causes of death were listed as non-combat related. Some said that although the military had not provided further details, information from soldiers in the field indicated that the deaths were from "friendly fire" or an accidental weapons discharge. For others awaiting the results of an investigation, the possibility of suicide was too painful to bear.
"I am not ready to hear that," said the mother of one soldier who died from a gunshot wound to the head -- a "non-combat weapons discharge," according to the Pentagon.
In Texas, the Suell family says the military has it wrong. Suellboy, as he was known to those closest to him, was strong-minded and a God-fearing Christian. The son of a minister, he preached to others that suicide was a sin. He drew hearts on the letters he sent to his wife and said he could not wait to come home to see his daughters.
Rebecca Suell, 23, said she will never believe that her husband killed himself. She and her mother-in-law, Mathis, 47, are demanding answers, and they say the military has been silent and unsupportive.
"We call them, we have questions, we want to know, and they don't have anything to tell us," Rebecca Suell said, standing at the edge of her husband's grave. "They don't have nothing to say, and that's not right."
'A Different Kind of War'
The 130,000 troops stationed in Iraq are fighting the first prolonged ground war since Vietnam. What the two conflicts have in common is a public debate over the war itself, which can cause soldiers to question themselves, said Ronald W. Maris, a professor emeritus of psychiatry at the University of South Carolina.
"World War I and World War II seemed a little more righteous in that there was an initial aggression by an enemy that we didn't start," he said. "That would not apply to Vietnam and not to Iraq."
The rate of military suicides is traditionally lower than that in the general population when looking at comparable age groups. And it usually decreases during wartime. A spike in the number in July prompted the military to send a mental health team to Iraq to investigate.
"Once the fighting is over, that's when people have time on their hands in an austere environment and 24-hour access to guns," Pentagon spokeswoman Martha Rudd said. "And they have the time to brood on their problems."
The postwar troops stationed in Iraq have to contend with roadside bombs, mortars launched into their base camps and the plaintive cries of women and children that are sometimes a ruse for an ambush. Although units are starting to be rotated and replaced, the length of deployment is uncertain.
By contrast, there were four days of ground war in the 1991 Persian Gulf War, after which the U.S. coalition declared victory. Two suicides were recorded during that conflict.
Other recent U.S.-led engagements "were more like video games," Maris said. "When you have hands on, face to face, see the dying, see the injured, see the blood, see the suffering, it's a lot more difficult."
Robinson, of the resource center, who is a retired Army ranger and fought in the first Gulf War, said Iraq is without a front line.
"Everybody's the enemy, there are no lines in front of you or behind you and the dangers are everywhere. . . . Every trash pile is your potential death," he said.
"It's a different kind of war."
That kind of stress can lead to low morale. For some, it can lead to full-blown depression and anxiety. And suicide is an overwhelmingly male behavior, by at least 4 to 1.
"A lot of times it's about feeling trapped," said Army Col. Ricky Malone, who recently returned from Iraq, where he was chief of mental health services at the Baghdad military hospital. " 'I've got to get out of here, and if I can't I'd rather be dead.' "
Ben Gonzalez, former emergency room chief of the same hospital, said: "For the comrades left behind, death of a soldier by suicide is much more devastating than enemy fire. The emotional attachment comes back. There's more participation from the unit, their buddies are here, they're standing around, they want updates -- it's a much more emotional level."
Soldiers looking for ways to cope have several options. Military chaplains, assigned to individual units, offer comfort without the label of mental illness. Soldiers in more serious distress might be referred to inpatient psychiatric wards or be sent home. The Army sent 596 soldiers from Iraq to mental health treatment facilities in 2003.
Still, some soldiers don't speak up or don't get noticed.
A Quest for Answers
In Lufkin, population 32,000, the names and faces of local troops serving in Iraq hang in the Lufkin Mall; shoppers pause briefly to look before continuing their stroll. Suell's picture is there. It has also been on the front page of the local paper, which is reporting his death as a suicide.
Mathis, Suell's mother, said she avoids the beauty salon and sometimes skips the Wal-Mart Supercenter, just to get away from the chatter. "No matter how he died or what happened, he still deserves respect and honor," she said. "I just want some honor for my son."
Floyd Slaughter, 74, who owns Lufkin Army Navy, doesn't know what to believe about whether Suell committed suicide.
"What could have happened -- fright? If he did, we don't have any proof except the word of the Army -- and they protect themselves," said Slaughter, who added that he supports a just war but not this one, because no weapons of mass destruction were found.
"If he did, he was scared and saw no way out. The officers should have caught that, pulled that boy out and sent him home."
Suell went against his mother's wishes when he enlisted in 2000. But when he returned from basic training, Mathis said the Army had made a man out of her son.
The family moved to Fort Sill, Okla. Suell went on a yearlong tour to Korea and missed the birth of his younger daughter. His wife called to complain that she was distressed and that Suell was granted a short visit home from his tour.
During the Iraq tour, too, Rebecca Suell pleaded, but she said she wasn't taken seriously. Her husband asked her to talk to his commander and say that his family needed him. She was working at Wal-Mart and attending school. She felt it was too much for one parent. "The commander said, 'We'll do everything that we can to get your husband home, it'll take a while' -- they ignored it," she said. "If he just had some time with his family, he'd still be here."
In his letters, Joseph Suell wrote that Iraq was a shadowy conflict. "Over here you never know what's going to happen next," he wrote to his mother-in-law, Janice Doggett, 41. "So I just keep faith in Jesus and keep my eyes open."
To his widow, those are not the words of a suicidal man. He had no history of mental illness, and even while in Iraq he was making plans. Married at City Hall, he and Rebecca planned a church wedding upon his return.
Maybe he took some pills because he couldn't sleep, Rebecca Suell suggested. Or because he was feeling a little bit stressed. But the intention was not death.
"When he got his teeth pulled he wouldn't even take one pill for the pain," said Rebecca Suell. "Why would he take a bottle?"
At the cemetery, one of two African American burial places in Angelina County, she circled the perimeter of the grave, stopping to straighten a fallen section of the white wooden fence. Nearby, her two children and nieces squealed as they ran around on the red Texas dirt.
Back at her house, Mathis has decorated her home with four yellow ribbons outside and a small shrine to Suell inside. It consists of a crisply folded American flag inside a triangular case with three of Suell's medals. A framed photo of Suell in military uniform stares out into the living room. There are several red and blue candles and two large birthday candles that say "2" and "5." Mathis had a birthday party for Suell in October, when he would have been 25 years old. His younger brother Michael Shepherd, 23, sat silently on the couch. He speaks very little about his brother's death but wears several dog tags, one specially made. It says:
My Brother.
My Friend.
We Miss You.
RIP.
Suellboy.
"He didn't commit suicide," Shepherd said. "That ain't him."
Mathis has continued her quest for answers in her son's death. The search has taken her to the local office of her U.S. senator, and to a nearby town where she drove around for three hours on a tip that a sergeant who used to know her son was back home on leave. She never found him. She leaves messages for an Army criminal investigator to check up on the case.
Tears crawled down her cheeks at a Sunday morning church service when the minister spoke of having a good year. In her living room, they fell again as she tried to make sense of Suell's death.
"I have no autopsy report, no toxicology report, nothing," she said. The one document that Mathis has from the military is a DD Form 1300, a casualty report that lists the cause and circumstances of the death as "self-inflicted: drug overdose."
"I believe in my heart that he did take some medicine, but it wasn't to kill himself. He probably had a headache," she said.
"I'm not blaming God -- God don't make mistakes. I'm not mad at the war -- Joseph wasn't war material."
Suell told his mother that he hadn't killed anyone, and he hoped he wouldn't have to.
"God looked down on Joseph and said he's not that type of person. God came down and took my son."
Staff writer Tamara Jones and researchers Madonna Lebling, Julie Tate and Rob Thomason contributed to this report from Washington.
-------- propaganda wars
Bush Appears on New Middle East Network
February 19, 2004
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/politics/19PREX.html
WASHINGTON, Feb. 18 - President Bush, helping to inaugurate a new American television network in the Middle East, said in an interview broadcast Wednesday that the United States would continue to press its plan for a Palestinian state and for democracy in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and other Arab countries.
Speaking on the Middle East Television Network, part of a new United States-sponsored system aimed at getting the American message across in the region, Mr. Bush described himself as "the first president to have ever articulated a Palestinian state," but said that this goal had been undercut by terrorists.
"The road map is in place," Mr. Bush said. "What has failed is, some parties are not advancing on the road map. They're stuck."
Mr. Bush ascribed the lack of progress in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader, who he said has undermined the peace process by failing to fight against terrorism.
He also said he hoped that with United Nations help, sovereignty could be restored to Iraq by June 30, and that disagreement on government among Sunnis, Kurds and Shiites was "very positive" because it reflected democratic stirrings.
In Arabic, the Middle East Television Network is known as "Al Hurra," or "The Free One." It is intended as a version of Radio Free Europe for the Middle East, American officials say. Mr. Bush's interview was taped Jan. 29.
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Scientists Say Administration Distorts Facts
February 19, 2004
By JAMES GLANZ
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/politics/19RESE.html
More than 60 influential scientists, including 20 Nobel laureates, issued a statement yesterday asserting that the Bush administration had systematically distorted scientific fact in the service of policy goals on the environment, health, biomedical research and nuclear weaponry at home and abroad.
The sweeping accusations were later discussed in a conference call organized by the Union of Concerned Scientists, an independent organization that focuses on technical issues and has often taken stands at odds with administration policy. On Wednesday, the organization also issued a 38-page report detailing its accusations.
The two documents accuse the administration of repeatedly censoring and suppressing reports by its own scientists, stacking advisory committees with unqualified political appointees, disbanding government panels that provide unwanted advice and refusing to seek any independent scientific expertise in some cases.
"Other administrations have, on occasion, engaged in such practices, but not so systemically nor on so wide a front," the statement from the scientists said, adding that they believed the administration had "misrepresented scientific knowledge and misled the public about the implications of its policies."
Dr. Kurt Gottfried, an emeritus professor of physics at Cornell University who signed the statement and spoke during the conference call, said the administration had "engaged in practices that are in conflict with spirit of science and the scientific method." Dr. Gottfried, who is also chairman of the board of directors at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the administration had a "cavalier attitude towards science" that could place at risk the basis for the nation's long-term prosperity, health and military prowess.
Dr. John H. Marburger III, science adviser to President Bush and director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the White House, said it was important to listen to "the distinguished scientific leadership in this country." But he said the report consisted of a largely disconnected list of events that did not make the case for a suppression of good scientific advice by the administration.
"I think there are incidents where people have got their feathers ruffled," Dr. Marburger said. "But I don't think they add up to a big pattern of disrespect."
"In most cases," he added, "these are not profound actions that were taken as the result of a policy. They are individual actions that are part of the normal processes within the agencies."
The science adviser to Mr. Bush's father, Dr. D. Allan Bromley, went further. "You know perfectly well that it is very clearly a politically motivated statement," said Dr. Bromley, a physicist at Yale. "The statements that are there are broad sweeping generalizations for which there is very little detailed backup."
The scientists denied that they had political motives in releasing the documents as the 2004 presidential race began to take clear shape. The report, Dr. Gottfried said, had taken a year to prepare, much longer than originally planned, and was released as soon as it was ready.
"I don't see it as a partisan issue at all," said Russell Train, who spoke during the call and served as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency under Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford. "If it becomes that way I think it's because the White House chooses to make it a partisan issue."
The letter was signed by luminaries from an array of disciplines. Among the Nobel winners are David Baltimore and Harold Varmus, both biomedical researchers, and Leon M. Lederman, Norman F. Ramsey and Steven Weinberg, who are physicists. The full list of signatories and the union's report can be found at www.ucsusa.org.
Aside from some new interviews with current and former government scientists, some identified in the report and others quoted anonymously, most of the information in the documents had been reported previously by a variety of major newspapers, magazines, scientific journals and nongovernmental organizations.
According to the report, the Bush administration has misrepresented scientific consensus on global warming, censored at least one report on climate change, manipulated scientific findings on the emissions of mercury from power plants and suppressed information on condom use.
The report asserts that the administration also allowed industries with conflicts of interest to influence technical advisory committees, disbanded for political reasons one panel on arms control and subjected other prospective members of scientific panels to political litmus tests.
Dr. Marburger said he was unconvinced by the report's description of those incidents. "I don't think it makes the case for the sweeping accusations that it makes," he said.
But Dr. Sidney Drell, an emeritus professor of physics at Stanford and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution who was not a signatory to the statement, said the overall findings rang true to him.
"I am concerned that the scientific advice coming into this administration seems to me very narrow," said Dr. Drell, who has advised the government on issues of national security for some 40 years and has served in Democratic and Republican administrations, including those of Presidents Nixon and Lyndon B. Johnson. "The input from individuals whose views are not in the main line of their policy don't seem to be sought or welcomed," he said.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
-------- courts
Jury Sides With Boeing In Employee Dismissal
Whistle-Blowing Led to Firing, Former Engineer Claimed in Suit
By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53171-2004Feb18.html
A Los Angeles jury yesterday sided with Boeing Co. in a lawsuit filed by a former employee who alleged he was wrongfully fired for revealing that a colleague possessed confidential Lockheed Martin Corp. documents, the company said.
Former Boeing engineer Krishnan Raghavan claimed he was dismissed in 2001 for alerting Boeing's ethics office that colleague Dean Farmer e-mailed him the proprietary documents. The documents gave Boeing an unfair advantage in competition for a commercial satellite contract, Raghavan said in his lawsuit, filed in California state court.
Boeing argued that Raghavan was laid off as part of a general downsizing. "We're very pleased," said Dan Beck, a Boeing spokesman. "It shows that Mr. Raghavan's dismissal was clearly related to business conditions and was not by any means retaliation for reporting violations."
Megan Wagner, Raghavan's attorney, said she will appeal what she characterized as several errors in law.
Boeing's internal investigation found that Farmer had more than 8,000 pages of secret Lockheed financial and bidding information, according to court records. Farmer was fired. He claimed he kept the computer files as templates and never intended for them to be used for competitive purposes.
Boeing has been under scrutiny during the past year as questions were raised about its ethics. In December, the company fired its chief financial officer, Michael M. Sears, after an internal inquiry found that Sears improperly recruited Darleen A. Druyun while she was an Air Force procurement official negotiating with Boeing on a deal to buy and lease refueling tankers. Druyun was also fired. Soon after, Boeing's chief executive, Philip M. Condit, resigned.
The circumstances in the Raghavan case were similar to a case in which Boeing admitted that several employees had Lockheed Martin documents during a competition to launch government satellites. That case is under investigation by the Justice Department.
Following Boeing's admission, the Air Force stripped the company of $1 billion in government business and suspended its space unit from competing for new contracts.
-------- homeland security
U.S. to Keep Key Data On Infrastructure
Secret Firms Encouraged to Report Security Gaps
By John Mintz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A21
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52740-2004Feb18.html
Starting tomorrow, chemical companies, railroads, electric utilities and other parts of the nation's critical infrastructure can begin submitting sensitive information to the Department of Homeland Security about their vulnerabilities to terrorist attacks with assurances that their proprietary data would be safe from public disclosure.
Under the Homeland Security Act of 2002, the department can deem data voluntarily provided by businesses that help the government stave off possible disruptions by terrorists as secret and unavailable to outsiders. The law's supporters view it as a way for U.S. officials to help map security plans for critical U.S. infrastructure, 85 percent of which is in private hands.
But some advocates for environmental protection and open-records laws say unscrupulous firms might manipulate the rules as part of an attempt to evade federal enforcement of health or safety rules.
Sean Moulton, a senior policy analyst with OMB Watch, a nonprofit group that opposes government secrecy, said that during the drafting of the law and the rules being released this week, key industries successfully lobbied for procedures ensuring that any information they share with Homeland Security would remain secret and would not be usable by other agencies in civil enforcement actions.
"The government agreed that 'we'll keep secret this information you give to Homeland Security, and we won't do anything with it,' " other than for counterterrorist purposes, Moulton said. "It's naive to think we won't have bad actors in industry" misusing the protections, he said.
Federal officials said they will strive to prevent the rules from allowing firms to avoid accountability for wrongdoing by including data about, for example, pollution at a chemical plant in a confidential report to the Homeland Security Department about security gaps.
Robert Liscouski, the department's chief of infrastructure protection, said his staff will strive to ensure that the law is "not providing a safe haven" for corporate wrongdoers. Companies can be charged with felonies if they mislead the department into believing that the information they provide is not related to any enforcement matters being considered by other agencies, officials said.
U.S. officials have no power under the Homeland Security Act to compel industries to provide data about their security gaps, so any corporate cooperation would be voluntary.
Safeguarding nuclear plants, telecommunications nodes and thousands of other critical networks was one of the main reasons for the formation of the Homeland Security Department last year. It is an arena in which it is critical that U.S. officials synchronize their efforts with private industry, officials said.
U.S. officials found soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that many industries were reluctant to share information about their operations and their security vulnerabilities because of fears of legal liability and concern that the information would be unearthed by outsiders using the federal Freedom of Information Act.
"These industries weren't comfortable giving sensitive information" to the federal government, said Jamie Conrad, a lawyer who specializes in security issues for the American Chemistry Council, which represents large chemical companies. "There wasn't a high degree of confidence the Department of Homeland Security could keep it confidential."
The industries' reluctance stifled progress in tightening security at many sites, officials said. That was what prompted Congress to extend secrecy guarantees to voluntary corporate declarations.
Liscouski said yesterday that while some infrastructure industries are eager to discuss security issues with the government, others are dragging their feet for fear of prompting later government requirements that they spend money to protect their networks.
The motivation of companies giving the information to his department, Liscouski said, is "doing public good in protecting the country."
-------- police
FBI report shows agents punished, fired for crimes
February 19, 2004
By Jerry Seper
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040218-110607-7486r.htm
Dozens of FBI agents were fired, disciplined and even prosecuted between 1986 and 1999 over their involvement in crimes ranging from rape, child abuse and attempted murder to bribery, extortion and drug trafficking, according to a report made public yesterday.
The 26-page document, completed in 2000 by the bureau's Behavioral Sciences and Law Enforcement Ethics units, identifies and assesses behavioral and ethical trends of FBI agents. The research project had been kept under wraps until its release by Sen. Charles E. Grassley, a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which oversees the FBI.
Mr. Grassley, Iowa Republican, said the document, known as the Behavioral and Ethical Trends Analysis, or the BETA report, was "alarming," saying it described the FBI's "lack of response to the findings and recommendations, the general lack of support for the project, the efforts to prevent its completion and attempts to withhold the report from Congress and the public."
"The shocking report is a laundry list of horrors, with examples of agents who committed rape, sexual crimes against children, other sexual deviance and misconduct, attempted murder of a spouse and narcotics violations, among many others," he said.
Mr. Grassley said the report stated that the fired or disciplined agents had exhibited warning signs, such as long histories of misconduct, and he questioned whether FBI executives had screened agent applicants properly or monitored agents identified as having problems.
He said 63 percent of the fired agents had been engaged in long-term misconduct, according to the report, and that 45 percent of them had previous disciplinary actions.
"While it's laudable that the FBI does fire agents who commit such terrible acts, these findings raise concerns about whether the FBI was dealing with problem agents soon enough and rigorously enough, possibly because of a reluctance to impose severe discipline," Mr. Grassley said.
The FBI had no immediate comment on the report. Mr. Grassley, who also serves as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said the report recognized what he called a double standard of discipline by FBI officials, saying that while serious misconduct was evident at all grades and positions within the bureau, Senior Executive Service employees "appeared to have received fewer suspensions and dismissals despite indications that they, too, engaged in egregious behavior."
He also said the report found that the FBI had failed to conduct thorough background checks on some of the agents or that it had hired them despite knowing they had problems. The report recommended that the FBI keep statistics on fired agents in the future to identify other trends in behavior.
The report noted that one in 1,000 agents was dismissed for serious misconduct or criminal offenses by the FBI between 1986 to 1999, which is about eight a year. But Mr. Grassley said that although the number was commendable, there were concerns that the document had been withheld.
Some examples of misconduct cited in the report included an agent who raped a subordinate employee, an agent who used his FBI weapon to shoot his spouse, an agent who sexually abused children and physically assaulted an adult female, and an agent with a gambling and alcohol problem who stole $400,000 in informant funds.
Others examples included an agent who pleaded guilty to manslaughter after killing his informant, an agent arrested for performing a sex act in public, an agent who misused his government credit cards, an agent who disclosed classified information to people representing a foreign-intelligence agency, an agent who took nude photographs on government property and an agent who engaged in sexual acts with prostitutes "dozens of times."
--------
Senator Says Report on Misconduct by F.B.I. Agents Is 'List of Horrors'
February 19, 2004
New York Times
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/19/politics/19FBI.html
WASHINGTON, Feb. 18 - A leading Republican senator charged Wednesday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation may have long tolerated egregious, even criminal conduct by some of its agents, including rape, embezzlement and extortion.
The senator, Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, released an internal report prepared by the F.B.I in 2000, which examined 107 instances of serious and sometimes criminal misconduct by its agents over a 16-year period.
The study found that the agents accused of wrongdoing often had a history of disciplinary proceedings and that the F.B.I. had hired some agents despite "a checkered past" and negative recommendations.
F.B.I. agents have been hit with a number of espionage and criminal scandals in recent years, with a former internal affairs official sentenced just last week to 12 years in prison in Texas for child molesting. But the internal report suggested that many cases of wrongdoing had never before been made public.
"The shocking report is a laundry list of horrors," Mr. Grassley said in a letter to the F.B.I., "with examples of agents who committed rape, sexual crimes against children, other sexual deviance and misconduct, attempted murder of a spouse, and narcotics violations, among many others."
Cassandra Chandler, an F.B.I. spokeswoman, said that the agency "takes seriously its commitment to holding its employees to the highest standards of conduct" and had taken strong steps to strengthen its disciplinary process.
An F.B.I. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said: "This is an old report, and a lot of this stuff has been dealt with and people have been prosecuted. You won't find any organization that doesn't have problems. People have weaknesses, and when the bureau becomes aware of that, we act on it."
Even so, the F.B.I.'s disciplinary process continues to undergo scrutiny. Robert S. Mueller III, director of the F.B.I., became so concerned about an "erosion of trust" in the process that he appointed an outside commission last May to study the problem. The commission's report is due to be completed soon.
But Mr. Grassley, a senior member of the Judiciary Committee who has pushed for tougher oversight of the F.B.I., charged that the bureau sat on results of that review and sought to "cover up" the findings of its 2000 report by slowing the research and blocking its release. Bureau officials denied the accusations.
"While it's laudable that the F.B.I. does fire agents who commit such terrible acts," Mr. Grassley said in his letter, "these findings raise concerns about whether the F.B.I. was dealing with problem agents soon enough and rigorously enough, possibly because of a reluctance to impose severe discipline."
The internal report in 2000 studied agents who had been fired by the bureau or left under investigation of wrongdoing from 1986 through 1999. The study found that dismissals for egregious behavior were generally "infrequent," averaging about 8.5 agents a year, or a rate of less than one in 1,000. A similar number of agents resigned under inquiry or retired abruptly in those years.
The fired agents were generally not newcomers. They averaged more than 10 years on the job before the misconduct, and 70 percent had received commendations for their work. About 65 percent of the former agents engaged in "long-term misconduct," and about 45 percent had a history of disciplinary problems, including suspensions.
While the report did not list names or dates, it did describe 77 cases in which agents were fired and, in some cases, sent to prison.
For instance, a former agent with gambling and alcohol problems was found to have stolen more than $400,000 in bureau informant funds and went to prison. An agent who sold cocaine was also imprisoned. And a third agent was found to have raped a subordinate.
-------- prisons / prisoners
Guardsman Charged in Al Qaeda Case
Associated Press
Thursday, February 19, 2004; Page A24
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53486-2004Feb19.html
FORT LEWIS, Wash., Feb. 18 -- A National Guardsman accused of attempting to pass military intelligence to the al Qaeda terrorist network has been formally charged, an Army spokesman said Wednesday.
Spec. Ryan G. Anderson was charged Feb. 12, but the Army did not immediately release that information, Lt. Col. Stephen Barger said. A military defense lawyer has been appointed for Anderson, but Barger refused to identify the lawyer.
Anderson was charged with two counts of attempting to supply intelligence to the enemy, the Army said. He could face the death penalty if convicted.
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, defense officials have said Anderson used extremist Internet chat rooms to try to get in touch with al Qaeda operatives. It is unclear how the U.S. government got wind of his alleged offer to supply military information to the terrorists. It does not appear he transmitted any information to al Qaeda, authorities said.
Barger said the soldier's alleged attempts to pass information occurred between Jan. 22 and Feb. 11.
Anderson, a Muslim convert, was arrested Feb. 12 and is being held at Fort Lewis.
The tank crew member from the Guard's 81st Armor Brigade was taken into custody just days before he was to leave for duty in Iraq.
-------- torture
Detained and tortured by the US military
Jim Loney,
Electronic Iraq,
19 February 2004
http://electroniciraq.net/news/1367.shtml
Ahmed is a 52 year-old farmer who lives on the outskirts of Bagdhad. He was detained and tortured by US forces at the end of January. Ahmed has 8 children. His youngest son is 11 years old. He grows vegetables, wheat, rice and beans, and is a driver for the Ministry of Irrigation. He asked us not to use his real name for fear of punishment from the US military.
The following story is an edited version of his translated remarks. Ahmed met with Christian Peacemaker Teams and Occupation Watch on February 13, 2004. This is his story.
One day, at the end of January, there was an explosion about 2km away. I was inside my house when we heard the voice of the explosion. We went to the mosque as usual to pray because it was Friday [the Muslim equivalent of the sabbath]. When we finished the prayers, we saw helicopters everywhere and we heard the news that the Americans came to my house and arrested my nephew who was visiting from another city. I told everyone in my family we did nothing so they will release him.
My son lives in the next house. They searched his house and took his money. When they finished checking his house they were waiting for us. They arrested my son and I and asked us if we did this explosion. We said no. They asked us do you know who did it and we said no. The soldiers said either tell us you did it, or tell us who did it.
They handcuffed me and took me to their car by grabbing the back of my shirt. They stopped their cars at the place of the explosion. They took me again by my shirt, showed us the explosion and then started beating us. They put bags over our heads so we cannot see who is beating us. They kicked me with their shoes.
On the way to the camp, I asked for water and they beat me on the head with the bottle of water. I fell down when I was getting out of the car and somebody lifted me under my arms and threw me to the ground. They lined us up against a wall. Somebody kicked me, my head jerked and banged into the wall. I fell down.
They took us at 1:00pm and we reached the camp at 5:30pm. We only had water for four days -- no food. And for all this time we were outside -- not under a roof -- and we can see nothing because we are wearing a hood.
After I hit the wall with my head and fell down, they handcuffed me with my hands behind my back lying on my stomach. [Ahmed shows us his wrists. They are ringed with pink scar tissue.] They kept me in this position through the night and into the next day -- almost 24 hours -- and we weren't allowed to move our legs in that time. We could not sleep during that time because they would kick us. I don't know for sure, but I think they did this for a purpose, as a way to torture us and not give us a chance to sleep.
Look at this. [His wife brings in a white tunic. Numbers are written in black marker across the front of the tunic.] This is what they wrote on me, to identify me.
During this 24 hours, they brought some dogs. I could hear them searching and doing things with them. They didn't bite me, but I could hear the screams of other people being bitten.
There was a translator and I tried to tell him that we cannot feel our hands -- it feels like they are cut -- but he said that's the way it is.
The next day, they made us sit cross-legged with our hands handcuffed behind our backs and we are still hooded. The soldiers would come and kick us on the knee cap and you can hear them laughing.
I was so tired, but if I started to fall asleep they would kick me. When you asked the translator to go to the toilet the soldiers would shout at you and kick you. You have to ask 10 to 15 times before they let you go.
When you reach the toilet, they release your hands but you cannot use them -- they won't bend -- so sometimes you cannot control yourself.
For all this time there was no food -- only water. It did not rain, but it was cold. We had to sit this way all through the night until the next day. This is the mark it made. [Ahmed shows us a quarter-sized, red scab on the outside bones of his ankles.] Then they made us stand for 24 hours. And so it continued this way for four days.
Sometimes they would take me to another place, always by the neck, and sometimes they would let me walk into a wall. They interviewed me three times. Each time they took me inside a room before someone with a translator. They lifted the hood from my head. It's made of the same clothes the Americans use to make sand bags. They asked me for 3 to 5 minutes if I know someone who did it and then they took back. They were just looking for information.
After 4 days, they told me I will go to have lunch. They took me in front of the wall and beside me was a dog. A soldier had a biscuit to give the dog and a piece of meat to give to me but I couldn't eat the meat because of its smell. So I told him give me the biscuit and give the meat to the dog, but the soldier gave the biscuit and the meat to the dog. [In Islamic culture, dogs are considered shameful.] They put the bag back on my head and took me back to my place.
On the fifth day, again taking me by the neck and hitting me into walls, they put me in a car and took me to Scania Factory, a huge military base they built in Al Dora [a suburb of Baghdad]. It was not only me, I think, because I could hear other voices with me. They searched me, took my cigars and my lighter and my money, and put it in a bag. They said I would get it back.
One of the soldiers spoke to me in Arabic. He said he will help me. He said he will put me with the group that has already been tortured. They took off the bag and freed my hands.
They took our group inside a room and closed the door. There were beds inside this room, and blankets so you can sleep. I slept inside this room but there was no food until 9:00 in the night. They brought us the same food they make for the soldiers which is difficult for us to eat. Then we spent all of the night until the next morning. In the morning you can go to the toilet if you want. We spent three days in this room. There were 20 people in this room.
After the 3 days, they took 10 of us and stood us against the wall outside. They said they will release us. They said when you reach the main road, stop a car and tell them you have no money and that you will pay them when you get home. They did not return my ID or my cigars or my money.
I went to the main road, found a taxi and drove home.
God says you have to tell the truth. For that reason I am telling you the truth.
Ali, Ahmed's 26 year-old son, told his story next. He has three children (ages 1, 3 and 4) and is a driver for the Ministry of Education. Like his father he was hooded, handcuffed and received no food for four days.
They put us in a dark room and we were sitting cross-legged on the floor. They took the bag off my head and an officer who was doing the investigation asked me with a translator about the explosion -- who did it, where I was. Then they put the bag over my head again and took me back [to where my father was].
At the second time, they took my father first and then they took me. They told me that my father told them everything so now we want to hear the truth from you. I replied to them the same -- I don't know anything about the explosion.
The third time, they put me inside the same room with the officer and the translator. They took the bag off my head and put me against the wall. He came really close to me and told me not to look to the left or to the right, to look just at him. He said you will answer my questions. But first he gave me four points to remember. Because I was nervous I forgot the fourth point and he beat me with his hand and I fell down. He asked me the four points again but I forgot the fourth point again so he kicked me in the groin and I fell down.
He kept asking me about the explosions. He put his hand under my chin and lifted me up from the floor. While he was doing this to me he said if you vomit you must swallow it -- don't spit it out. Then he hit me with his hand and I fell and he kicked me with his shoes. Then he said if you refuse to answer my questions I will take pictures of your wife and your mother and your sister naked and I will put them on the satellite as a sex film. The last time he beat me I collapsed and I couldn't remember anything after that.
The next day they used something like a needle on my neck and my back. I couldn't tell what it was because I was hooded, but it felt like they were poking me with a nail.
When we were released after four days, they took us to the outside gate. We were 11 persons and they left all of us with our hands handcuffed behind our backs. We had to go to someone with a shop nearby and ask for a knife to cut our handcuffs.
When they released me, they took 400,000 dinars (about $280 US) and my ID.
Jim Loney is a member of the Christian Peacemaker Teams, a Chicago-based violence reduction program sponsored by Mennonite, Brethren, Quaker, Presbyterian and Baptist church organizations. Occupation Watch is a joint project of an international coalition of peace and justice groups including Bridge to Baghdad, Code Pink and Global Exchange. Both organizations are currently monitoring American human rights violations in Iraq.
-------- ENERGY AND OTHER
-------- alternative energy
U.S. extends carmakers' alternative fuel incentive
Thursday, February 19, 2004
By John Crawley,
Reuters
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-02-19/s_13268.asp
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration extended a controversial incentive Wednesday for automakers to produce vehicles that can burn either gasoline or alternative fuels.
The program has long been popular with automakers because it helps their vehicles meet federal fuel economy standards. And the government calls it a good initiative to help reduce dependence on oil imports.
"Diversifying the fuels we use will help protect the environment while achieving greater energy independence and security for our nation," Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta said.
But environmental and consumer groups claim the incentive program is flawed and fails to provide even symbolic energy savings.
A flexible-fueled or dual-fueled vehicle is capable of operating on gasoline, diesel, or an alternative like an ethanol-gasoline blend.
The incentive has been active for several years, and the Transportation Department's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration extended it Wednesday for another four years.
Automakers get a fuel economy credit of 1 mile-per-gallon for producing flex-fueled models. Many experts agree that the number of dual-fueled models produced - 2 million on the road today - has helped automakers meet the federally mandated fuel economy targets. Those regulations require passenger cars to average 27.5 miles per gallon. Light trucks, which include sport utilities, minivans, and pickups, must get 20.7 mpg this year.
No Prrof Alternative Fuels Used
But critics claim the program is a mirage. They contend manufacturers are getting important fuel economy credits for their vehicles without proof that motorists are using alternative fuels.
In fact, David Friedman, research director of the clean vehicles program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said virtually all dual-fueled vehicles use gasoline. This is because there are limited numbers of places around the country where motorists can fill up with ethanol blends or other alternatives.
Auto companies say it is difficult to track what is in the tanks of their dual-fueled vehicles but say they are holding up their end of the bargain.
"We think the credit extension was the right thing to do," said GM spokesman Chris Preuss. "We don't produce fuel. We produce vehicles. We put the vehicles out there."
Eron Shosteck, a spokesman for Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, says the industry is working with energy companies and others to improve the infrastructure for offering alternative fuels to everyday consumers.
"What we would like to see is filling stations put in more ethanol pumps," Shosteck said. He added that once motorists find it convenient to access alternative fuels then use will increase.
Tim Hurd, a spokesman for NHTSA, agreed, saying the incentive program is aimed at automakers not energy companies. "You have to have different people involved on both sides. This program is devoted to creating the vehicles," Hurd said.
-------- environment
Wake Up Weyerhaeuser. Protect Forests Now.
From Rainforest Action Network
Thursday, February 19, 2004
Environmental News Network
http://www.enn.com/direct/display-release.asp?objid=D1D1364B000000FACE884F66DB3A7B4F
Seattle, WA - This morning environmental activists braved dizzying heights in downtown Seattle to unfurl a 2,400 square foot banner reading "Wake Up Weyerhaeuser: Protect Forests Now." The non-violent direct action marks the launch of an international Consumer Democracy Campaign to transform the barbaric environmental practices of Washington-based logging giant Weyerhaeuser (NYSE: WY), the number one destroyer of old-growth forests in North America. The campaign follows Rainforest Action Network's recent victory with Boise Cascade Corporation (NYSE: BCC) that resulted in the company's withdrawal from old-growth forests in the United States and adoption of a plan to exit endangered forests worldwide. Forest Action Network is the Canadian coalition partner, and in Alberta, the campaign is supported by the Sierra Club of Canada's Bighorn Country Campaign.
In a September 2003 letter to Weyerhaeuser CEO Steven Rogel, Rainforest Action Network executive director Michael Brune conveyed growing market demands for the company to completely phase out all logging and procurement of wood products from endangered and old-growth forests globally; to cease conversion of biologically rich native forests into ecologically bankrupt tree farms; to cease experimentation with genetically modified trees; and to halt all logging on U.S. taxpayer-owned public lands. Rainforest Action Network is also asking the company to implement a full chain-of-custody program for all its operations and to attain Forest Stewardship Council certification, the best independent standard in sustainable forestry.
Throughout the United States, Weyerhaeuser annually logs an average of over 70,000 acres on taxpayer-owned public lands. In the Southeastern U.S., in areas like Tennessee's Cumberland Plateau, Weyerhaeuser is actively clear-cutting biologically diverse hardwood forests and converting them into fast-growing, monoculture tree farms, an ecological disaster that the NRDC has dubbed the "The Tennessee Tree Massacre." Throughout the Canadian boreal region, one of the most important forest ecosystems on Earth, Weyerhaeuser has already destroyed forests that take several hundred years to mature because of the cool, northern climate. More than 50,000 square miles of Canadian public lands lay open to Weyerhaeuser's chainsaws, and each year it destroys 160,000 acres, primarily for export to the U.S. market. Weyerhaeuser currently has no meaningful company-wide environmental policy covering all its logging operations and wood procurement.
"We are asking Weyerhaeuser to be an environmentally ethical business in all of the 44 states and 18 countries in which it operates, not just those where local public pressure has forced them to the table," said Jennifer Krill, director of Rainforest Action Network's Old Growth Campaign. "The world's last remaining old-growth forests are in a state of crisis and need more than piece-meal compromises. If left intact, these forests can continue to provide us with a steady supply of clean air and pure water, invaluable resources that we must safeguard for future generations. If left to companies like Weyerhaeuser, every last ancient tree will get turned into two-by-fours and grocery bags."
"Weyerhaeuser is in denial," said Sharon Smith, organizer of Rainforest Action Network's Old Growth Campaign. "American business can not afford any more environmental scandals abroad. The global marketplace is changing, and the era of international tolerance for U.S. clear-cuts and oil spills is coming to an end. This is a wake-up call that destroying old-growth forests is an immoral and outdated practice. Any company that is still destroying old-growth forests today is on the wrong side of history."
"Weyerhaeuser is one of the largest destroyers of Canada's vastly under-protected boreal forests, the second largest intact forest region in the world," said Greg Higgs of Forest Action Network. "Woodland caribou and other threatened species call this their home. It is a crime to see such magnificent forests destroyed for short-term profit."
The Weyerhaeuser Company is one of the world's largest forest products companies with annual sales of over $19 billion. It owns or has long-term leases to over 43 million acres of forestland; maintains large-scale operations in endangered areas through South America and Southeast Asia.
Since 1985, Rainforest Action Network and a global movement of grassroots activists and allies have campaigned to transform the relationship between economy and ecology in the global marketplace. The group has played a role in helping companies including Citigroup, Boise Cascade, Home Depot, Kinko's, Mitsubishi, Burger King, Lowe's, Hallmark, Hewlett Packard, Centex Homes, KB Home, Levi-Strauss and over 400 others understand and introduce environmental ethics to their bottom line. In the grand tradition of American patriots, suffragists and activists, Rainforest Action Network is one of the leading public interest organizations using education, grassroots organizing and non-violent direct action to end crimes against the environment.
The world's forests are in a state of crisis and Americans prefer protection.
- 80 percent of the world's intact old-growth forests have been destroyed or degraded, much within recent decades. (World Resources Institute)
- Only 4 percent of U.S. old-growth forests remain intact. (Native Forests Council)
- At least 37.5 million acres of rainforest are lost annually. (United Nations)
- Indonesia's critically endangered rainforests are "disappearing at a rate equivalent to the area of 300 soccer fields every hour." (BusinessWeek)
- 70 percent of Americans say they prefer to purchase from companies with environmentally ethical practices. (American Demographics)
- 9 in 10 Americans favor wilderness protection. (Los Angeles Times)
Tropical rainforests contain at least half of all life on Earth. Boreal forests play an important role in global climate regulation and provide habitat for rare and endangered species. Global deforestation coupled with climate destabilization is causing a mass extinction of life, unparalleled since the disappearance of the dinosaurs.
For more information, contact:
Paul West Communications Director Rainforest Action Network media@ran.org
Web site: http://www.ran.org
----
Kerry hailed as ally of the wider world on environment
Thursday, February 19, 2004
By Alister Doyle,
Reuters
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-02-19/s_13269.asp
OSLO, Norway - Environmentalists fete John Kerry as a possible savior in a stalled battle against global warming if the Democratic front-runner topples U.S. President George W. Bush in the November election.
"Kerry has probably been the greatest champion of climate change issues with (Joe) Lieberman in the U.S. Senate," said Jennifer Morgan, director of the WWF environmental group's climate change program.
European governments, among the strongest backers of the U.N.'s stalled 1997 Kyoto protocol meant to limit global warming, would welcome a shift towards Kerry's environmental policies after years of trans-Atlantic feuds with Bush.
"Clearly we would like the new administration, whether Republican or Democrat, to come closer to European policies on the environment in particular," said Diego de Ojeda, a spokesman for the European Union's executive Commission in Brussels. "It's better late than never," he said.
Bush stunned the world in 2001 by pulling the United States - the globe's biggest polluter - out of Kyoto, arguing the plan was too costly and wrongly excluded developing nations.
Massachusetts senator Kerry, who has won 15 of 17 Democratic primary contests so far, has berated Bush for ditching Kyoto rather than seeking to renegotiate.
Kerry now talks of taking part "in the development of an international climate change strategy to address global warming" - music to the ears of many Kyoto backers who view climate change as the biggest long-term threat to life on earth.
Kerry has also campaigned for green issues like better fuel efficiency in cars or against plans for Arctic oil drilling. By contrast, Bush did not use the word "environment" in his 2004 State of the Union address.
No Magic Wand
But a Kerry presidency would be no magic environmental wand. Kerry judged in 1997 that Kyoto would be unacceptable to the U.S. Senate and now reckons it is too late for Washington to sign up for the first round of cuts under Kyoto, in 2008-12.
The protocol aims to curb emissions of gases like carbon dioxide (CO2) spewed by factories and cars and blamed by scientists for blanketing the planet and driving up temperatures, bringing more droughts, floods, or typhoons.
Even so, some experts say the rise of a credible Democratic challenger to Bush could nudge an undecided Russia towards ratifying Kyoto, which will collapse without Moscow's backing.
"The fact that the United States has decided to stay out has been cited by analysts as an important factor in the reticence by Russia," de Ojeda said. "If the U.S. administration changed its position it might have a positive effect."
Kyoto has been ratified by countries producing 44 percent of industrialized nations' emissions but will only enter into force if it reaches 55 percent. Without the U.S. stake of 36 percent, Russia has a casting vote with 17 percent.
"Russia looks very attentively at the opinion of the U.S. administration, saying if the U.S. won't do anything then we won't either," said Alexander Nikitin, a Russian environmentalist. "A change in the U.S. position could well cause a change in Russia's as well."
Steve Sawyer, climate policy director at Greenpeace, praised Kerry for policies stretching back to opposing oil drilling off New England in the 1980s. "It's probably true that it's too late for the United States" to sign up for Kyoto, he said.
A surge in U.S. emissions since 1990 means that an abrupt shift from fossil fuels to meet Kyoto targets would threaten U.S. industries from coal fields in Montana to automakers in Detroit.
(Additional reporting by Oliver Bullough in Moscow, Patrick Chalmers in Kuala Lumpur)
-------- ACTIVISTS
Ranking Scientists Warn Bush Science Policy Lacks Integrity
WASHINGTON, DC, (ENS)
February 19, 2004
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/feb2004/2004-02-19-02.asp
More than 60 of the nation's top scientists, including 20 Nobel laureates, leading medical experts, and former federal agency directors, as well as university chairs and presidents, issued a statement Wednesday calling for regulatory and legislative action to "restore scientific integrity to federal policymaking."
They say President George W. Bush has suppressed and distorted scientific analysis from federal agencies, subjected government scientists to "censorship and political oversight," and taken actions that have undermined the quality of scientific advisory panels.
"Across a broad range of issues, the administration has undermined the quality of the scientific advisory system and the morale of the government's outstanding scientific personnel," said Dr. Kurt Gottfried, emeritus professor of physics at Cornell University and Chairman of the Union of Concerned Scientists. "Whether the issue is lead paint, clean air or climate change, this behavior has serious consequences for all Americans."
The statement notes that while scientific input to the government is rarely the only factor in public policy decisions, this input should be weighed from an objective and impartial perspective. But these critics say the administration of President George W. Bush has disregarded this principle.
"We are not simply raising warning flags about an academic subject of interest only to scientists and doctors," said Dr. Neal Lane, a former director of the National Science Foundation and a Presidential Science Advisor in the Clinton administration. "In case after case, scientific input to policymaking is being censored and distorted. This will have serious consequences for public health."
Comparing President Bush with his father, George H.W. Bush and former President Richard Nixon, the statement warned that had these former Presidents, both Republicans, similarly dismissed science in favor of political ends, more than 200,000 deaths and millions of respiratory and cardiovascular disease cases would not have been prevented with the signing of the original Clean Air Act and the 1990 amendments to that Act.
"Science, to quote President Bush's father, the former president, relies on freedom of inquiry and objectivity," said Russell Train, head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under Presidents Nixon and Ford.
"But this administration has obstructed that freedom and distorted that objectivity in ways that were unheard of in any previous administration," Train said.
For example, the scientists state, "in support of the President's decision to avoid regulating emissions that cause climate change, the administration has consistently misrepresented the findings of the National Academy of Sciences, government scientists, and the expert community at large. Thus in June 2003, the White House demanded extensive changes in the treatment of climate change in a major report by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). To avoid issuing a scientifically indefensible report, EPA officials eviscerated the discussion of climate change and its consequences."
"The Earth system follows laws which scientists strive to understand," said Dr. F. Sherwood Rowland a Nobel laureate in chemistry. "The public deserves rational decisionmaking based on the best scientific advice about what is likely to happen, not what political entities might wish to happen."
In conjunction with the statement, the Union of Concerned Scientists today released a report, "Scientific Integrity in Policymaking," that investigates numerous allegations in the scientists' statement involving censorship and political interference with independent scientific inquiry at the EPA, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Departments of Health and Human Services, Agriculture, Interior and Defense.
One example cited in the statement and report involves the suppression of a study by the EPA that found the bipartisan Senate Clear Air bill would do more to reduce mercury contamination in fish and prevent more deaths than the Bush administration's proposed air pollution plan, known as "Clear Skies."
"This is akin to the White House directing the National Weather Service to alter a hurricane forecast because they want everyone to think we have clear skies ahead," said Kevin Knobloch, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists "The hurricane is still coming, but without factual information no one will be ready for it."
On February 14, 2002, President Bush announced his Clean Skies Initiative, a plan to cut power plant emissions by establishing a cap and trade program that the President said was "based on sound science." It was modeled after his father's successful emissions trading market for sulfur dioxide, a component of acid rain.
Cap and trade systems set a national limit on emissions and allow companies to choose whether to cut their own emissions or buy credits from plants that do. Firms that innovate first are rewarded and companies that do not pay greater costs.
If approved by Congress, Clear Skies would establish new emissions trading markets for nitrogen oxides and mercury, while reducing the allowable sulfur dioxide emissions level. President Bush has said the initiative mandates a 70 percent cut in air pollution from power plants over the next 15 years, including the first ever national cap on mercury emissions.
President George W. Bush discusses his Clear Skies Initiative in the East Garden of the White House. September 16, 2003. (Photo by Tina Hager courtesy The White House) But in December 2002 the EPA rewrote a Clean Air Act regulation known as the New Source Review (NSR) to make it easier for coal fired electric utilities to generate more power without having to install additional emissions controls. In addition, the Bush administration has halted prosecution of some 50 power plants that are alleged to be in violation of the old NSR rule.
In October 2003 the General Accounting Office, Congress' investigative arm, reported that the revised NSR rule could "limit assurance of the public's access to data about and input on decisions to modify facilities in ways that affect emissions." This would make it more difficult for the public to monitor local emissions, health risks, and NSR compliance.
Under the Bush NSR revision, the companies themselves can determine whether there is a "reasonable possibility" a facility change will increase emissions enough to trigger a review of their controls. But, the General Accounting Office wrote, the EPA has not defined "reasonable possibility," or required that companies keep data on all of their reasonable possibility determinations, or specified how the public can access the data companies do keep on site - in effect limiting public access to factual information.
At the same time, the Rockefeller Family Fund and Council of State Governments released a joint study that said changes in the way industrial plants are allowed to count emissions under the Clear Skies policy would increase outputs of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, carbon monoxide and soot.
In view of such Bush administration policies, the scientists are demanding that the Bush administration's "distortion of scientific knowledge for partisan political ends must cease." They are calling for Congressional oversight hearings, guaranteed public access to government scientific studies and other measures to prevent such abuses in the future.
How has the Bush administration breached the principles of scientific integrity? In their statement, the scientists count the ways.
- Highly qualified scientists have been dropped from advisory committees dealing with childhood lead poisoning, environmental and reproductive health, and drug abuse, while individuals associated with or working for industries subject to regulation have been appointed to these bodies.
- Censorship and political oversight of government scientists is not restricted to the EPA, but has also occurred at the Departments of Health and Human Services, Agriculture, and Interior, when scientific findings are in conflict with the administration's policies or with the views of its political supporters.
- The administration is supporting revisions to the Endangered Species Act that would greatly constrain scientific input into the process of identifying endangered species and critical habitats for their protection.
- Existing scientific advisory committees to the Department of Energy on nuclear weapons, and to the State Department on arms control, have been disbanded.
- In making the invalid claim that Iraq had sought to acquire aluminum tubes for uranium enrichment centrifuges, the administration disregarded the contrary assessment by experts at the Livermore, Los Alamos, and Oak Ridge National Laboratories.
Scientists who signed the statement include two Nobel laureates in physics - Leon Lederman, who is director emeritus of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, and Philip W. Anderson of Princeton University.
The list of signers includes 19 recipients of the National Medal of Science, an award given by the President of the United States to individuals "deserving of special recognition by reason of their outstanding contributions to knowledge in the physical, biological, mathematical, or engineering sciences."
In their statement, the scientists call upon their peers in the scientific, engineering and medical communities to work together "to reestablish scientific integrity" in the policymaking process.
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Police infiltration of protest groups upsets rights activists
February 19, 2004
Chicago Sun-Times
BY FRANK MAIN Crime Reporter
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-spy19.html
Chicago Police officers infiltrated five protest groups in 2002 and launched four other spying operations in 2003 -- actions that civil rights activists are calling outrageous.
The investigations have come in the wake of a court decision that expanded the department's intelligence-gathering powers.
In 2002, undercover officers were assigned to attend meetings, rallies and fund-raisers of the Chicago Direct Action Network, the American Friends Service Committee, The Autonomous Zone, Not in Our Name, and Anarchist Black Cross.
Police zeroed in on the groups because protesters were threatening to disrupt the Trans-Atlantic Business Dialogue -- a meeting of international business leaders held in Chicago in 2002 -- according to an internal police audit obtained by the Sun-Times. The department made video and audio recordings of the protests, the audit said.
The department would not describe what organizations were targeted in 2003.
Ed Yohnka, spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union, criticized the police for targeting the American Friends Service Committee in 2002.
"We cannot imagine any circumstance that would justify the intrusive infiltration of such a peaceful group, and we hope that the city will open up all of the relevant files related to this matter to explain this disturbing action," Yohnka said.
Michael McConnell, regional director of the American Friends Service Committee, said he was outraged that police infiltrated the anti-war group, founded in 1917.
"What was the officer's participation and did it affect the group?" McConnell asked. "This is a disturbing pattern throughout the country of infiltration of peace groups that are doing nothing more than fulfilling their rights of freedom of speech."
In Denver last year, he noted, the police agreed to investigate only people "reasonably suspected" of criminal activity after American Friends Service Committee members and others wound up in police spy files.
Chicago's new spying activity stems from the 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals decision in 2001 to modify the so-called Red Squad consent decree.
The federal decree, which dated to 1982, barred the city from gathering information on suspected terrorist and hate groups because it violated their First Amendment right to free speech.
In 2001, though, Chief Judge Richard A. Posner wrote that the decree "rendered the police helpless to do anything to protect the public." The court approved a modified decree that allows police to snoop on demonstrators and other groups.
"The department has demonstrated compliance with the consent decree on every level," said Sheri Mecklenburg, general counsel to police Supt. Phil Cline.
Under the modified decree, intelligence gathering must be documented. And internal and external audits are required to make sure the department is complying with the decree.
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Quaker deserts as unit deploys
By Julia Oliver Staff writer
2004-02-19
http://www.fayettevillenc.com/story.php?Template=military&Story=6185924
Jeremy Hinzman fled to Canada with his wife, Nga Nguyen, and their son, Liam, in January.
Jeremy Hinzman said he could barely stomach chanting "kill we will" during basic training and, as a Quaker, he didn't want to shoot anybody. But it was the thought of serving U.S. interests in Iraq that made the 82nd Airborne Division specialist flee to Canada last month.
"I would have felt no different than a private in the German Army during World War II," he said by phone from Toronto, where he is seeking refugee status.
Hinzman, 25, who was a member of the 2nd Battalion of the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, is subject to prosecution as a deserter if he is caught within U.S. borders.
His name will go on a national database that law enforcement officers can access, said Sgt. Pam Smith, a spokeswoman for the 82nd Airborne. He can be arrested, but the Army won't go looking for him, she said.
"We don't have time to go and track down people who go AWOL," she said. "We're fighting a war."
Hinzman, who grew up in Rapid City, S.D., joined the Army in January 2001. The socialist structure of the military appealed to him, he said. He liked the subsidized housing and groceries and, at the end of his service, the money for college.
"It seemed like a good financial decision," he said. And, he said, "I had a romantic vision of what the Army was."
But from the beginning, basic training bothered him. He said he was horrified by the chanting about blood and killing during marches, by the shooting at targets without faces and by what he called the dehumanization of the enemy.
"It's like watching some kind of scary movie, except I was in it," he said. "People would just walk around saying things like, 'Oh, I want to kill somebody.'"
He felt that the prospect of killing should be taken more seriously and that soldiers should not talk about death in such a cavalier way, he said.
In August 2002, Hinzman turned in his first application to be a conscientious objector. He wanted to fulfill his service obligation, he said, but he didn't want to participate in combat. He wrote a six-page explanation of his beliefs, but the Army told him it was lost.
"I was informed three months later that it was never received," he said. Last fall, while doing clerical work, he was given a file that included that application.
By the time Hinzman applied again at the end of October, his unit was on track to go to Afghanistan. He deployed in December, and the application was pending.
"I didn't mind being deployed. I just didn't want to shoot anybody," he said.
Not allowed to go on patrol, he worked as a dishwasher, often 15 hours a day and, for the first few months, without a day off. He said his unit didn't get into any major combat.
Application denied
While he was in Afghanistan, his application for conscientious objector status was evaluated and denied, he said. Hinzman said he thinks one question - Would he defend his unit if attacked? - destroyed his chances. He said he answered yes, reasoning that he had no choice if he was forced to carry a gun.
"I was a little bit too honest, I guess," he said.
In July, he returned to Fayetteville, and to his wife, Nga Nguyen, and their 14-month-old son, Liam.
"My son, of course, was a little bit shy about seeing me, but that went away after a few hours," he said.
He and Nguyen figured it was only a matter of time before his unit would go to Iraq. He said he felt the war there was unjust and was being fought over oil interests.
"Had we, say, gone to war with North Korea or someone that was an imminent threat, I would have gone along with it," he said. "I signed up to defend our country, not be a pawn in some sort of political ideology."
He began to think about his options. And about what he might have to do if he went to Iraq.
On Dec. 20, Hinzman found out that his unit would be deployed. And on Jan. 2, he packed his family into his car for the 18-hour drive to Canada. The three left at night, on the Friday of a four-day weekend. Hinzman's absence wasn't noticed until that Monday; he wasn't declared AWOL until the following day.
Support network
Through his philosophical objections to the Army, Hinzman has received much support from Quakers in Fayetteville and Toronto. He has always been interested in Buddhism, he said, but joined the Friends Meeting after he moved to Fayetteville and couldn't find a place to worship in the Buddhist faith.
"The Quaker's mode of worship was closest to meditation because it's silent," he said. In Toronto, the Quakers took Hinzman and his family in while they looked for an apartment, he said.
Ann Ashford, recording clerk at the Fayetteville Friends Meeting, said Hinzman and his wife were faithful attendees of the meetings. She said the community supports Hinzman, but no one at the meeting knew he was planning to desert.
"We're all very concerned about him," she said.
Ashford said Hinzman spoke with Chuck Fager, executive director of the Quaker House, a related organization that counsels soldiers who are seeking discharge from the military. Fager could not be reached Wednesday but has said in an e-mail that calls to the organization's hot line from service members and their families last year reached a record total of 6,187, up by 50 percent from the year before.
According to the Toronto Globe and Mail, Hinzman is believed to be the first U.S. soldier filing for refugee status in Canada for refusing duty in Iraq. During the Vietnam War, an estimated 30,000 Americans sought refuge in Canada to avoid compulsory military service.
Hinzman's chances of receiving refugee status are statistically slim: According to Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board, none of the 268 American applicants last year was accepted. But people who are denied refugee status are not automatically deported; they may be granted permission to stay in Canada under other provisions, said Charles Hawkins, a spokesman for the board.
Hinzman knows that the decision will take awhile.
"It's a big drawn-out process," he said.
He said that the hardest part has been leaving the people in his unit, which is still in Iraq.
"I didn't do this out of animosity toward them," he said, "but toward the situation we were in."
Staff writer Julia Oliver can be reached at oliverj@fayettevillenc.com or 323-4848, ext. 280.
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The 9/11 Truth Movement:
Widows Lead Growing Effort To Expose What The Government Knew
Long Island Press
February 19,2004
http://longislandpress.com/v02/i07040219/coverstory_01.asp?2192004
When former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean took the helm of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, more popularly known as the 9/11 Commission, the moderate Republican made a vow: He would not let his investigation become another Warren Commission, the 1964 federal inquiry criticized for failing to adequately probe the possibility of conspiracy in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
The 9/11 Commission would look into every aspect of the attacks, and try to illustrate why the United States was so ill-prepared.
But as the original May 27 deadline for the commission's report fast approaches, eyebrows are already being raised. On Jan. 27, the commissioners asked for 60 more days. The White House repeatedly said "no way" until Feb. 4, when President George W. Bush reversed himself and gave the commission two more months.
Part of the delay has been caused by the Bush administration itself, which has withheld key documents, angering commission members, victims' families and skeptical citizens all the more. "We're coming down to the final [months] of the commission and we're still messing around with access issues," said former Georgia Sen. Max Cleland, who served as one of the commission's five Democrats until resigning late last year. Cleland, too, sees parallels to the JFK investigation.
"This is the most serious independent investigation since the Warren Commission. And after watching History Channel shows on the Warren Commission...the Warren Commission blew it," Cleland went on. "I'm not going to be part of that. I'm not going to be part of looking at information only partially. I'm not going to be part of just coming to quick conclusions."
"It's just a dog-and-pony show," says John Judge, co-founder of 9/11 CitizensWatch, a Washington, D.C.-based watchdog group monitoring the work of the independent bipartisan commission. "It's just like when you go into the Warren Commission, and you have five areas of inquiry: 'Who was Oswald?'; 'Who was Ruby?'; 'Who was this and that?' But you don't have 'Who shot Kennedy?,'" he says. "They've already had a panel on 'Who are the terrorists?,' which was all about al Qaeda. So they're investigating the official line of assumptions."
The 9/11 hearings have been poorly attended and bloodless in content. Witnesses have been mostly top government officials along with former spies. The media have been largely absent. Citizens' groups have been shut out of the process, and some 9/11 widows and widowers have become livid with frustration.
Across the nation, a growing number of people are determined to discover the truth about 9/11. Citizen-led organizations such as CitizensWatch and the 9/11 Visibility Project are trying to give the public a say.
But the movement with the most clout is the loose-knit band of some 100 families who are suing airlines and government agencies rather than accept part of the $5 billion payout offered to victims' relatives in exchange for a promise not to sue. A lawsuit, many feel, offers the best hope of dragging information out into the open.
THE WIDOWS' JOURNEYS
Ninety-eight percent of the families filed for claims with the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund, 20 percent doing so in the final week of the Dec. 22, 2003 deadline.
That number superceded Fund Director Kenneth Feinberg's "magic minimum" of 90 percent, about which he remained "cautiously optimistic" when the Press spoke to him on Dec. 10.
But it's the other 2 percent-roughly 125 families filing some 200 separate lawsuits-who are trading millions of dollars for the truth that Feinberg and the commission have to worry about.
"I would rather eat dirt than [get] into the fund," says Ellen Mariani, whose husband, Louis Mariani, died aboard United Flight 175, the plane that hit the World Trade Center's South Tower. "I don't want to sign off my rights as a citizen of this country. I want answers."
In the wake of the tragedy, Mariani was determined to stay strong. She helped reschedule her daughter's wedding, originally set for Sept. 12, 2001, and attended it four days after the disaster. But events caught up with her.
"I couldn't sleep...I had been watching TV. I was writing, listening, and then comparing," she says. "And nothing was making sense." She began two years of research into the Bush family's business and military involvement in the Middle East.
Mariani went through two different lawyers before she found Philip Berg, a Pennsylvania Democratic activist and former gubernatorial candidate. The gravity of the situation is not lost on Berg.
"We're at a point in our history where the American public must stand up, hand in hand, shoulder to shoulder, and fight," Berg tells the Press. "We're losing rights minute by minute here and we're in a very dangerous time in this country."
On Nov. 26, 2003, Mariani and Berg filed an amended detailed complaint in their racketeering lawsuit against President Bush and other top officials (Mariani had sued United Airlines two years earlier).
"There's high levels of people in the Bush administration who knew of, failed to warn, failed to prevent and also are covering up since 9/11," says Berg. "Ashcroft, for instance, stopped flying commercial aircraft in July of 2001. Why?"
That's just one of the questions the families want answered.
Mariani isn't alone.
"This may be uncharted waters, but I was thrown in a pool on Sept. 11, 2001, and had to learn to swim," says 9/11 widow Monica Gabrielle, of West Haven, Conn. "No one has been fired. No one has been demoted. The same people who are guarding us today on an elevated security alert are the same people who were working that day." She describes her late husband, Richard Gabrielle, an insurance broker who lay trapped underneath rubble as the South Tower collapsed: "He was a gentle man, and he was alive, trying to get out of that building that day. The dead. The dying. The smoke. The terror. No one should have suffered like that. I want accountability. I need answers."
Gabrielle is represented by Kreindler & Kreindler, the Manhattan firm that won $2 million in 1995 for 13 American Airlines passengers who had experienced 28 seconds of severe turbulence. Gabrielle is one of many plaintiffs represented by the firm who have joined others in filing suit against the airlines and security firms involved in 9/11. Also named are Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda, certain governments, and parties accused of masterminding the attacks.
As Gabrielle's attorney, Brian Alexander, sees it, the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund is the byproduct of powerful airline lobbying. "The legislation [that created the fund] was designed to protect the airlines first and foremost-and it was airline lobbyists who pushed it," Alexander says. "The Victim Compensation Fund for the families was an afterthought."
Skeptical of the Mariani suit's chances, Alexander says, "At the end of the day there are legal defenses that the government can take, they get to be stupid, they can be as negligent as all get-out, and they will still win, especially when you're talking about intelligence."
But Mariani's goal is not victory in court, but a closer pass at the truth.
IMPEDIMENTS
Creating an independent 9/11 commission was a Herculean effort, seemingly resisted by the Bush administration from the start. When it couldn't stop the juggernaut, the administration tapped controversial figure Henry Kissinger to be chairman. Kissinger, former national security adviser and secretary of state to Richard Nixon, had been both lauded and lambasted for his role in international affairs. Kissinger bowed out of the assignment rather than disclose who his international consulting clients were.
Since then, the commission has become publicly frustrated by the administration's refusal to allow full access to documents, notably the Aug. 6, 2001 daily brief prepared by the CIA and seen by the president, which referred to possible commercial airline attacks. After Commissioner Cleland resigned (to take a job as a director of the Export/Import Bank), a compromise was reached: The panel received a lengthy briefings summary edited by the White House then prepared by two 9/11 commissioners.
Then there was the funding. The commission was expected to adhere to a mere $3 million budget to reach its findings within 18 months. After some time, the budget was increased to $12 million. Many believe the panel is still being stiffed, considering the gravity of the task and the number of people killed. After all, $40 million was spent investigating the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, which caused seven deaths. Republicans in Congress gave Kenneth Starr $47 million and five years for the Clinton investigation, which focused on real estate dealings and the president receiving fellatio from an intern.
In addition to secrecy and underfunding, many feel the commission's pursuits are compromised by the interests of its members (see sidebar). Some observers see nothing more than a collection of D.C. insiders who won't rock the boat. This theory gained credence recently when the commission called two of its own, Executive Director Philip Zelikow and Jamie Gorelick, as witnesses. Zelikow worked with National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice during the first Bush administration and as part of the current administration's transition team. Gorelick was deputy attorney general during the Clinton presidency. Zelikow and Gorelick were interviewed by the panel regarding their influence on national security policy and terrorism.
"Did [Zelikow] interview himself about his own role in the failures that left us defenseless?" asked Lori Van Auken, one of the 9/11 widows.
Indeed, the commission may not even be meeting its own legal mandates. According to the legislation that created it, members should have no connection to any administration or to anyone potentially associated with the case. But as their résumés clearly show, the majority of commissioners break Rule 2 and the Republican commissioners break Rule 1.
Then there has been the absence of meaningful testimony from witnesses. In late January, the commission heard from an immigration inspector, Jose Melendez-Perez, of Orlando, Fla. He prevented Mohamed al-Qahtani, believed by many to be a 20th hijacker, from entering the country in late August 2001. Authorities believe that hijacker Mohamed Atta was at Orlando International airport to meet al-Qahtani, but Melendez-Perez put al-Qahtani on a plane back to Saudi Arabia. It would perhaps be more instructive to interview those officers who stopped nine hijackers but in the end let 19 of them board planes, even though between two and eight had fraudulent visas. But those officials have not been called as witnesses.
THE HEARINGS BEGIN
On March 31, 2003, the commission commenced its hearings, downtown near Ground Zero in the dusty but regal U.S. Customs Building. The spacious auditorium was one-third full of observers and media. With Gov. Kean in charge, things were proceeding civilly.
Survivors of the 9/11 tragedy spoke first-stockbrokers and Port Authority cops who had escaped the blaze with burns or emotional scars. It was hard not to be moved when a beefy police officer's testimony was choked by tears. Victims emphasized that they were not angry, and didn't want to "point fingers." But then a panel of widows and widowers urged the panel to find who was responsible-and "point fingers."
At lunchtime, CitizensWatch served sandwiches at its press conference, held in the same building. John Judge and co-founder Kyle Hence put together a list of "unanswered questions" that they urged the commission to address.
Their questions include: Why were three top FBI agents blocked from tracking the terrorists before 9/11? Why did the FBI convince the University of Iowa to destroy the system that could track every kind of anthrax 10 days before the mailing of the first envelope? Eleven months later, these questions remain unasked and unanswered.
Judge, a journalist who has made a name for himself by looking into possible conspiracies in history, is careful to make clear that he doesn't believe everything he's heard-and he's heard a lot. He is critical of certain voices, some coming from the far right, who link 9/11 to a Jewish/Israeli conspiracy. The theory that no one of Jewish descent was in the WTC that day is easily dismissed by a look at the list of the victims.
If Judge were chair of the 9/11 Commission, who would he call as witnesses?
"Not the FAA/NORAD top brass at the Pentagon," says Judge. "I would call the pilots. I would call the base commanders, people on the horn at the air traffic controller's."
LI'S MOVEMENT
At a Dec. 16 forum at Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Shelter Rock in Manhasset, a coalition of Long Island groups attempted to answer the questions: How-and why-did the campaign against terrorism become a war on Iraq? What are the financial connections between the Bush and bin Laden families? Did a "crisis presidency" give the far right leeway to transform U.S. policies? The coalition included representatives of such diverse groups as Five Towns Forum and L.I. Freespace. Hofstra Professor Michael D'Innocenzo, German 9/11 expert Nico Haupt and Massapequa's Michael Kane of the local hard rock/hip-hop group Clarity, whose song themes include questioning the government's knowledge of the attacks, were among the panelists.
After the showing of the film Aftermath: Unanswered Questions from 9/11, Kane, a recent finalist in www.MoveOn.org's "Bush in 30 Seconds" online video contest, spoke to the crowd. The questions that were thrown around could make anyone dizzy.
What about the unusual activity in the options markets for United Airlines and American Airlines in the days before 9/11? Why did National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice make contradictory remarks in her May 16, 2002 press briefing? She stated, "I don't think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center, take another one and slam it into the Pentagon." Yet there was a long line of published intelligence dating back to 1994 that specifically warned of bin Laden using aircraft as bombs. The San Francisco Chronicle reported an upsurge in threats in mid-July, including specific information of a threat to President Bush at a summit in Genoa, Italy. That threat is said to have included an airplanes-as-missiles plot.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said that in the weeks before the attacks, the Egyptian intelligence service warned U.S. officials of a possible attack by the bin Laden terrorist network, according to The New York Times. The White House, however, responded that the United States had no warnings at all.
OUTSIDE THE U.S.
Non-American audiences are finding it a lot easier to imagine the worst. Many Europeans pride themselves on their more critical views of U.S. policy, and are quick to point out that the same figures who participated in the Iran/Contra scandal (Colin Powell, Dick Armitage, Elliot Abrams and Dick Cheney) are back in the saddle in this White House.
These views have translated into best- seller status for several books on the subject. One author, Andreas Von Bulow, is a former German cabinet member. In France, a title called The Forbidden Truth also enjoyed notoriety and heavy sales. Co-author Jean-Charles Brisard met with FBI counterterror chief John O'Neil, and documents how O'Neil was frustrated with how the administration accommodated the Taliban and bin Laden. O'Neil, who resigned from the FBI to become head of security at the Twin Towers, died on 9/11.
The mainstream American media refuses to give most theories serious coverage. Then again, maybe the pundits are finally coming around. Recently, Mariani's lawyer Phil Berg has been appearing on major television news programs and in newspaper interviews.
Daniel Hopsicker, author of Barry & "the Boys" : The CIA, the Mob and America's Secret History, has spent the past few years in Venice, Fla., researching Huffman Aviation, where two of three 9/11 pilots allegedly trained. The seamy dirt he uncovered was partly revealed in Mohamed Atta and the Venice Flying Circus, a video released in 2002, with more in his forthcoming book, Welcome to Terrorland, due out this month. Hopsicker reports that he wouldn't be able to get information if it weren't for insiders willing to blow a whistle. "Sept. 11 was so overwhelming," he says, "that people who are functionaries for that secret government are still human, like you and I. It's compelled some of them to break ranks."
"What I saw, after a number of people talked about the FBI silencing them, was that American streak that won't let that happen," he continues. "Real Americans won't be silenced."
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