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NUCLEAR
Soil transfer at Plumsted Bomarc site complete
Vermont Nuke Plant Shuts Down After Fire
Transformer fire shuts down Yankee
The "case" for nuclear power
Areva, RWE, Cameco agree fixed-price deal to acquire Russian uranium
Supply shudders drive uranium prices
Uranium prices soar, Canadians look at new mine
Ontario Considers Building a Nuclear Plant
U.S. names Pakistan major non-NATO ally
Bush's Gift to Pakistan by Mumtaz
Friend or Foe?
India, Pakistan gear up for historic nuclear security talks
India, Pakistan Kick Off Nuclear Talks
India, Pakistan Experts Address Nuke Risks
Images Show Iran May Be Hiding Nuke Plants
Timeline: Iran's Nuclear Program
US accuses Iran of razing nuclear sites
Iran Assailed for Lack of Cooperation on Nuclear Program
IAEA Rebukes Iran Over Nuclear Cover-Ups
Former PM Says Japan Considered Going Nuclear
N-reprocessing seen key to energy policy
'Realistic' Missile Tests Ordered
Senators vote to boost missile defense
Experts: Radiological Weapon Attack 'All But Certain'
Experts Say 'Dirty Bomb' Attack Likely
Senators: Bill assures Idaho cleanup .. But
TCE plume located
Vermont Nuke Plant Shuts Down After Fire
Hanford workers begin new phase of clean up
Workers begin sludge removal from Hanford's K Basins
Energy Department pledges to remove 99 percent of nuclear waste from tanks
MILITARY
10 Die As Warlords Overrun Afghan Town
West African Nations to Create Military
South Korea to Send 3,000 Troops to Iraq
UK - UPSET AS ANTI-TERRORIST POLICE SCOUR BARNS VILLAGE
Lockheed, Others Get Liability Shield
41 Iraqis Killed in Two Car-Bomb Attacks
Israel Plans 'Remote Control Border'
Arafat climbdown stuns Palestinians
Acting on Threat, Saudi Group Kills Captive American
NATO Head Says Alliance Credibility on Brink
Pakistan Troops Kill Wanted Tribal Leader
Rumsfeld admits secret prisoner detention
Navy secretary to lead reviews in Guantanamo
Rumsfeld Admits He Told Jailers to Keep Detainee in Iraq
Putin Says Russia Gave U.S. Intel on Iraq
CIA contractor indicted in prisoner's death
How Feuds and Failures Affected American Intelligence
UN agency set to rap Iran over nuclear program: US makes new accusation
Senate Votes to Add 20,000 Soldiers to Army
Fort Drum prepares for another deployment
Annan Rebukes U.S. for Move to Give Its Troops Immunity
Annan Opposes Exempting U.S. From Court
China Will Not Back U.S. on Immunity from New Court
U.S. Immunity Demand Could Divide U.N.
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
Cheney Authorized Shooting Down Planes
Homeland Security Employs Imagination
House Rejects Plane Cargo Inspections
Funds help counties jail illegal aliens
Border Patrol Makes In-Country Sweep
GOP Senators Block Subpoena on Memos but Prod White House
Sam Dash's Warning About Government Intruders
Denver Police's 'Spy Files' to Be Archived
Civilian Charged In Beating of Afghan Detainee
Rumsfeld Authorized Secret Detention of Prisoner
U.S. Issues Gulf-Wide Terror Warning
9/11 Plot Reportedly Hatched in 1996
POLITICS
Panel Has Doubts on Post-9/11 Measures
Excerpts From Report on Orders to Shoot Down Planes on Sept. 11
To the Minute, Panel Paints a Grim Portrait of Day's Terror
Cheney blasts media on al Qaeda-Iraq link
Bin Laden's Doomsday Plan
White House Lawyer Questioned in CIA Leak
9/11 Panel to Eye Ways to Prevent Attacks
9/11 Report Cites Lack of Preparation
US groups want Moore film banned
Inside Al-Jazeera
Rumsfeld clears higher-ups in abuse probe
Bush Censure by Envoys May Be a First, Historians Say
Kerry adopts Edwards' ideas
ENERGY
Iraq likely to resume oil exports today
OTHER
Food irradiation, Health risks
ACTIVISTS
Hong Kong Leader Tries to Head Off March
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- accidents and safety
Soil transfer at Plumsted Bomarc site complete
Bob Vosseller
06/18/2004
New Egypt Press
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=12002353&BRD=1688&PAG=461&dept_id=41629&rfi=6
PLUMSTED, NJ - The cleanup effort at the Boeing Michigan Aeronautical Research Center (BOMARC) should be completed by October. Shipments of plutonium-contaminated soil from the site was transported last month according to Col. Nicholas Sipos, vice commander of the 305 Air Mobility Wing at McGuire Air Force Base.
The BOMARC facility experienced a fire in a nuclear-tipped missle which released radioactive plutonium into the area surrounding the military base on June 7, 1960.
The water used by firemen spread the plutonium from the site into an adjacent drainage ditch.
During a meeting held on Monday night at the township library, members of the Base Resotration Advisory Board told the public that about 22,000 cubic yards of siol had been transferred to a facility in Utah.
The 75-acre site is on a portion of Fort Dix property and was overseen by the U.S. Army. It was leased to the Air Force shortly after it opened four decades ago. At one time it housed 84 nuclear missiles. It was shut down in 1972.
The cleanup project was to have culminated last summer but when new contamination was found it was extended. More funding was requested by the Air Force. It received $2.2 million last July.
----
Vermont Nuke Plant Shuts Down After Fire
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
June 18, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Plant-Fire.html
MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) -- The Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant was shut down Friday after a transformer caught fire in the non-nuclear part of the facility, officials said. The fire was put out, and no radiation was released, they said.
The operators declared an ``unusual event,'' the lowest of four emergency classifications set by the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The fire was detected just before 7 a.m. and the nuclear reactor was automatically shut down, said plant spokesman Rob Williams.
The unusual event status was still in effect after the fire was put out. Williams said the fire cause had not yet been determined. No release of radiation occurred, and no one was injured, he said.
``Since the fire lasted longer than several minutes, by procedure we declared an unusual event,'' Williams said.
The transformer is used to step up the voltage of the electricity generated at the plant so it can be transmitted efficiently.
It was unknown how badly the transformer was damaged, and Williams said he could not estimate when the plant might be back on line again.
As part of the plant's emergency procedure, officials in Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts have been notified, Williams said. The plant is in Vernon, at Vermont's southeast tip near the other two states.
Vermont's lone nuclear plant, which began operations in 1972, is seeking permission from regulators to boost its power output.
In April, about 20 cracks were discovered in the plant's steam dryer, a component that has been prone to cracking at other plants that have increased their power output.
Also that month, two fuel rod segments were discovered missing from the plant's spent fuel storage pool. Officials believe it was most likely shipped to a disposal facility.
---
Transformer fire shuts down Yankee
By SUSAN SMALLHEER,
Rutland Herald Staff
Jun. 18, 2004
http://www.rutlandherald.com/04/Story/85408.html
VERNON - A spectacular fire that sent flames shooting 30 feet into the air, as well as a giant column of black smoke, forced the shutdown of Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant Friday.
The early-morning fire severely damaged the plant's 2-year-old transformer, which converts the raw electricity generated at the nuclear reactor into power suitable to be distributed on the New England power network. The fire did not affect the nuclear side of the plant, a company official said.
Entergy Nuclear was forced to declare the lowest level nuclear emergency - a so-called "unusual event" - because the fire could not be put out within 10 minutes. The unusual event lasted for five hours after the fire was reported out.
Entergy spokesman Robert Williams said the fire, which was discovered at about 6:50 a.m., was put out by fire departments from three surrounding towns, as well as Vermont Yankee's own fire brigade, by 7:17 a.m.
There were no reported injuries from the fire and the plant emphasized that there was no radioactivity released because of the transformer fire.
The anti-nuclear group, New England Coalition, said a plant employee contacted them after the fire and said that there was "arcing and sparking" in the switchyard before the transformer exploded and caught on fire.
Williams would neither confirm nor deny that the oil-filled transformer exploded, but Williams said 20 to 30 gallons of oil from the transformer got into the Connecticut River via storm drains, as water poured on the fire carried the oil away. Entergy Nuclear brought in specialists to clean up the pollution on the river, he said, to avoid any damage to wildlife.
He said that arcing would be a common occurrence under such circumstances as a high-voltage electrical fire. Williams said the plant had launched an investigation. He said it was not clear late Friday exactly how severely damaged the transformer was or how soon Yankee would be back generating power.
Meanwhile, Vermont's three-man congressional delegation immediately called for a special Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspection, and assurances that the plant would not be restarted until the cause of the fire and what led up to it was uncovered.
"We believe a fire at the exterior of the plant lasting approximately an hour is a significant event warranting the commission's full attention and response. We request that the NRC initiate a formal incident investigation immediately," wrote Sen. James Jeffords, I-Vt., Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Rep. Bernard Sanders, I-Vt.
"The NRC should determine that the conditions leading to this fire are not present in other areas of the plant," the delegation's letter stated.
NRC spokeswoman Diane Screnci said Entergy had already started its own investigation to determine how the fire started and what conditions allowed it to take place.
Transformer fires at nuclear reactors are not unusual; Entergy Nuclear's Pilgrim plant outside Boston had a serious transformer fire last year. And in the early 1990s, Maine Yankee had a serious transformer fire. Vermont Yankee itself had a serious transformer fire in 1972.
The transformer fire is the latest in a series of problems or mishaps at the plant in the past couple of months. In April, more than 20 cracks were discovered in the plant's steam dryer, and on April 21 the NRC discovered that two pieces of nuclear fuel were missing from the plant's spent fuel pool. The pieces were last seen in 1980 and still are missing after two months of investigating.
When coupled with the intense, ongoing debate over whether the 32-year-old reactor should increase power by 20 percent, Vermont Yankee has had more than its share of headlines.
The current transformer was installed in 2002, shortly after Entergy Nuclear bought Vermont Yankee from its original owners. The transformer, which was made in Scotland and cost $4.5 million, was installed in preparation for Entergy's desire to increase power production.
Williams said he didn't know whether the plant had a backup transformer, but William Sherman, the state's nuclear engineer, said that the old transformer, which was removed in 2002, was still at the Vernon reactor.
"The plant shut down automatically, and there was no danger to the public's health and safety," Sherman said.
Sherman estimated that the plant would be shut down for at least a week for repairs, although he said it could be longer. He said the transformer was about the size of a large panel truck.
The burned transformer is outside the turbine building, although it is inside the high security fences surrounding the nuclear reactor. Entergy Nuclear refused media access to the fire scene on Friday, saying security issues forbade it.
The emergency prompted Vermont Emergency Management officials to open its operations center, largely to handle the large number of telephone calls required.
Brattleboro Fire Chief David Emery, who was one of the first firefighters on the scene, said the transformer appeared "severely" damaged.
"It was heated and bent and warped," he said.
Emery was one of three fire chiefs who organized the firefighting effort.
Emery said that there was a large column of black smoke coming out of the switchyard when he first approached Vernon, and he said the smoke was visible from Miller's Crossing, which is about a half-mile from the reactor.
Emery said the top half of the transformer appeared to be on fire when he first arrived. Once plant personnel cut power to the switchyard, the fire was quickly brought under control, he said. Firefighters poured thousands of gallons of water on the fire, and completed their firefighting efforts with special chemical protein foam. He praised the efforts of the Yankee fire brigade, which he said did everything they were supposed to do.
Emery said that more than 30 years ago he helped put out a fire at Vermont Yankee's first transformer fire and he said after the fire he reviewed a photograph from the 1972 fire.
"It has the exact same smoke marks on the building," he said.
The Brattleboro chief said that gaining access to the nuclear plant in the fire emergency was not a problem. All of Brattleboro's firefighters are on a special list and carry identification with them at all times.
"Now, getting out was more of a problem," he joked. "It's like a prison."
Williams said the plant has a water deluge or water curtain system, which sent down a cascade of water near the switchyard, cooling the side of the building. That building contains the giant generators.
Sherman said he believed, based on the information he received Friday, that the fire started with the high voltage wires carrying the power out of the turbine building. He said the wires carry 510 megawatts of power and are cooled by hydrogen gas.
Raymond Shadis, the staff technical advisor for the New England Coalition, said he believed that the fire was a result of a cutback in maintenance and inspection, or a result of hurried work this spring in the switchyard in preparation for the power uprate during the plant's regular shutdown for refueling and maintenance.
"The fire may be attributed to modifications to the switchyard for the uprate," Shadis said, saying he based his statements on information from the coalition's "informant."
"The first thing he saw was arcing and sparking. That's an indication there's a lot of voltage on the loose," Shadis said.
"Then he said the transformer actually exploded," Shadis said.
Shadis said he had shared the information he had with Arnold Gundersen, a nuclear engineer who has been helping him on technical issues, and they theorized, based on the informant's description, that recent controls installed on the switchyard for the proposed increase in power failed.
"This company either has very, very, very, very poor management or it's very, very, very, very unlucky," Shadis said, referring to the string of problems that has surfaced at Vermont Yankee in recent months. "Either way, it's not comforting to the public."
Contact Susan Smallheer at susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com.
----
The "case" for nuclear power
Fri, 18 Jun 2004
Sidney Goodman <gizmoguy@mindspring.com>
Editor, Time Magazine:
Extensive disinformation has brainwashed many people, even the extensively published James Lovelock, an environmentalist.
He recently called for the expansion of nuclear power to solve the problem of global warming.
Folks have taken notice because of his prominence.
He is evidently unaware that many of the world's top scientists were persecuted, censored, or had their careers harmed in some foul way when they revealed why their initial support for nuclear power was misguided.
A description of what happened to them is in my book, "Asleep at the Geiger Counter", published by Blue Dolphin Publishing, Inc.
The history of nuclear power is a history of silenced concerns, rigged studies, suppressed scientists, and in Mr. Lovelock's case, bamboozled environmentalists.
The incessant claim of the industry is that nuclear power eliminates the burning of fossil fuel. Actually, vast amounts of coal and fossil fuel have been guzzled in the preparation of nuclear fuel. It has contributed to global warming directly and will do so even more in the future by the consumption of fossil fuels to cope with radioactive wastes and decommissioning nuclear plants. Details and documentation about this are in my book,
Dr. Helen Caldicott, founding president of "Physicians for Social Responsibility" endorsed my book. She is painfully aware of the total picture and has a deep concern for the environmental effects of global warming.
A wealth of renewable energy alternatives has been available all along. They are cleaner, safer and cheaper than nuclear energy, when total costs to the American taxpayer and ratepayer are tallied.
The problem is that our government has favored dangerous and polluting sources for the worst of political reasons.
The Wall Street Journal once quoted Dr. Carl Sagan's lament that our government was spending about as much money on non-nuclear alternatives to fossil fuel as we spent during one hour of our first war with Iraq.
Just as tobacco executives lied to Congress about the hazards of smoking, government officials were caught lying under oath about how much energy is really obtainable from uranium. There is evidence that there really isn't enough fissionable uranium for a greatly expanded nuclear program unless we make a big commitment for the plutonium breeder reactor.
The breeder poses hideous economic, environmental, and nuclear weapons proliferations problems.
The Chairman of the Advisory Board of the Atomic Energy Commission admitted to Congress that many nuclear poisons are a million to a billion times worse than other chemicals. He said that human weaknesses and equipment flaws must not be allowed. Famous last words!
Mr. Lovelock stated that the problems of radioactive waste are minuscule. That is ludicrous. My book explains why uranium tailings, the debris of making nuclear fuel, pose a health hazard that is ten times worse than the dirtiest coal plant operation. Those tailings give off gaseous fumes which blow clear across the nation.
The tailings are toxic for billions of years. Deposits from those gases were found in the lungs of lung cancer victims during autopsies.
Given the hideous toxicity of radioactive waste, leaks during the first thirty years of the nuclear age demonstrated that the industry has already been thousands of times less reliable than they have to be to make good on their assurances about health and safety.
The very serious problem of radioactive waste has not been solved and it will never be solved.
To solve the problem requires retrieving those leaks and re-isolating them. That is impossible.
It is bad science to put our wastes in Yucca Mountain, the most earthquake prone region of our nation, where there is also a dormant volcano.
Dr. Edward Teller (father of the hydrogen bomb) wrote that a nuclear plant is potentially more deadly than a hydrogen bomb. He urged that plants should be buried deep underground as a safety precaution. Utilities have refused to do this because it would add about 10% to their construction costs.
Every nuclear plant is a potential weapon of mass destruction. In 1977, a government report admitted that nuclear plants are vulnerable and attractive targets. It recommended police state methods as a precaution.
It admitted that even if we had a complete police state (fascism) there is still no way to predict what the chances are for a terrorist induced catastrophe.
After studying health statistics, some doctors in India are convinced that the fallout from the Chernobyl nuclear plant accident in the Soviet Union caused the death of at least a million children over the years.
Despite white wash reports to the contrary, there was a high casualty toll from the Three Mile Accident although that was only a partial meltdown. This has eluded high government officials who are in denial about harm that has already been caused. The government will put a warning on a pack of cigarettes telling you that smoking is dangerous. It will not tell you that nuclear power is dangerous because it is the government's own product. The same government facilities, which are used to make nuclear weapons, are used to make nuclear fuel. Hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies are up for grabs. Every government involved with building nuclear weapons has a political need to put a friendly face on nuclear technology. .
A catastrophe at the Indian Point (near NYC) would kill a large number of people though out the NYC metropolitan area and points beyond. It could cause a trillion dollars damage, updating the CRAC 2 report by our federal Sandia Laboratory, NM.
The owners and operators of nuclear plants are afraid to take full responsibility for the risk they happily impose on us all.
They insist on keeping the Price Anderson Act reauthorized. This Act is a federal law, which essentially excuses their liability for the harm they can inflict. This law abolishes every ones' property rights to protect the property rights of nuclear operators.
Every nuclear plant can be used to make nuclear weapons. Our atoms for peace program has really been a program of bombs for sale. American manufacturers have dominated the export market with the help of government subsidies, to bail out the ailing nuclear industry. This has proliferated the threat of terrorists who now have access to nuclear materials.
Nuclear power cannot survive or compete without endless multi-billion dollar subsidies and bailouts. Right now, our government is knuckling under to the nuclear lobby, at the expense of better energy alternatives. The high price of gasoline is a direct result of decades of irresponsible government priorities.
Every energy source has its downsides. None can compare with the downsides of nuclear power.
For decades, we have been cheated out of what could have been a golden age of economic and environmental benefits, with less inflation and less war.
Sidney J. Goodman, PE, MSME Professional Engineer. NJ License # 15326
Sidney Goodman gizmoguy@mindspring.com <mailto:gizmoguy@mindspring.com>
-------- business
Areva, RWE, Cameco agree fixed-price deal to acquire Russian uranium
PARIS (AFP)
Jun 18, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040618183201.6du4g0wr.html
State-owned French nuclear group Areva said Friday it and its partners RWE of Germany and Cameco of Canada had agreed a new deal which would allow them to purchase Russian uranium at fixed prices until 2013.
The agreement amends a contract originally signed in 1999 as part of Russia's programme for dismantling its nuclear weapons.
Under the deal the three companies agreed not to excercise certain purchase options in return for the fixed-prices and guaranteed volumes of uranium.
Areva will have access to 26,000 tonnes of natural uranium, over 20 percent of its requirements over the period.
----
Supply shudders drive uranium prices
By Barry FitzGerald
June 18, 2004
The Age (Australia)
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/17/1087245038621.html?oneclick=true
Uranium prices are booming, surging 80 per cent to more than $US18 a pound in the past 12 months, in response to the fears held by nuclear power utilities about future long-term supply sources.
The price surge has sparked renewed interest in Australia's undeveloped uranium resources, which in total, are the world's biggest.
The Canadian mining industry is showing particular interest, with one of the first to benefit being the unlisted, Sydney-based Tackle Resources.
Tackle is associated with mining analyst Steve Bartrop, who is executive director of the Sydney-based Fat Prophets research house. The Canadian tidger Laramide Resources has struck an option deal with Tackle to acquire a 100 per cent interest in the Westmoreland/Lagoon Creek uranium deposit and associated copper and gold prospects in far north Queensland.
The uranium deposit was discovered in the 1950s by MIM and more recently was kicked over by Rio Tinto, the last owner before Tackle picked up the vacant ground. Advertisement Advertisement
The copper/gold potential was what pricked Tackle's interest when the land package became available but it is the uranium that has excited Laramide. It told the Canadian market that Rio Tinto's pre-feasibility work showed the mineralisation was amenable to acid leaching.
Westmoreland was last listed as containing 21,000 tonnes of uranium oxide material, making it one of Australia's biggest known undeveloped deposits.
The biggest developed deposit is WMC Resources' Roxby Downs copper/uranium/gold deposit in South Australia.
The uranium component at Roxby Downs was a factor in the share price of WMC marching to a six-week high yesterday.
Laramide said the rising uranium price reflected strong industry fundamentals, with present world mine output of 43,000 tonnes a year representing little more than half of the 78,000 tonnes a year that power utilities consume.
"This positive pricing picture follows a prolonged bear market dating to the early 1980s," the Canadian company said.
That bear market had much to do with the nuclear power fears that followed the partial meltdown of the nuclear reactor at Three Mile Island in the US in 1979.
A flood of material from the former Soviet Union in the 1990s continued the bear market, notwithstanding uranium maintaining its 16 per cent share of the world electricity market.
The Uranium Information Centre, a Melbourne-based industry group, said yesterday there was nervousness about uranium supplies.
UIC general manager Ian Hore-Lacy said "there is a perception that stockpiles held by utilities are depleted".
This comes at a time when 30 new reactors are in various stages of construction around the world, and when nuclear power is seen by some as the answer to the greenhouse gas problem fossil fuels pose in power generation.
----
Uranium prices soar, Canadians look at new mine
By Barry Fitzgerald
June 18, 2004
Sydney Morning Herald
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/06/17/1087245042449.html?oneclick=true
Enrichment ... uranium prices have soared 80pc as old mines run out and nuclear power stations keep pumping out electricity. Photo: AFP
Uranium prices are booming, surging 80 per cent to more than $US18 a pound in the past 12 months in response to fears by nuclear power utilities about long-term supplies.
The price surge has sparked renewed interest in Australia's undeveloped uranium resources, which are the world's biggest.
The Canadian mining industry is showing particular interest, with one of the first to benefit being the unlisted Tackle Resources.
Tackle is associated with mining analyst Steve Bartrop, an executive director of Sydney's Fat Prophets research house.
Canadian Laramide Resources has stuck an option deal with Tackle to acquire a 100 per cent interest in the Westmoreland/Lagoon Creek uranium deposit and associated copper/gold prospects in far north Queensland.
The deposit was discovered in the 1950s by MIM and more recently kicked over by Rio Tinto, which owned it before Tackle picked up the vacant ground.
The copper/gold potential was what pricked Tackle's interest when the land package became available but it is the uranium that has since got Laramide excited. Advertisement Advertisement
It told the Canadian market that pre-feasibility work by Rio Tinto showed the mineralisation was amenable to acid leaching.
Westmoreland was last listed as containing 21,000 tonnes of uranium oxide material, making it one of the biggest known undeveloped deposits in Australia.
The biggest developed deposit is WMC's Roxby Downs copper/ uranium/gold deposit in South Australia.
The uranium component at Roxby Downs was a factor in WMC's share price marching to a six-week high yesterday.
Laramide said the rising uranium price reflected strong industry fundamentals, with present world mine output of 43,000 tonnes a year representing little more than half of the 78,000 tonnes a year consumed by power utilities.
"This positive pricing picture follows a prolonged bear market dating to the early 1980s," the Canadian company said.
The bear market had much to do with the nuclear power fears and political protests that followed partial meltdown of the nuclear reactor at Three Mile Island in the US in 1979.
A flood of material from the former Soviet Union in the 1990s continued the bear market, notwithstanding uranium's maintaining its 16 per cent share of the world electricity market.
The Uranium Information Centre, a Melbourne industry group, said yesterday that there was nervousness about uranium supplies.
UIC general manager Ian Hore-Lacy said "there is a perception that stockpiles held by utilities are depleted".
This comes at a time when 30 new reactors are in various stages of construction around the world and when nuclear power is seen by some as the answer to the greenhouse gas problem facing fossil fuels in power generation.
-------- canada
Ontario Considers Building a Nuclear Plant
June 18, 2004
By BERNARD SIMON
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/business/worldbusiness/18nuke.html?pagewanted=all&position=
TORONTO, June 17 - With Ontario on the brink of an energy supply squeeze, and some of its aging nuclear plants facing an uncertain future, moves are under way in the province, Canada's most populous, to build the first nuclear reactor in North America in more than two decades
Memories of last August's power blackout, which was felt in a wide swath of southern Ontario as well as in the Northeast and Midwest of the United States, have only increased pressure for the province to become more self-sufficient.
Ontario's energy minister, Dwight Duncan, said in a recent interview that in any overhaul of the power sector, the province would have to consider nuclear energy. "The use of nuclear power is controversial," he said. "We have some significant decisions to make."
Introducing a bill to streamline regulation of the power sector and to attract private sector investment, Mr. Duncan said earlier this week, "It is absolutely critical that we move forward quickly to boost new supply, increase conservation and maintain price stability for consumers."
A new nuclear plant would most likely be built on the shore of one of the Great Lakes, where Ontario's three existing nuclear plants are.
It would be the first in North America since confidence in atomic energy was shattered by an accident at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania in 1979.
Energy policy in Canada is largely in the hands of the provinces, and a committee set up by the Ontario government to examine power supplies concluded in March that "the right nuclear strategy will play a key role in ensuring that Ontario has reliable, competitively priced power over the long term." The panel, whose chairman was John Manley, a former deputy prime minister of Canada, said that the province "must begin planning now to supplement and ultimately replace its aging nuclear assets with new and better generations of nuclear technology."
Mr. Duncan, Ontario's energy minister, said in an interview that his government would probably decide this fall on the future role of nuclear power in the province.
According to Roger W. Gale, chief executive of GF Energy, an industry consulting firm based in Washington with clients on both sides of the border, while "the United States is at the study stage, Canada could potentially be at the doing stage."
Canadian authorities are more likely to support the nuclear industry than their American counterparts, he and other experts said. Ontario is facing tight energy supplies, and a government-owned Canadian company ready and eager for new business has supplied every existing nuclear reactor in the country. The approval and other regulatory processes for new nuclear plants is also simpler in Canada. And public opposition will probably be more muted north of the border.
The last fulfilled order for a nuclear power plant in the United States was in 1973; Canada's last was in 1978. Since then, almost all sizable generating stations built in either place have been fueled either by coal or, more recently, natural gas, though several other countries, like China, Japan, India and Russia, have continued to build nuclear plants.
Ontario's existing nuclear power plants have been dogged by problems. Several units of the Pickering plant, east of Toronto on the shores of Lake Ontario, and the Bruce plant, on the shores of Lake Huron, have not been restarted since they were taken out of service seven years ago for safety reasons.
Nuclear power accounts for 45 percent of electricity generating capacity in Ontario, but 14 percent in Canada.
That compares with 20 percent in the United States, where several proposals for new nuclear plants are inching forward. Various consortiums - among them, one that includes the Exelon Corporation of Chicago and the Entergy Corporation of New Orleans, two of the country's largest nuclear plant owners - are in the early stages of applying for licenses to build and operate new plants.
In May, the Department of Energy agreed to finance half the $4.25 million cost of a detailed study by a different group, led by the Tennessee Valley Authority, to build two nuclear generating units at a site near Hollywood, Ala.
Construction of any American projects is not expected to start before 2010 at the earliest, however, said J. Scott Peterson, a vice president at the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group in Washington.
The sense of urgency is considerably greater in Canada, where, experts say, construction could begin a couple of years earlier.
Mr. Duncan said Ontario needed to refurbish, replace or conserve 25,000 megawatts of generating capacity by the year 2020, equal to 80 percent of current power supplies. He estimated that these investments would cost 25 billion to 40 billion Canadian dollars ($18 billion to $29 billion).
At the same time, the provincial government, seeking to cut pollution, has pledged to phase out all five of Ontario's coal-fired generating stations by 2007, plants that now generate about a fifth of the province's electricity.
Compounding the drive for new capacity is uncertainty over the future of three idled units at the big Pickering plant, run by the government-owned Ontario Power Generation. The estimated cost of repairs to these and another unit that was restarted last year, originally 1.1 billion Canadian dollars, has escalated to 3 billion to 4 billion Canadian dollars. The authorities are now mulling whether to press ahead with the repairs or abandon the reactors.
With the coal plants destined for oblivion and the attraction of natural gas diluted by volatile prices, some consider nuclear the clear favorite for expansion of the province's base load power capacity.
"There's certainly a climate now where it's being seriously considered," said Duncan Hawthorne, chief executive of Bruce Power, the company that operates the 6,200-megawatt Bruce station on Lake Huron.
Another factor favoring the nuclear option is the development of a new reactor by Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., a government corporation known for its heavy-water Candu - Canada Deuterium Uranium - plants. All 17 reactors currently operating in Canada are Candu models. Ian Dovey, a company spokesman, said it expected to win regulatory approval for the new model, known as the ACR-700, by the end of 2006.
According to Tom Adams, executive director of Energy Probe, a Toronto-based research group that campaigns against nuclear power, the climate is friendlier toward the nuclear industry in Canada than in the United States in large part because of government support for Atomic Energy of Canada.
Mr. Gale, the Washington consultant, said that if all went smoothly, construction work on a new nuclear plant in Ontario could begin by 2008.
But numerous obstacles must be overcome. According to Mr. Hawthorne of Bruce Power, there needs to be greater certainty on the cost and financing of a new plant, as well as the selling price of its output.
Bruce Power's 2,300-acre site, 150 miles northwest of Toronto, is a possible location for a new plant. Mr. Hawthorne said that the company would probably decide within the next year whether to refurbish those of its eight existing reactors nearing the end of their lives by 2012, or build new ones, or both.
The prospect of new nuclear plants has so far raised little public concern in Ontario. Glenn R. Sutton, the mayor of Kincardine, the town closest to the Bruce plant, describes the local community as "pro-nuclear."
Most of Bruce Power's 3,000 workers live in or near Kincardine, population 12,000.
Still, nuclear power is not without critics in Ontario, and protests could grow as the planning process moves forward.
A recent report by the Ontario Clean Air Alliance, an environmental group, concluded that the Manley committee's findings were based on unreliable assumptions.
In an interview, the group's chairman, Jack Gibbons, rated the chances that a new nuclear station would be built in the province as "extremely low," because the province's needs could be met by cheaper and more reliable power sources, like natural gas and hydro and wind power and by conservation.
Besides, said Frank de Jong, chairman of the Green Party of Ontario, "people are still not convinced of the safety of nuclear power."
-------- depleted uranium
U.S. names Pakistan major non-NATO ally
2004-06-18
Reuters
http://www.etaiwannews.com/Asia/2004/06/18/1087527747.htm
U.S. President George W. Bush on Wednesday named Pakistan a major non-NATO ally of the United States, making it easier for the country to acquire U.S. arms.
The announcement rewards Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf for supporting the U.S.-led war on terrorism.
Secretary of State Colin Powell told Musharraf in March that his country would get the designation. A memorandum issued by Bush on Wednesday made it official.
The status of major non-NATO ally is also enjoyed by Australia, Bahrain, Israel, South Korea and Morocco.
As a major non-NATO ally, Pakistan could use U.S. funding to lease some defense items and would become eligible for loans of military supplies for research and development projects.
It would also become eligible to buy depleted uranium ammunition, to have U.S.-owned military stockpiles on its territory outside U.S. bases and to receive U.S. military training on easier financial terms.
However, the designation does not confer the mutual defense and security guarantees enjoyed by NATO members.
The United States imposed sanctions on Pakistan after it conducted nuclear tests in 1998 but most were lifted in the wake of the September 11 attacks on the United States, when Pakistan became a key U.S. ally in the war on terror.
Given Pakistan's porous border with Afghanistan, its help is seen as vital if the United States is to catch Osama bin Laden and defeat his al-Qaida network.
Many in Pakistan have not forgiven United States for refusing to deliver 28 F-16 fighters in the 1990s because of worry over Pakistan's nuclear program. The planes had been paid for, but it took eight years for the money to be refunded.
India, Pakistan's long-standing rival, opposes the sale of F-16s to Pakistan and the decision to grant Islamabad major non-NATO ally status could trouble New Delhi, which does not have that status, although it has growing military contacts with Washington as part of their overall "strategic partnership."
"India is one of our closest allies," a senior Bush administration official said. "We have wonderful bilateral relations with India and we will continue to do so."
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Bush's Gift to Pakistan by Mumtaz
By Hamid Rao,
Al-Jazeerah,
June 18, 2004
http://www.aljazeerah.info/Opinion%20editorials/2004%20opinions/June/18o/Bush's%20Gift%20to%20Pakistan%20by%20Mumtaz%20By%20Hamid%20Rao.htm
PUFFING the zephyr of horizons of Pakistan - with a lot of fragrant allures - US President George W Bush has eventually bestowed Pakistan with-what is phrased as-an elevated and glamorous status of a 'Major non-NATO ally'.
An indicator to this effect was aired by Secretary of State, Colin Powell during his visit to Islamabad-a few months ago whereby the cogent voice of the Bush administration was showered as many flora of fragrance, aroma n' cologne on Pakistan - as he could do, a facet which, was pragmatically never rayed by Washington - ever in the past.
To be explicit, while in New Delhi, the US Secretary of State focused his perceptions - very overtly - on the so-called 'infiltration' in India held-Kashmir - yet during his chat with newsmen on the soils of Pakistan was filled with zest of 'keen desire of his country to have long-term ties with Pakistan and hoped the current Pak-India dialogue will lead to resolution of the lingering Kashmir dispute.' [What a fabulous style of fascinating n' captivating diplomacy?]
Yet another news, Colin Powell broke to the world was the first time acknowledgement by the United States with its 'desire for a long-term strategic relationship with Pakistan and towards this, the decision to make it a major non-NATO ally' - yet with no exact time-frame for the innovative phrase - like the 'roadmap' - added in the political glossary, just freshly at the behest of the United States [at the outset an axiom, solitarily meant for the Middle East, which surfaced as a follow-up for South Asia].
With gargantuan gratitude for the Powell, we deem it apposite to quote his words, which he very munificently articulated; "We have been involved in a long-term partnership with Pakistan for many years and I believe that in the current environment we have every opportunity to strengthen that relationship in strategic ways as we move forward. I advised the foreign minister this morning that we will also be making notification to our Congress that will designate Pakistan as a major non-NATO ally (MNNA) for purposes of our future military-military relations."
The MNNA was shaped back in 1989 and Pakistan will obviously be the fourth Muslim country [if at-all it so happens] after Egypt, Jordan and Bahrain to become a member. Some of the other countries in this club include Japan, South Korea, New Zealand and Australia.
If n' when this status is 'bestowed', it would make Pakistan eligible for priority delivery access to defense articles, stockpiling of military hardware, purchase of depleted uranium for anti-tank rounds, cooperation in defense and research programmes plus the loan facilities.
Analyzing the words of Powell, one feels absolutely swayed that of-late, the United States has turned too generous towards Pakistan. It is a common perspective that - by n' large - such a yawning love comes from Washington - only with peculiar intent n' objectives. To add, it - paradoxically - remains restricted to 'words' only rather than turning such a vision or 'dream' translated into a reality.
To recapitulate, we would jog your memory to the Camp David Accord, Mr. Secretary, wherein a magnificent package was set off for Pakistan after a face-to-face or one-to-one interaction between President Musharraf n' President Bush. It remains, nothing more than an expectation or a probability - to date.
Going by the index of the history, a momentous, in fact a vital, crucial and critical facet, which surfaces is that US has never been a upright n' steadfast friend [of Pakistan] in the gone-bye epoch and it's, as some egalitarians envision, highly implausible that it shall be so - even in the times ahead.
Even then, amid his visit to Pakistan, we hope that not only that the newest pledges - beamed by Mr. Powell - shall be fulfilled without any delay, but - simultaneously - the previous oaths vis-à-vis Pakistan shall be accomplished - without any delay or impediments - clearing the mature backlog.
We would like to recap that an awful facet - very well known to the US - whereby Pakistan did extend unreserved help to the United States in its' fight against terrorism, which, by now is still being seen by the Bush administration's stalwarts with mistrust [despite the loss of precious and lovely lives in a Wana episode(s) - still going on unabated] and albeit being acquainted with the veracity that the Pakistan had sided with the Washington against the wishes of its' masses - which, in some circles persists even today.
The proceedings of Pakistan's Senate n' National Assembly stand as clear as crystal as a witness to the veracity, where the Opposition - irrespective of any specific leaning or proclivity towards a meticulous political party - stages frequent walk-outs against the Wana events - almost every day. Yet, setting aside all such milieus, the government is resolute to weed-out terrorism, in its' all forms n' manifestations, in line with the US-led crusade towards the pest of terrorism. Isn't it adequate testimony about Pakistan's sincerity?
As a matter of fact, Pakistan has suffered a lot as an upshot of its support to the US war on terror in Afghanistan, yet by now, it has got nothing in return via eye-catching n' clear-cut and categorical terms - except 'plain n' promises'. Eventually, it's hoped that Powell will make sure the realization of all the commitments, made by US with Pakistan by keeping in mind the magnitude of its' sniffles n' dilemmas rather than being more demanding [beyond one's mind eye] the moment he gets back home - the abode of the Statute of Liberty.
A gaze n' glance on the episodes of the recent past would unveil the fact that most of the US ventures by n' large have been abortive, virtually taking a shape of turbulent turmoil in place of enormous respects, regards n' veneration, which is ought to be the authentic right of the solitary super-power - the United States. Just have looks on the realms like Afghanistan n' Iraq, which are still camouflaged with haziness without an obvious forceful flash [of affluence] for the near future.
With words of adore and eulogize for President Bush for his marvelous plans n' pledges for Pakistan, we would like to ring a bell to the government of Pakistan not to over-react or be melodramatic - at least till the time - Washington makes an evolution or a headway on its' elfin or hefty assures - in entirety.
At the same time we are ought to keep a vigilant watch on the actuality, being beamed most exclusively by the United States and of-late by India. We, by all means, all-the-time have to keep in mind, intellect n' brain power - an entrenched realism, the general elections in the United States - environ wherein an optimal digit of sympathizers with their own faith or family(s) dwelling [abroad or on the locales n' vicinities of a state] is pre-requite, [to win-over] - as a human psyche.
With this acuity, we are to ensure that in no case - Pakistan is exploited by any nauseating realm - for ones' peculiar n' ephemeral motifs - in any mode or manner.
The raison d'être is - 'Pakistan comes First', a gallant n' pragmatic slogan, vow n' dictum, for which the nation is all set to make sacrifice of any echelon to shield its' dignity, honor and sovereignty - at all costs.
[The writer is an analyst of global fame, ex-Head [Director] of News & Current Affairs, Pakistan TV and Editor of Pakistan's first independent daily newspaper on the Web: www.PakistanTimes.net]
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Friend or Foe?
Bradford Plumer,
June 18, 2004
Mother Jones
http://www.motherjones.com/news/dailymojo/2004/06/06_523.html
In the eyes of many Americans, Pakistan has long evinced a split personality--hunting down al-Qaeda one moment, peddling nuclear secrets the next. On Wednesday, the Bush administration endorsed the "friend" point of view, when it officially granted Major Non-NATO Ally (MNNA) status to Pakistan. But the announcement doesn't do much to dispel the lingering question: What kind of ally is Pakistan, anyways?
By offering the country MNNA status, the Bush administration clearly hopes to boost the Pakistan government in its fight against al Qaeda and Taliban fighters within its own borders. (Calculating cynics take note: A major al-Qaeda capture in Pakistan would certainly liven up Bush's sickly poll numbers.) Crucially, the status renders Pakistan eligible for new and previously unavailable weapons--such as depleted uranium ammunition--from U.S. army stockpiles, along with new government-backed loans to build up its military capability. Other nations with MNNA status include South Korea, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and Egypt.
India--which is not an MNNA --will no doubt feel some unease over the boost to their arch-rival. In all likelihood, though, the new alliance will not disrupt the balance of power in Central Asia. Pakistan will not be granted mutual defense and security guarantees, as NATO allies are. In the event of a war between Pakistan and India, the U.S. would almost certainly refrain from taking sides, and instead try to broker peace from a neutral position.
Nevertheless, some Indian officials have expressed private concern, predicting that the new inflow of weaponry could lead to an unhealthy arms race between the two countries. Indian leaders may also worry that some of the arms could find their way into the hands of Pakistani fighters within the disputed Kashmir region.
From an American point of view, Pakistan's new status will likely rekindle the debate over the country's commitment to the war on terrorism. Just this past Tuesday, the 9/11 Commission's report cited evidence to back up the widespread and persistent suspicion that Pakistan collaborated with the Taliban before September 11:
'The Taliban's ability to provide Bin Laden a haven in the face of international pressure and UN sanctions was significantly facilitated by Pakistani support,' the report said. 'Pakistan benefited from the Taliban-Al Qaeda relationship, as Bin Laden's camps trained and equipped fighters for Pakistan's ongoing struggle with India over Kashmir.'
It's unclear to what extent Pakistan has changed its ways in the time since President Bush declared, after September 11, that countries were either with the U.S. or against it. On the one hand, news headlines blare daily reports of Pakistan's purported military crackdown on al Qaeda fighters within its own borders. On the other hand, the Pakistani government has been far from forthright about its actions. Around the time when Pakistan first learned from Colin Powell that it would receive MNNA status, the government eagerly proclaimed that it had cornered Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's second-in-command. The announcement later proved false, leaving some to wonder if it was merely a hoax to impress the Bush administration. More recently, The New York Times questioned whether Pakistan was simply going through the motions in its hunt for al-Qaeda and other Islamic militant groups:
One Pakistani military official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the government was taking advantage of the American focus on Iraq to delay acting in the tribal areas. The official said the government hoped to wait out American demands for action until the presidential election was over and American attention and pressure might drop.
The Times also notes that militant groups in Pakistan continue to pull in new recruits.
On top of all this, the U.S. government has yet to resolve the questions surrounding the Pakistani government's knowledge of, and involvement in, the selling of nuclear secrets to rogue nations by one of its top scientists, Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan. Back in March, Khan told The Guardian that the government had been fully aware of everything:
The disgraced founder of Pakistan's nuclear programme has informed investigators that he supplied rogue states with nuclear technology with the full knowledge of the country's ruling military elite, including President Pervez Musharraf, a friend of the nuclear scientist was reported as saying yesterday...
According to an unnamed friend who spoke to the Associated Press, the nuclear scientist last week told government investigators: "What ever I did, it was in the knowledge of the bosses."
Still, in the time since Colin Powell delivered Pakistan a light slap on the wrist in February of 2004, the Bush administration has appeared content to let the matter drop.
For his part, Pakistan's president, Gen. Perez Musharraf, has shown only a moderate inclination to shake things up and reform Pakistan. He has narrowly escaped several recent assassination attempts, and is understandably wary of angering too many Islamist groups at home. To make matters more difficult, the ranks of Pakistan's army contain many fundamentalists, and the intelligence agency, the ISI, has extensive links to the Taliban and other militant groups. Brian Maher recently described Musharraf's precarious position:
He still cannot count on the loyalty of the military and the ISI, despite his attempts to eradicate suspect elements. If he sent the army into the tribal areas [to fight militant groups like al Qaeda], he runs the risk of defections in the ranks and widespread rebellion, which would threaten the survival of the regime.
Indeed, the pressure on Musharraf comes not only from within his government. Popular rallies decrying the president's pro-American policies have become increasingly common; Musharraf's new alliance with the U.S. may draw further denunciations.
Officially, Pakistan is now an ally of the U.S. But that is still a long way from being our friend.
-------- india / pakistan
India, Pakistan gear up for historic nuclear security talks
NEW DELHI (AFP)
Jun 18, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040618013001.tbzgd5zn.html
Two years after lurching towards war and sparking fears of a nuclear meltdown in South Asia, rivals India and Pakistan come together this weekend to discuss ways to reduce such potentially cataclysmic risks.
Anti-nuclear activists are demanding that both sides agree to dismantle warheads from missiles and that the arch-rivals institute safeguards against accidental use of their weapons of mass destruction.
But in Islamabad, Pakistani foreign office spokesman Masood Khan said the discussions in New Delhi would focus on "strategic stability, nuclear crisis management, risk reduction and coordinated as well as responsible stewardship".
The talks will also coincide with a meeting of the two countries' foreign ministers in China on the sidelines of a regional conference -- their first exchange since a change of government in New Delhi.
"Since India now has a less hawkish government and Pakistan is now an ally of the United States, one would expect tangible confidence-building measures (CBMs) from the talks," said Jay Prakash of the Delhi Science Forum, one of India's top disarmament groups.
The former government of Hindu nationalist premier Atal Behari Vajpayee conducted nuclear weapons tests in May 1998, prompting Pakistan to carry out tit-for-tat tests a few days later -- which drew a slew of US-led sanctions against both.
The two South Asian neighbours, who have fought three wars since 1947, have refused to endorse nuclear non-proliferation treaties.
Islamabad and New Delhi, however, agreed to discuss confidence-building measures and launch a dialogue after a landmark pact between Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Vajpayee in January to resolve all issues, including the dispute over Kashmir.
Disarmament groups in both countries appeared gladdened by Musharraf's recent statement that Pakistan was prepared to cut down its nuclear arsenal if India did the same, but experts said mere pledges would be futile.
"We don't have any worldwide military ambitions. We maintain a force for deterrence," Musharraf said in Dubai on June 4 and offered to make South Asia a "nuclear-free zone" if India agreed.
Strategic analyst Raja Mohan said the two sides -- who moved towards nuclear war twice in 2002 following an attack on the Indian parliament in December 2001 by Islamic insurgents which New Delhi blamed on Islamabad -- must focus on practical steps to enhance nuclear security.
"For India and Pakistan, the priority on the nuclear front is to put in place effective CBMs and avoid such unverifiable proposals as non-deployment of nuclear weapons," Mohan said.
"The two sides must also prepare to launch a broader military-strategic dialogue that will avoid the prospect of even a conventional war in the (South Asian) subcontinent," Mohan said in recently published comments.
Anti-nuclear activists warn that since neither India nor Pakistan have the technology to recall a nuclear-tipped missile fired in error, an accidental launch could trigger an unimaginable holocaust in the region of 1.5 billion people.
"And so, as we welcome the proposed bilateral talks on a number of issues including nuclear risk reduction measures (NRRM), we are opposed to the long-range missiles in their possession," said Veenita Bal, of the Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament and Peace (CNDP).
The CNDP, which is coordinating the efforts of disarmament groups in both countries ahead of the meeting, said "hollow" talks on issues such as transparency in the nuclear doctrines of the two nations were not only meaningless but also risky.
"Transparency is a vague term because if one party is identified as the enemy then there cannot be any transparency. It is ridiculous," said Prakash, whose Forum is also a member of the CNDP.
"The best and strongest form of NRRMs is to separate the nuclear warheads from delivery systems and store them and monitor them elsewhere," said Bal, a scientist.
--------
India, Pakistan Kick Off Nuclear Talks
Reuters
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53435-2004Jun18.html
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India and Pakistan on Saturday kick off unprecedented talks to reduce the risk of nuclear war for the first time since the neighbors became nuclear powers in 1998 and two years after they edged to the brink of war.
The two days of talks in New Delhi come during a hesitant, year-old peace process as the two sides try to rebuild relations.
Pakistan's acting foreign secretary, Tariq Osman Hyder, is leading an eight-member team for the discussions with an additional secretary from India's Foreign Ministry, Sheel Kant Sharma, and other officials.
The meeting, delayed a month by India's election, comes a week before talks on a range of issues, including disputed Kashmir, from next Sunday between the two foreign secretaries -- the civil servants in charge of both foreign ministries.
Tensions over Kashmir, especially fighting in the summer of 1999 in the Kargil region, have delayed the nuclear risk reduction talks for six years.
Some analysts say the fact the countries are talking at all on how to prevent nuclear conflict is welcome in itself. "The aim of the talks is to agree on the broad agenda for future talks. It is unrealistic to expect a quick breakthrough. It took the superpowers over 30 years to break their nuclear impasse," defense analyst Jasjit Singh said.
"But whether now or later, both sides will have to talk about reducing armed conflict across its full spectrum to decrease the risk of a nuclear clash."
India and Pakistan have fought two of their three wars over the scenic Himalayan region of Kashmir where Muslim militants are fighting New Delhi's forces in the Indian-held part.
Despite attempts at a peace process after Kargil, the two countries came close to war in mid-2002 after Pakistan-based insurgents attacked India's parliament in late 2001, sparking international fears of a nuclear exchange.
After former Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's offer last year of peace drew an encouraging response from Islamabad. Transport links and full diplomatic ties were restored and the aging leader met Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf in January in Pakistan.
New Delhi's stated nuclear policy is not to strike first with nuclear weapons, but Pakistan, worried about India's growing conventional military superiority, has made no such pledge.
--------
India, Pakistan Experts Address Nuke Risks
By NIRMALA GEORGE
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52555-2004Jun18.html
NEW DELHI - Indian and Pakistani experts meet Saturday to discuss steps to reduce the risk of an accidental nuclear attack, six years after the neighboring rivals conducted atomic tests and raised fears of a conflagration in South Asia.
The two-day talks will focus on nuclear crisis management - including a ban on further tests and the prevention of the accidental or non-authorized use of nuclear weapons.
"We are coming with a positive spirit and positive suggestions. We look forward to a result-oriented outcome," Pakistani Foreign Ministry official Tariq Usman Haider said Friday on his arrival in the Indian capital.
Haider is leading Pakistan's six-member delegation, including disarmament experts, to the talks.
The talks are confidence-building measures between the nations and coincide with a wide-ranging dialogue on outstanding disputes launched in January by Pakistan and the Indian government then-headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
The nuclear doctrines of India and Pakistan are asymmetric.
India says it would not be the first to use nuclear weapons and would not use them against non-nuclear weapons states. Pakistan has not committed itself to a no-first-use doctrine.
The talks come more than four months after Abdul Qadeer Khan, long regarded as a national hero for helping Pakistan obtain a nuclear deterrent against rival India, confessed to transferring sensitive technology to North Korea, Iran and Libya.
He received a pardon from Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, a key U.S. ally. Pakistan denies any official involvement in nuclear proliferation, although doubts remain over how top military and government officials remained in the dark for years over Khan's activities.
India and Pakistan shocked the world when they carried out nuclear tests in 1998, inviting military and economic sanctions by the United States and its allies.
International fears worsened when the two countries battled in the Himalayas in 1999 and came close to war again in mid-2002.
However, relations have since thawed and both countries are actively pursuing peace. International sanctions also have been lifted by the United States and other countries.
The foreign secretaries of the two countries also will meet June 27-28 to discuss the decades-old dispute over the divided Himalayan territory of Kashmir, the cause of two of the two countries' three wars since their independence from Britain in 1947.
-------- iran
Images Show Iran May Be Hiding Nuke Plants
Friday, June 18, 2004
Fox News
By Liza Porteus
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,123081,00.html
NEW YORK - Satellite photos of two locations in Iran show the nation may be continuing to pursue and hide a program to produce nuclear weapons, images obtained exclusively by Fox News show.
One site at Natanz appears to show a hidden uranium enrichment plant, possibly surrounded by defense fortifications capable of thwarting an attack. The other site, Arak, is a heavy water facility used to make plutonium.
The two sites together could be capable of building atomic bombs. "You have to conclude this is not part of an energy program, this is part of a weapons program," John Pike, the founder of Globalsecurity.org , told Fox News.
Iran - one of three nations President Bush labeled as part of an "axis of evil" in 2003 - has come under heavy criticism by the international community for not doing away completely with its nuclear program, which has been under investigation for nearly two decades.
Iranian leaders argue that the nation is enriching the uranium in order to produce nuclear power; the United States says the program is a front for developing atomic weapons. Enrichment can be used to produce power or bombs.
The U.N. nuclear watchdog is investigating the photos. The U.S. intelligence community also has the images.
On Friday, the International Atomic Energy Agency (search ) censured Iran for past cover-ups in its nuclear program in a resolution that warned Tehran to be more forthcoming.
Iranian officials have said that if the United Nations were to pursue a resolution like that agreed upon Thursday, Tehran would continue with their enrichment program.
"I'm not at all sure that's a threat that should deter us that much," former Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger told Fox News. "I think we have a very serious problem and we'll have to pursue it very hard."
Before and After in Iran Images
The pictures of the Natanz facility - taken on Sept. 20, 2002 and Feb. 29, 2004 - show that Iran has been trying to cover up the compound, Pike said.
"We're really quite amazed at what we were seeing in this imagery and we're also quite amazed at what we're not seeing," Pike said.
Remarking on the most recent image, Pike said, "we don't see much of anything after all, it's basically just a big empty field, but if we had looked at it earlier, we can see this is their primary, their main enrichment facility."
The 2002 images show buildings under construction. But in the 2004 images, "you can see that they completely covered it up with a thick layer of dirt," Pike noted, perhaps to make it difficult to see it and harder for precision-guided munitions to target the underground facility.
A thick network of what could be fighting positions also encircle the plant, according to Pike's interpretation of the images.
"Possibly they would be fighting positions in case a commando raid was launched against this facility," Pike said. "It really looks like the Iranians have a fear someone is going to try to destroy this building before it can make bombs."
Alireza Jafarzadeh, a Fox News foreign affairs analyst, exposed the two sites on Aug. 14, 2002, after obtaining information from Iranian opposition forces with access to the regime.
Construction of buildings at Natanz began in 2000, he told Foxnews.com. There are two major parts, one of which consists of about six white buildings while three more in the images are under construction. In those three buildings are two large underground hallways.
It's in those hallways - one of which is about 32,000 square meters in size, the other is close to 8,000 square meters - Jafarzadeh said, where centrifuge machines are to be lined up.
"Once fully operational, it would have as many 50,000 centrifuge machines lined up there," he said. "These are the main enrichment halls that would produce enriched uranium en masse ... once that's fully operational, perhaps just this site in Natanz would be able to produce 15 to 20 bombs a year."
The building is protected by 8-feet thick concrete walls, "primarily to protect it against air strikes," Jafarzadeh noted. Also, the entrance to the main building consists of a U-shaped tunnel.
"This way, even smart bombs cannot sort of glide or crawl into the hall," he said. "That tells me this is definitely built underground for air strike protection."
Photos of the Arak facility show that between Aug. 18, 2001 and Feb. 28, 2004, heavy construction took place at the plutonium-production facility.
"What is significant about this pictures - it shows how rapidly they have actually advanced in the construction of these sites," Jafarzadeh said.
"Because in such a short period of time, they have made big advancements ... this facility can be used both for producing low-enrichment uranium, which as Iran claims, is for supporting fuel for nuclear reactors for what they call peaceful purposes and at the same time, it can be used for enriching uranium for weapons grade."
IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming told Fox News that the agency first received allegations that these sites were used for nuclear bomb-making programs in 2002 and they immediately began "intensive" inspections that continue to this day.
"We are in Arak and Natanz quite frequently," she said.
Although the agency still has a number of questions about both sites, they "are both known to us and our investigation is focusing elsewhere right now," she said.
IAEA also has regular access to the scientists that work at both facilities and has visited the Natanz site since Feb. 29, 2004 and found nothing untoward, she said.
"If it had been razed we certainly would know something about it," she said of the site.
U.S.: Iran Denials 'Hollow'
Some experts warned that the satellite images can't be considered a smoking gun quite yet.
"It's clear Iran is trying to deal with the knowledge the IAEA has this two-decade long program," Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association (search), told Fox News on Friday. "I think it's unclear to me from this satellite imagery what's been hidden and what's not been hidden, which makes it all the more important for Iran to cooperate more fully" with weapons inspectors.
"We need to be careful that the pressure does not ratchet up so high that Iran kicks out inspectors" and closes the blinds to the global community about its nuclear activities, Kimball continued.
IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei (search) acknowledged Thursday that he had to revise one part of his report on Iran saying they had not disclosed the purchase of 15 magnets for P-2 centrifuges, when in fact Iran had admitted it in May.
Contrary to interpreting that as proof Iran is coming clean, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said: "It only points out more how hollow Iran's denials and statements have been ... So we're once again left in the situation where we find that Iran has spent months and months and months denying things that were known, months and months trying to pretend that it was not doing things that finally became known and that it finally admitted."
Perhaps even more disconcerting, Boucher notes, is the satellite imagery showing Iran is actually trying to hide its activities.
"That report shows that Iran does have a track record of trying to hide clandestine nuclear activity since - for many years, including a practice of trying to remove equipment and sanitize buildings," Boucher said. "It's deplorable but not surprising that Iran's deception has gone to the extent of bulldozing entire sites to prevent the IAEA from discovering evidence of its nuclear weapons program."
Boucher said satellite images indicate that Iran has completely razed a different facility at Lavizan Shiyan, which the IAEA had not visited. The site first became known when an exiled Iranian opposition group said it was connected to a biological weapons program.
Jafarzadeh told Foxnews.com that at that site is now something called the Center for Readiness and New Defense Technology, which is affiliated to the defense ministry of the Iranian regime.
The center supposedly is part of new special military unit that now overseas all nuclear programs of the regime, separated from the "peaceful" uses of the program and under the control of the military, Jafarzadeh said. It's at this center where P-2 machines - more efficient enrichment devices used in producing the fuel used in nuclear power plants and atomic bombs - are allegedly produced.
A small number of fully assembled P-2 machines were found at one location in Iran earlier this year, U.S. and European officials said. Iran reportedly was looking to import 100,000 magnets, which can be used for 50,000 machines - two magnets for each machine.
"This raises serious concerns and fits a pattern, as I said, that we've seen from Iran of trying to cover up on its activities, including by trying to sanitize locations which the IAEA should be allowed to visit and expect," Boucher said.
Fox News' Amy Kellogg and Teri Schultz contributed to this report.
----
Timeline: Iran's Nuclear Program
Friday, June 18, 2004
Fox News
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,123090,00.html
Iran's nuclear program has been under intense investigation recently by the U.N. atomic watchdog agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which is headed by General Mohammed El Baradei. Below are some key dates regarding Iran and its possible nuclear intentions:
June 18, 2004: The IAEA censures Iran for past cover-ups in its nuclear program in a resolution warning Tehran to be more forthcoming.
Also, satellite photos of two locations obtained exclusively by Fox News show Iran may be continuing to pursue a program to produce nuclear weapons.
One site at Natanz appears to show a hidden uranium enrichment plant, possibly surrounded by defense fortifications capable of thwarting an attack. The other site, Arak, is a heavy water facility used to make plutonium.
Together, these two plants could be capable of building nuclear bombs.
June 17, 2004: The IAEA says they have information Iran may be engaging in a new nuclear cover-up near a military facility outside Tehran.
June 15, 2004: Iran rejects criticism from the IAEA that it has been delaying a probe into suspect nuclear activities.
June 12, 2004: Iran says it would reject international restrictions on its nuclear program and challenged the world to accept Tehran as a member of the "nuclear club."
June 11, 2004: IAEA reports Iran produced small amounts of plutonium as part of covert nuclear activities. While finding "no evidence" that Tehran tried to make atomic arms, it said such efforts cannot be ruled out.
June 10, 2004: Diplomats say Iran sought "tens of thousands" of black market parts for its covert nuclear program.
April 12, 2004: U.N. nuclear inspectors arrive in Iran to confirm the claim and resolve concerns that the Islamic nation has a covert atomic weapons program.
April 9, 2004: Gholamreza Aghazadeh, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, says Iran would "voluntarily" suspend its centrifuge work.
March 29, 2004: Iran claims it stopped building centrifuges for uranium enrichment, though it was not expected to dispose of the centrifuges it already possessed.
Nov. 11, 2003: A confidential U.N. nuclear agency report found "no evidence" that Iran tried to make atomic arms, but it criticized Tehran for cover-ups and warned it's still uncertain if Iran's nuclear efforts were for peaceful purposes.
Sept. 25, 2003: The IAEA finds traces of weapons-grade, highly enriched uranium in Iran.
Jan. 29, 2002: President Bush delivers his State of the Union speech months after the September 11 terrorist attacks, naming Iran as a member of the "Axis of Evil," along with Iraq and North Korea.
----
US accuses Iran of razing nuclear sites
Agence France-Presse Washington,
June 18
http://hindustantimes.com/news/181_834083,00050001.htm
The United States has accused Iran of razing nuclear sites to hide banned nuclear activity.
"It's deplorable but not surprising that Iran's deception has gone to the extent of bulldozing entire sites to prevent the IAEA from discovering evidence of its nuclear weapons programme," said State Department spokesman Richard Boucher.
"I can't give you any independent information, but commercial satellite photography shows the complete dismantling and the razing of a facility at Lavizan Shiyan.
"And that's a site that was previously disclosed as a possible Iranian weapons of mass destruction-related site," he said.
During a press conference, Boucher was asked about an ABC News report saying that Iran had torn down buildings at an industrial complex in Lavizan Shiyan, a Teheran suburb.
ABC television said the IAEA had recently received information that the site had been hidden.
The network, which did not cite sources, published two photographs, apparently of the site, taken by commercial satellites about 12 months ago and in March 2004, showing the buildings were gone and the top soil replaced.
The ABC report also said that in May 2003, the National Council of the Resistance of Iran, an Iranian opposition group, said the government had built a bacterial weapons plant at Lavizan Shiyan.
Although the United States believes the group has links with terrorism, it has in the past used the group's information on banned weapons.
----
Iran Assailed for Lack of Cooperation on Nuclear Program
June 18, 2004
By MARK LANDLER
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/international/middleeast/18CND-NUKE.html
VIENNA, June 18 - Adding another black mark to its ledger of complaints about Iran, the International Atomic Energy Agency passed a resolution today sharply criticizing the Iranian government for its lack of cooperation in disclosing the details of its nuclear program.
The resolution, sponsored by Britain, France and Germany, accuses Iran of not leveling about where it obtained blueprints and parts for advanced centrifuges, which can produce weapons-grade uranium.
It says Iran has not explained how several sites in the country were contaminated with highly enriched uranium. And it has hampered the efforts of inspectors to explore these suspicious facilities.
The resolution is the latest chapter in Iran's nearly two-year confrontation with the agency. The frustration is beginning to show on the agency's board, which adopted the measure unanimously after Iran's usual defenders, including Russia and China, distanced themselves from Tehran.
The director of the agency, Mohamed ElBaradei, said the statement "calls in very explicit terms on Iran to accelerate its cooperation." He said it must clear up the lingering questions within "the next few months."
Iran defiantly rejected the pressure. A senior Iranian diplomat, Amir Zamaninia, warned that Tehran would instead reconsider "voluntary confidence-building measures," which include a pledge to suspend the enrichment of uranium, a preliminary step in producing a nuclear device.
Iran's chief delegate here, Hossein Mousavian, was more conciliatory, however, declaring that his government would continue to work with the agency and would abide by its existing agreements.
The United States welcomed the resolution, while leaving little doubt that it would have preferred a stiffer response. The American ambassador to the agency, Kenneth C. Brill, asked the board to consider whether more urgent steps were needed to compel Iran to cooperate.
"The passage of time is not a neutral factor in proliferation cases," Mr. Brill said in a statement to the board.
The United States lobbied unsuccessfully for the resolution to include a deadline by which Iran must show a more compliant attitude. Mr. Brill said Washington still believed the matter should be referred to the United Nations Security Council, where Iran could face sanctions.
The next step in the showdown could come soon, as the agency looks into reports that Iran may have conducted nuclear activity at an undeclared site next to a military facility near Tehran. Commercial satellite images indicate that Iran razed buildings and removed topsoil from the area.
With environmental sampling, officials close to the agency said, it would not be hard to determine whether nuclear activity had occurred there. Iranian officials dismissed the report as "100 percent false," and said the agency was welcome to inspect the site, known as Lavizan Shivan.
The United States, however, seized on the report to buttress its case that Iran is determined to conceal its activity. "Iran's instruments of choice may be the wrecking ball and the bulldozer," Mr. Brill said.
--------
IAEA Rebukes Iran Over Nuclear Cover-Ups
By GEORGE JAHN
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 5:09 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52858-2004Jun18?language=printer
VIENNA, Austria - The International Atomic Energy Agency rebuked Iran Friday for past cover-ups in its nuclear program and warned the Islamic republic it has little time left to disprove it has a nuclear weapons program.
The resolution, adopted unanimously by the IAEA's 35-member board of governors, doesn't impose a deadline or directly threaten sanctions. But its harsh wording amounted to substantial pressure on Iran to clear up suspicions about a nuclear program that was covert for nearly 20 years until discovered two years ago.
U.S. Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton welcomed the tough text and said it will hinder Iran's efforts to "deceive and obstruct" agency inspectors.
Bristling at the tone, Iran threatened retaliation, suggesting it could reconsider its plans to suspend uranium enrichment - the process that can make both energy or nuclear warheads.
The final document - submitted by Germany, France and Britain after days of diplomatic maneuvering over the wording - said the IAEA "deplores" that "Iran's cooperation has not been as full, timely and proactive as it should have been."
It said that since Iran's undeclared program came to light two years ago, "a number of questions remain outstanding."
The resolution also noted that "with the passage of time," Iran's cooperation with the IAEA probe was becoming more important.
A U.S. official suggested that phrase could help Washington impose a deadline for Tehran, setting the stage for U.N. Security Council involvement at the next scheduled meeting in September.
"This new element of time being short certainly moves the ball forward," the official said on condition of anonymity.
Washington, which believes Iran is pursuing a secret nuclear weapons program, wants the IAEA to declare the country in breach of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and refer the case to the Security Council, which may impose sanctions.
Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful energy purposes, not geared toward making bombs.
The resolution does not set a deadline, but it does state that Iran must answer open questions "within the next few months."
IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei also told reporters the board "expects these (outstanding) issues to come to a close in the next few months."
The resolution also urged Iran to give up on plans to start a uranium conversion facility and build a heavy water reactor, both of which have possible weapons applications.
In Washington, State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said the administration welcomed the resolution.
"It maintains strong pressure on Iran to comply with its non- proliferation treaty safeguards obligations and to cooperate fully with the IAEA," he said.
In veiled criticism of the United States, Iranian delegate Amir Zamaninia told the meeting the tone of the resolution was influenced by "wild and illusionary allegations of a secret Iranian nuclear weapons program."
He warned his country was reviewing its "voluntary confidence-building measures," an indication that Iran might rethink the suspension of its uranium enrichment activities.
The increased pressure on Iran coincided with new evidence that it might still be hiding nuclear activities. Diplomats say the IAEA is looking into accusations that Iran was razing parts of a restricted area next to a military complex in a Tehran suburb.
Satellite photos showed several buildings had been destroyed and topsoil had been removed at Lavizan Shiyan, one diplomat said on condition of anonymity. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said in Washington that commercial satellite photography showed the complete dismantling and the razing of a facility on the site, previously thought to be a possible location for weapons of mass destruction.
Iranian delegate Hossein Mousavian denied a cover-up and told The Associated Press the IAEA was free to see the site. "There is nothing there," he said.
ElBaradei said his agency would "like to ... clarify" the suspicions and he hoped inspectors could go to the site and report their findings to the board in September.
U.S. delegate Kenneth Brill accused Iran of taking "the wrecking ball and bulldozer" to the site "to deal with some particularly incriminating facts."
He said the resolution put the board "on record as rejecting Iran's continuing tactics of delay, denial and deception."
Most of the still-unanswered questions in Iran focus on the source of traces of highly enriched uranium found at several sites and the extent and nature of work on the advanced P-2 centrifuge, used to enrich uranium. Iran has acknowledged working with the P-2, but said its activities were purely experimental.
Tehran says the minute amounts of enriched uranium were from equipment bought on the nuclear black market.
On Friday, ElBaradei said one sample, enriched to 36 percent, - not yet weapons-grade but higher than needed for energy generation - did not appear to come from abroad, suggesting Tehran had enriched it domestically.
The report also said Iran inquired about buying thousands of such magnets on the black market - substantially more than Tehran needed for what it said was a research program. ElBaradei has said Iran expressed interest in 100,000 magnets.
On the Net:
International Atomic Energy Agency,http://www.iaea.org
-------- japan
Former PM Says Japan Considered Going Nuclear
Reuters
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51523-2004Jun18.html
TOKYO (Reuters) - Former Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone once ordered defense officials to look into developing a nuclear capability for Japan, the only nation to be attacked with an atomic bomb, Kyodo news agency said Friday.
Japan has long adhered to three principles banning the possession, production and import of nuclear arms, and any hint at abandoning those -- or even merely discussing them -- has long spelled trouble for politicians.
Nakasone, prime minister from 1982 to 1987, was quoted as saying in his memoirs due out next week that as defense minister in 1970 he had asked military experts to investigate the cost and time needed for Japan to develop and deploy nuclear weapons.
The report gave no reason for his request.
The experts estimated Japan could attain a nuclear capability in five years at a cost of 200 billion yen, but that it would be impossible for Japan to develop nuclear weapons without a testing ground, Nakasone was quoted by Kyodo as saying.
"I have always opposed (Japan having) nuclear weapons," said Nakasone, long known for his hawkish views.
"However, the talk would be completely different if the United States removed its nuclear umbrella," he said. "Japan would have to consider many possibilities, including nuclear weapons."
Nakasone, a former lieutenant in the Imperial Navy and a member of parliament until last year, is among politicians who believe Japan should build up its military and alter its pacifist constitution to give the army a bigger role in defending the country and in regional security.
The taboo on discussing nuclear weapons has eased slightly in Japan after the outbreak of a crisis involving North Korean's nuclear ambitions in late 2002, and some countries believe Japan could be swift to follow if Pyongyang declared a nuclear capability.
But Yasuo Fukuda, who was Chief Cabinet Secretary until he was forced to quit last month, set off a furor two years ago when he told reporters that Japan might review the ban on nuclear arms.
In 1999, parliamentary Vice Defense Minister Shingo Nishimura resigned after suggesting parliament should debate nuclear arms.
--------
N-reprocessing seen key to energy policy
Masae Honma, C Takeshi Kurihara and Toshinao Ishii
June 18, 2004
Yomiuri Shinbun
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/newse/20040619wo31.htm
The tests operations approved Thursday at Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd.'s nuclear fuel-reprocessing plant in Rokkashomura, Aomori Prefecture, are a giant step toward securing a stable supply of energy for the country, but there are many hurdles still to be overcome. For one thing, the cost of running the nuclear fuel-reprocessing plant remains enormous. In addition, a way has to be found to reduce the nation's stocks of dangerous plutonium.
With debate heating up over whether nuclear fuel reprocessing should be carried out, Rokkashomura residents view the forthcoming tests with a mixture of expectation and anxiety.
Full-scale test operations at the facility will use real radioactive waste. The tests are crucial for Japan's nuclear power policy, since any failure would mean the plant could not open in 2006 as scheduled.
With a lack of conventional energy resources, Japan has sought to establish a nuclear fuel cycle. This would involve reprocessing plutonium extracted from spent nuclear fuel to produce fresh nuclear fuel.
After a series of problems, the plan is on the brink of falling apart, however.
The Monju fast-breeder reactor, which would have consumed a large amount of plutonium, was shut down after a leak of sodium coolant occurred in 1995.
Four years later, the implementation of the pluthermal plan, under which plutonium-uranium mixed oxide fuel (MOX) was to be used in conventional nuclear reactors, was suspended when British Nuclear Fuels Ltd. was found to have falsified data on MOX fuel. Implementation of the plan was subsequently postponed to 2007.
As a result, stocks of spent nuclear fuel at nuclear power plants have been increasing.
Meanwhile, the lifetime cost of running and later decommissioning the fuel reprocessing plant was revealed to be about 19 trillion yen, giving fresh ammunition to those pressing the government to abandon reprocessing.
Even government officials are divided over whether the project should be given the green light.
A senior official of the Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry said that, under the current circumstances, a review of the nuclear fuel cycle would be inevitable if terrorists attacked the reprocessing plant or if there was an accident.
After more than 400 technical problems, including a pipe leak, other countries are watching to see whether the test will succeed.
On the other hand, while the reprocessing plant involves some risk, it could bring investment and jobs to Rokkashomura.
The prefectural government has to conclude a safety agreement with Japan Nuclear Fuel before the test begins. As a precondition for concluding the agreement, Aomori Gov. Shingo Mimura plans to seek assurance from the central government that it will not alter existing plans for the nuclear fuel cycle. Mimura plans to make his appeal after the cabinet reshuffle that is expected to follow the July 11 election.
The experience of the Mutsu Ogawara Kaihatsu development project taught prefectural politicians to be wary of changes of heart in Tokyo.
To be funded by national and local governments, as well as the private sector, the 5,200-hectare development project was to create a massive new industrial park. The 1965 project has languished following prolonged wrangling, however.
Against this backdrop, the prefecture accepted the construction of the nuclear fuel reprocessing facility. The prefectural government is expected to rake in about 11.7 billion yen in fiscal 2004 in nuclear fuel taxes from the reprocessing plant and other related facilities. That is about 10 percent of the prefectural government's tax revenues.
The local business sector hopes the plant will go into operation as early as possible since its operations are expected to create business opportunities.
But many citizens in the prefecture are concerned about the nuclearization of northern Honshu.
A prefectural assembly member said he could not accept the government's policy of imposing unwanted facilities on depopulated areas. But Yosaku Fuji, the head of the Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan, said that in the long run, the reprocessing plant would contribute to the nation's limited resources. The plant can also reprocess spent nuclear fuel produced by nuclear power plants, stocks of which have been accumulating in the absence of any reprocessing plant.
As of the end of March, 11,110 tons of spent nuclear fuel was stored at 52 nuclear power plants across the country. Tokyo Electric Power Co. and Kansai Electric Power Co. have already transported 888 tons of such fuel to the Rokkashomura plant.
If the nuclear fuel cycle is suspended, the spent nuclear fuel will have to be moved out of the plant in line with a memorandum drawn up by Rokkashomura and Japan Nuclear Fuel.
The storage facilities at TEPCO's Fukushima No. 2 nuclear power plant and other facilities that supply electricity to the metropolitan area will be full in two years if they are not allowed to transport spent nuclear fuel to other locations.
That would force TEPCO to suspend operation of its nuclear power plants.
But the estimated 19 trillion yen cost of the reprocessing plant over its expected 40 years of operation and the additional 40 years it will take to decommission it remains a huge problem. The general energy research council, an advisory panel to the METI minister, is studying ways to help shoulder such a cost, which equates to about 105 yen per household, per month.
-------- missile defense
'Realistic' Missile Tests Ordered
Senate Also Votes to Increase Army Troop Levels Permanently
By Helen Dewar
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50525-2004Jun17.html
The Senate ordered "realistic" tests of the Bush administration's proposed missile defense system yesterday but balked at Democratic proposals to delay deployment until the tests are conducted and to require an evaluation by an independent testing office.
The Senate also voted, 93 to 4, to increase permanently the authorized size of the Army by 20,000 troops, to 502,400. The administration has temporarily expanded Army troop levels to more than 495,000 but opposes a permanent increase. The House voted earlier to expand the Army by 30,000 and the Marines by 9,000 over three years.
The missile defense votes amounted to a go-ahead for initial deployment of the first nine ground-based missile interceptors in Alaska and California later this year and signaled likely congressional support for about $10 million for the program in next year's defense budget.
Democrats, arguing that the planned national shield may not be effective in shooting down incoming missiles, wanted to require tests of the system's operation under realistic conditions, with the results to be evaluated by the Pentagon's chief of testing, Thomas Christie, whom they regard as independent from political pressures.
A proposal by Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) would have had Christie's office oversee the testing and its evaluation. Reed's proposal would have required testing without specifying whether it should be conducted before or after deployment.
Under an alternative proposed by Armed Services Committee Chairman John W. Warner (R-Va.) and approved by a largely party-line vote of 55 to 44, "operationally realistic" tests will have to be conducted by October 2005, but with the evaluation to be made by the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency.
Republicans argue that the system is needed to shield the country in case of a ballistic missile attack by North Korea, Iran or terrorist groups and could serve as a deterrent to attacks. But Democrats cautioned that a flawed system would be dangerous and wasteful. "You don't deter something with a system that may not work," said Sen. Carl M. Levin (Mich.), ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee.
A report two months ago by the General Accounting Office, Congress's investigative agency, said the system was "largely unproven" and called for more realistic testing.
Earlier in the day, the Senate, voting 57 to 42, rejected a proposal by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) to require operational testing before the system is deployed.
Warner's testing provision was included in the $447 billion defense authorization bill for next year that the Senate hopes to complete early next week.
--------
Senators vote to boost missile defense
June 18, 2004
By Brian DeBose
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040617-114927-1257r.htm
Senate Republicans yesterday ensured that the nation's efforts to improve missile defense will continue to be a priority.
The Senate passed several amendments yesterday to the $447 billion fiscal 2005 Defense Department spending authorization bill with little fanfare. With the exception of one assault attempt on the Bush tax cuts, most of the debate centered on how the country would move forward in conducting tests for missile-defense systems, beefing up the size of the military and increasing military benefits.
A final vote on the defense bill is expected Wednesday.
An amendment by Sen. John W. Warner, Virginia Republican, requires the secretary of defense to develop criteria for real-life operational missile tests by Feb. 1, with the testing to begin no later than Oct. 1, 2005. The amendment also calls for the Pentagon to deliver a base price for the program to Congress.
"Mr. Warner is removing the customary way we test defense through independent testers. He wants the secretary of defense and the Pentagon to conduct and review the test," said Sen. Jack Reed, Rhode Island Democrat, whose amendment was replaced by Mr. Warner's.
The Warner amendment says the Pentagon will be responsible for conducting and reviewing operational tests on its own missile defense without an independent analysis.
"I don't think we can make this timeline ... we don't want to curtail missile defense; we just want independent evaluation," Mr. Reed said.
But Mr. Reed was able to persuade senators in a 93-4 vote to boost the number of troops from 482,400 to 502,400 by the end of 2005, contrary to Bush administration requests. Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska co-sponsored the legislation.
Sen. Jeff Sessions, Alabama Republican, however, objected, saying there must be an increase in funding for training, housing and technology in order to beef up troop strength. He said the Air Force has 17,000 more pilots than it needs who could transfer to other branches where necessary.
"The problems we've been having in Iraq are a direct result of not having enough boots on the ground after the end of formal combat," Mr. McCain said, objecting to Mr. Sessions' comments. "The dirty little secret as to why the civilian administration over the military was so reluctant to deploy more troops is because we didn't have them."
Mr. Sessions, however, was victorious, by voice vote, in getting his amendment to have the federal government pay military life insurance to match any soldier's private insurance up to $100,000 in the event of the soldier's death.
"I can't say how strongly I believe that we should do right by our soldiers," Mr. Sessions said.
Two Democratic amendments were dismissed by the majority.
An amendment to curtail deployment of a new missile defense until it can pass real-life tests was introduced by Sen. Barbara Boxer of California. It was defeated 57-42, with five Democrats voting against it.
Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware failed to convince Republicans that his amendment to increase the top line of the Bush tax cuts for five years going to the top 1 percent of the wealthiest Americans from 35 percent to 36 percent was necessary to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
-------- terrorism
Experts: Radiological Weapon Attack 'All But Certain'
'Dirty Bombs' Appeal To Terrorists Since They're Tough To Track
June 18, 2004
Associated Press
http://www.thebostonchannel.com/news/3435813/detail.html
Terrorists are "all but certain" to set off a radiological weapon in the United States, since it will take authorities too many years to track and secure the radioactive materials of such "dirty bombs," a team of nuclear researchers has concluded.
The U.S. and other key governments took an important step on controls this month, agreeing at the G8 summit to tighten -- by the end of 2005 -- restraints on international trade in highly radioactive materials.
But thousands, possibly tens of thousands, of high-risk radioactive sources are already in use worldwide, with few accurate registries for tracing them, the scientists say. They cite Iraq, where an undetermined number of such sources have gone missing in the postwar chaos.
The findings are being published in a 300-page book, "The Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism," the result of a two-year study by the authoritative Center for Nonproliferation Studies, or CNS, of California's Monterey Institute of International Studies.
The team also examined the potential for terrorists to steal or build an actual nuclear weapon, but found that less likely than the construction of a radiological dispersal device, or dirty bomb.
Unlike warheads designed to kill and destroy through a huge nuclear blast and heat, these radiation weapons -- which thus far no one has employed -- would rely on conventional explosives to blow radioactive material far and wide. A successful bomb could make a section of a city uninhabitable for years.
The fear of such weapons grew in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States. Al-Qaida and Russia's Chechen rebels have shown an interest in highly radioactive material.
Misunderstandings persist about the threat. This month, for example, the Justice Department said al-Qaida-linked detainee Jose Padilla planned to wrap explosives in uranium to make a dirty bomb. But uranium would add nothing; it has minimal radioactivity. Instead, specialists who study the threat focus on isotopes with millions of times more radioactivity than uranium -- such as cesium-137, cobalt-60 and iridium-192. These nuclear reactor byproducts have uses ranging from radiation treatment of cancer, to sterilizing food and medical equipment, to gauging thicknesses.
The CNS study notes steps taken by the U.S. government, including:
- An order quietly sent to operators of sterilizing irradiators last year, instructing them to strengthen security against theft and attack. These large, powerful devices hold immense amounts of lethal radioisotopes.
- Research to develop a substitute for cesium chloride, a talc-like powder that could spread deadly radioactivity widely and insidiously in a blast. Experts consider it the most worrisome material in use.
- Approval of sale of Prussian blue, a drug that counteracts ingested cesium. The U.S. military is "fast-tracking" research into drugs to treat a broader array of radioactive poisons.
The United States alone has an estimated 2 million licensed radioactive sources, thousands of them high-risk materials, the CNS reports. Because of disjointed licensing by federal and state agencies, no complete registry exists. Transfers are not always noted, and sources go astray.
The Energy Department says it has already collected and secured 7,500 "disused" sources, and expects to handle thousands more in the next few years.
The CNS researchers highlighted a major loophole in radioactive commerce: U.S. and other exporters can ship high-risk sources abroad without a government review of the end user, including to such turmoil-ridden lands as Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Colombia.
Commercial rivalries have slowed moves to close that loophole, the study says. At the recent summit, however, the United States and seven other major industrial nations agreed to seek "effective controls" on end users before 2006.
Physicist Charles Ferguson, a lead author of the CNS book, was cautious in praising the G8 move. "The devil is in the details," he said in an interview. "The bureaucracies will have to stay on top of this to get it done."
In many "end user" countries, the domestic regulation of radiological sources is "fragmentary" at best, the study says.
"So many potent radioactive sources are now used in medicine, industry, and research around the world, and so many have fallen outside regulatory control, that it will be many years, if ever, before secure custody of these items can be achieved," it concludes.
As a result, it says, "a radiological attack appears to be all but certain within the coming years."
--------
Experts Say 'Dirty Bomb' Attack Likely
By CHARLES J. HANLEY
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53730-2004Jun18.html
Terrorists are "all but certain" to set off a radiological weapon in the United States, since it will take authorities too many years to track and secure the radioactive materials of such "dirty bombs," a team of nuclear researchers has concluded.
The U.S. and other key governments took an important step on controls this month, agreeing at the G-8 summit to tighten - by the end of 2005 - restraints on international trade in highly radioactive materials.
But thousands, possibly tens of thousands, of high-risk radioactive sources are already in use worldwide, with few accurate registries for tracing them, the scientists say. They cite Iraq, where an undetermined number of such sources have gone missing in the postwar chaos.
The findings are being published in a 300-page book, "The Four Faces of Nuclear Terrorism," the result of a two-year study by the authoritative Center for Nonproliferation Studies, or CNS, of California's Monterey Institute of International Studies.
The team also examined the potential for terrorists to steal or build an actual nuclear weapon, but found that less likely than the construction of a radiological dispersal device, or dirty bomb.
Unlike warheads designed to kill and destroy through a huge nuclear blast and heat, these radiation weapons - which thus far no one has employed - would rely on conventional explosives to blow radioactive material far and wide. A successful bomb could make a section of a city uninhabitable for years.
The fear of such weapons grew in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States. Al-Qaida and Russia's Chechen rebels have shown an interest in highly radioactive material.
Misunderstandings persist about the threat. This month, for example, the Justice Department said al-Qaida-linked detainee Jose Padilla planned to wrap explosives in uranium to make a dirty bomb. But uranium would add nothing; it has minimal radioactivity.
Instead, specialists who study the threat focus on isotopes with millions of times more radioactivity than uranium - such as cesium-137, cobalt-60 and iridium-192. These nuclear reactor byproducts have uses ranging from radiation treatment of cancer, to sterilizing food and medical equipment, to gauging thicknesses.
The CNS study notes steps taken by the U.S. government, including:
- An order quietly sent to operators of sterilizing irradiators last year, instructing them to strengthen security against theft and attack. These large, powerful devices hold immense amounts of lethal radioisotopes.
- Research to develop a substitute for cesium chloride, a talc-like powder that could spread deadly radioactivity widely and insidiously in a blast. Experts consider it the most worrisome material in use.
- Approval of sale of Prussian blue, a drug that counteracts ingested cesium. The U.S. military is "fast-tracking" research into drugs to treat a broader array of radioactive poisons.
The United States alone has an estimated 2 million licensed radioactive sources, thousands of them high-risk materials, the CNS reports. Because of disjointed licensing by federal and state agencies, no complete registry exists. Transfers are not always noted, and sources go astray.
The Energy Department says it has already collected and secured 7,500 "disused" sources, and expects to handle thousands more in the next few years.
The CNS researchers highlighted a major loophole in radioactive commerce: U.S. and other exporters can ship high-risk sources abroad without a government review of the end user, including to such turmoil-ridden lands as Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Colombia.
Commercial rivalries have slowed moves to close that loophole, the study says. At the recent summit, however, the United States and seven other major industrial nations agreed to seek "effective controls" on end users before 2006.
Physicist Charles Ferguson, a lead author of the CNS book, was cautious in praising the G-8 move. "The devil is in the details," he said in an interview. "The bureaucracies will have to stay on top of this to get it done."
In many "end user" countries, the domestic regulation of radiological sources is "fragmentary" at best, the study says.
"So many potent radioactive sources are now used in medicine, industry, and research around the world, and so many have fallen outside regulatory control, that it will be many years, if ever, before secure custody of these items can be achieved," it concludes.
As a result, it says, "a radiological attack appears to be all but certain within the coming years."
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
-------- idaho
Senators - Bill assures Idaho cleanup ...
But Kempthorne, others say South Carolina measure undermines public confidence
Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.magicvalley.com/news/localstate/index.asp?StoryID=10425
BOISE -- Idaho's two Republican senators say they have left no doubt that highly radioactive liquid waste must be completely removed from a nuclear facility in eastern Idaho.
But Gov. Dirk Kempthorne remained concerned the Senate's support of an Energy Department plan to reclassify similar waste in South Carolina as "incidental," which permits its on-site burial, would allow for the same reclassification in Idaho.
Against Kempthorne's recommendation, U.S. Sens. Larry Craig and Michael Crapo voted earlier this month for the South Carolina plan. They say it will not affect radioactive cleanup at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, and this week inserted a provision in the legislation specifically stating that it cannot be buried on site at the Idaho Falls facility.
"The language that the Senate passed two weeks ago regarding the South Carolina cleanup did not affect Idaho, but now we have made it that much more visible and obvious by stating that flat out," Craig said. "If people are still claiming doubt and confusion about Idaho's tanks being implicated here, at this point, I don't know what would satisfy them."
However, Kempthorne still has concerns about waste reclassification, said his spokesman, Michael Journee.
"The governor hasn't changed his position at all," Journee said.
Kempthorne still worries that the South Carolina plan undermines public confidence by reinforcing fear that the government wants to walk away from its nuclear waste cleanup responsibilities, Journee said. Kempthorne favors a House version of the bill that does not endorse the South Carolina plan.
Assurances for lawmakers
Meanwhile, the head of the Energy Department's cleanup program told lawmakers Thursday that the agency is committed to removing 99 percent of the nuclear waste in underground tanks at INEEL and other sites, and anything less is "off the table."
Assistant Energy Secretary Jessie Roberson told a Senate hearing in the nation's capital that she saw no chance that as much as 10 percent of the waste might be kept in the tanks -- even if the department is allowed to keep residual sludge at the bottom of the buried containers.
The assurance came as Roberson was pressed by senators about the cleanup of highly radioactive waste left over from decades of plutonium production for nuclear weapons at INEEL, the Energy Department's Hanford nuclear reservation in Washington state and in South Carolina.
Eleven tanks at the INEEL hold 900,000 gallons of liquid waste from the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel. Should the tanks leak, they could threaten the regional aquifer below that supplies water to much of southern Idaho and feeds the Snake River. Cleaning them up is a state priority.
A federal judge last year ordered the nuclear waste, or sludge, could not be reclassified, must be removed and eventually stored at the proposed permanent waste dump in Nevada. After that decision, $90 million earmarked for cleanup at the INEEL was withheld.
While Crapo and Craig bucked Kempthorne on the sludge, they convinced the Senate to order the Energy Department to release that cash as the governor wanted.
That was something the House had not done until this week when the House Appropriations Committee approved a similar directive for the money to be released.
That, combined with an extra $50 million for research and other activities at INEEL, demonstrates "a genuine support for the future" of the Idaho site, U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson said.
In light of the federal judge's ruling last year, the Energy Department has been trying to convince Congress to reclassify the residual sludge as having a "low level" of radioactivity. That would allow the department to mix the sludge with a cement-like grout and not remove it.
Roberson, who is leaving her job next month for personal reasons, sought to allay some of the states' concerns at Thursday's hearing before the Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., told Roberson he had been informed that the department was considering leaving as much as 10 percent of the waste and "dangerously high" levels of radiation in the Hanford tanks.
Unless the state agrees to something different, Roberson said, "99 percent is what we're living by ... I don't see any chance that we're going to go to (disposing only) 90 percent."
Wyden said he was encouraged but not totally satisfied by the assurance and asked for it in writing. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., also wanted a guarantee that the Energy Department would stick to the 1 percent.
"That is our commitment," Roberson said.
Not convinced
Some environmentalists, when asked to respond to Roberson's assurances, questioned the significance.
"One percent of what?" said Tom Cochran, a nuclear waste expert at the Natural Resources Defense Council. He argued that a small amount of waste volume left in the tanks could have a large percentage of the radioactive intensity in a tank.
Geoff Fettus, an NRDC lawyer who brought the successful lawsuit challenging the Energy Department's attempt to reclassify tank waste without congressional action, said "what they plan to leave behind in the tanks has been a moving target." In court papers the department said it would remove "as much as economically and technically feasible," said Fettus.
On a related issue, Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., told Roberson that, should residual radioactive sludge be allowed to be kept in the tanks, he was concerned that the Energy Department -- and not the Nuclear Regulatory Commission -- would determine whether the grout-sludge mixture met NRC criteria to leave it behind.
"I would feel much more comfortable if the NRC made the decision on whether its own criteria had been met," Bingaman said.
Roberson said she was confident waste left in the tanks would have a low enough radioactive intensity to classify it as low-level once mixed with the grout. "We believe we are not leaving high-level waste in the tanks," she insisted.
-------- new jersey
TCE plume located
Friday, June 18, 2004
By SUSAN T. GAZZARA,
New Jersey Times
http://www.nj.com/news/times/index.ssf?/base/news-1/108754604415840.xml
PLUMSTED - A saturated layer of peat some 50 feet underground is the source of a plume of chemical contamination emerging from the long-closed BOMARC missile site off Route 539, according to Air Force environmental engineers.
Engineer John Pohl said at a meeting of the McGuire Air Force Base Restoration Advisory Board that a plume of trichloroethylene (TCE) - discovered 17 years ago during evaluation work at the Boeing Michigan Aeronautical Research Center facility - is coming from the layer of peat at the eastern edge of the BOMARC compound.
The BOMARC site is located on 75 acres of the Fort Dix military reservation. While the Army owns the land, the site has been leased by the Air Force since the BOMARC facility opened.
The contaminated plume is spreading off Fort Dix property and into the adjacent Colliers Mills Wildlife Refuge, Pohl said. The plume eventually discharges into the Success Branch stream inside the wildlife refuge, officials have said.
TCE is a nonflammable, colorless liquid, used mainly as a solvent to remove grease from metal parts. It also is an ingredient in adhesives, paint removers, typewriter correction fluids and spot removers.
Air Force officials have said the chemical plume currently poses no danger to area drinking water because it is limited to the shallow aquifer and confined to an area without residential development.
A fire at the BOMARC facility more than 40 years ago destroyed a missile equipped with a nuclear warhead, resulting in a release of plutonium over a 7-acre section of the missile base.
Work on excavating contaminated soil from the site ended last month with the final shipment of debris to a disposal site in Utah.
Pohl said field research indicates TCE was used well over 30 years ago to clean up hydraulic fluid within the missile shelters and was then dispersed into drainage culverts to the east of the BOMARC facility.
The peat layer has served as a sponge, Pohl said, absorbing the TCE and holding it until penetrated by water from the Cohansey-Kirkwood Aquifer.
"We have found the bulls-eye to our target," Pohl said. As the water moves through the peat zone, it carries the contaminant along with it. "A chlorinated compound like that can go for miles," Pohl said.
Peat is a mixture of decomposed plant material that builds up in a water-saturated environment and in the absence of oxygen.
Pohl said contamination levels in groundwater samples from the area were significantly higher than allowable state and federal limits. He said Air Force environmental specialists want to see the project under way. "We have a contaminant moving off Air Force property, so I would rate this as a high priority," he said.
Pohl said one cleanup approach under strong consideration is blocking escape of the TCE through the use of steel sheets driven down about 100 feet to the base of the shallow aquifer. The sheets would surround two distinct TCE hot spots.
"Once we have the sheets in we should have the contamination sitting inside, closed off," Pohl said.
Officials said the approach would block off the source and allow TCE levels outside the sheeting section to drop. "This would be a triage," Pohl said.
He said contractors could either pump out and treat the contaminated water or use a chemical treatment to oxidize it.
Pohl said Air Force officials will meet next month with representatives of the state Department of Environmental Protection, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Pinelands to present a final plan.
If project "stakeholders" approve the approach, it will go to headquarters for review and approval, Pohl said. The next step would be applying to Congress for the money to pay for it.
According to information on a toxic substances Web site, drinking large amounts of TCE may cause nausea, liver damage, unconsciousness, impaired heart function or death.
Drinking small amounts of TCE for long periods may cause liver and kidney damage, impaired immune system function and impaired fetal development in pregnant women, though the extent of some of these effects is not yet clear, according to the site.
-------- vermont
Vermont Nuke Plant Shuts Down After Fire
By DAVID GRAM
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 7:06 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53151-2004Jun18.html
MONTPELIER, Vt. - The Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant was shut down Friday after a transformer caught fire in a non-nuclear part of the plant, officials said. The fire was put out, and no radiation was released, they said.
The operators declared an "unusual event," the lowest of four emergency classifications set by the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The nuclear reactor was automatically shut down as soon as the fire was detected, plant spokesman Rob Williams said. The cause of the blaze had not been determined.
"Since the fire lasted longer than several minutes, by procedure we declared an unusual event," Williams said.
Ten to 20 gallons of oil from the transformer flowed into the Connecticut River through a storm drain, Williams said. A clean-up crew was called in to contain the spill.
The transformer is used to step up the voltage of the electricity generated at the plant so it can be transmitted more efficiently. Officials did not know how badly it was damaged, and Williams said he could not estimate when the plant might be back on line again.
Williams said the transformer was installed less than two years ago.
An anti-nuclear group, the New England Coalition, quoted what it said was a witness account that the transformer exploded before burning. Williams said he could not confirm the report.
As part of the plant's emergency procedure, officials in Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts were notified. The plant is in Vernon, at Vermont's southeast tip near the other two states.
Vermont's lone nuclear plant, which began operations in 1972, is seeking permission from regulators to boost its power output.
In April, about 20 cracks were discovered in the plant's steam dryer, a component that has been prone to cracking at other plants that have increased their output.
Also that month, two fuel rod segments were discovered missing from the plant's spent fuel storage pool. Officials believe they were most likely shipped to a disposal facility.
-------- washington
Hanford workers begin new phase of clean up
By SHANNON DININNY,
Associated Press Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.taftmidwaydriller.com/articles/2004/06/18/news/features/feat03.txt
RICHLAND, Wash. - Workers at the Hanford nuclear reservation have begun a new phase of cleaning up along the Columbia River corridor: digging up solid waste near two dormant nuclear reactors.
The chore represents the last major hurdle for soil cleanup near Hanford's B and C reactors. When completed, the B and C areas will be the first reactor sites where cleanup will be finished along the river.
But unearthing nuclear junk comes with its share of surprises. Already, there have been times workers were left scratching their heads wondering what exactly they had dug up, said a laughing Rex Miller, onsite manager for Bechtel Hanford, the contractor responsible for tearing down and cocooning Hanford's reactors and cleaning up the grounds nearby.
"You have to dig as if you expect a surprise with every bucketful," Miller said. "Every bucketful is kind of an adventure."
Both reactors at the south-central Washington nuclear reservation were closed in the late 1960s after more than two decades of producing plutonium for the nation's nuclear weapons arsenal. Over the years, reactor workers buried nuclear junk and garbage, some of which could still be radioactive or contaminated by chemicals.
Liquid waste at the two reactor sites already has been removed. Removing the solid waste _ which can include everything from old files to rusty reactor parts to telephone poles and wires _ then backfilling and replanting the areas is scheduled to be completed by December 2006. Work already is ahead of schedule.
Final decisions on handling groundwater contamination in the river corridor and the future of the cocooned reactors still lie ahead.
There are about 22 waste sites to be cleaned up at the B and C reactors alone, and at least a half-dozen are expected to contain solid waste. They range in size from a few feet to larger than a football field.
More than 1 million cubic feet of material is expected to be dug up at the burial grounds. About 35 containers weighing 18 tons each are hauled away each day.
Monitors check for chemical or radiological contamination. After repeated sorting, most of the waste is hauled to an onsite landfill. Samples are sent away for laboratory testing if questions or concerns arise about the contents of any waste.
"We have unknown contaminants buried all over the place out here. We believe we've identified most," Miller said. But, "no matter how well you manage something, you can always run into things."
Case in point: While digging into a mound of dirt last month, workers heard a hissing sound and pulled out of the area after realizing they had uncovered some type of compressed gas.
No one was injured, and safety procedures at the site worked exactly as they are supposed to, said Dennis Faulk, environmental scientist for the Environmental Protection Agency.
"They never did find what actually caused the release of gas. That was just one of the surprises they can expect to encounter as they go through these sites," Faulk said.
Digging up the burial grounds near the B and C reactors also serves as an education for what to expect at the other sites, Faulk said.
"We're kind of the trailblazers since this is the first area," he said. "And hopefully the uncertainty here will remove a lot of the guessing work for a lot of the other burial grounds."
----
Workers begin sludge removal from Hanford's K Basins
06/18/2004
By SHANNON DININNY
Associated Press
http://www.kgw.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D839O0IG0.html
Workers at the Hanford nuclear reservation have begun removing radioactive sludge from pools of spent nuclear fuel, a move widely considered a significant step forward in cleanup efforts at the contaminated site.
The indoor pools of water, known as the K East and K West basins, once held 2,300 tons of spent nuclear fuel about 400 yards from the Columbia River. More than 90 percent of the fuel has been removed.
What remains in the basins is sludge from corroded spent nuclear fuel stored in the huge water-filled basins, along with dust, dirt and sloughed material from the basin walls. Work on removing sludge began late Thursday, the Energy Department announced Friday.
"That's a major accomplishment for us. It's been difficult getting this particular evolution under way, but yesterday we were able to pump our first unit of sludge, and it's gone like clockwork and we're very proud," said Keith Klein, the Energy Department's Richland operations manager.
The Energy Department missed a legal deadline established under the 1989 Tri-Party Agreement - the legal pact governing cleanup at Hanford - to begin removing the sludge by Dec. 31, 2002. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency fined the agency $76,000 last year, but the Energy Department and regulators reached a new agreement last month.
"This is a significant risk reduction for Hanford," said Larry Gadbois, environmental scientist for the EPA. "Yes, it is very late starting, but finally we're getting done what needed to be done."
More than three-fourths of the 50 cubic meters of sludge inside the basins is located in the leak-prone K East basin.
Under the new agreement, K East basin sludge must be removed by Jan. 31, 2006, and K West basin sludge must be removed by June 30, 2006.
All fuel, debris and water will be taken out of the K East basin, and the basin itself will be removed by March 31, 2007. The other basin will be removed by spring 2009.
The previous plan called for total removal by July 2007.
But the new plan also requires that the sludge be treated before being shipped out of state to New Mexico's Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, a national waste repository. The previous plan had called for the sludge to be eventually removed from the basins and stored in containers at Hanford before being shipped offsite.
"It will be a long journey, but the first step is always the hardest and that's what we celebrate this week," said Ron Gallagher, president of Fluor Hanford, the contractor handling K Basin cleanup.
About 2,100 metric tons of spent fuel were stored in the K Basins, built in the 1950s to hold the highly radioactive fuel rods that came out of the N Reactor, which was used to make plutonium for nuclear weapons during the Cold War.
-------- us nuc waste
Energy Department pledges to remove 99 percent of nuclear waste from tanks
Friday, June 18, 2004
By H. Josef Hebert,
Associated Press
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-06-18/s_25030.asp
WASHINGTON - The Energy Department is committed to removing 99 percent of the nuclear waste in underground tanks at weapons sites, and anything less is "off the table," the head of the cleanup program told lawmakers Thursday.
Assistant Energy Secretary Jessie Roberson told a Senate hearing that she saw no chance that as much as 10 percent of the waste might be kept in the tanks even if the department is allowed to keep residual sludge at the bottom of the buried containers.
The assurance came as Roberson was pressed by senators about the cleanup of highly radioactive waste left over from decades of plutonium production for nuclear weapons at the Energy Department's Hanford complex in Washington state as well as at sites in Idaho and South Carolina.
The department would like to reclassify the residual sludge that will be left at 177 buried tanks at Hanford and in dozens of similar waste tanks at the Savannah River site in South Carolina and the INEEL facility in Idaho as having a "low level" of radioactivity.
The proposal, which would require Congress to change the nuclear waste law, has been met with concern in Washington state and Idaho, where officials argue the sludge should be buried in a special repository to be built in Nevada for high-level radioactive defense waste. The department wants to mix the sludge with a cementlike grout and not remove it.
Roberson, who is leaving her job next month for personal reasons, sought to allay some of the states' concerns at a hearing by the Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, told Roberson he had been informed that the department was considering leaving as much as 10 percent of the waste and "dangerously high" levels of radiation in the Hanford tanks.
Unless the state agrees to something different, said Roberson "99 percent is what we're living by.... I don't see any chance that we're gong to go to (disposing only) 90 percent."
Wyden said he was encouraged but not totally satisfied by the assurance and asked it in writing. And Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, also wanted a guarantee that the Energy Department would stick to the 1 percent.
"That is our commitment," said Roberson.
Some environmentalists, when asked to respond to Roberson's assurances, questioned the significance.
"One percent of what," said Tom Cochran, a nuclear waste expert at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). He argued that a small amount of waste volume left in the tanks could have a large percentage of the radioactive intensity in a tank.
Geoff Fettus, an NRDC lawyer who brought the successful lawsuit challenging DOE's attempt to reclassify tanks waste without congressional action, said "What they plan to leave behind in the tanks has been a moving target." In court papers they said they would remove "as much as economically and technically feasible," said Fettus.
On a related issue, Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-New Mexico, told Roberson that, should residual radioactive sludge be allowed to be kept in the tanks, he was concerned that the Energy Department - and not the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) would determine whether the grout-sludge mixture met NRC criteria for low-level waste.
"I would feel much more comfortable if the NRC made the decision on whether its own criteria had been met," said Bingaman..
Roberson said she was confident waste left in the tanks would have a low enough radioactive intensity to classify it as low-level once mixed with the grout. "We believe we are not leaving high-level waste in the tanks," she insisted.
The DOE announced earlier this week that Roberson was resigning as head of the cleanup program, effective July 15, after three years on the job.
Asked about the resignation Thursday, she denied her departure involved policy issues, criticism by some lawmakers of the tank cleanup plan, or the recent resignation of two other senior DOE officials involved in environmental cleanup issues.
She said "a little ruffling" at a hearing would not cause her to quit. "I leave for personal reasons, and they are unconnected to anyone else but my family."
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
10 Die As Warlords Overrun Afghan Town
By AMIR SHAH
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 12:16 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52019-2004Jun18?language=printer
KABUL, Afghanistan - Warlords overran a provincial capital in central Afghanistan, officials said Friday, forcing the governor to flee in the latest burst of infighting in this war-fractured nation.
The attack, in which 10 people were reportedly killed, highlights the challenges U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai faces in trying to extend his writ to the countryside. It also was further evidence of slipping security ahead of key elections scheduled for September.
Fighters armed with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades seized Chagcharan, the main town in remote Ghor province 350 miles west of Kabul, on Thursday, a leader of the offensive and a government official said.
Gov. Mohammed Ibrahim fled to the western city of Herat, leaving his deputy and a group of nominally loyal militiamen and police to regroup in a nearby village.
Din Mohammed Azimi, the governor's deputy, said at least 10 of his men were killed and that the remainder were preparing a counterattack.
But Ghulam Yahya, a former Ghor police chief who claimed Friday he was back in his old job, said he knew of only one fatality.
The fighting followed weeks of tension between allies of provincial military commander Ahmad Murghabi, who also was driven out, and rival tribes over positions in the local administration.
Azimi said a group led by a commander called Rais Salam launched the attack after rejecting an offer of control of four government departments, including police and intelligence.
He said a delegation from Kabul had left Chagcharan on Wednesday.
But it was unclear whose side the central government was on.
Karzai, who returned Friday from a trip to the United States, has vowed to disarm the warlords who still control most of the country more than two years after the fall of the Taliban.
But stalling by powerful regional leaders like Herat Gov. Ismail Khan and Uzbek strongman Abdul Rashid Dostum means only a few thousand of some 100,000 irregular fighters have given up their weapons so far.
Azimi said he had appealed to Defense Minister Mohammed Fahim and other officials in Kabul.
"They promised to help but nothing came. The central government is very weak, it's useless," he said, also calling for NATO and the U.S. military to send troops.
A Defense Ministry spokesman said he knew of the incident only from media reports. Other government officials could not be reached for comment.
Yahya described the battle as a "popular uprising," and said a council of tribal leaders would decide how to organize the province's affairs.
"I'm chief of police and Rais Salam has taken over the military headquarters," Yahya said.
"We're respecting and listening for the comment of the central government," he said. "The governor is a very good person."
Karzai diverted hundreds of troops from the new U.S.-trained Afghan National Army to western Herat and the northern province of Faryab earlier this year to calm fighting between warlord factions.
The United Nations said it had pulled election workers out of Chagcharan during Thursday's fighting in another setback to its attempts to register voters.
Farther south, U.N. registration teams have yet to venture into many remote areas for fear of Taliban attacks.
On Friday, gunmen attacked a United Nations refugee office in Kandahar city, sparking a shootout but causing no casualties, an official said.
The attackers fired at least two rockets at the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, causing some damage to its walls, said Khalid Pashtun, a spokesman for the governor.
Foreign reconstruction and aid agency workers have been a favorite target of insurgents.
Eleven Chinese road contractors were shot and killed in their beds in Kunduz province last week, while five aid workers, including three Europeans, were gunned down June 2 in the remote northwest.
Also Friday, two elite New Zealand troops were injured in central Afghanistan when they were fired on by militants armed with small arms and rockets.
The two soldiers were evacuated by helicopter to a U.S. base in the southern city of Kandahar for treatment, American military spokeswoman Master Sgt. Cindy Beam said. Both were in stable condition.
-------- africa
West African Nations to Create Military
By GILBERT Da COSTA
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 6:25 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53079-2004Jun18.html
ABUJA, Nigeria - West African defense chiefs agreed Friday to create a 6,500-strong multinational force to respond to "crisis and threats to peace" in the war-ravaged region.
The core of the force will be 1,500 "highly trained and equipped" rapid response troops and 3,500 backups. The remaining 1,500 soldiers will form a reserve, the Economic Community of West African States said in a statement.
Regional officials will assess capabilities and recruit troops to be on standby in their home bases, ECOWAS said.
The new force "could be deployed immediately in response to crisis or threat to peace and security in the region," ECOWAS said.
However, it was unclear when the force will come into being.
Logistics depots will be created in Mali and Sierra Leone, rebuilding after a devastating 1990s civil war.
The announcement follows a two-day meeting in the Nigerian capital involving defense chiefs of staff from 15 member nations of ECOWAS.
Officials sought the standing force to avoid delays experienced in deployment of ECOWAS and U.N. intervention troops in wars in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Ivory Coast.
Earlier this year, a new peacekeeper training center was inaugurated in Accra, Ghana, to offer programs to regional forces.
-------- asia
South Korea to Send 3,000 Troops to Iraq
By CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52176-2004Jun18.html
SEOUL, South Korea - South Korea will send 3,000 soldiers to northern Iraq beginning in early August to assist the U.S.-led coalition, the Defense Ministry said Friday. Once the deployment is complete, South Korea will be the largest coalition partner after the United States and Britain.
South Korea plans to send 900 troops to Kurdish-controlled Irbil in early August, followed by about 1,100 troops between late August and early September, Defense Ministry spokesman Nam Dai-yeon said. Another 1,000 soldiers will travel to Iraq later.
South Korea already has 600 military medics and engineers in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah. They are expected to head to northern Iraq beginning in mid-July to prepare facilities ahead of the arrival of the main force, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported.
"Our troop dispatch to Iraq is to assist the quick establishment of peace and reconstruction of Iraq, to develop the South Korea-U.S. alliance, and for our national interest, and to contribute to peace and stability in the world," Nam said.
Seoul has portrayed the deployment as a way of strengthening the alliance with the United States, thereby winning more support from Washington for a peaceful end to a long-running dispute over North Korea's nuclear weapons development.
Some South Koreans believe Washington's policy toward the North has been too aggressive and uncompromising.
The United States, which has a large troop presence in South Korea, has demanded that North Korea dismantle its nuclear programs in a verifiable, irreversible manner. It denies North Korean accusations that it plans to invade.
A round of six-nation talks on the nuclear crisis begins next week in Beijing. U.S. and North Korean officials might choose to hold a bilateral meeting at that time.
Some members of President Roh Moo-hyun's ruling Uri party had demanded that the long-delayed dispatch be reconsidered. But Roh held firm on the plan despite the uproar over the prisoner abuse scandal involving U.S. troops in Iraq, as well as the unstable security situation in many parts of the country. Irbil is in a relatively quiet area.
The National Assembly passed the troop deployment bill on Feb. 13, when the conservative Grand National Party, a staunch supporter of the planned deployment, held a majority in parliament. The plan lost some political support after the liberal Uri party won a majority in elections in April.
South Korea originally had planned to send troops to the northern Iraqi town of Kirkuk as early as April. The plan was canceled amid concerns it would involve combat operations, in violation of a parliamentary mandate for peacekeeping duties only.
In May, the United States told the South Korean government that it planned to move 3,600 troops from South Korea to Iraq this summer. Washington's broader plan to realign troops globally calls for the withdrawal of a third of its 37,500 soldiers stationed in South Korea by the end of 2005.
-------- britain
UK - UPSET AS ANTI-TERRORIST POLICE SCOUR BARNS VILLAGE
Whitehaven News,
June 18, 2004
http://www.whitehaven-news.co.uk/news/viewarticle.asp?id=107338
-OMIC police have frightened villagers at Drigg by making high-profil\]== =]=-[[[ searches to tighten up security near Sellafield.
The UKAEA constables, whose special search-and-arrest powers allow them to carry firearms, have been scouring farmers' fields, barns and other buildings near BNFL's low-level radioactive waste site.
The Constabulary fears that, as well as Sellafield, the Drigg site (which harbours the nation's low-level nuclear waste products) also has potential for a strike by terrorists. BNFL is currently engaged in a costly programme of moving plutonium contaminated waste from Drigg to Sellafield on its own rail link and this will continue for some time.
To try to allay any alarm, the Atomic Police Authority is writing to farmers and other landowners in the Drigg area to explain the need for the searches. But while people accept the need for extra vigilance after September 11, they doubt that the dump would be a target for terrorists or that the area around it could prove useful to launch an attack.
Concerns have been highlighted at the Sellafield Local Liaison Committee.
Parish councillor David Cook said: "UKAEA police are marching willy-nilly over people's property and land.
"At Sellafield itself we can understand the need to look in barns searching for mortars and such like, but I don't think a low-level waste site really needs the police doing all this.
"If they really have to, they should at least have the decency to ask first.
"It's local farmers who have found police officers on their land and been told they are looking for any potential attack sites for terrorists or anything than could prove a danger to the site.
"We don't think its needed to this extent and it's put the frighteners on people," said Coun Cook.
UKAEA spokesman Andy Munn said: "Who is going to make the judgement of what is a high-risk site or not? It is still a nuclear facility.
"Rather than cause alarm to local people we would hope the high-visibility patrols will be reassuring and act as a deterrent to any terrorists who might be thinking of carrying out an attack against Sellafield or Drigg."
-------- business
Lockheed, Others Get Liability Shield
By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page E01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50664-2004Jun17.html
Four companies that sell security technology have been granted liability protection from lawsuits triggered by an act of terrorism, the Department of Homeland Security plans to announce today.
The department has worked for more than a year on regulations intended to encourage companies to come forward with innovative technology and services, in part by assuaging fears that they could be held responsible for the consequences of a catastrophic attack.
Among those receiving the limited liability protection is Bethesda-based Lockheed Martin Corp.'s risk assessment platform, the computer system at the heart of the aviation screening program called CAPPS II. It is designed to use public records and intelligence to determine whether an individual poses a security threat. The other companies produce explosive-detection systems, biohazard sensors and devices designed to neutralize explosive devices.
Homeland Security officials consider the liability protection crucial in spurring development of new technologies to protect the nation. The authority comes from a law approved in 2002 called Support Anti-Terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies (SAFETY) Act, which was included in the legislation that created the department.
"We need to make sure that technologies that protect the American people are deployed," said Penrose "Parney" Albright, the department's assistant secretary for science and technology.
Scores of companies have applied for the designation and certification that provides the legal protection, and a dozen or so more will receive the designation before long, officials said. But the process of applying can take up to 110 hours and require a company to provide pages of details about its operation and financial condition. Approval can take as long as three months, according to a Homeland Security Department document.
Department officials streamlined the process after companies complained last fall about the task of applying for the designation.
Benefits for the makers of "qualified anti-terrorism technologies" include a prohibition on punitive damages, limits on payments to plaintiffs and limits on the amount that a business will pay for liability insurance coverage. The SAFETY Act says businesses should be able to obtain insurance at "prices and terms that will not unreasonably distort the sales price" of their products.
-------- iraq
THE VIOLENCE
41 Iraqis Killed in Two Car-Bomb Attacks; at Least 142 Others Are Wounded
June 18, 2004
By EDWARD WONG
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/international/middleeast/18iraq.html?pagewanted=all&position=
BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 17 - A powerful suicide car bomb ripped into a throng of men waiting Thursday morning outside the army's main recruiting station in the heart of the capital, killing at least 35 Iraqis and wounding at least 138, health officials said. The men were lining up to enlist in the new Iraqi army.
Another car bomb exploded in front of a city council building in a village 50 miles north of Baghdad, killing six members of the Iraqi security forces and wounding four others.
The car bomb in Baghdad was fashioned from a white sport utility vehicle packed with artillery shells. The attack was the deadliest in Iraq since a blast at the same recruiting station killed scores of Iraqis in February.
The explosion on Thursday took place at around 9 a.m. at the edge of the former Muthana Airport, now used as a military base by Americans and Iraqis. The explosion sent a thick plume of smoke over the city skyline and scattered bodies across a four-lane road. Cars burst into flames. Bits of charred shrapnel rained from the sky. Ambulances raced to the scene, their sirens wailing.
"I just heard a loud explosion, a strong explosion," said Abdullah Shadhan, 31, who had been waiting outside the recruiting center in sweltering heat with five cousins and 10 friends. "I was thrown into the air. Then I blacked out for a couple of minutes. I didn't know what was happening. When I woke up, I didn't think I was injured. But I couldn't stand up. Something was wrong with my legs."
Mr. Shadhan coughed up blood as he spoke in his bed at Yarmouk Hospital. "I have seven children," he said. "Now what am I supposed to do?"
He used a bloodstained pink towel from beneath his head to dab at his eyes.
The assault came after several days of powerful blasts in Baghdad and at a delicate moment for the Iraqi army. Many soldiers refused to fight their countrymen during the uprising in April, and the Americans are now trying to recruit and train a reliable force that can begin taking over security after June 30, when the interim Iraqi government is scheduled to assume limited sovereignty.
Newly appointed Iraqi officials said at news conferences that they were ready to crack down hard on the insurgency after June 30. "We will chase them from house to house, we will limit them, we will cut off their hands and we will behead them," said Hazim al-Shalaan, the defense minister.
Falah al-Naqib, the interior minister, said he "won't hesitate" to declare martial law if more devastating bombings take place.
Asked about the possibility that the Iraqis would impose martial law after the handover, a senior administration official said that White House officials were not aware of the comments by Mr. Naqib.
The official said the United States would no longer be in a position to second-guess decisions by the new Iraqi government. "There's got to be a period of stepping back," the official said. "There are going to have to be a lot of Iraqi solutions to the problems and they aren't necessarily the solutions we would have used."
It seemed doubtful that the Iraqi government had the resources to carry through with the pledges to crush the insurgency, given that American and Iraqi forces together have failed to control the insurgency. During a visit to the northern city of Mosul, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz said Iraqi forces would need "substantial help" for some time.
Whether the Iraqis will succeed in establishing security where the Americans have so far failed is an open question. But Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations, said in New York today that it was still too dangerous for his organization to return to Iraq. "As of today, circumstances do not permit, and we are monitoring the situation extremely carefully," he said.
The recruiting station in Baghdad was hit by a suicide car bomb in February that killed at least 47 men waiting in line. Though the front of the station was protected on Thursday by a barrier of double-tiered sandbags, witnesses said hundreds of men were forced to stand outside for hours. Many had come to find out if their names would be called over a loudspeaker, which would mean they could return for interviews.
"I was outside talking with an old friend from the army, and we were talking about how we wanted to join the army again," said Hassan Jasim, 35, a thin man lying in a hospital bed with white gauze bandages wrapped around his forehead. "Then we heard the explosion. Some of the people with me are dead, some are injured, some escaped."
Many of the victims blamed the Americans for the lack of security and stability in Iraq Iraqis have recited that same complaint over and over since the uprising in April. Hatred of the occupation seems to be running higher than ever.
"We were at the guard tower and saw injured people and bodies everywhere," said Ahmed Kadhum, 36, a military policeman working at the recruiting station. "There is no security. America is responsible for the lack of security here."
An hour after the bombing, soldiers from the First Cavalry Division and the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps, a national militia, sealed off the area. Humvees blocked the glass-littered highway running past the front gate. A light-blue sedan with a cracked windshield sat atop the median.
"I don't know who did this," said Lt. Col. Mike Murray, the commander of the American soldiers. "It's obviously like some other ones we've seen."
In the morgue at Karama Hospital, a weeping man in a pristine white robe kept lifting up the bloody head of his 22-year-old son, who lay on a metal tray against a wall.
The man, Abdul Munim Ali Hamood, 53, said he had married four times just so he could have a son. So when his only son, Riyadh, told him three days ago that he was joining the army, the two stopped talking. Then Riyadh and a cousin drove down to Baghdad from their hometown of Tikrit to sign up.
"He's all I have and I've lost him," Mr. Hamood said between sobs.
Violence surged in other parts of the country. A Hungarian soldier was killed and a civilian driver wounded on Thursday by a roadside bomb that struck an armored vehicle southeast of Baghdad, the Hungarian defense minister said. It was Hungary's first military death here.
In the southern city of Amara, members of the militia of Moktada al-Sadr, the Shiite cleric who has been at the heart of the uprising, lobbed mortar shells overnight at the headquarters of the occupation authority and at a nearby British military base, Agence-France Presse reported. On Wednesday, Mr. Sadr had called on his troops to put down their weapons and go home.
The American military said that a third soldier had died of wounds from a Wednesday rocket attack on a base in the town of Balad. At least 831 American soldiers have died since the United States invaded Iraq.
Richard W. Stevenson contributed reporting from Washington for this article.
-------- israel / palestine
Israel Plans 'Remote Control Border'
By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51979-2004Jun18?language=printer
JERUSALEM - The Israeli army envisions a "remote control" border with the Gaza Strip after a troop withdrawal, including unmanned patrol cars and computerized observation posts that would automatically spot and kill attackers, a military official said Friday.
The technology already exists, but the plan hasn't been approved yet, and other options are also being considered, the official said on condition of anonymity.
In preparation for the Israeli withdrawal, the Palestinian Authority and militant groups in Gaza have begun drafting an agreement for jointly running the territory, officials said Friday.
Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia said the document would be completed after additional talks in Egypt.
Qureia met Friday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Cairo to discuss the Israeli withdrawal, scheduled to be completed in September 2005. Egypt has been serving as mediator between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
Qureia has also met with leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza in recent days. The militants have refused to join the Palestinian Authority, which was established as a result of interim peace accords with Israel that they opposed. But they have indicated they want to participate in running Gaza after a withdrawal.
"Now we are working on a paper that includes a framework for all the issues. When concluding the dialogue based on this paper and when we say that we have had fruitful results then we can say that we have an agreement," Qureia said in a telephone interview from Cairo.
Also Friday, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was quoted as saying he "definitely" understands that Israel must retain its Jewish character - a rare statement by the Palestinian leader. But Arafat was evasive when asked by the Haaretz daily about the fate of more than 4 million Palestinian refugees and their descendants.
In peace talks, the Palestinians have insisted that Israel recognize the refugees' "right of return." Israel refuses, saying a mass influx of Palestinians will demographically overwhelm the state's Jewish population. The dispute has contributed to the collapse of past negotiations.
In the interview, Arafat suggested that many refugees could settle in a future Palestinian state, but refused to say how many should be allowed into Israel.
The resumption of negotiations on a final peace deal appeared remote, with Sharon forging ahead with his plan of "unilateral disengagement" from the Palestinians.
As part of the plan, Israel also plans to withdraw from four small West Bank settlements, expand other large settlements there that it intends to keep and complete construction of a West Bank separation barrier that would become the border until a final peace deal is reached.
Military officials said Sharon expects the military to present a detailed Gaza withdrawal plan by July. Army planners estimate the troop redeployment would cost $223 million, the Yediot Ahronot newspaper reported Friday.
Military officials also said, an army think tank has been working on a new border design for months. Planners envision a "remote control" border to cut down on the number of troops deployed in the area. High-tech equipment for border control is already being tested, they said.
A computerized observation system will allow the army to identify "hostile elements" and fire deep into Gaza, Yediot reported. The system will even choose the most appropriate weapon to use to hit a specific target.
In addition, the army is testing unmanned patrol cars that can identify and defuse explosives by remote control. Planners have also prepared alternatives, military officials said. "The technology exists, but it (the plan) hasn't been approved yet," one official said.
On Thursday, the Israeli Defense Ministry published a bid for an 80-foot-deep trench between Egypt and Gaza meant to block Palestinian arms smuggling after a withdrawal.
The trench would cost millions, and military officials said it remains unclear whether more Palestinian homes would have to be demolished to make room for it. Israeli media reported the trench idea would be presented in talks next week with Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman.
Such plans deepen Palestinian fears that Israel will block all movement in and out of Gaza. "The Israeli government is planning to turn Gaza into a big prison, with 1.3 million people," said Palestinian Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat. "I think it would be better to have ... security cooperation. That's what people do when they have a shared border."
However, Israel says that it needs to seal Gaza to prevent Palestinian militant attacks. On Friday, a homemade rocket was fired from Gaza at the Israeli town of Sderot, landing in a backyard. The rocket caused no injury. Dozens of such rockets have been fired at Sderot in more than three years of Israeli-Palestinian fighting.
Israeli army planners have also looked at what could hamper a withdrawal - the collapse of Sharon's shaky coalition, violent settler resistance and an increase in militant attacks that could turn Israeli public opinion against a pullback.
Evacuation of Gaza's 7,500 settlers is seen as the most difficult part of the pullout. The army is considering setting up a special unit of 2,000 reserve soldiers to remove settlers, government officials said.
The officials said that within 10 days, settlers volunteering to leave will be able to present their compensation demands. In August, the first settlers could leave the enclaves.
The government is also considering speeding up by several months the evacuation timetable, currently set for September 2005, the officials said.
--------
Arafat climbdown stuns Palestinians
Aljazeera
By Khalid Amayreh
Friday 18 June 2004
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/099302D3-6D30-487D-BD86-B796CC3E6A71.htm
In what appears to be a significant departure from the erstwhile Palestinian position, Yasir Arafat has voiced his willingness to recognise Israel as a "Jewish state".
The remarks were made in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz on Friday.
According to the paper, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Arafat said he "definitely" understood that Israel ought to "preserve her Jewish character" and that he personally recognised "Israel's Jewish identity".
Furthermore, Arafat told the paper that the PA had dropped an Arab summit resolution, calling for a just solution of the Palestinian refugee problem based on UN General Assembly Resolution 194.
The Israeli media featured Arafat's statements prominently, viewing them as a "significant change" of position on the plight of the refugees, considered one of the most insurmountable issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Two reasons
The PA had always refused to or refrained from recognising Israel as a Jewish state for two reasons.
First, the PA leadership thought that lending such a recognition would seriously militate against the interests and future of Israel's 1.2 million strong Palestinian community, which makes up one-fifth of Israel's population.
Second, the PA understood all along that recognising Israel as a Jewish state would, in the final analysis, imply that the Palestinians were giving up on the right of return for millions of Palestinian refugees who were expelled from their homes when Israel was created in 1948.
That right is embodied in UN resolution 149 which stipulates repatriation and restitution for the refugees.
PA officials contacted by Aljazeera.net refused to comment on Arafat's remarks, saying they did not think that Arafat meant what the Israeli newspaper quoted him as having said.
One PA minister, who requested that his identity remain anonymous, said Arafat "doesn't necessarily mean every word he says".
"The president says a lot of things he doesn't mean. But in case he meant what he reportedly said, then it is a serious matter."
Another PA official said: "We don't take everything said or published by the Israeli press for granted."
Condemnation
Palestinian political leaders strongly denounced the idea of recognising Israel as a Jewish state.
Israel has long pressured the PA to recognise it as a Jewish state Ziad Abu Amr, a professor of political science and a former PA minister, called Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state "the most stupid thing the Palestinians could do".
"The Palestinian people and the world at large are under no obligation to recognise the Jewish identity of Israel.
"Israel is a nation-state and has no extra rights and privileges."
Abu Amr said recognising Israel as a Jewish state would amount to agreeing, at least tacitly, that one-fifth of Israel's population would have to accept an inferior status.
Timing resented
"Who can tell the non-Jewish population of Israel that they must settle for an inherently inferior status vis-a-vis Jews and agree that they have lesser rights as citizens on no account other than being non-Jews?" argued Abu Amr.
Some Palestinian leaders seemed to deeply resent the timing of Arafat's statement.
"It is ridiculous that such issues are raised at a time when Israel is narrowing Palestinian horizons and turning Palestinian population centres into mass prisons and detention centres by this annexation wall," said Palestinian political activist and public leader Mustafa Barghuthi.
He castigated Israel for insisting that the Palestinians recognise it as a Jewish state while the Israeli government is blocking the creation of a Palestinian state worth the name.
"So they [Israel] want us to recognise Israel as a Jewish state, not a state for all its citizens, and at the same time they are killing the very possibility of establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank and East Jerusalem."
Barghuthi denounced "any Palestinian leader" who might "tamper with the rights and interests of our brothers in Israel proper".
"Nobody, not me, not you, nor anybody else, whoever he may be, has any right to compromise the rights of Palestinians in Israel."
-------- mideast
Acting on Threat, Saudi Group Kills Captive American
June 18, 2004
By DAVID STOUT
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/international/middleeast/18CND-SAUDI.html?pagewanted=all&position=
WASHINGTON, June 18 - Paul M. Johnson Jr., the American engineer kidnapped last weekend by militants in Saudi Arabia, has been beheaded, his Al Qaeda captors announced today. Hours later, the top terrorist suspect in Saudi Arabia, who was believed to have been behind the abduction, was reported to have been killed in a gunfight with Saudi security forces.
The news of Mr. Johnson's death was posted in a message in Arabic on the Internet by the group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. "The infidel got his fair treatment," the statement said.
The statement, on a Web site that the group often uses for announcements, was accompanied by three photographs showing Mr. Johnson's corpse and head. "Let him taste something from what Muslims tasted who were long reached by Apache helicopter fire and missiles," the statement said.
A few hours later, the Arab satellite stations Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera said the terrorist leader Abdulaziz al-Muqrin, described as the leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, had been killed. His group, which some experts say is inspired by Al Qaeda rather than an operational arm of it, took responsibility for the kidnapping and a string of recent violent acts.
The Saudi Embassy here said Mr. Johnson's body had been found in a northern section of Riyadh, and that security forces had cornered a number of Al Qaeda terrorists in the central part of the city.
The news of Mr. Johnson's beheading prompted a news conference in Washington at the Saudi Embassy and the first hints of the firefight in which Mr. Muqrin was reportedly killed.
"There have been firefights," Adel Al-Jubeir, a foreign policy adviser to the Saudi government, told reporters. "A number of terrorists have been killed. I cannot confirm the numbers for you yet, but we will be keeping you updated."
Mr. Johnson, 49, worked in Saudi Arabia for the past decade in cooperation with Lockheed Martin on the Apache helicopter.
President Bush vowed that the United States would not be intimidated by terrorists.
"The murder of Paul shows the evil nature of the enemy we face," Mr. Bush said during a campaign trip to Washington State. "These are barbaric people. There's no justification whatsoever for his murder, and yet they killed him in cold blood. And it should remind us that we must pursue these people and bring them to justice before they hurt other Americans."
In Washington, D.C., Secretary of State Colin L. Powell stepped out of the State Department to denounce the killing as "barbarism."
"We of course totally condemn this action," he said. "It's an action of barbarism, an action that shows, once again, what the world is dealing with these kind of individuals who behead somebody or murder somebody in cold blood, an innocent individual who was just trying to help people and trying to do his job."
Mr. Powell added, "If anything, it will cause us - I'm quite confident, it will cause our Saudi colleagues - to redouble our efforts to go after terrorists wherever they are, wherever they are trying to hide and to go after those who support this kind of terrorist activity."
At the Saudi Embassy, Mr. Jubeir said his country had received the news of Mr. Johnson's killing "with great pain and sadness."
"His brutal murder illustrates the cruelty and inhumanity of the enemy we all are fighting," Mr. Jubeir said. "The people of Saudi Arabia are outraged by the cruel and cold-blooded murder of this innocent man. His murder has shaken us to the core."
Mr. Johnson's employer, Lockheed Martin, issued a statement saying his colleagues were "very saddened, very depressed" at reports of "his tragic and senseless death."
In New Jersey, the family of Mr. Johnson was in seclusion at a town house in Galloway Township, N.J.
Senator Frank R. Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey, condemned the slaying.
"All of New Jersey and America is shocked," the senator said. "We grieve alongside his friends and family. Mr. Johnson was not only an innocent man, but he was also an ambassador of goodwill who had made many Arab and Muslim friends in his 10 years working and residing in Saudi Arabia. The depravity of this act must be a call to all countries to band together to find and eliminate terrorists and their supporters wherever they hide or find refuge."
Senator John Kerry, the presumed Democratic candidate, also expressed his outrage, saying his "prayers and deepest sympathies are with the family and friends of Paul Johnson."
"Americans are united against the terrorists who committed this abhorrent act against an American civilian in Saudi Arabia," the senator said in a statement. "It is essential that we have the full cooperation of the Saudi government in tracking down these terrorists and destroying al Qaeda. This must be our nation's highest priority."
The militants holding Mr. Johnson threatened on Tuesday to put him to death within 72 hours unless the Saudi authorities released hundreds of their comrades being held in jail - a demand that the Saudis showed no sign of meeting.
Saudi Arabia, the homeland of 15 of the 19 airplane hijackers in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, has been under international pressure in recent months to show its resolve to stamp out terrorism. Thus, it was no surprise that the kingdom showed no public willingness to release any prisoners, especially since the militants also threaten the internal stability of Saudi Arabia.
Many antiterror experts also say that negotiating with hostage-takers may encourage others to take captives in pursuit of their goals.
Resentment toward the United States has intensified in the Middle East in recent weeks with the disclosures that Iraqi prisoners were mistreated by American jailers.
Mr. Johnson's death was the second such execution in recent weeks. Nicholas Berg, an American kidnapped in Iraq, was beheaded by his captors, who made and publicized a videotape of the killing. In 2002, the American journalist Daniel Pearl was killed in Pakistan in similar fashion. American officials say they believe an Al Qaeda leader now in custody, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, was Mr. Pearl's killer.
Mr. Johnson's family had pleaded for his release. And some Arabs had expressed hopes that the militants would spare him. They suggested that Westerners working in Saudi Arabia by invitation deserved protection.
Instead of showing any signs of yielding, the Saudi authorities engaged in fruitless searches of the sprawling Riyadh slums that are known as a hotbed of militancy.
The unwillingness, or inability, of the Saudi and United States governments to help Mr. Johnson was underlined earlier today, before his fate became known, at a State Department briefing.
"The government of the United States and the government of Saudi Arabia are doing, I think, everything they can to resolve this situation peacefully and positively," Adam Ereli, a department spokesman, said at a regular news briefing.
At another point, Mr. Ereli noted, "Both the Saudis and the U.S. government have made it clear that they're not going to negotiate with terrorists or with kidnappers."
-------- nato
NATO Head Says Alliance Credibility on Brink
Reuters
Friday, June 18, 2004
By Jeremy Lovell
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52867-2004Jun18.html
LONDON (Reuters) - NATO's international credibility is at stake as its members make grand political declarations but then fail to produce the troops needed to fulfill them, the alliance's head said Friday.
"NATO's political clout is directly related to its military competence," Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told a conference, lamenting how he continually had to beg countries to honor their pledges.
"I don't mind taking out my begging bowl once in a while. But as a standard operating procedure, this is simply intolerable," said de Hoop Scheffer, citing alliance's role in Afghanistan as a case in point.
Currently NATO has some 6,400 troops in the country, of which all but a handful are confined to Kabul.
NATO leaders have pledged to beef up the mission so it can operate more widely, but have since been dragging their heels on actually coming up with the necessary troops.
"Missions such as Afghanistan present wholly new challenges in terms of generating forces. We have never done anything quite like this before and it should be no surprise that there are challenges," said de Hoop Scheffer.
"Whenever we enter into a political commitment to undertake an operation, we must have a clear idea beforehand as to what forces we have available to honor this commitment," he added.
He said he hoped the NATO summit in Istanbul on June 28 and 29 would not only resolve the Afghan troop problem but also push forward necessary internal reforms to the alliance.
In his most hard-hitting speech to date, de Hoop Scheffer told the Royal United Services Institute think-tank in London that NATO's role was in the throes of revolution.
No longer could it simply defend its borders, it had to look far further afield to spot emerging threats to peace and security and nip them in the bud.
"The demand for NATO is likely to increase, not diminish, in the future," he said. "NATO will be called upon by the international community to be peacemaker, peacekeeper, and the provider of security and stability.
"If we are serious about the need to project stability in today's volatile security environment, we must continue to make sure that our means match our ambitions," he added.
The former Dutch foreign minister said NATO's force structure also had to be reformed to meet the challenges of the new era of global insecurity.
"We need more wide-bodied aircraft and fewer tanks. We need forces that are slimmer, tougher and faster; forces that reach further and can stay in the field longer but still punch hard."
He also advocated a review of the traditional way of funding in which countries finance their own troop contingents.
This meant that those with greater means were called on disproportionately more often than their less well equipped counterparts.
"So can we deliver? The simple answer to this question is that we must deliver," he said. "We must make sure that our means match our ambitions. There simply is no other choice."
-------- pakistan / india
Pakistan Troops Kill Wanted Tribal Leader
By PAUL HAVEN
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 2:02 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52271-2004Jun18?language=printer
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Pakistan's army killed a renegade tribal leader accused of sheltering al-Qaida fighters, tracing him to a mud-brick compound via a satellite phone and then leveling the building in a helicopter assault, officials said Friday. Six other people also died.
"We were tracking him down and he was killed last night by our hand," Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan told The Associated Press in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital.
A helicopter fired a missile at the hideout of Nek Mohammed near Wana, the main town in South Waziristan, near the Afghan border.
The army got its break late Thursday when a satellite phone intercept tracked Mohammed to the home of another tribal leader, according to a security official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
It was not clear if the United States was involved in the phone intercept, although Pakistan is thought to lack the sophisticated satellite technology necessary for such intelligence work, and acknowledges it sometimes receives "technical help" from the Americans.
Sultan would not say how Mohammed was found, but said Pakistani forces were the ones who killed Mohammed. He said local reports that an unmanned U.S. aircraft may have fired the missile were "absurd."
Mohammed granted two phone interviews with a Pakistan-based reporter for the British Broadcasting Corp. this week, but it was not clear whether authorities used either of those calls to track him down.
In one of the interviews, Mohammed vowed to overthrow both the Pakistani and Afghan governments.
"We want to eradicate the U.S.-installed puppet governments in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Once we overthrow them, then there will be peace and no one will be able to harm Muslims," he said.
The security official said at least two of those killed along with Mohammed were foreigners, but they did not appear to be senior al-Qaida leaders.
Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayyat told lawmakers Friday in the National Assembly that the killing of Mohammed was a "major success."
"We are confident that this killing of Nek Mohammed will help the ongoing operation in South Waziristan, and counter the threat of terrorism in other parts of the country," he said. "Operations will continue until the last terrorist is eliminated."
About 70 foreign militants have been killed in South Waziristan since June 9, when the army launched the latest offensive against them, Hayyat said.
Mohammed led a rebellion in March in which 120 people were killed, including nearly 50 security forces. He later agreed to cooperate with the government and turn over foreign militants, but reneged on that promise, prompting the recent burst of fighting.
The U.S. military, pursuing al-Qaida on the Afghan side of the border, has been pressing hard for Islamabad to step up military activity in Waziristan.
The area is considered a possible hideout for al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden, though there is no hard intelligence on his whereabouts.
Mohammed was staying in the home of another tribal leader, Sher Zaman, when the army helicopters attacked late Thursday. Residents said that in addition to Mohammed, two of Zaman's grown sons, his grandson and an associate of Mohammed were killed in the attack in Pir Bagh, near Wana, the main town in South Waziristan.
On Friday, Mohammed's body was taken to his village of Kaloosha, about six miles west of Wana, where thousands attended his funeral.
Mohammed's death was a major victory for the Pakistani army, which has been embarrassed by its forces' losses in fighting with the militants. In the March assault, Pakistani forces were surprised on the first day, suffering heavy casualties and allowing hundreds of suspects to flee.
Government officials had said they believed a high-ranking al-Qaida operative - possibly bin Laden No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri - was surrounded in the March attack, but no senior leaders were found. An Uzbek militant, Tahir Yuldash, was reportedly injured in the assault, but he got away.
Associated Press reporter Munir Ahmad contributed to this report.
-------- prisoners of war
Rumsfeld admits secret prisoner detention
Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal continues to dog Rumsfeld
Friday 18 June 2004
Aljazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/C6F02A7F-E150-45D8-B735-589B12CEC848.htm
US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld acknowledged on Thursday that the military secretly held a prisoner in Iraq, but denied it was done to prevent international monitors from gaining access to him.
Rumsfeld said, however, the Pentagon determined it was "appropriate" to not register the prisoner with the International Committee of the Red Cross, but refused to cite the reason, saying it was classified.
The Pentagon acknowledged earlier Thursday that it made a mistake in not registering the alleged senior operative of Ansar al-Islam captured in November and was working to correct the problem.
The United States links Ansar al-Islam to al-Qaeda. "It's broadly understood that people do not have be registered in 15 minutes when they come in," Rumsfeld said.
"What the appropriate period of time is I don't know. It may very well be a lot less than seven months, but it may be a month or more."
The prisoner who has not been named, was held at Camp Cropper, on the outskirts of Baghdad International Airport, officials said.
The New York Times, citing senior defence and intelligence officials, reported in its Thursday edition that Rumsfeld had ordered his detention without notifying the Red Cross to keep it from checking the suspect's treatment and condition.
Admissions
Senior Pentagon and intelligence officials, have confirmed that the prisoner was hidden along with other "ghost detainees", largely to prevent the International Committee of the Red Cross from monitoring their treatment and conditions.
Rumsfeld's order last November came at the request of George Tenet, the CIA director who resigned this month, according Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman.
Both assigning a prisoner number and notifying the Red Cross are required under the Geneva Conventions and other international humanitarian laws.
"I will acknowledge that the ICRC should have been notified about this prisoner earlier," Whitman said. "He will be assigned an identification number and, if appropriate, moved into the general prison population."
Ghost detainees described as "deceptive, contrary to army doctrine, and in violation of international law"
Maj Gen Antonio Taguba, US army investigator
The report came as the United States continued to conduct a major investigation into the abuse, including sexual humiliation, of prisoners by the US military in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
In March, Major General Antonio Taguba, the army officer who investigated abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison, criticised the practice of allowing ghost detainees as "deceptive, contrary to army doctrine, and in violation of international law".
Active threat
Pentagon and intelligence officials told the New York Times on Thursday, that the decision to hold the detainee without registering him, at least initially, was in keeping with the administration's legal opinion about the status of those viewed as an active threat in wartime.
"Once he was placed in military custody, people lost track of him," a senior intelligence official told the Times. "The normal review processes that would keep track of him didn't."
Rumsfeld personally ordered the prisoner be kept unregistered
The detainee was described by the official as someone "who was actively planning operations specifically targeting US forces and interests both inside and outside of Iraq."
The man is still in prison but has only been questioned once while in detention.
The Pentagon's chief spokesman, Lawrence Di Rita, told the paper that officials at Camp Cropper questioned their superiors several times in recent months about what to do with the suspect. The Times said that only in the last two weeks had a senior Rumsfeld aide asked the CIA to deal with the suspect.
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Navy secretary to lead reviews in Guantanamo
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
By Bill Gertz
June 18, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040617-114936-9182r.htm
Navy Secretary Gordon England has been picked to head a review process that will determine whether to release prisoners detained at the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, defense officials said.
Mr. England will be the senior civilian in charge of the U.S. military's annual reviews for the approximately 600 terrorist suspects who have been captured in Afghanistan, said officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
"We've refined the procedures, and they will soon be published as regulations," one senior official said. "The Navy secretary will be the responsible official for managing the long-term detention review."
A formal announcement of Mr. England's appointment was expected earlier this week but was delayed because further work was needed on the final review procedures, the official said.
U.S. intelligence officials have said some of the Guantanamo detainees are Islamists who belonged to al Qaeda and the Taliban movement that was ousted by U.S. and Afghan forces in December 2001. The prisoners have been interrogated in an effort to gain intelligence on al Qaeda and other terrorists.
The nonjudicial review process will allow the prisoners held at the Guantanamo base to present appeals to a panel of three military officers. Each prisoner will be given U.S. military assistance in preparing to present his case before the panel.
U.S. government intelligence, security and law enforcement agencies then will be given a chance to appeal to the panel on whether to continue holding the prisoner, based on the need to seek additional intelligence or the risk that releasing the prisoner could lead to further terrorist or paramilitary attacks.
Mr. England then will decide whether the prisoner will be released, transferred to his home country for continued detention, or kept in U.S. custody.
Officials said the review procedure is not a legal requirement because the Bush administration has labeled the prisoners at Guantanamo "enemy combatants detained in the ongoing conflict."
The process was put in place because the war on terrorism, unlike past conflicts, does not involve formal state-to-state conflict and might not end with a peace treaty.
Draft procedures for the review were made public March 3, and the final rules will reflect public comment.
The detainees have nationalities from around the world, including Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
The draft rules call for an initial review of whether detainees continue to pose a threat of al Qaeda attacks on the United States or its allies. The draft rules also permit home governments of prisoners to present information on behalf of a prisoner or his family by making statements or providing information.
As of May, 134 prisoners had been released and 13 others were sent to other nations for continued detention.
As enemy combatants, the prisoners at Guantanamo can be held until the global war on terrorism is declared over.
Unlike wartime detention in past conflicts, the review procedure will allow the detainees to make a case for why they no longer represent a threat to the United States.
The review procedure is not expected to be public because the Pentagon expects most of the information presented to be classified.
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PRISONERS
Rumsfeld Admits He Told Jailers to Keep Detainee in Iraq Out of Red Cross View
June 18, 2004
By THOM SHANKER
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/politics/18abus.html
WASHINGTON, June 17 - Senior Pentagon officials acknowledged Thursday that a suspected Iraqi terrorist who was held in a military jail - but kept off prison rosters - should have been registered more quickly with the International Committee of the Red Cross.
But the officials said the fact that the secret detention of the captive, who was jailed near the Baghdad airport without records, stretched for seven months was probably attributable to a bureaucratic breakdown.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Thursday at a Pentagon news briefing that he ordered the detainee held without a registration number at the written request of George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence.
At the same briefing, Daniel J. Dell'Orto, the Pentagon's principal deputy general counsel, said the initial decision to hold the detainee without registering him was permissible, at least temporarily, for security reasons.
But he added: "We should have registered him much sooner than we did. It didn't have to be at the very instant we brought him into our custody. And that's something that we'll just have to examine as to whether there was a breakdown in the quickness with which we registered him."
Pentagon officials declined to discuss Mr. Tenet's reason for wanting the detainee, believed to be a high-ranking officer of Ansar al-Islam, a terrorist organization, held off the prison rolls. An agency spokesman said the C.I.A. would have no comment on Mr. Tenet's reasoning.
Mr. Rumsfeld said the detainee, who is still in military detention in Iraq, has been treated humanely. Officials said he was now being registered with the Red Cross.
A Human Rights Watch report last week identified 13 "ghost detainees" taken into United States custody since Sept. 11, 2001. The author of the report, Reed Brody, said the 13 were either being held in undisclosed detention facilities, or the United States government had not acknowledged holding them.
The detainees are all associated with Al Qaeda and include Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and Ramzi bin al-Shibh, whose interrogations were discussed at the Sept. 11 commission hearings this week.
Mr. Brody's staff identified the 13 detainees by tracking their arrests, largely from news reports or interviews with their relatives, he said. They were arrested in Pakistan, Indonesia, Thailand, Morocco and other countries.
"What's clear in these cases is that they're being held in situations that are equal to or worse than Triple X," said Mr. Brody, referring to the Ansar detainee in Iraq. "They are being held outside anybody's scrutiny. We have no idea in most cases whether these people are dead or alive."
Also on Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee rejected a proposal by two Democratic senators, Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont and Dianne Feinstein of California, to subpoena Justice Department documents on the administration's policies regarding the treatment of prisoners. The proposal, which was rejected in a 10-9 vote, identified 23 memos, letters or reports from Sept. 25, 2001, through March of this year on topics that included the treatment of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and rules for interrogation.
According to the proposal, the documents include a memo from Mr. Rumsfeld to Gen. James T. Hill, the senior officer of the Southern Command, dated April 2003 and titled, "Coercive interrogation techniques that can be used with approval of the Defense Secretary." Another memo dated Jan. 4, 2004, written by the top legal adviser to Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the senior American commander in Iraq, and sent to military intelligence and police personnel at the Abu Ghraib prison, is titled, "New plan to restrict Red Cross access to Abu Ghraib."
Mr. Leahy and several other senators asked Attorney General John Ashcroft for some of the documents at a June 8 hearing, but Mr. Ashcroft said he would not hand them over, an aide to Mr. Leahy said.
"A formal request would have to come by way of subpoena under the rules of the Senate," said Mark Corallo, a Department of Justice spokesman. "You would think that senators would know their own Senate rules."
Before the vote was taken, the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, Orrin G. Hatch, told committee members that he had read several of the memos and advised them against voting for the proposal.
"We should not reveal our interrogation techniques to our enemies," said Senator Hatch, Republican of Utah. "There must be some reasonable limits on what can and should be disclosed by the executive branch to Congress and the public about the war against terrorism."
-------- russia / chechnya
Putin Says Russia Gave U.S. Intel on Iraq
By BAGILA BUKHARBAYEVA
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53786-2004Jun18.html
ASTANA, Kazakhstan - Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday his government warned Washington that Saddam Hussein's regime was preparing attacks in the United States and its interests abroad - an assertion that appears to bolster President Bush's contention that Iraq was a threat.
Putin emphasized that the intelligence didn't cause Russia to waver from its firm opposition to the U.S.-led war last year, but his statement was the second this month in which he has offered at least some support for Bush on Iraq.
"After Sept. 11, 2001, and before the start of the military operation in Iraq, the Russian special services ... received information that officials from Saddam's regime were preparing terrorist attacks in the United States and outside it against the U.S. military and other interests," Putin said.
"Despite that information ... Russia's position on Iraq remains unchanged," he said in the Kazakh capital, Astana, after regional economic and security summits. He said Russia didn't have any information that Saddam's regime had actually been behind any terrorist acts.
"It's one thing to have information that Saddam's regime is preparing terrorist attacks, (but) we didn't have information that it was involved in any known terrorist attacks," he said.
Putin didn't elaborate on any details of the alleged plots or mention whether they were tied to al-Qaida. He said Bush had personally thanked one of the leaders of Russia's intelligence agencies for the information but that he couldn't comment on how critical it was in the U.S. decision to invade Iraq.
In Washington, a U.S. official said Putin's information did not add to what the United States already knew about Saddam's intentions.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Putin's tip didn't give a time or place for a possible attack.
Bush alleged Thursday that Saddam had "numerous contacts" with al-Qaida and said Iraqi agents had met with the terror network's leader, Osama bin Laden, in Sudan.
Saddam "was a threat because he had terrorist connections - not only al-Qaida connections, but other connections to terrorist organizations," Bush said.
However, a commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks reported this week that while there were contacts between al-Qaida and Iraq, they did not appear to have produced "a collaborative relationship."
Also Thursday, a top Russian diplomat called for international inspectors to resolve conclusively the question of whether Iraq had any weapons of mass destruction.
"This problem must be resolved ... because to a great extent it became the pretext for the start of the war against Iraq," the Interfax news agency quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov as saying. He said such a finding would allow the U.N. Security Council to "finally close the dossier on Iraqi weapons."
In the wake of the invasion of Iraq, Putin sharply rebuked the United States for going to war despite opposition within the U.N. Security Council and said the threat posed to international security by the war was greater than that posed by Saddam.
But Putin's relationship with Bush is warm by the accounts of both leaders, and last week he said he has no patience for those who criticize Bush on Iraq.
"I don't pay attention to such publications," Putin said of media criticism of Bush at the end of the Group of Eight summit in the United States, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency.
Putin said opponents who criticize Bush on Iraq "don't have any kind of moral right. ... They conducted exactly the same kind of policy in Yugoslavia."
Russia vehemently opposed the NATO bombing attacks on Yugoslavia in 1999, which the United States pushed for under President Clinton.
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CIA contractor indicted in prisoner's death
ASSOCIATED PRESS
June 18, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040617-114927-2475r.htm
A CIA contractor was indicted yesterday in connection with the beating death of a prisoner in Afghanistan - the first civilian to face criminal charges related to U.S. treatment of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The four-count indictment was handed up in Raleigh, N.C., against David A. Passaro, 38, for the June 21, 2003, death of a prisoner in U.S. custody. Attorney General John Ashcroft said Mr. Passaro was accused of "brutally assaulting" the man while questioning him over two days.
The prisoner, identified as Abdul Wali, was being held at a U.S. detention facility in Asadabad, in the Kunar province of Afghanistan. Court documents say Mr. Wali had surrendered and was being questioned by Mr. Passaro about frequent rocket attacks directed at the U.S. facility, close to the Pakistani border.
Mr. Ashcroft said al Qaeda and Taliban fighters were common in that part of the region.
Mr. Wali died in his prison cell after Mr. Passaro beat him "using his hands and feet and a large flashlight" during two days of interrogations, according to the indictment.
Mr. Passaro, of Lillington, N.C., was to appear in federal court in Raleigh. The indictment does not say whether he worked for a specific company but says he was in Afghanistan "on behalf of the CIA, engaging in paramilitary activities."
The CIA often uses independent contractors who are hired for short-term assignments. Although they sometimes are recruited by and work through a private company, they also can be contracted directly by the agency. The contractors are known as "green badgers" for the color of their ID cards. Regular employees have blue badges.
Mr. Wali's is among three detainee deaths being investigated by the Justice Department and the CIA's inspector general in Iraq and Afghanistan, where charges of abuse include reports from former prisoners of hoodings, beatings and sexual humiliation. The Justice Department declined to bring charges in a fourth death.
The indictment charges Mr. Passaro with two counts each of assault and assault with a dangerous weapon - the flashlight. He faces up to 40 years in prison and up to a $1 million fine if convicted. Federal law allows civilian charges to be brought against U.S. citizens for crimes overseas if they are not under military jurisdiction.
"We take allegations of wrongdoing very seriously, and it is important to bear in mind that CIA immediately reported these allegations to the agency's inspector general and the Department of Justice," said CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield.
"While we cannot comment on specifics of this case, given that it is currently before the courts, the CIA does not support or condone unlawful activities of any sort and has an obligation to report possible violations of the law to the appropriate authorities," Mr. Mansfield said. "This was done promptly."
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BOOKS OF THE TIMES | 'A PRETEXT FOR WAR'
How Feuds and Failures Affected American Intelligence
June 18, 2004
By MICHIKO KAKUTANI
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/books/18BOOK.html?pagewanted=all&position=
In the walk-up and wake of the Iraq war, it's no secret that one of the most bitter battles in Washington has been between the C.I.A. and the State Department on one side, and neoconservative hawks in the Pentagon and White house, on the other.
Intelligence and State Department officials have characterized the neocons as hawkish ideologues who entered office before 9/11 with an agenda to depose Saddam Hussein. They have accused the hard-liners of cherry-picking and hyping intelligence in order to sell the war against Iraq.
The hawks have characterized the C.I.A. as a bunch of risk-averse, bean-counting bureaucrats, hobbled by what Richard Perle has called "ideologically liberal assumptions." They have accused the agency of continuing intelligence failures, from the overthrow of the shah's government in Iran in 1979 to the terrorist attacks of 9/11.
As James Bamford, the author of two respected books on American intelligence, tells it, there is plenty of blame to go around. His new book, "A Pretext for War," draws a damning portrait of the country's intelligence agencies as woefully ill equipped to deal with the threats of terrorism and a post-cold-war world. It also draws a scathing picture of ideologues in the Bush administration, manipulating dubious evidence about links between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein and flawed information about weapons of mass destruction in the push toward war.
In addition Mr. Bamford suggests that the C.I.A. caved to pressure from administration hard-liners. He quotes a C.I.A. case officer who says that in January of 2003, one of the agency's higher-ups called a meeting and said, "You know what - if Bush wants to go to war, it's your job to give him a reason to do so." And he writes that the C.I.A. chief George Tenet said of the provocative intelligence about Iraq that Secretary of State Colin Powell presented to the United Nations in February of 2003: "I'm standing behind it one hundred percent," even though much of that intelligence later turned out to be flawed, and Mr. Tenet stated in 2004 that his agency "never said there was an `imminent' threat" from Saddam Hussein.
Much of the information and many of the theories in Mr. Bamford's book will be familiar to readers from earlier magazine and newspaper articles, and other books: most notably, Bob Woodward's "Bush at War" and "Plan of Attack;" "Ghost Wars," Steve Coll's exhaustive history of the C.I.A., Osama bin Laden and Afghanistan; the former counterterrorism czar Richard A. Clarke's best-selling exposé of the war on terror, "Against All Enemies;" and "Inside 9-11," a detailed chronicle of the terrorist attacks of 2001 by Der Spiegel journalists.
But Mr. Bamford unearths new details about everything from the identity of one of the undisclosed locations used by Vice President Dick Cheney after 9/11 (Site R, a secret military command post on the Maryland-Pennsylvania border) to the failures of a special C.I.A. unit charged with tracking Osama bin Laden, and he connects the many dots, both old and new, to create a vivid, unsettling narrative.
Discursive in organization, "A Pretext for War" provides selective context for the failure to prevent the attacks of 9/11 and the Bush administration's path to war. Mr. Bamford is highly persuasive in recounting the many ways in which American intelligence agencies failed to adapt to the end of the cold war: they lacked specialists in many key Middle Eastern languages and a sufficient number of analysts to grapple with an avalanche of cyber-age data, and even though Americans like John Walker Lindh had been secretly joining Al Qaeda, operatives appear to have made little effort to penetrate terrorist organizations, preferring the decorous, low-risk tack of trying to recruit foreign embassy officials at cocktail parties.
Mr. Bamford does not address the broader question of how cold war paradigms shaped the thinking of key Bush administration members like the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and Mr. Cheney. And unlike James Mann in "Rise of the Vulcans," he does not delve into many of the larger factors shaping the hawks' thinking - from their experiences in dealing with the Soviet Union to their appropriation of the Wilsonian idea of exporting democracy abroad.
What he does focus on is the role that Israel has played in shaping American policy. Mr. Bamford contends that "the blueprint for the new Bush policy" on the Middle East "had actually been drawn up five years earlier by three of his top national security advisers" (Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and David Wurmser) for the Israeli prime minister at the time, Benjamin Netanyahu (who rejected the plan), and that when they entered office in January 2001, all these hawks needed was "a pretext" for war against Iraq. Citing a report from the British newspaper The Guardian, Mr. Bamford adds that the Office of Special Plans, a Pentagon unit set up by Mr. Feith, "forged close ties to a parallel, ad hoc intelligence unit within Ariel Sharon's office in Israel," which "was designed to go around the country's own intelligence organization, Mossad."
In recounting the failures of intelligence before 9/11, Mr. Bamford points to missed clues about the hijackers and the poisonous rivalry (not to mention fatal lack of communication) between the C.I.A. and F.B.I. He also writes that a special unit of the C.I.A. named Alec Station, which was set up in 1996 "with the sole mission of collecting intelligence" on Osama bin Laden and "disrupting his network," had an abysmal record: that "after four years and hundreds of millions of dollars," it failed "to recruit a single source within bin Laden's growing Afghanistan operation." He adds: "It was George Tenet's biggest secret. Not only was Al Qaeda never penetrated, neither the Counterterrorism Center nor Alec Station ever picked up a single piece of usable intelligence on bin Laden or his organization, the country's greatest threat."
Mr. Bamford is equally scorching on the subject of an alternative intelligence gathering operation (called the Policy Counterterrorism Evaluation Group) set up at the Pentagon by Mr. Feith and Mr. Wurmser, arguing that it "was little more than a pro-war propaganda cell" designed "to produce evidence to support the pretexts for attacking Iraq." He also denounces the Pentagon's heavy reliance on intelligence acquired through Ahmed Chalabi, the head of the Iraqi National Congress and a longtime friend of many prominent administration hawks. Though much of the information from Mr. Chalabi's sources about weapons of mass destruction later turned out to be incorrect or fabricated, Mr. Bamford writes, it was funneled to the White House and to the press - most notably, The New York Times - to help sell the "war to the American public."
Both President Bill Clinton and President George W. Bush are taken to task in these pages as well. In describing the country's vulnerability in the face of terrorism, Mr. Bamford repeatedly notes that budget cutbacks during the Clinton administration weakened the country's intelligence agencies, and he writes that the now famous Aug. 6, 2001, President's Daily Brief - titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." - seemed "to have made little impression" on Mr. Bush.
He observes that when George Tenet, the head of the C.I.A. during both administrations, declared war on terrorism - in the wake of the 1998 embassy bombings in Africa - it was so low-key that senior officials at the Pentagon and the F.B.I. had not heard of it. And he points out that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who actually controls a large portion of America's spy world, was "far more concerned with downsizing the Pentagon than reorganizing and reinvigorating the intelligence community" when he entered office.
In the end Mr. Bamford's conclusions are alarming, if not unfamiliar ones: that incompetence, timidity and a lack of readiness contributed to the failure to prevent the terrorist attacks of 9/11, and that misinformation, ideological agendas and poor intelligence led to the decision to go to war against Iraq.
-------- un
UN agency set to rap Iran over nuclear program: US makes new accusation
VIENNA (AFP)
Jun 18, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040618013806.pf55owtm.html
The UN atomic agency was set to adopt Friday a resolution deploring delays and omissions by Iran in declaring its nuclear activities even as the United States brought forth a new charge of clandestine weapons development.
The International Atomic Energy Agency was expected to adopt by consensus a British-French-German resolution calling for the IAEA's 15-month-old investigation into Iran's nuclear activities to be stepped up and for Tehran to do more to help it complete the probe within a few months.
The tough resolution was tabled Thursday at an IAEA governors board meeting in Vienna, even though the IAEA admitted it had made a mistake in its investigation and after Iranian President Mohammad Khatami warned the Islamic republic could back away from voluntary commitments such as the suspension of uranium enrichment and allowing tougher inspections.
But Iran reacted mildly Thursday. Chief Iranian delegate Seyed Hossein Mussavian said Iran would continue to cooperate with the IAEA and hailed as a victory the fact that the IAEA had not heeded a US call to impose a deadline on Iran.
The United States claims Iran has a secret program to develop nuclear weapons and wants the IAEA to impose a cut-off date on its investigation in order to send the Iranian file to the UN Security Council, which could impose international sanctions on the Islamic Republic, diplomats said.
"The Americans were trying to put a deadline. In this draft we don't see a deadline. I consider this process a victory process for Iran," Mussavian told reporters.
But Washington said it was happy with the resolution. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said: "The United States has felt that it's important for the IAEA to continue its pressure on Iran, to continue its investigation, its inspections, to continue finding things out about this program."
Boucher also accused Iran of razing nuclear sites to hide banned nuclear activity.
"I can't give you any independent information, but commercial satellite photography shows the complete dismantling and the razing of a facility at Lavizan Shiyan (a Tehran suburb).
"And that's a site that was previously disclosed as a possible Iranian weapons of mass destruction-related site," he said.
A senior diplomat close to the IAEA told AFP the agency was interested in this site but had not yet been "invited" by Iranian authorities to visit it.
The IAEA admitted Thursday it had made a mistake in saying that Iran had failed to report the import of magnets for advanced P-2 centrifuges that can process uranium to bomb-grade, highly enriched levels.
References to this were taken out of the resolution, according to a copy of the text obtained by AFP.
But the resolution still says that Iran's reporting on the crucial P-2 centrifuge issue has "in some cases ... been incomplete and continues to lack the necessary clarity."
The resolution repeats a call by IAEA director general Mohamed ElBaradei "that it is essential for the integrity and credibility of the inspection process to bring these issues to a close within the next few months."
And it "deplores... that overall as indicated by the Director General's written and oral reports, Iran's cooperation has not been as full, timely and proactive as it should have been."
The resolution also kept in the clause Iran most objected to -- a call for it to stop tests in uranium conversion, a first step in the nuclear fuel cycle.
Mussavian told AFP after examining the resolution that "Iran will continue cooperation with IAEA."
He said: "Iran will be committed to (the nuclear) non-proliferation treaty (NPT) and there is no issue of withdrawal from the NPT."
"We will concentrate (focus) with the IAEA to resolve these two technical remaining issues which are P-2 and contamination (of equipment by highly enriched uranium particles)," he said.
"We hope this will be also resolved within a few months," Mussavian said.
Mussavian said Iran "will continue to cooperate with the IAEA also in the framework of the protocol 93 + 2," which is the additional protocol to the NPT that mandates tougher inspections.
But he said maintaining the suspension of uranium enrichment, which is outside the NPT, was a decision to be made in Tehran.
-------- us
Senate Votes to Add 20,000 Soldiers to Army
June 18, 2004
By CARL HULSE
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/politics/18spend.html
WASHINGTON, June 17 - The Senate voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to increase the strength of the Army by 20,000 soldiers, with lawmakers saying the military is badly strained by operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Members of both parties said the troops, added to the Pentagon spending plan for 2005 on a 93-to-4 vote, were essential in light of international tensions and the policy of keeping military personnel in Iraq and elsewhere beyond their scheduled tours.
"Frankly, they need more help," said Senator Jack Reed, Democrat of Rhode Island and a chief proponent of additional personnel. "This operational tempo is putting great stress and duress on soldiers."
He and others, including Senators John McCain of Arizona and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, both Republicans, have been pressing for a personnel increase as well as for dispatching more forces to Iraq. The administration has resisted, saying the army has enough.
"I hope that the Pentagon and the civilian leadership there will come to their senses and recognize that there are not enough men and women in the military today," Mr. McCain said. "They're stretched too thin, they're badly overworked, and we have paid a very heavy price for these failings from the beginning of the Iraqi conflict."
Under a compromise, the Senate agreed to pay the $1.7 billion cost of the new personnel out of the administration's $25 billion request for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan through early next year. Mr. Reed said the 20,000 recruits were the number Pentagon officials said could be absorbed in the next year. The addition would bring the authorized strength of the Army to 502,400.
The House also approved additional troops, but phased them in over three years.
As it debated the $447 billion measure, the Senate defeated an effort to halt deployment of a new ground-based missile defense network until it was fully tested. Backers of the system said such a delay could put national security at risk.
"We expect to get these missiles in the ground this fall,'' Senator Wayne Allard, Republican of Colorado, said, "and we're going to begin to have a system in place where we can defend this country from an unexpected missile attack that may occur out of North Korea or Iran."
The senators voted 57 to 42 to proceed with fielding the system.
The decision was one of two defeats for Democratic critics of how the Bush administration is proceeding with establishing the nation's first missile defense system.
Senators also turned aside a proposal to require an independent test of the system, adopting a Republican alternative that calls for testing but allows the secretary of defense to determine how it is done.
Some Democrats said the administration was rushing to deploy an untried system for political purposes, without fully assessing its capability, a departure from existing rules for adding major new weapons systems to the national arsenal.
" 'Fly before you buy' is essential," said Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, who proposed withholding the $3.7 billion to be spent deploying new interceptor missiles until more tests are done. "We want the people to know the system works."
Mr. Reed offered a plan to allow the deployment of the system but require testing by an independent entity. He and others suggested that the Pentagon agency responsible for the missile network had such a stake in its success that it might not be able to make an unbiased assessment. "You tend to pass every test that you give yourself," he said.
Proponents of the system, a much more rudimentary missile defense than the space-based shield envisioned in the Reagan era, said it was better to get it into place and test it in a realistic setting.
"Eventually you have to put the components together, build the missiles, put them in the ground and test them in real conditions," said Senator Jon Kyl, Republican of Arizona.
Under the system concept, special "kill vehicles" are attached to booster rockets. Upon detection of a missile launched at the United States, the rockets would be launched, with the kill vehicle separating itself to destroy the incoming missile. The Pentagon intends to deploy up to 40 of the interceptors eventually.
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Fort Drum prepares for another deployment
NBC News
By Tom Costello
June 18, 2004
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5239889/
FORT DRUM, N.Y. - In upstate New York, the men and women of the most deployed division in the army are back in camouflage green.
The 10th Mountain Division has seen a lot of the world over the past few years: Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo, and the nation's most recent battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The division lost 11 men fighting Taliban and Al-Qaida elements before returning just a few months ago.
That sacrifice brought President Hamid Karzai here recently to personally express his appreciation to the troops, "for reclaiming our country from terror and oppression."
"To those of you who have served in Afghanistan, my deepest gratitude," Karzai said on June 8. "And to those who made the ultimate sacrifice on Afghan soil, we, the people of Afghanistan, mourn them as we mourn our own."
Yet even as Karzai was extending his thanks, more than 3,000 men and women of the 2nd Brigade were receiving word that they were about to depart for Iraq.
Back to well-trodden ground
Approximately 60 to 70 percent of the troops in the brigade already wear combat patches. The troops returned from Iraq only last July, while some members were in Afghanistan as recently as three months ago.
With the U.S. army struggling to come up with enough troops to meet its commitments around the world, the brigade's men and women are once again being deployed to a combat zone.
"It's tough on the families and it's tough on the soldiers," brigade commander Colonel Mark Milley told NBC News. "But this is a unique time in American history."
"We have our part to play and we want to finish this thing on our watch. If we don't, then our kids - I have a 12-year-old son - then he and they will have to do it on their watch."
Families pay the ultimate sacrifice
Another foreign deployment is especially difficult on the children of Fort Drum. At nearby Calcium Primary School, roughly a quarter of the 370 students have a parent now deployed overseas. Principal Lana Taylor and her staff spend a lot of time comforting children who seem distracted by an outside world that seems very frightening.
"Our mantra is stability," said Taylor. "To keep things as normal as possible. To give these children a safe haven, to give kids a place to go to school that's happy."
Fort Drum and the nearby towns of Calcium and Watertown are a tight-knit community. Wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, and families come together to support each other when the soldiers are gone. The latest deployment to Iraq will last 12 months under the Pentagon's new rules governing tours to Iraq.
For Kim Prayner, the wife of Captain Bill Prayner, it means organizing the company's Family Readiness Support Group, keeping an eye on families staying at Fort Drum during the long deployment.
"My biggest worry is the spouses left behind," she said. "I know what to expect. I've gone through Iraq deployments before. But for new wives with new babies, it's stressful."
But Kim Prayner is herself left to raise the couple's 18-month old twins on her own, as Bill will lead 180 soldiers in Iraq.
Capt. Prayner admits he was surprised his brigade was being sent back to Iraq. But his job now is to ensure that his company comes home next year.
"Will I miss my children? Absolutely," said Capt. Prayner. "There's nothing that means more to me in this world. But right now, what needs my undivided attention is my men, and the unit."
"I am privileged to be able to serve them and to have them work for me, and I will bring them home. That is my commitment."
Supporting the other 'family'
Among Capt. Prayner's men is Sgt. Jared Wolshleger, who returned from Afghanistan in April. Because he had been home only a few months, Wolshleger was not expected to return to Iraq with second brigade.
After four years in the army, he would likely have been allowed a discharge this summer so he could begin college in the fall, as he had planned.
But Wolshleger could not stay home while his friends left for a war zone. So he re-enlisted with the army, on the condition he could deploy to Iraq with his company.
"Besides my parents, I don't have any family," Wolshleger said the afternoon he was packing his duffel bag for Iraq. "The guys I work with every day basically are my family and I just could not stay behind while they went away to do something that isn't going to be easy."
It is a common theme heard from members of the 2nd Brigade. They were leaving their own families behind for a year to join their other "family" - one that for many soldiers has come to mean just as much, if not more. Tom Costello is an NBC News correspondent. He was recently on assignment at Fort Drum, N.Y.
-------- war crimes
JUSTICE
Annan Rebukes U.S. for Move to Give Its Troops Immunity
June 18, 2004
By WARREN HOGE
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/international/18nati.html
UNITED NATIONS, June 17 - Secretary General Kofi Annan harshly criticized the United States on Thursday for seeking immunity for its peacekeeping troops from the International Criminal Court.
He said the Security Council should resist the American move, which he said was "of dubious judicial value" and particularly deplorable this year "given the prisoner abuse in Iraq."
"I think in this circumstance it would be unwise to press for an exemption, and it would be even more unwise on the part of the Security Council to grant it," Mr. Annan told reporters. "It would discredit the Council and the United Nations that stands for rule of law and the primacy of the rule of law."
The Bush administration has argued that people could use the court to bring politically motivated actions against Americans abroad. When the court was established two years ago, Washington threatened to end its participation in United Nations peacekeeping operations if its troops were not promised such protection.
Last month, the United States introduced a resolution to the Security Council that would continue an exemption first granted in 2002 and renewed a year ago, exempting American personnel in United Nations-authorized operations like that contemplated in Iraq from prosecution in the international court. Mr. Annan has opposed such action both years, but not with such a forthright statement.
"While today's statement is more explicit than the secretary general has made before, it has even greater resonance since in the current environment the idea of exempting people from the rule of law because of their nationality is obviously less defensible than ever,'' said Richard Dicker, director for international justice at Human Rights Watch.
In the vote last year, three nations abstained, and diplomats said that as many as 7 of the 15 Security Council members were thinking of abstaining this year. If they do so, the United States could not get the nine votes it needs for passage.
Late last month, China obtained a postponement of the debate, saying that the events at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq had changed its thinking, and it could no longer rule out a veto. At the Chinese Mission to the United Nations on Thursday, a spokeswoman said, "Our capital is still studying this issue, and the mission does not have instructions yet."
Richard A. Grenell, the spokesman for the American Mission, said the United States intended to press for a vote before June 30 and saw no reason why the resolution should not pass. "We still think that it should be a technical rollover," he said.
The court is the first permanent tribunal to try cases of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, but it has no jurisdiction in Iraq because neither the United States nor Iraq were signatories to the 1998 Rome treaty establishing it.
The United Nations role will grow in Iraq once power is transferred on June 30 from the American-led occupying forces to the Iraqis, but Mr. Annan said Thursday that he was still unwilling to send international staff back to Iraq because of poor security.
--------
Annan Opposes Exempting U.S. From Court
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A24
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50531-2004Jun17.html
UNITED NATIONS, June 17 -- U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan urged the Security Council on Thursday to oppose renewal of a resolution that would shield U.S. troops serving in U.N.-approved peacekeeping missions from prosecution before the International Criminal Court, saying the "exemption is wrong."
Annan noted that the United States is facing international criticism for abuses of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan. He told reporters: "It would be unwise to press for an exemption, and it would be even more unwise on the part of the Security Council to grant it. It would discredit the council and the United Nations that stands for the rule of law."
The U.N. chief's remarks added momentum to a campaign by supporters of the war crimes court to defeat the U.S.-sponsored initiative. Senior U.N. diplomats said Annan would press his case in a closed-door luncheon Friday with the 15 Security Council members.
"Blanket exemption is wrong," Annan said. "It is of dubious judicial value, and I don't think it should be encouraged by the council."
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States is well aware of Annan's position but will press the council for renewal. The resolution, first adopted two years ago, applies to "current or former officials" from countries that have not ratified the treaty establishing the court -- which includes the United States -- and exempts them from prosecution before the court for crimes committed in U.N.-authorized operations. The council expressed an "intention" to renew the resolution each year "for as long as may be necessary."
"It should be renewed the way the council said it would," Boucher said. "And so we're still talking to other governments in New York and discussing this with them."
The United States faces fierce resistance within the council as the July 1 deadline for renewal approaches.
China has threatened to veto the resolution, citing concern that it could be use to provide political cover for abuses. U.S. and other Security Council officials say that China -- which also has not ratified the court treaty -- is confronting the United States because it recently supported Taiwan's bid for observer status in the World Health Assembly. "This could have an impact," said one council ambassador, who spoke anonymously because of the sensitivity of the issue. China is sending a "signal" to Washington that this "will threaten the development of bilateral relations."
U.S. diplomats acknowledge that they are struggling to line up the nine votes required to pass the resolution. Six countries -- Russia, Britain, the Philippines, Pakistan, Algeria and Angola -- are expected to support the United States, according to council diplomats.
France, Spain, Germany, Brazil, Benin and Chile have indicated they will abstain. Romania's U.N. ambassador, Mihnea Ioan Motoc, said his government will abstain unless its vote is responsible for defeating the U.S. resolution.
The International Criminal Court was established by treaty at a 1998 conference in Rome to prosecute individuals responsible for the most serious crimes, including genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The treaty has been signed by 135 nations and ratified by 94; it took effect in July 2002.
President Bill Clinton signed the treaty in December 2000, but the Bush administration renounced it in May 2002, warning that it could be used to conduct frivolous trials against U.S. troops. The United States subsequently threatened to shut down U.N. peacekeeping missions in Bosnia and East Timor unless the council exempted U.S. personnel from prosecution.
That strategy has fueled resentment against the Bush administration at the United Nations. More than 40 countries have a standing request to discuss the resolution in a public debate. A senior diplomat said most nations will use the event to criticize the resolution, and to draw attention to U.S. abuses of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"We think the resolution is not compatible with the U.N. charter," one Canadian diplomat said. "It's harmful to international accountability for serious crimes and the rule of law."
--------
China Will Not Back U.S. on Immunity from New Court
Reuters
Friday, June 18, 2004
By Evelyn Leopold
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A52807-2004Jun18.html
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - China said on Friday it would abstain on a resolution giving the United States immunity from the new International Criminal Court, a decision that may leave Washington short of votes to pass the resolution.
"I said to my colleagues we will abstain," Beijing's U.N. ambassador, Wang Guangya, told Reuters after a luncheon among the 15 Security Council members and U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Wang said earlier the resolution would send a wrong signal in light of the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal.
China's abstention could deprive the Bush administration of the nine "yes" votes required to adopt a resolution. So far only Britain, Russia, Angola and the Philippines are considered sure votes in favor.
All other members are contemplating an abstention or are undecided, following a rebuke by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who said on Thursday the resolution was "wrong," would "discredit the council" and was of "dubious judicial value."
He said that resolution "would be a very unfortunate signal to send at any time -- but particularly at this time."
On Friday Annan distributed a memorandum to council members, "strongly" urging them not to renew the measure.
"The secretary-general believes that extending the exemption once more would contradict the efforts of the United Nations -- including the council itself -- to promote the rule of law in international affairs," the memorandum said."
The United States, for the third year, is seeking to renew a U.N. Security Council resolution that would exempt from the court's prosecution military and civilian personnel "related to a U.N.-authorized operation" such as that in Iraq.
The immunity would be extended to all nations not among the 94 countries that have ratified a treaty establishing the court, set up to prosecute the world's worst atrocities -- genocide, mass war crimes and systematic human rights abuses.
"We're going to be coming back to the council by Tuesday with a final plan -- with our position in terms of next steps," said U.S. representative Stuart Holliday.
"Our position remains the same," he said. The resolution was first adopted in 2002 after the United States began to veto U.N. peacekeeping missions.
ABU GHRAIB IMPACT
The United States is investigating the abuse of prisoners by the U.S. military in Iraq, particularly in the large Abu Ghraib jail, and in Afghanistan.
Among the 15 council members, Germany, France, Spain, Brazil, Chile, Benin, Romania and now China are expected to abstain, diplomats said. Pakistan and Algeria were undecided.
The Chinese position is unusual because Beijing has not signed or ratified the court's treaty. Diplomats believe it was also related to disputes with Washington over Taiwan, although Beijing envoys have denied it.
Algerian Ambassador Abdallah Baali, whose "yes" vote had been considered certain, said his government had not decided.
"Obviously the Americans don't have the nine votes. The secretary-general's statement was quite strong and apparently the Abu Ghraib situation had an impact," said Baali, the only Arab member of the council.
The Bush administration is opposed in principle to an international court having any jurisdiction on American soldiers abroad and has signed 89 bilateral agreements to exempt any American officials.
Based in The Hague, Netherlands, the tribunal is a court of last resort. Analysts say it would not, for example, interfere in the abuse of Iraqi prisoners as long as a country's judicial system probed the allegations.
--------
U.S. Immunity Demand Could Divide U.N.
By EDITH M. LEDERER
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A53431-2004Jun18?language=printer
UNITED NATIONS - Secretary-General Kofi Annan told Security Council ambassadors Friday that renewing U.S. peacekeepers' immunity from international prosecution for war crimes would undermine international law and send "a very unfortunate signal" to the world.
Annan stepped up his campaign against a U.S.-sponsored resolution renewing American immunity from prosecution by the International Criminal Court for a third year, and opposition in the council appeared to be growing.
Despite intensive lobbying, Washington does not have the minimum nine votes of support on the 15-member council to approve a new exemption, council diplomats said.
On Thursday, Annan urged the council not to shield American peacekeepers, citing the recent abuse of Iraq prisoners by U.S. forces.
He kept up the pressure Friday, handing council ambassadors a written note at their monthly luncheon that raised "serious doubts" about the legality of an exemption and warning against dividing the Security Council.
It warned that granting immunity would "contradict" U.N. efforts "to promote the rule of law in international affairs."
The note, obtained by The Associated Press, "strongly urges the council not to renew this measure." It also stressed that a new exemption "would be a very unfortunate signal to send at any time - but particularly at this time."
Annan said after the luncheon, "We have some very difficult challenges ahead of us and the council needs to be able to work together and speak with one voice."
France, Germany, Spain, Brazil and Chile already said they would abstain on a new exemption, and Romania and Benin indicated they were likely to join them, council diplomats said.
China's U.N. Ambassador Wang Guangya said Friday that Beijing also will abstain. Algeria's U.N. Ambassador Abdallah Baali said his country - which was considered to be in the U.S. camp - was reconsidering its position.
Russia, also considered a U.S. supporter, called Friday for a compromise.
Earlier, U.S. deputy ambassador Stuart Holliday noted that the exemption was an issue for the council - the diplomatic way of saying the United States was unhappy about Annan's pronouncements.
But after the luncheon, Holliday was more conciliatory.
"The secretary-general shared his view and I think he expressed his concern for the unity of the council," Holliday said. "We're taking that on board."
The current exemption expires June 30. The United States introduced a resolution authorizing a one-year extension last month, but has delayed calling for a vote.
Asked whether Washington was going to put the resolution to a vote, Holliday said that between now and Tuesday "we're going to talk to our Security Council colleagues about that very question."
Germany's U.N. Ambassador Gunter Pleuger strongly backed Annan and expressed hope that other council members "will see it the same way."
The International Criminal Court can prosecute cases of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed after it was established July 1, 2002, but it will step in only when countries are unwilling or unable to dispense justice themselves.
The Bush administration argues that the International Criminal Court - which started operating last year - could be used for frivolous or politically motivated prosecutions of American troops.
Besides seeking another year's exemption, Washington has signed bilateral agreements with 89 countries barring any prosecution of American officials by the court and is seeking more such treaties.
The 94 countries that ratified the 1998 Rome Treaty establishing the court maintain it contains enough safeguards to prevent frivolous prosecutions.
Human rights groups and supporters of the court argue that nobody should be exempt from prosecution for war crimes.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
-------- homeland security
Cheney Authorized Shooting Down Planes
By Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50745-2004Jun17?language=printer
At 10:39 on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Vice President Cheney, in a bunker beneath the White House, told Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in a videoconference that he had been informed earlier that morning that hijacked planes were approaching Washington.
"Pursuant to the president's instructions, I gave authorization for them to be taken out," Cheney told Rumsfeld, who was at the Pentagon. Informing Rumsfeld that the fighter pilots had received orders to fire, Cheney added, "It's my understanding they've already taken a couple of aircraft out."
Cheney's comments, which were soon proved erroneous, were detailed in a report issued yesterday by the commission investigating the terrorist attacks. The comments are part of the considerable confusion that surrounded top government officials as the tense drama unfolded.
The commission's description of actions taken by Cheney and President Bush, based in part on interviews with both men, provides new details of that morning. The report portrays the vice president taking command from his bunker while Bush, who was in Florida, communicated with the White House in a series of phone calls, and occasionally had trouble getting through.
Cheney, who told the commission he was operating on instructions from Bush given in a phone call, issued authority for aircraft threatening Washington to be shot down. But the commission noted that "among the sources that reflect other important events that morning there is no documentary evidence for this call, although the relevant sources are incomplete." Those sources include people nearby taking notes, such as Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, and Cheney's wife, Lynne.
Bush and Cheney told the commission that they remember the phone call; the president said it reminded him of his time as a fighter pilot. National security adviser Condoleezza Rice, who had joined Cheney, told the commission that she heard the vice president discuss the rules of engagement for fighter jets over Washington with Bush.
Within minutes, Cheney would use his authority. Told -- erroneously, as it turned out -- that a presumably hijacked aircraft was 80 miles from Washington, Cheney decided "in about the time it takes a batter to swing" to authorize fighter jets scrambled from Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, Va., to engage it, the commission reported.
Only later did White House Deputy Chief of Staff Joshua B. Bolten suggest that Cheney call Bush once more to confirm the engagement order, according to the commission. Logs in Cheney's bunker and on Air Force One confirm conversations at 10:18 and 10:20, respectively.
Later, Cheney spoke to Rumsfeld via videoconference. When the vice president said the orders had been relayed to the jets and "a couple of aircraft" had been downed, Rumsfeld replied: "We can't confirm that. We're told that one aircraft is down but we do not have a pilot report that they did it."
But the commission determined that the Langley fighter jets sent to circle Washington never received the shoot-down order. It was passed down the chain of command, but commanders of the North American Aerospace Defense Command's northeast sector did not give it to the pilots.
"Both the mission commander and the weapons director indicated they did not pass the order to fighters circling Washington and New York City because they were unsure how the pilots would, or should, proceed with this guidance," the commission reported.
"In short," the report added, "while leaders believed the fighters circling above them had been instructed to 'take out' hostile aircraft, the only orders actually conveyed to the Langley pilots were to 'ID type and tail.' "
Unknown to Cheney or Bush, however, by 10:45 other fighter jets would be circling Washington, and these had clear authority to shoot down planes, the commission determined. They were sent from Andrews Air Force Base by the commander of the 113th Wing of the Air National Guard, in consultation with the Secret Service, which relayed instructions that an agent said were from Cheney.
That arrangement was "outside the military chain of command," according to the commission report. Bush and Cheney told the commission they were unaware that fighters had been scrambled from Andrews.
Cheney would give the order to engage twice -- at news that United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania, was approaching Washington, and at what turned out to be a medevac helicopter, the commission determined. Neither aircraft was engaged.
About 9 a.m. that day, at the Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Fla., it was Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, who first told him and White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center, though initially it was believed to be a small private plane, the commission reported.
Cheney, told by his assistant to turn on his television, was pondering "how the hell a plane could hit the World Trade Center" when he saw the second plane crash into the South Tower, the commission reported.
White House officials jumped into action, but the commission was skeptical about whether their efforts that morning had much effect. It said a video teleconference in the White House situation room, chaired by Richard A. Clarke, then head of counterterrorism at the White House, "had no immediate effect on the emergency defense efforts."
Bush remained in the classroom for "five to seven minutes" after learning of the second crash as the children around him continued reading. He had his first conversation with Cheney at about 9:15. Those traveling with the president did not know other aircraft were missing, the commission reported.
Communications with Washington were so poor that Bush, who told the commission he was "deeply dissatisfied" with the technical problems, at one point resorted to using a cell phone on the way to Air Force One, according to commission Chairman Thomas H. Kean and Vice Chairman Lee H. Hamilton. Both said Bush's motorcade took a wrong turn on the way to the airport and had to reverse.
Bush and Cheney spoke again at 9:45, while Bush was on the tarmac aboard Air Force One. By that time, both towers of the World Trade Center were aflame and the Pentagon had been hit.
"Sounds like we have a minor war going on here," Bush told Cheney, according to the commission report. "I heard about the Pentagon. We're at war . . . somebody's going to pay."
Cheney joined the Secret Service and Card in urging Bush not to return to Washington. The two apparently were still on the phone, about 10 minutes later, as Air Force One took off from Florida without a destination. "The objective was to get up in the air -- as fast and as high as possible -- and then decide where to go," the commission report noted.
Staff writer Dan Eggen contributed to this report.
--------
Homeland Security Employs Imagination
Outsiders Help Devise Possible Terrorism Plots
By John Mintz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A27
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50534-2004Jun17.html
The Department of Homeland Security, given the difficult task of trying to divine al Qaeda's future methods of attack on the United States, is seeking advice from some unexpected sources these days: futurists, philosophers, software programmers, a pop musician and a thriller writer.
Picking the brains of people with offbeat specialties and life experiences is the latest tactic in the government's efforts to get inside the heads of worldwide terrorists. Homeland Security's Analytic Red Cell office employs a tactic that has been used for decades by U.S. intelligence agencies, the Pentagon and large corporations -- gathering together people from outside their insular bureaucracies to arrive at fresh insights.
"We try to anticipate four, five moves ahead in the mind of our adversary," said Jon Nowick, director of the Analytic Red Cell program, which is part of the department's Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection, or intelligence, unit. "We paint a picture where there are no dots to connect."
Typically the Red Cell team assembles 20 or so participants for a day-long session at leased offices in the Washington area. Each session divides into smaller groups and takes up a different question, such as: If you were a terrorist, how would you target the G-8 economic summit, held last week in Georgia? Another recent topic was: Why haven't terrorists hit the United States since Sept. 11, 2001?
The results are compared with terrorism analysis from Homeland Security's intelligence professionals who examine real-life threat information. Written reports on Red Cell's sessions are then forwarded to terrorism analysts inside the department, as well as to local and state police and security experts in private industry. Most Red Cell reports note they are "alternative assessments intended to provoke thought and stimulate discussion."
The Red Cell has not previously publicized itself. Its leaders talked to a reporter recently in part to quell rumors that one of the team's threat scenarios -- such as an assault on a chemical plant -- might be a real-life event.
Many participants have not worked much with the government before.
"When I got the call, I was floored," said Brad Meltzer, the author of several successful Washington thrillers, recalling his talk with the Homeland Security official who recruited him. "They said, 'We want people who think differently from the ones we have on staff.' "
He declined to say what scenario his session focused on -- like other participants, he had to sign a nondisclosure agreement. But Meltzer said among the participants in his session were a psychologist, a philosopher, a professor of Middle Eastern terrorism and employees of the CIA and FBI.
Red Cell has finished 10 reports this year, and six more are being prepared -- quickening the pace of reports in its first months of operation last year. Homeland Security officials provided only vague descriptions of a few of their topics.
In one early session last summer, Red Cell examined the vulnerabilities of commercial aviation. The participants, including aviation professionals, noted possible methods for terrorists to get bomb-bearing parcels onto passenger planes. The findings helped inform the department's rules on air cargo, officials said.
Last fall, as Hurricane Isabel approached the mid-Atlantic states, another session warned of specific ways terrorists could launch an attack to exploit local authorities' preoccupation with the storm.
A typical session will examine a sector of critical infrastructure -- gas pipelines, say -- and could include Special Forces experts on attack tactics, scientists who understand pipeline engineering and corporate security officers who know the workings of that industry.
"Homeland Security is on to a good thing," said Daniel S. Gressang IV, who trains intelligence officers at the Pentagon's Joint Military Intelligence College and who has advised the Red Cell team. "They're getting at some creative ideas."
"I'm a huge fan of red teaming" efforts like Homeland Security's, said Frank Cilluffo, a former domestic defense official in the Clinton and Bush White Houses who is now head of George Washington University's homeland security program. "It's an important learning tool."
The CIA has used red teaming for decades -- in the 1970s, Harvard University Russia expert Richard Pipes ran a "Team B" study that asserted the agency had underestimated Soviet military strength. Navy Seals have used Red Cell teams to mount assaults on military bases to test their security.
The Pentagon has gathered hundreds of Red Teams to reexamine assumptions about foreign militaries and their weapon systems, at times recruiting the services of Web designers, historians and screenwriters.
Meltzer, a Montgomery County resident, reckons Homeland Security picked him in part because some of his novels include closely held details about the physical layout of some key Washington landmarks, and descriptions of how people can sneak around and in them.
In his novel "The First Counsel," a young White House lawyer falls in love with the president's daughter, and the two evade Secret Service minders as they prowl tunnels beneath the White House. These sections of his books were based on careful reporting, and he had retired Secret Service agents vet them, Meltzer said.
Meltzer said he was impressed by the Red Cell team's ingenuity and seriousness. "If I can help the government on terrorism," he said, "that's better than being on the bestseller list."
--------
House Rejects Plane Cargo Inspections
By ALAN FRAM
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 11:35 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53874-2004Jun18.html
WASHINGTON - The House refused on Friday to require inspections of all cargo shipped on passenger airline flights, heeding arguments that technology is not available, and losing the freight would drive carriers into bankruptcy.
With its 211-191 vote, the House ignored election-year cries that the government must do what it takes to enhance security in an era of unabated terror threats. Currently, only a small percentage of cargo aboard passenger flights is inspected, and uninspected cargo is supposed to come only from shippers known to the government.
"If six planes are blown out of the sky a week from now or two weeks from now, are all of us going to go back to our districts and say, `We can't afford to do it?'" said Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn. "I can't do that."
Rep. Harold Rogers, R-Ky., cited estimates by the Transportation Security Administration that it would take $700 million and the hiring of 9,000 additional inspectors to examine cargo thoroughly on passenger flights at the nation's largest airports. He said forbidding airlines to carry uninspected freight would have financially catastrophic effects on an industry that already has several struggling companies.
"You shut off air cargo, you close down the airlines," Rogers said.
The vote was on an amendment by Shays and Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., to a measure providing $32 billion for next year for the Homeland Security Department.
The overall bill was approved by 400-5. It would provide more money than President Bush proposed to help state and local emergency responders, though less than he wanted for cities considered the likeliest terrorist targets.
Last year, the House easily approved a similar provision requiring inspections of cargo aboard passenger flights, but it was never approved by the Senate.
Lobbying against this year's effort were the airline, airport and air freight industries, congressional aides said. Also helping to sink the proposal were money in the bill for research, 100 new cargo inspectors and dogs for detecting explosives, along with a requirement that the percentage of air cargo inspected be doubled.
House Democrats also lost a fresh attempt to annul a huge federal security contract with Accenture LLP, as lawmakers ignored arguments that the company's Bermuda-based parent firm was letting it avoid some U.S. taxes.
The near-party line 221-182 vote came despite Democrats' hopes that they had found a resonant campaign issue. Democrats argued that at a time of war and record budget deficits, the government should not award work worth up to $10 billion over 10 years to a company they said was shrinking its U.S. tax burden by incorporating offshore.
They ran into broad opposition from business and House GOP leaders. Accenture supporters said canceling the contract would cost thousands of U.S. jobs and delay work on a project for developing high technology ways of screening foreigners as they enter or leave the country.
The House also voted 259-148 to kill a proposal by Rep. Thomas Tancredo, R-Colo., that would have barred Homeland Security money to states and municipalities that issue drivers' licenses to illegal aliens, or refuse to share information on them with the federal government.
Tancredo said his plan simply would have required local governments to heed current law, but his proposal sparked heated comments by opponents.
"He wants all of us who look a certain way, have certain names, speak a certain way to have big brother filter us out," said Rep. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., a member of the House Democratic leadership.
And early Friday, the House voted 237-171 to kill an effort by lawmakers from New York and other urban areas to shift $446 million for emergency responders from a nationwide program to one for cities considered likely terror targets.
-------- immigration / refugees
Funds help counties jail illegal aliens
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
By Christina Bellantoni
June 18, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/metro/20040617-110031-6173r.htm
Fairfax and Arlington counties will receive more than $800,000 in federal grant money to offset the cost of jailing illegal aliens, a power the localities will gain under a new state law that takes effect July 1.
Officials in both counties said they will enforce the law aimed at cracking down on illegal immigrants in the fight against gangs and terrorists.
Sen. George Allen, Virginia Republican, said yesterday the 28 jurisdictions in Virginia that will be enforcing the law will each get a portion of the $2.8 million federal grant to help defray the costs associated with detaining the illegal aliens.
Arlington will receive $223,125, and Fairfax County will receive $618,920. Loudoun County will receive $72,846, and Prince William County will receive $296,786.
A spokesman for Mr. Allen said the money is intended to help jurisdictions with already tight budgets deal with the federal issue of illegal aliens. The federal grant is part of the U.S. Department of Justice's State Criminal Assistance Program.
"Senator Allen feels that committing a violent crime is outrageous and has made it very clear he wants to get violent criminals off the street," spokesman John Reid said. "The fact that they are illegal aliens means we shouldn't have to deal with their crime in the first place."
Mr. Reid said the senator hopes jurisdictions will now feel they have the resources - with the new law and the federal grant money - to respond to the state's problem with illegal aliens.
Currently, police investigating a crime are not authorized to forcibly hold an illegal alien pending the arrival of a federal Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent. The new law will permit local police to arrest any illegal immigrant who previously had been convicted of a felony and deported.
Fairfax County Police Sgt. Richard Perez said the county, which receives the largest portion of the grant, will use the powers granted by the new law.
"Fairfax County Police Department will use that law to rid our communities of felons, who are here illegally and who are engaging in criminal activity," he said.
In a letter published May 1 in The Washington Times, Arlington County Police Chief M. Douglas Scott said current policy authorizes officers to take action when they come into contact with illegal immigrants who are convicted felons or are suspected of terrorism or gang activity.
"When the law goes into effect July 1, Arlington police officers will arrest known undocumented immigrants, meeting the very narrow criteria set forth in the new law," Chief Scott wrote.
The chief's spokesman, Matt Martin, declined to comment further yesterday.
Meanwhile, Alexandria officials plan to announce a policy concerning the law in the next few weeks, according to police spokeswoman Amy Bertsch.
Miss Bertsch said police are working with the Alexandria Human Rights Commission, the city's Commonwealth's Attorney's office and Hispanic groups to develop a policy.
Immigration experts estimate that 10 million illegal aliens reside in the United States and that more than 100,000 of them live in Virginia.
Authorities have connected illegal immigrants from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras with crime gangs operating in Northern Virginia, and a Mexican drug syndicate with a sharp increase in methamphetamine trafficking in the Shenandoah Valley.
The new law was part of a package of antigang legislation proposed this year by state Attorney General Jerry W. Kilgore, a Republican.
--------
Border Patrol Makes In-Country Sweep
By BEN FOX and MICHELLE MORGANTE
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 1:55 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52237-2004Jun18?language=printer
ONTARIO, Calif. - Elidia Celestina peered from behind a window shade before opening the door a crack to a stranger. If she leaves her apartment at all these days, it is only for a rushed, nerve-racking trip to the store.
"Everyone is afraid," said Celestina, 19, who came from Mexico five months ago. "We're like mice, hiding in our homes."
She and many other illegal immigrants in Southern California have been gripped by fear since a new Border Patrol unit began roving through Hispanic communities and making arrests well north of the border, beyond the agency's usual area of operations.
Since June 1, the unit has captured more than 420 suspected illegal immigrants. They have been picked up on the street, pulled over while driving, or caught coming out of stores in communities 100 miles or more from the Mexican border.
The raids have spread such fear that some people have stopped going shopping or attending church. Immigrant advocates say some are staying home from work, too.
California is home to an estimated 2 million illegal immigrants, more than any other state. The border itself is patrolled aggressively. But for years, illegal immigrants who reach the interior, often at great cost and danger, have faced little risk of arrest.
"It does appear to be a shift in tactics," said Shaheena Ahmad Simons, a Los Angeles attorney with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund. "These sweeps have created a pervasive fear and even anger among Latinos regardless of their immigration status."
While the Border Patrol has employed what it refers to as roving units in the past, it had not used them recently, said Mario Villarreal, an agency spokesman in Washington.
Villarreal would not say exactly why the Border Patrol has started the inland sweeps.
The Border Patrol has the legal authority to make arrests inland but traditionally operates close to the border, and it employs checkpoints instead of roving patrols. It is immigration agents, from a different agency altogether, who generally make arrests inland.
The Mobile Patrol Group consists of 12 agents based at a station in Temecula, about 55 miles from the border. The Temecula team ranges across some 3,000 square miles.
Border Patrol officials said it makes arrests only when it has information about the presence of illegal immigrants.
"If you're here legally in the United States, you really don't have anything to worry about," said Raul Martinez, a Border Patrol spokesman.
Nevertheless, immigrant activists contend agents have violated people's rights by questioning Hispanics without probable cause.
"In Southern California, there are many people who appear to be of Mexican ancestry. That does not mean they are here illegally," said Simons, whose organization is considering a legal challenge.
Mexican President Vicente Fox also has criticized the arrests, instructing his foreign secretary this week to lodge "an energetic protest" with the U.S. government.
Throughout the region, the arrests have set off rumors and panic.
Alerts, often false, about "la migra" checkpoints (Spanish slang for immigration officials) have become as common as traffic reports on Spanish-language radio. Activists have organized marches and protests. Local politicians have called immigration officials, demanding answers. Shops and restaurants in Hispanic neighborhoods say their business has plummeted because many illegal immigrants are staying close to home.
"We're just waiting for the moment when it's going to get us. We're terrified," said Luis Paredes, a 28-year-old construction worker in Escondido, 50 miles north of the border. He and wife go out only to work or to buy groceries. And they stick together when they do so, for fear one will be deported without the other.
On June 4, the Border Patrol unit went north to the San Bernardino County city of Ontario, about 100 miles from Mexico, and captured 79 illegal immigrants. Among them were Celestina's husband and his two brothers, who were caught as they headed to a job unloading trucks. A day later, the patrol arrested 75 people in Corona, about 80 miles from the border.
The Border Patrol said about 10 percent of those detained had criminal records. "We've gotten numerous calls of support from the community," Martinez said. "It's overwhelming."
Nearly all those captured are Mexican, with a few from Central America. The vast majority have agreed to be released just across the border, in Tijuana, rather than await a deportation hearing. Celestina, who said she is four months pregnant, now waits for her husband to return from Tijuana.
The area around Escondido, which means "hidden" in Spanish, has been hardest hit by the patrol, with 268 people arrested as of Thursday.
In a commercial district frequented by Hispanics, witnesses said Border Patrol agents cornered people at a laundry and a supermarket.
Beatriz Ramirez, who runs a money-transfer business, said the number of people using her service to send cash to families in Latin America has dropped to one or two per day, down from 20.
"It's become a ghost street," she said.
Teodulo Ruiz Perez, who is from Mexico and works at a car wash, said: "We're just here working. What harm are we doing? Is it a sin to work?"
On the Internet:
http://www.maldef.org
http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/enforcement/
-------- justice
GOP Senators Block Subpoena on Memos but Prod White House
By Helen Dewar
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A23
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50454-2004Jun17.html
Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee blocked a move by Democrats yesterday to subpoena Justice Department memos on the use of torture, intimidation and other abusive tactics in interrogation of suspected terrorists.
But several GOP senators, including the committee chairman, Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), called on the Bush administration to give Congress the documents and warned that they might support a subpoena at some point, just not now.
Hatch said he asked Attorney General John D. Ashcroft and White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales to turn over the 23 memos -- some of which suggested legal justification for abuse of prisoners -- and believed they would do so.
He described the Democrats' subpoena request as a "dumb-ass thing to do" and a "fishing expedition . . . to make a political point" but added that "I think the White House should comply" with the committee's earlier requests for the documents.
Democrats, accusing the administration of having "snubbed" and "stonewalled" the Senate on the issue, remained skeptical of administration intentions, however, and argued that subpoenas were the only guaranteed way to get the material.
"Hiding these documents from view is the brazen sign of a coverup, not cooperation," said Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), ranking minority member, who requested the subpoena on behalf of Democrats on the panel. "I haven't seen this kind of stonewalling since the Nixon era," he added.
But Republicans contended that Leahy's proposed subpoena was premature, overly broad and a threat to national security. Some of the questions amount to a "dangerous intrusion" on the country's strategy for fighting terrorism, said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.).
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), a member of both the Judiciary and Armed Services committees, said Defense Department general counsel William J. Haynes II told him earlier this week that the Pentagon would give the Armed Services Committee some of the memos listed in the subpoena. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) said Democrats have received no such assurances.
In an attempt to strike a compromise, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) offered to give Ashcroft another week to turn over the documents or explain why they should not be released before the subpoenas would be served June 24. But, even though Hatch had earlier indicated interest in Feinstein's proposal, it was defeated, 10 to 9, on a strictly party-line vote.
At yesterday's hearing, Kennedy vowed to take the issue to the full Senate -- which Republicans control with 51 votes -- if the committee refused to act. "This is a defining issue about the ideals and values of this country," Kennedy said.
--------
Sam Dash's Warning About Government Intruders:
The Story Of The Rise And Fall Of Fourth Amendment Protections
FindLaw
By JOHN W. DEAN
Friday, Jun. 18, 2004
On May 29, 2004, Sam Dash, who had served as Chief Counsel of the Senate Watergate Committee, departed this mortal coil. (Ironically, former Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox passed away later the same day.)
Throughout his career as a practicing attorney, prosecutor and law professor, Sam Dash found himself challenging those who abused their powers. When I talked with him shortly before he was hospitalized with the heart problem that would take his life, he was planning to do so again.
"This guy Ashcroft is a very dangerous attorney general," he told me during our last telephone conversation. We were talking about the book he had just finished, The Intruders: Unreasonable Searches and Seizures from King John to John Ashcroft, which has now been published.
I just finished reading Sam's final work, and it is a warning not to be ignored. But before examining his challenge of Ashcroft's abuses of power, a few words about Sam are appropriate. He was man I knew and admired long before Watergate, where his work left a model for legislative investigations.
Sam was not a partisan, but rather a consummate professional. He never looked for gratuitous combat, yet when so engaged, he never shied from saying what needed to be said. He took his work seriously, and as his career evolved, he became one of the nation's leading legal ethicists.
Most knew him as Professor Dash, for he spent the better part of his professional career sharing his knowledge of criminal law and criminal justice with countless students at the Georgetown University Law Center.
Challenging Those Who Abused Their Power
As Chief Counsel to the Senate Watergate Committee, Dash found it necessary to take to task some of the most powerful men in government for abusing their authority. Sam was deeply troubled, for good reasons, about the Nixon White House's illegal wiretaps and unfounded break-ins to obtain information without a search warrant.
When former Attorney General John Mitchell and former Nixon aides John Ehrlichman and Bob Haldeman appeared before the committee, Dash repeatedly pressed them on their abuses of power. And his new book shows that the only thing he agreed with these men about was the fact that they had eroded the rights of Americans under the Fourth Amendment.
Many years after Watergate, Dash again found himself publicly confronting the misuses of power as a part of the Independent Counsel's investigation of President Clinton. Dash had been hired by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr to serve as his ethics adviser. But he resigned from that post in protest over Starr's improper use of his office to advocate President Clinton's impeachment.
When Starr appeared before the House Judiciary Committee to testify, Dash -- who had largely written the law creating independent counsels -- believed Starr had violated the law. "You have violated your obligations under the independent counsel statute and have unlawfully intruded on the power of impeachment, which the Constitution gives solely to the House," Dash wrote to Starr in resigning.
Not surprisingly, Starr disagreed. But Dash's resignation showed that politics dominated the Starr inquiry.
In our last conversation, Sam told me of his plans to tell Americans that Attorney General John Ashcroft was ignoring the lessons of history in fighting terrorism. He had been working on a book about history of the Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable searches and seizures -- a body of law he had studied throughout his professional career.
He said he had just about finished his book when 9/11 occurred. "I was dumbfounded by the way the Bush Administration pushed aside the Constitution to launch their war on terrorism," he said. "These guys didn't need new laws to deal with terrorism. The 9/11 disaster didn't occur because we were without sufficient laws on the books. What we needed before 9/11, and now, is more competent law enforcement," he explained.
Sam - who was as hardnosed and knowledgeable a law enforcement person as could be found -- was deeply concerned that Ashcroft had asked Congress for, and then received, new laws as part of the USA Patriot Act that further narrowed the proscription of the Fourth Amendment. For there was no chance, Sam felt, that the present conservative U.S. Supreme Court would strike down the new law as unconstitutional, despite the fact that it pushed even further than the High Court's present limits.
The Development Of Fourth Amendment Rights
Dash's book, The Intruders: Unreasonable Searches and Seizures from King John to John Ashcroft, offers a compressed history of the 800-year struggle for individual privacy rights that ranges from the Magna Carta to writing of the Fourth Amendment. For this nation, those rights were central to the American Revolution.
The Fourth Amendment declares that people in this country have the right to be secure in their houses, persons, papers and effects from unreasonable searches and seizures. It repeals the English law of "general warrants," which had enabled British soldiers to search and seize from the American colonists -- in their homes, or from their persons -- at whim. Under the Fourth Amendment, warrants must be issued upon probable cause and then only regarding specific places to be searched, and persons or things to be seized.
Dash has written a history, not a treatise. And he has written it for lawyers as well as a general reader. Remarkably, while the Fourth Amendment was adopted in 1791, it did not become an issue before the U.S. Supreme Court for close to one hundred years. Until then, there were simply no federal criminal laws that raised the issue, and the state courts held that the Fourth Amendment did not apply to them. And initially, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed
From the Code of Hammurabi, to the Bible, to pronouncements of Roman emperors, civilized society has long recognized the need for individual privacy free from the prying eyes of government. But effective means of protecting this need has been slow in evolving. Indeed, it was not until 1914 that the U.S. Supreme Court discovered how to give meaning to Fourth Amendment law, when it developed what would become known as the exclusionary rule in the landmark case of Weeks v. United States.
Dash tracks the evolution and development of the exclusionary rule. That rule precluded the use of evidence obtained by unconstitutional means - which, in turn, made it impossible for law enforcement to prosecute cases where officers had failed to comply with the Fourth Amendment's strictures in investigating crimes.
Not unlike Michael Dorf's Constitutional Law Stories, Dash's book presents the human story behind the landmark Fourth Amendment decisions of the High Court. With approval, Dash tells how and why the Warren Court expanded the law to impose the exclusionary rule on state courts as well in Mapp v. Ohio.
Dash's book masterfully digests important history that is essential to understanding a freedom many Americans take for granted. But the true reason underlying Dash's work becomes apparent only in its last two chapters.
There, it takes Dash less than fifty pages to show how we are now rapidly losing rights and liberties it took us some 800 years to acquire.
Dash's Core Concern: The Limiting Of Fourth Amendment Rights
The mince-no-words professor lays out his core concerns in the book's final chapters. "Our popular belief that American constitutional principles of freedom are immutable -- that objective and wise justices consistently declare the law of the land -- is stored myth," Dash explains. "In fact, the meaning of constitutional protections of the people is politically decided from time to time, depending on who is appointed to the Court."
Dash shows that Nixon's and Reagan's appointees to the Supreme Court undertook a sustained attack on the work of the Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren, who "had presided during the 1960s over what has been called the Bill of Rights revolution -- a reaffirmation and strengthening by the Court of the basic constitutional protections of the people, particularly those persons accused in criminal cases."
As Dash explains, the Court under Chief Justices Warren Burger and William Rehnquist have twisted and rendered largely ineffective precedents such as Weeks and Mapp - using, he argues, intellectually dishonesty to do so. Rather than overturn these precedents (which would have produced an uproar), they have enfeebled this landmark Fourth Amendment holding by using a more subtle strategy.
As described by Dash, the strategy is this: The Justices proceed by "(1) inventing a balancing test, (2) limiting the number of challenges to unlawful searches and seizures through the doctrine of 'standing,' and (3) creating a good faith exception." (The "standing" doctrine holds that not all persons, but only a select class, are appropriate to be the plaintiffs suing to enforce a particular constitutional right.)
Dash's Particular Concern: The USA Patriot Act
As disturbing as these decisions were to Dash, he explains them with scholarly honesty. But it was the USA Patriot Act that pushed the envelope over the edge for him. (I know this not because of his book, which throughout retains the even temper of a litigator not wanting to annoy either judge or jury with hyperbole, but because of our conversations.)
Dash writes of the USA Patriot Act, that "the president and his attorney general demanded greater search and seizure powers than a permissive Supreme Court had already given them. Though members of Congress grumbled, they submitted to these demands, desiring to appear as patriotic as the president in the war on terrorism." In conversation, however, Sam was less temperate; he expressed outrage at this foolishness -- at the Congress's removing almost all restrains on law enforcement when investigating "terrorism."
To make his point, while waiting for his book to come off the presses, Sam wrote in a Newsday article, "If, as now seems likely, top White House aides leaked the identity of an American undercover agent, they may have committed an act of domestic terrorism as defined by the dragnet language of the Patriot Act their boss wanted so much to help him catch terrorists." (See my prior column for an explanation of why the leak of agent Valerie Plame's identity was criminal.)
Under the Patriot Act, as Sam said to me with a chuckle, all the FBI has to do is tell a judge that it would "impede their investigation" to give the White House notice, and they could sneak into the Oval Office without warning -- carrying approval from a secret court, granted in secret. "Maybe if the president or his aides were investigated under this law they would understand what they are doing," Sam declared.
But if they, and others, would read Dash's The Intruders: Unreasonable Searches and Seizures from King John to John Ashcroft, I doubt the Bush-Cheney reelection bid would make further extensions of the USA Patriot Act a centerpiece of their campaign. Nor would they boast of their war on terrorism to date.
Sam Dash warns: "Our government leaders -- executive, legislative, and judicial branches -- have made many mistakes in the past when they have lost sight of the sacred American values rooted in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. We are at the brink of even graver mistakes and assaults on these values. We dare not turn away from them -- for how naked, weak, and poor we will be without them."
-------- police
Denver Police's 'Spy Files' to Be Archived
June 18, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/national/18denver.html
DENVER, June 17 (AP) - Thousands of "spy files" kept by the Denver police on members of peaceful protest groups will be archived so the subjects can view information gathered about them over the past half-century.
Mayor John Hickenlooper apologized Thursday for the files, blaming "a general lack of oversight."
Subjects included a Franciscan nun, Amnesty International and more than 100 public school students. The American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado said the files covered 10,000 people and 1,000 groups.
The A.C.L.U. sued to stop the Denver Intelligence Bureau, a division of the police department, from collecting such information without a clear law enforcement reason, saying it had a chilling effect on First Amendment rights. The group reached a settlement with the city last year.
-------- prisons / prisoners
Civilian Charged In Beating of Afghan Detainee
By Susan Schmidt and Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50792-2004Jun17?language=printer
A former Army Special Forces soldier working as a contractor for the CIA in Afghanistan was charged yesterday with brutally assaulting a prisoner during three days of interrogations that ended in the Afghan man's death last year.
David A. Passaro, 38, became the first civilian to be charged in the scandal surrounding the abuse of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan. A grand jury in Passaro's home state of North Carolina handed up a four-count indictment that accused him of using a large flashlight to beat a detainee suspected of participating in rocket attacks on a U.S. military base near the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Abdul Wali died in his tiny mud-walled cell last June 21, three days after he surrendered for questioning at the front gate of Asadabad Base. Justice Department officials said that Passaro was charged with assault rather than murder because no autopsy had been performed on Wali that would have established the cause of death.
"It's a continuing investigation," Attorney General John D. Ashcroft said in announcing the indictment. "We would follow additional evidence to add charges if warranted."
The indictment comes as the U.S. military investigates allegations of detainee abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan that extend beyond the mistreatment captured in widely published photographs at the Abu Ghraib prison. Earlier this month, the Pentagon said that it had investigated 36 deaths of detainees and that 12 inquiries were still open.
The Army announced yesterday that one investigation has resulted in a murder charge against a captain in the killing of an Iraqi man during an altercation on May 21 in Kufa, Iraq. Soldiers of the 1st Armored Division were chasing a vehicle believed to be carrying members of Moqtada Sadr's militia, and they shot and wounded the driver and passenger. The officer, whose name was withheld, is accused of fatally shooting one of them after the chase.
Ashcroft said yesterday that his department has received from the CIA additional referrals of possible prisoner abuse -- a number he had previously set at three. He said the department has also been asked by the Pentagon to investigate a case of possible abuse. He declined to detail the other cases or to say whether they involved deaths.
Passaro was arrested in Fayetteville, N.C., yesterday morning and is scheduled for a detention hearing Tuesday. Court officials said he had not yet retained a lawyer.
The CIA's inspector general began an investigation shortly after Wali's death and referred the matter to the Justice Department in November for criminal prosecution. The department sent the case to the U.S. attorney's office in Raleigh, N.C., earlier this year. Passaro was relieved of his duties and sent back to the United States after Wali died, Justice Department officials said.
Passaro was part of a clandestine paramilitary team made up of U.S. Special Forces and CIA personnel who capture and interrogate Taliban and al Qaeda members. He had worked for the CIA since December 2002 and got to Asadabad in early June 2003, said a U.S. official familiar with the case.
A member of the U.S. military who was based in Asadabad when the death occurred said three CIA workers -- one full-time employee and two contractors -- took part in interrogating Wali. Special Forces guards checked on him every several hours. About an hour after one interrogation session, guards entered the holding cell and discovered that "the man was dead," he said.
Immediately after Wali's death, he said, the CIA personnel left the base by helicopter. The soldier later learned that the CIA station chief in Kabul had been told that Special Forces troops had killed the man, according to the military source and an official in Washington. When the Special Forces team threatened to make the case public, the military source said, the CIA personnel admitted what had happened. An intelligence official in Washington yesterday called that allegation "flat wrong."
CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield said: "We take allegations of wrongdoing very seriously, and it is important to bear in mind that the CIA immediately reported these allegations to the CIA inspector general and the Department of Justice. . . . The CIA does not support or condone unlawful activities of any sort and has an obligation to report possible violations of the law to the appropriate authorities."
Wali's final days were chronicled by an American, Hyder Akbar, 18, whose father, Sayed Fazl Akbar, had returned to his native Kunar province to become the governor there after the fall of the Taliban. Portions of a tape-recorded diary that Hyder Akbar kept during a visit with his father were played Dec. 12 on National Public Radio.
Sayed Fazl Akbar, speaking into his son's tape recorder, said he asked the Americans to hold off using military force to capture Wali, who he said "had been on the Americans' and the coalition force's most-wanted list for cooperating with terrorists or being a terrorist." Wali was deeply fearful of turning himself in to the Americans, said the elder Akbar, so Akbar sent his son to go with him "as a sign of trust."
Said Hyder Akbar: "So I took him to the Americans. And, like, they're asking him where he was 14 days ago on the night of the three rockets. And this guy, like, don't have calendars, you know? . . . I just put my hand on his shoulder and I let him know: 'Just say the truth. Nothing is going to happen if you just say the truth.' And he was absolutely petrified, and he could barely whisper the okay."
Three days later, Hyder Akbar and his father returned to Asadabad to check on Wali. A translator named Steve and another American named Dave sat down with them, according to Hyder Akbar, and said, "Unfortunately, Abdul Wali passed away." Hyder Akbar said: "My jaw dropped. It's like 'Oh, my God.' . . . They said that at 3:30, 4, he just collapsed and they tried to make him stand again. And he stood for a second, but then he fell again and then they did the whole routine with the CPR and they said no expenses were held, just like they would have treated an American life."
Hyder Akbar said the Americans told him Wali was well treated, but that he had "put rocks in his mouth," tried to break free of his shackles and "hit his head against the wall a couple of times." Akbar said he was taken to see the body and saw no marks on Wali.
"It's hard not to feel responsible," Akbar said. "Poor guy was only 28. He was just so scared."
Passaro trained as a police officer in Hartford, Conn., but was fired in 1990 during his probationary period after he was arrested by state police on an assault charge, according to Hartford police spokeswoman Nancy Mulroy. Passaro pleaded guilty to a lesser charge, she said.
Ashcroft said the Wali investigation has been slowed somewhat by the exigencies of war, classification issues and the dispersal of witnesses to other international locales.
Each of the four assault counts against Passaro is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Ashcroft said a team of prosecutors experienced in cases involving classified information and national security issues has been created to handle other cases of alleged prisoner abuse.
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Rumsfeld Authorized Secret Detention of Prisoner
By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A22
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50746-2004Jun17.html
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said yesterday that he approved the secret detention of a suspected terrorist in Iraq after receiving a request to do so from CIA Director George J. Tenet, effectively hiding the prisoner from the International Committee of the Red Cross for seven months.
Rumsfeld, in an afternoon news briefing at the Pentagon, also acknowledged that there have been other cases in which detainees have been held secretly. "There are instances where that occurs," Rumsfeld said. "And a request was made to do that and we did."
Earlier this year, an Army investigation into the abuses of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq sternly criticized the practice of keeping "ghost detainees" -- CIA prisoners who were kept off official rolls and moved to keep them from the Red Cross. The investigative report called it "deceptive, contrary to Army doctrine and in violation of international law."
Yesterday Rumsfeld said the CIA was authorized to secretly detain suspected terrorists. And he said this prisoner, an Iraqi suspected of membership in the terrorist group al-Ansar, should not be put in the same category as the prisoners who were secretly held at Abu Ghraib.
"This individual, this Ansar al-Islam individual, I think, should be looked at separately from that," Rumsfeld said, although he said he did not know specifically how the individual's legal status would be different from that of Abu Ghraib prisoners.
Yesterday's briefing was the first time Rumsfeld has publicly addressed questions about abuses in Iraq since the public release of several internal administration documents and memos concerning U.S. policy on foreign detainees.
The documents show that a range of severe interrogation tactics was approved by high-ranking military officers for use at Abu Ghraib. Military intelligence interrogators got authority to use unmuzzled dogs to help with prisoners, for example.
Other internal documents show the administration weighed the legal issues surrounding the use of torture against detainees -- although President Bush and administration officials have repeatedly said that all prisoners in Iraq were covered by international law and that U.S. authorities were ordered to treat detainees in the war on terror humanely.
Rumsfeld said yesterday he fears news reports concerning such documents has created a dangerous and mistaken impression that U.S. policy endorses torture.
He said again that the Abu Ghraib abuses caught in alarming photographs appear to be isolated incidents at the hands of a few rogue military police soldiers. Rumsfeld said that he is monitoring several investigations that are delving into alleged abuses.
"At the moment, I have high confidence that I have not seen anything that suggests that a senior civilian or military official of the United States of America has acted in a manner that's inconsistent with the president's request that everyone be treated humanely," he said. He added that he knows of nothing that "could be characterized as ordering or authorizing or permitting torture or acts that are inconsistent with our international treaty obligations or our laws or our values as a country."
Rumsfeld yesterday defended his decision to honor the CIA's request to hold the suspected al-Ansar member without giving him an internee number or listing him on records. At the same time, he acknowledged that military personnel should have recorded the detainee's name and identification number sooner -- it has taken seven months -- so Red Cross officials could meet with the prisoner, who has not been identified.
He said that, contrary to reports that the detainee had essentially become lost in the system after his arrest, the prisoner's whereabouts were known for the entire time of his detention, and that he was treated humanely and was never at Abu Ghraib.
Rumsfeld said he also believes Tenet had the power to order such detentions. "We know from our knowledge that he has the authority to do this," Rumsfeld said, adding that the military has received other prisoners from the CIA "where they have, for some reason, captured somebody or arrested somebody or been given somebody and at some moment brought them to us and said, 'Would you please take custody of this person?' "
Tom Malinowski, a spokesman for Human Rights Watch, said the Geneva Conventions call for prompt registration of each detainee and allow governments to prevent Red Cross access only in extreme circumstances, such as when a prison is being shelled or when giving access to the prisoner would specifically put either party in immediate danger.
"I can't see what legitimate national security purpose is served by hiding people from the Red Cross," Malinowski said. "The only thing it achieves is to further tarnish America's reputation and to invite similar treatment of captured Americans. Whatever benefit the U.S. gains, if any, from using those methods, they are vastly outweighed by the damage done to American interests by treating detainees in this way."
Human rights organizations have contended for nearly three years that the Bush administration should open detention camps to greater scrutiny by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Prisoners typically have no family contact or access to legal advice or judicial review. In countless cases, their families do not know their whereabouts.
"The United States has a network of secret facilities and secret detainees that goes way beyond Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo," Elisa Massimino, Washington director of Human Rights First, said yesterday, after the group released a report titled "Ending Secret Detentions."
Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), the Democratic presidential nominee, said yesterday that the world is getting a "muddled message" from the Bush administration regarding the alleged abuses. He said that if he were president, he would appoint a high-level official outside the Pentagon to investigate what happened.
"Every few days, folks, we learn more" than the administration is "willing to tell us," Kerry said. "Every few days we learn that this runs higher and goes deeper than they have been willing to admit. We have gone from the president's first statement that only a few people were involved to now knowing that it went up. . . . Now the secretary of defense personally approved not applying the Geneva Conventions to a prisoner in Iraq."
Staff writers Lois Romano in Detroit and Peter Slevin in Washington contributed to this report.
-------- terrorism
U.S. Issues Gulf-Wide Terror Warning
Reuters
Friday, June 18, 2004; 7:51 PM
By Saul Hudson
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53214-2004Jun18.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States extended a warning of possible al Qaeda attacks against Westerners and oil workers beyond Saudi Arabia to the entire Gulf region on Friday after a kidnapped American was beheaded in the kingdom.
A senior Saudi official criticized the United States for issuing such warnings, saying they could help the militants to spread fear in the oil-rich region that depends heavily on foreign workers.
President Bush, who is campaigning for reelection as a strong leader in the war on terrorism, has vowed not to yield ground to militants but his administration on Thursday strongly urged U.S. citizens to leave Saudi Arabia.
"The U.S. government has received information that extremists may be planning to carry out attacks against Westerners and oil workers in the Persian Gulf region, beyond Saudi Arabia," the State Department said in its Friday announcement.
The regional warning reflected the same range of potential dangers, such as kidnappings and suicide bombings, as it had specifically for Saudi Arabia but it did not advise Americans to leave the area as a whole.
Adel al-Jubeir, a foreign policy adviser to Crown Prince Abdullah Saudi Arabia, said he did not support such warnings.
"We believe that one of the objectives of the terrorists is to drive people out of Saudi Arabia and so as a consequence we believe that calls for withdrawing people from Saudi Arabia could inadvertently play into the hands of the terrorists," he told reporters in Washington.
A State Department official, who asked not to be named, said it would be irresponsible not to warn U.S. citizens about the dangers in the region.
"Of course the Saudis don't agree with us telling people to leave. But you can't tell them (Americans) to hunker down and ride it out because the fact is they cannot be protected," he said. "That does not mean the United States of America, the U.S. government, is not committed to working with Saudi Arabia."
The United States has withdrawn all but essential staff from its embassy in Riyadh because of the lack of security.
On Friday, al Qaeda militants beheaded U.S. hostage Paul Johnson and their leader was then killed in a shootout with security forces as he tried to dispose of the body, Saudi officials said.
Saudi Arabia has been battling an intensifying al Qaeda campaign to destabilize the government that has particularly targeted foreigners in the world's largest oil exporter over the last few months.
Jubeir said the militants had failed to spark an exodus of foreigners and that even if they did Saudis could run their own oil industry.
"We believe we can manage our oil facilities and oil production with all-Saudi personnel," he said.
---------
9/11 Plot Reportedly Hatched in 1996
By CONNIE CASS
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A53537-2004Jun18?language=printer
WASHINGTON - Five years before the worst terror attack in American history, a U.S.-educated Kuwaiti pitched an outlandish idea to Osama bin Laden. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, now a U.S. captive, concedes his apocalyptic vision of 10 planes steered into nuclear power plants, skyscrapers and other American targets received only a lukewarm response from the al-Qaida kingpin.
The meeting in Afghanistan in mid-1996, however, apparently was the genesis of the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001. Three reports issued this week by the Sept. 11 commission provide the fullest picture yet of how Mohammed's idea evolved from wild scheme to unfathomable reality - and the government's chaotic response.
Mohammed had targeted U.S. airliners before. He was indicted in the United States earlier in 1996 for plotting to bomb 12 flights over the Pacific Ocean, but he wasn't captured. Mohammed, born in Kuwait and a 1986 graduate from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, also wanted to crash a plane into CIA headquarters.
His new plan needed bin Laden's money and his muscle.
Between May 1996, when bin Laden moved to Afghanistan from Sudan, and the Sept. 11 attacks, more than 20,000 men trained at his terror camps. They learned to be soldiers and, the Sept. 11 commission said, "to think creatively about ways to commit mass murder."
They floated ideas: take over a Russian launch site and fire a nuclear missile at the United States, pump poison gas into a building's air conditioning, hijack a plane to attack a city.
Advanced terrorism training was given to only the most promising recruits, among them the Sept. 11 hijackers. Early in 1999, bin Laden gave the go-ahead for a scaled-down version of Mohammed's proposal three years earlier.
According to Mohammed, the two drew up a list of potential targets:
-the Capitol, perceived source of U.S. policy in support of Israel;
-the White House and Pentagon, both advocated by bin Laden as potent American symbols;
-the World Trade Center, favored by Mohammed, whose nephew Yousef was in prison for the 1993 bombing of the towers that represented America's financial might.
Bin Laden selected potential suicide hijackers. The first two arrived in Los Angeles on Jan. 15, 2000. During the next 18 months, 17 more followed, some entering the country on fraudulent visas. Four, including ringleader Mohammed Atta, attended U.S. flight schools.
FBI agents in Arizona and Minnesota were suspicious of the flight students, but their alarms went unheeded by higher-ups.
The summer of 2001 was a time of intensive preparation by the hijackers. They rode cross-country flights for surveillance, brought boxcutters onto planes as tests, practiced flying rented planes and honed their strength at gyms.
Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, senior al-Qaida leaders were under pressure from the Taliban not to attack inside America's borders. Some feared U.S. military retaliation. Despite the pressure, bin Laden prodded Atta to get on with it.
In mid-August, Atta settled on the date of Sept. 11, choosing a week when Congress would be back from summer break. Bin Laden wanted to strike the White House; Atta preferred the Capitol as an easier target. The commission said it has been unable to determine definitely which was the intended target on Sept. 11.
The hijackers bought their flight tickets in late August and early September. Then, ever loyal, they took care of a final detail - sending back to al-Qaida $36,000 they didn't need.
At the airports early on Sept. 11, nine of the hijackers were pulled aside for extra security screenings, but all were allowed to proceed, some with hidden knives and boxcutters.
At 8 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 took off from Boston, with five hijackers aboard. Within 45 minutes, the other 14 hijackers were airborne: on flights out of Boston at 8:14, from Dulles airport near Washington at 8:20, from Newark, N.J., at 8:42.
On the ground, the first sign of trouble came when air traffic control lost contact with Flight 11 about 8:13 a.m. Minutes later, air traffic controllers heard an ominous transmission from the cockpit:
"We have some planes. Just stay quiet and you'll be OK. We are returning to the airport."
The Boston controller wasn't sure what he had just heard. Then came a second transmission, believed to have been the voice of Atta, the plane's pilot, addressing the passengers: "Nobody move. Everything will be OK. If you try to make any moves, you'll endanger yourself and the airplane."
It was a hijacking.
Air controllers first tried to call a military alert site in Atlantic City, N.J., unaware it had been closed. It was the start of a cascade of communications errors that morning that undermined any chance of stopping the attacks.
At 8:37 a.m., controllers reached the Northeast sector of NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, and urged them to scramble fighter jets because a hijacked plane was headed for New York.
"Is this real-world or exercise?" responded an incredulous military official.
"No, this is not an exercise, not a test," the FAA said.
Nine minutes later, Flight 11 flew into the north tower of the World Trade Center.
Those nine minutes were the most notice the military would receive of any of the four hijackings.
Confusion turned to chaos during the next hour, as the Federal Aviation Administration struggled with "an unprecedented challenge they had never encountered and had never trained to meet," the commission wrote.
Just before 9 a.m., President Bush stood outside a Sarasota, Fla., elementary school classroom, preparing to read to second-graders. Aides told him a small plane had struck the World Trade Center. He assumed it was a tragic accident, though the FAA and air defense officials already knew otherwise.
Air traffic controllers in New York were looking frantically for another plane that had disappeared from their screens. The hijackers had turned off its transponder, a tracking device.
"It's escalating big, big time," a New York manager warned the FAA command center in Herndon, Va. Two minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 from Boston crashed into the south tower of the World Trade Center.
White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card whispered in the president's ear: "A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack."
Bush stayed in the classroom another five minutes or so, listening to children read. He later said he was trying to project calm.
Bush wanted to return to the White House, but his aides and the Secret Service advised it was too dangerous. Air Force One took off about 9:55 a.m., its destination undecided.
The Secret Service just wanted to get him off the ground quick - on a day when death came from the air, the skies offered refuge.
Before Air Force One could lift off, the Pentagon was in flames from the crash of American Airlines Flight 77.
That plane, which had taken off from Dulles, deviated from its flight pattern, then disappeared from radar at 8:54 a.m. A controller in Indianapolis, who had been tracking it, was unaware of the first two hijackings and believed it might have crashed.
A half-hour later, air traffic personnel at Dulles airport spotted the plane moving east at an extremely high speed. An unarmed National Guard cargo plane, already in the air, was tasked to follow it.
Minutes later, at 9:38 a.m., came his report: "Looks like that aircraft crashed into the Pentagon, sir."
Bush reacted to the news by calling Vice President Dick Cheney from the air: "Sounds like we have a minor war going on here. I heard about the Pentagon. We're at war. ... Somebody's going to pay."
Meanwhile, air traffic control in Cleveland heard transmissions that sounded like screams and a struggle. Then a voice from United Flight 93: "Keep remaining sitting. We have a bomb on board."
The plane turned toward Washington.
As FAA higher-ups discussed whether military jets should be scrambled, the passengers and flight attendants took things into their own hands, improvising an assault on the hijackers.
In the White House's underground shelter, with reports of a jet closing in, Cheney authorized the Air Force to shoot down hijacked planes. Cheney said Bush earlier had given him the authority to do so.
The order, which came minutes after Flight 93 had crashed in a Pennsylvania field, never was passed on to the fighters circling Washington and New York. The same National Guard pilot who witnessed the Pentagon crash, then resumed his flight to Minnesota, was the first to report "black smoke" on the ground in Pennsylvania.
Two hours after it began, an attack five years in the making was over. The last plane had been downed short of its target, not because of government action, but at the hands of its passengers.
"We are sure that the nation owes a debt to the passengers of United 93," the commission wrote. "Their actions saved the lives of countless others, and may have saved either the U.S. Capitol or the White House from destruction."
On the Net:
Transcripts and documents form the Sept. 11 panel are available at:http://wid.ap.org/transcripts/front.html
National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States:
http://www.9-11commission.gov
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DOMESTIC SECURITY
Panel Has Doubts on Post-9/11 Measures
June 18, 2004
By MICHAEL JANOFSKY
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/politics/18lessons.html
WASHINGTON, June 17 - The two government agencies responsible for keeping the skies over the United States safe say they have made vast improvements to prevent the lack of coordination that the 9/11 commission's staff report described on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.
But leading members of the commission, speaking to reporters after the report was released on Thursday, expressed skepticism that enough has been done by the Federal Aviation Administration and the North American Aerospace Defense Command.
Specifically, they cited an incident two weeks ago when an unidentified aircraft flew unusually low over New York City and confusion arose over who had the authority to respond.
"It gave me the jitters," Thomas H. Kean, the commission chairman, said. "What it basically said was that although people are telling us these problems have been fixed, some of these problems are still out there."
Lee Hamilton, the commission co-chairman, said: "When you hear all of this testimony, as we have repeatedly heard again and again and again that that problem has been fixed, we've got it worked out, you have to have some doubts about that, and you have to be skeptical. And I think you should be skeptical to see if it really works."
The staff report, titled "Improvising a Homeland Defense," offered the most detailed public accounting yet of the government's response as officials tried to understand what was happening to four commercial jetliners that were hijacked on a mission of mass murder.
To a large degree, the report focuses on the inability of the F.A.A. and Norad, a joint United States-Canadian operation, to communicate and coordinate their efforts; it concluded that "On the morning of 9/11, the existing protocol was unsuited in every respect for what was about to happen."
"What ensued," it said, "was the hurried attempt to create an improvised defense by officials who had never encountered or trained against the situation they faced."
In one instance, the report said, the military had been responding to a report about "an aircraft that did not exist."
While the commission report assessed no individual blame, insisting that officials "made the best judgments they could" under difficult circumstances, the agencies nonetheless began implementing new strategies almost immediately to eliminate many of the problems that arose on that frantic morning.
"We still do exercises often because we know we have to continue to improve," said Maj. Douglas Martin, a Canadian Army officer and spokesman for Norad. "If we have holes, we have to fix them. We'll find the ways. Nothing can be perfect, but we're always striving for perfection."
One of the prime concerns cited by the commission report was the inability of Norad and the F.A.A., which had no direct means of communication before 9/11, to obtain and exchange dependable information.
To correct that, each agency now has a representative from the other and dedicated phone lines that allow them to communicate instantly.
Before Sept. 11, the commission report said, if a hijacking were confirmed and F.A.A. personnel needed military help, an air traffic controller would notify a supervisor, who would notify senior F.A.A. officials, who would tell the "hijack coordinator," who would contact the National Military Command Center at the Pentagon.
Now, said Laura J. Brown, the F.A.A. spokeswoman, telephone lines link the F.A.A. headquarters in Herndon, Va., near Dulles Airport, with the Norad command center in Colorado Springs.
In addition, a military liaison officer for Norad is now stationed at F.A.A. headquarters, and F.A.A. personnel are stationed at Norad headquarters as well as inside its three regional centers, near Rome, N.Y.; Panama City, Fla.; and Seattle.
Also since 9/11, Norad has begun air patrols over metropolitan areas and important facilities, like nuclear power plants, as well as over important events, like the G-8 summit meeting last week at Sea Island, Ga. Norad said it has scrambled fighter jets or diverted them from routine patrols more than 1,500 times since 9/11 to respond to possible air threats.
The area around metropolitan Washington is now under constant Norad patrol, with fighter jets, helicopters and air defense artillery.
Norad officials have helped develop rules of engagement to respond to hostile acts within United States air space.
The report raised questions about whether the White House and the military had followed proper chain of command in authorizing fighter jets to shoot down a commercial airliner.
But the recent incident over New York City suggests that uncertainties remain.
Benedict Sliney, an F.A.A. operations manager, determined that an unidentified plane had been approaching the city at an unusually low altitude, about 16,000 feet.
Appearing before the commission on Thursday, he said he had notified a superior and minutes later was called by someone from Norad, asking whether he was requesting jets to be scrambled.
His reply was, "I'm not requesting anything," he told the 9/11 commissioners, adding that he was not sure he had the authority to request military action.
Mr. Sliney then took part in a conference call with Norad and F.A.A. officials to determine whether he had the authority to request the jets. It was determined that he had, but he told the commissioners, "I did not know that prior to that moment in time."
By then, the plane had passed harmlessly over Manhattan and it was later determined, he said, to have been on a "photo mission of some civilian nature that was not coordinated with us."
Mr. Kean, the commission chairman, called the incident "very, very disturbing."
"You had a decision maker two or three weeks ago who didn't know he had the power to make the decision," he said. "And he was asking all over the place on the phone, 'Who makes this decision?' And then he had to find out that he had the authority to make it. I mean, that's unacceptable."
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Excerpts From Report on Orders to Shoot Down Planes on Sept. 11
June 18, 2004
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/politics/18ptext.html?pagewanted=all&position=
Following are excerpts from Staff Statement No. 17 prepared for the Commission on Terrorist Attacks. Subheadings are from the original. The full report is online at nytimes.com/Washington.
United 93
And the Shoot-Down Order
There was not an open line of communication between the president and vice president on the morning of 9/11, but rather a series of calls between the two leaders. The vice president remembered placing a call to the president just after entering the shelter conference room. There is conflicting evidence as to when the vice president arrived in the shelter conference room. We have concluded, after reviewing all the available evidence, that the vice president arrived in the shelter conference room shortly before 10:00, perhaps at 9:58. The vice president recalls being told, just after his arrival, that an Air Force combat air patrol (CAP) was up over Washington. At 9:59, a White House request for such a CAP was communicated to the military through the Air Threat Conference.
The vice president states that the purpose of his call to the president was to discuss the rules of engagement for the CAP. He recalled he felt it did not do any good to put the CAP up there unless the pilots had instructions to tell them whether they were authorized to shoot if the plane would not divert. He said the president signed off on that concept. The president said he remembered such a conversation, and that it reminded him of when he had been a fighter pilot. The president emphasized to us that he had authorized the shoot-down of hijacked aircraft.
The vice president's military aide told us he believed the vice president spoke to the president just after entering the conference room, but he did not hear what they said. Rice, who entered the conference room shortly after the vice president and sat next to him, recalled hearing the vice president inform the president that, "Sir, the CAP's are up. Sir, they're going to want to know what to do." Then she recalled hearing him say, "Yes sir." At 10:02, the communicators in the shelter began receiving reports from the Secret Service of an inbound aircraft - presumably hijacked - heading toward Washington. That aircraft was United 93. The Secret Service was getting this information directly from the F.A.A., through its links to that agency. The service's operations center and their F.A.A. contact were tracking the progress of the aircraft on a display that showed its projected path, not its actual radar return. Thus, for a time, they were not aware the aircraft was going down in Pennsylvania.
At some time between 10:10 and 10:15, a military aide told the vice president and others that the aircraft was 80 miles out. Vice President Cheney was asked for authority to engage the aircraft. The vice president's reaction was described as quick and decisive, "in about the time it takes a batter to decide to swing." He authorized fighter aircraft to engage the inbound plane. He told us this was based on his prior conversation with the president. The military aide returned a few minutes later, probably between 10:12 and 10:18, and said the aircraft was 60 miles out.
He again asked for authorization to engage. The vice president again said yes. The Secret Service was postulating the flight path of United 93, not knowing it had already crashed. Also at the conference room table was White House Deputy Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten. Bolten watched the exchanges and, after what he called "a quiet moment," suggested that the vice president get in touch with the president and confirm the engage order. Bolten told us he wanted to make sure the president was told that the vice president had executed the order. He said he had not heard any prior conversation on the subject with the president. The vice president was logged calling the president at 10:18 for a two-minute call that obtained the confirmation. On Air Force One at 10:20, the president's press secretary, Ari Fleischer, noted that the president told him he had authorized a shoot-down of aircraft, if necessary.
Minutes went by, and word arrived of an aircraft down over Pennsylvania. Those in the conference room wondered if perhaps the aircraft had been shot down pursuant to these directions. At approximately 10:30, the shelter started receiving reports of another hijacked plane, this time only 5 to 10 miles out. Believing they had only a minute or two, once again the vice president communicated authority to "engage" or "take out" the airborne aircraft. At 10:33, Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley passed that guidance on the Air Threat Conference call: "I need to get word to Dick Myers that our reports are there's an inbound aircraft flying low five miles out. The vice president's guidance was we need to take them out." Eventually, the shelter received word that the alleged hijacker five miles away had been a Medevac helicopter.
Transmission of the Authorization From the White House
To the Pilots
The National Military Command Center learned of the hijacking of United 93 at about 10:03. The F.A.A. had not yet been connected to the Air Threat Conference and in general had practically no contact with the military at the level of national command. The N.M.C.C. instead received news about the hijacking of United 93 from the White House. The White House had received the word from the Secret Service's contacts with the F.A.A.
Norad [North American Aerospace Defense Command] had no information either. In response to questions, the Norad representative on the Air Threat Conference stated at 10:07: "Norad has no indication of a hijack heading to Washington, D.C., at this time."
Repeatedly between 10:14 and 10:19, a lieutenant colonel at the White House relayed the information to the National Military Command Center that the vice president had confirmed fighters were cleared to engage the inbound aircraft if they could verify that the aircraft was hijacked.
The commander of Norad, General Eberhart, was en route to the Norad operations center in Cheyenne Mountain, Colo., when the shoot-down order was communicated on the Air Threat Conference. He told us that by the time he arrived at the mountain the order had already been passed down the Norad chain of command.
It is not clear how the shoot-down order was communicated to the Continental Region headquarters. But we know that, at 10:31, Gen. Larry Arnold instructed his staff to broadcast the following message over a Norad chat log: "10:31 Vice president has cleared to us to intercept tracks of interest and shoot them down if they do not respond, per CONR CC [General Arnold]."
In upstate New York, Neads [Northeast Air Defense Sector] personnel first learned of the shoot-down order from that chat log message:
Floor leadership: You need to read this - the region commander has declared that we can shoot down aircraft that do not respond to our direction. Copy that?
Controllers: Copy that, sir.
Floor leadership: So if you're trying to divert somebody and he won't divert- -
Controllers: D.O. [director of operations] is saying no.
Floor leadership: No? It came over the chat. You got a conflict on that direction?
Controllers: Right now no, but- -
Floor leadership: O.K.? O.K., you read that from the vice president, right? Vice president has cleared. Vice president has cleared us to intercept traffic and shoot them down if they do not respond per CONR CC [General Arnold].
In interviews with us, Neads personnel expressed considerable confusion over the nature and effect of the order.
Indeed, the Neads commander told us he did not pass along the order because he was unaware of its ramifications. Both the mission commander and the weapons director indicated they did not pass the order to the fighters circling Washington and New York City because they were unsure how the pilots would, or should, proceed with this guidance. In short, while leaders in Washington believed the fighters circling above them had been instructed to "take out" hostile aircraft, the only orders actually conveyed to the Langley pilots were to "ID type and tail."
The president apparently spoke to Secretary Rumsfeld briefly sometime after 10:00, but no one can recall any content beyond a general request to alert forces. The president and the secretary did not discuss the use of force against hijacked airliners in this conversation.
The secretary did not become part of the chain of command for those orders to engage until he arrived in the N.M.C.C. [National Military Command Center]. At 10:39, the vice president tried to bring the secretary up to date as both participated in the Air Threat Conference:
Vice president: There's been at least three instances here where we've had reports of aircraft approaching Washington. A couple were confirmed hijack. And, pursuant to the president's instructions, I gave authorization for them to be taken out. Hello?
SecDef: Yes, I understand. Who did you give that direction to?
Vice president: It was passed from here through the operations center at the White House, from the [shelter].
SecDef: O.K., let me ask the question here. Has that directive been transmitted to the aircraft?
Vice president: Yes, it has.
SecDef: So we've got a couple of aircraft up there that have those instructions at the present time?
Vice president: That is correct. And it's my understanding they've already taken a couple of aircraft out.
SecDef: We can't confirm that. We're told that one aircraft is down but we do not have a pilot report that they did it.
As this exchange shows, Secretary Rumsfeld was not involved when the shoot-down order was first passed on the Air Threat Conference. After the Pentagon was hit, Secretary Rumsfeld went to the parking lot to assist with rescue efforts. He arrived in the National Military Command Center shortly before 10:30. He told us he was just gaining situational awareness when he spoke with the vice president, and that his primary concern was ensuring that the pilots had a clear understanding of their rules of engagement.
The vice president was mistaken in his belief that shoot-down authorization had been passed to the pilots flying at Norad's direction. By 10:45, there was, however, another set of fighters circling Washington that had entirely different rules of engagement. These fighters, part of the 113th Wing of the D.C. Air National Guard, launched out of Andrews Air Force Base based on information passed to them by the Secret Service. The first of the Andrews fighters was airborne at 10:38.
General Wherley, the commander of the 113th Wing, reached out to the Secret Service after hearing second-hand reports that it wanted fighters airborne. A Secret Service agent had a phone in each ear, one to Wherley and one to a fellow agent at the White House, relaying instructions that the White House agent said he was getting from the vice president. The guidance for Wherley was to send up the aircraft, with orders to protect the White House and take out any aircraft that threatens the Capitol. General Wherley translated this in military terms to "weapons free," which means the decision to shoot rests in the cockpit or, in this case, the cockpit of the lead pilot. He passed these instructions to the pilots that launched at 10:42 and afterward.
Thus, while the fighter pilots under Norad direction who had scrambled out of Langley never received any type of engagement order, the Andrews pilots were operating under "weapons free," a permissive rule of engagement. The president and the vice president told us they had not been aware that fighters had been scrambled out of Andrews at the request of the Secret Service and outside of the military chain of command.
Reflections on United 93
Had it not crashed in Pennsylvania at 10:03, we estimate that United 93 could not have reached Washington, D.C., any earlier than 10:13, and most probably would have arrived before 10:23. We examined the military's ability to intercept it. There was only one set of fighters orbiting Washington, D.C., during this timeframe, the Langley F-16's. They were armed and under Norad's control. But the Langley pilots were never briefed about the reason they were scrambled. As the lead pilot explained, "I reverted to the Russian threat. I'm thinking cruise missile threat from the sea. You know you look down and see the Pentagon burning, and I thought the bastards snuck one by us. [Y]ou couldn't see any airplanes, and no one told us anything." The pilots knew their mission was to identify and divert aircraft flying within a certain radius of Washington but did not know that the threat came from hijacked commercial airliners.
Also, Neads did not know where United 93 was when it first heard about the hijacking from F.A.A. at 10:07. Presumably, F.A.A. would have provided the information, but we do not know how long it would have taken, nor how long it would have taken Neads to find and track the target on its own equipment. Once the target was known and identified, Neads needed orders to pass to the pilots. Shoot-down authority was first communicated to Neads at 10:31. Given the clear attack on the United States, it is also possible - though unlikely - that Norad's commanders could have ordered the shoot-down without the authorization communicated by the vice president. Norad's officials have maintained that they would have intercepted and shot down United 93. We are not so sure. We are sure that the nation owes a debt to the passengers of United 93. Their actions saved the lives of countless others, and may have saved either the U.S. Capitol or the White House from destruction.
The details of what happened on the morning of Sept. 11 are complex. But the details play out a simple theme. Norad and the F.A.A. were unprepared for the type of attacks launched against the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. They struggled, under difficult circumstances, to improvise a homeland defense against an unprecedented challenge they had never encountered and had never trained to meet.
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THE TIMETABLE
To the Minute, Panel Paints a Grim Portrait of Day's Terror
June 18, 2004
By ERIC SCHMITT and ERIC LICHTBLAU
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/18/politics/18minutes.html?pagewanted=all&position=
WASHINGTON, June 17 - At 9:36 a.m. on Sept. 11, halfway through America's most calamitous morning, military air defense officials learned that American Airlines Flight 77 was just six miles - and little more than a minute - away from the White House.
An air defense commander in upstate New York ordered three Air Force fighter jets to intercept the third airliner hijacked that morning. But he soon discovered that the Virginia-based fighters were not heading north toward Baltimore as instructed, but streaking east over the Atlantic Ocean. "I don't care how many windows you break," the commander barked, ordering the jets to turn around and "crank it up" to the White House.
At that moment in Washington, Secret Service agents were hustling Vice President Dick Cheney to a secure underground White House bunker. In Sarasota, Fla., President Bush's motorcade was speeding away from an elementary school, initially headed in the wrong direction, to rush the president to the airport - and up into the sky, to safety.
The nation has relived that morning countless times since Sept. 11, 2001, but never with the harrowing detail and minute-by-minute drama of the staff report released Thursday by the independent commission investigating the attacks.
The 29-page report recounts a frenetic 149 minutes unlike anything ever faced by the nation's aviation and military defenses. And it details moments both of unflinching calm, like actions by the air traffic controllers who managed to orchestrate the landings of all 4,500 flights aloft, and of maddening miscommunications, mangled coordination and broken chains of command.
The account shows civilian air traffic controllers and regional air defense officers improvising a defense for a disaster for which they had never trained, and senior administration officials struggling to sift certainty from sheer confusion, at times learning more from television news than from classified intelligence reports.
Throughout the morning, the Federal Aviation Administration had virtually no contact at the national command level with the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or Norad, which is responsible for defending the nation's airspace. And the Secret Service resorted to coordinating its own shoot-down policy regarding hijacked airliners with a National Guard general at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, outside the normal protocol.
"There were a lot of people who should have been in the loop who weren't in the loop," Thomas H. Kean, the commission's chairman and a former Republican governor of New Jersey, said after Thursday's hearing. "There were a lot of things that should have been done that weren't done."
The late-summer day began like any other at Logan Airport in Boston, as American Airlines Flight 11, bound for Los Angeles with 81 passengers and 24,000 gallons of jet fuel, began its takeoff roll at 8 a.m.
The last moment of normalcy came at 8:13 a.m., when air traffic control instructed the plane to turn to the right, according to the commission report. The pilot quickly acknowledged the transmission.
Just 16 seconds later, when the controller directed the plane to climb higher, the line went dead. After failing to make contact using emergency frequencies, the controller told supervisors that "he thought something was seriously wrong," the report said.
Confirmation came at 8:24. The plane had already changed its route when a chilling voice - believed to be that of Mohamed Atta, the lead plotter - was heard to say: "We have some planes. Just stay quiet and you'll be O.K. We are returning to the airport."
Aviation officials in Boston began sending word to supervisors in Herndon, Va., that Flight 11 had been hijacked and was heading to New York City. But it was not until 8:37 that Norad officials in Rome, N.Y., responsible for defending the Northeast, were notified.
"We need someone to scramble some F-16's or something up there," an F.A.A. manager said.
"Is this real-world or exercise?" a military official asked.
"No, this is not an exercise, not a test," came the response.
Two F-15 jets at Otis Air Force Base, some 150 miles from New York City, were airborne at 8:53. But Flight 11 had crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center six minutes earlier.
Meanwhile, United Airlines Flight 175, which had left Boston at 8:14 for Los Angeles with 65 passengers, had already begun acting erratically. No one on the ground noticed, however, because the controller responsible for that flight was also handling the hijacked Flight 11.
At 8:48, an F.A.A. manager in New York, unaware that Flight 11 had already crashed, reported that an attendant on that flight had been stabbed.
By about 9 a.m., aviation officials had realized that a second hijacked plane was heading for New York City. "Heads up, man, it looks like another one coming in," the F.A.A. reported.
Moments later, United Flight 175 crashed into the south tower. Military air defenders were only just getting word at that time that a second plane had been hijacked. In a vexing pattern seen throughout the morning, the aviation defense system was steps behind the hijackers and unable to catch up.
In Sarasota, meanwhile, President Bush was visiting some second graders at 9:05 when Andrew H. Card Jr., his chief of staff, whispered to him that a plane had hit the second tower.
The president had been told minutes earlier about the first crash, but Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser, who was on the trip, said initially that the plane that crashed was a twin-engine aircraft. When the second plane hit, however, White House aides said they knew it was no accident.
In the classroom, reporters' pagers and phones started ringing. President Bush showed little emotion, telling the commission later that "his instinct was to project calm, not to have the country see an excited reaction at a moment of crisis," the report said.
He remained in the classroom another few minutes. Shortly before 9:15, he returned to a holding room, where he was briefed by staff members, watched television coverage and called Mr. Cheney and others. Mr. Bush prepared to return to Washington - a decision that worried aides would later persuade him to reverse.
No one in the White House traveling party had any indication by then that any other planes had been hijacked, the report said.
But by 9:21, aviation officials had realized that a third plane - American Airlines Flight 77, which had left Dulles International Airport outside Washington at 8:20 - was missing. Controllers lost sight of it near Indianapolis and did not realize it had turned back toward Washington.
Minutes later, just as the president was preparing to leave the school, the F.A.A. cleared the airspace over Manhattan and the fighter planes patrolled the skies above the city.
But the threat then was not in New York City, where the twin towers were in flames; it was at the Pentagon, where Flight 77 was headed. The plane traveled undetected toward Washington for 36 minutes, the report found.
At 9:32, aviation officials in Washington finally spotted what turned out to be the missing plane. The F.A.A. contacted the Secret Service, and controllers at Reagan National Airport sent an unarmed National Guard C-130H cargo plane to follow the suspicious jetliner. Once again, it was too late. At 9:38, the National Guard pilot reported to the Washington tower that it"looks like that aircraft crashed into the Pentagon, sir."
Military officials did not even know about the frantic search for Flight 77, the report said. Instead, the military was searching for a ghost plane headed to Washington. The F.A.A. had erroneously reported that American Flight 11 - the plane that had crashed into the north tower of the trade center more than half an hour earlier - was still airborne and heading for Washington, the report said.
By 9:37, the Pentagon had opened a high-level teleconference, called the Air Threat Conference call, which would last more than eight hours. Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and other senior officials from across the government would participate at various times during the day.
Conspicuously absent for the crucial first 40 minutes of the call was a representative from the Federal Aviation Administration, which controls all civilian air traffic. The official who ultimately joined the call at 10:17 had no familiarity with hijackings, no access to senior agency decision makers, and none of the information available to senior F.A.A. officials by that time, the report said.
Even as officials were meeting in Washington to grapple with the situation, three F-16 fighters from Langley Air Force Base in Virginia were racing toward Washington, and the final hijacking was playing out aboard United Airlines Flight 93.
Just minutes before the crash at the Pentagon, Flight 93, flying from Newark to San Francisco, went off course near Cleveland. An air traffic controller there and pilots of other aircraft flying nearby heard over a radio transmission what sounded like screams and a struggle.
By 9:38, controllers in Cleveland had moved several aircraft out of the way of Flight 93, and soon after that the hijacked flight reversed course over Ohio and began heading toward Washington.
Four minutes later, a top F.A.A. operations manager, Ben Sliney, ordered all F.A.A. sites to direct all airborne aircraft to land at the nearest airport, the first such action in the nation's history. About 4,500 aircraft soon landed without incident.
Meantime, aboard Flight 93, passengers had gotten cellphone calls about the other hijackings, and some of them rushed the cockpit. At about 10:03, Flight 93 crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pa., 125 miles from Washington.
Despite the numerous discussions among F.A.A. officials about Flight 93, no one at the agency's headquarters ever requested the military's help. Just before 10 a.m., officials in Washington were ordering additional steps. Stephen Hadley, Mr. Bush's deputy national security adviser, requested that the Pentagon provide fighter escorts for Air Force One, which was just leaving Florida; combat air patrols over Washington; and help carrying out the continuity of government procedures, the doomsday rules under which cabinet members and Congressional leaders are whisked to undisclosed locations in a national emergency.
By 10:10, the F-16's that had been over the Atlantic arrived in Washington, but were told by the Norad commander in Rome, N.Y., that they were not cleared to fire on any hijacked airliner threatening Washington.
But at the same time, Mr. Cheney, still in the White House bunker, ordered the shooting down of any threatening airliner. Before the order went out, Joshua Bolten, Mr. Bush's deputy chief of staff, suggested that Mr. Cheney call Mr. Bush again to confirm the order.
Neither Mr. Bolten, nor I. Lewis Libby, Mr. Cheney's chief of staff, nor Lynne V. Cheney, his wife, all of whom were in the bunker, said they recalled a phone call minutes earlier that Mr. Cheney and Mr. Bush said they had had authorizing the drastic action. At 10:20 a.m., officials on Air Force One confirmed Mr. Bush's authorization of a shootdown order.
At 10:31, the order was relayed to air defense commanders over a military chat log, but military officials down the chain of command expressed confusion about the directive and never passed it on to the pilots circling Washington and New York.
Even as the pilots were waiting for instructions, Brig. Gen. David F. Wherley Jr., commander of the District of Columbia Air National Guard's 113th Wing, heard secondhand reports that the Secret Service wanted fighters airborne over the capital, and offered his fighter jets based at Andrews Air Force Base, the report said.
Based on Mr. Cheney's authority, the first fighters were airborne at 10:38 a.m. Four minutes later, General Wherley issued orders that the pilots from Andrews were operating "weapons free," meaning the decision to shoot down any hijacked planes rested with the lead pilot.
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Cheney blasts media on al Qaeda-Iraq link
Says media not 'doing their homework' in reporting ties
CNN
June 18, 2004
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/18/cheney.iraq.al.qaeda/index.html
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Vice President Dick Cheney said Thursday the evidence is "overwhelming" that al Qaeda had a relationship with Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq, and he said media reports suggesting that the 9/11 commission has reached a contradictory conclusion were "irresponsible."
"There clearly was a relationship. It's been testified to. The evidence is overwhelming," Cheney said in an interview with CNBC's "Capitol Report."
"It goes back to the early '90s. It involves a whole series of contacts, high-level contacts with Osama bin Laden and Iraqi intelligence officials."
"The press, with all due respect, (is) often times lazy, often times simply reports what somebody else in the press said without doing their homework."
Members of 9/11 commission found "no credible evidence" that Iraq was involved in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks carried out by al Qaeda hijackers, and they concluded that there was "no collaborative relationship" between Iraq and Osama bin Laden, the network's leader, according to details of its findings disclosed Wednesday at a public hearing.
However, the commission also found that bin Laden did "explore possible cooperation with Iraq."
Cheney told CNBC that cooperation included a brigadier general in the Iraqi intelligence service going to Sudan, where bin Laden was based prior to moving his operations to Afghanistan, to train al Qaeda members in bomb-making and document forgery.
Both Cheney and President Bush are strongly disputing suggestions that the commission's conclusion that there were no Iraqi fingerprints on the 9/11 attacks contradicts statements they made in the run-up to the Iraq war about links between Iraq and al Qaeda.
Bush, who has said himself that there is no evidence Iraq was involved in 9/11, sought to explain the distinction Thursday, saying that while the administration never "said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated" with Iraqi help, "we did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda."
"The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda [is] because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda," the president said. (Full story)
In his CNBC interview, Cheney went a bit further. Asked if Iraq was involved in 9/11, he said, "We don't know."
"What the commission says is they can't find evidence of that," he said. "We had one report, which is a famous report on the Czech intelligence service, and we've never been able to confirm or to knock it down."
The uncorroborated Czech report, which has been widely disputed, alleged that 9/11 ringleader Mohammed Atta met with an Iraqi intelligence agent in Prague before the attacks.
Asked if he knows information that the 9/11 commission does not know, Cheney replied, "Probably."
--------
Bin Laden's Doomsday Plan
Sidney Morning Herald
By Paul McGeough, Chief Correspondent and agencies
June 18, 2004
http://fairuse.1accesshost.com/news2/smh5.htm
Americans were confronted yesterday with the unabridged horror of Osama bin Laden's original plans for September 11, and witnessed a devastating assault on the credibility of the White House campaign to justify war in Iraq by linking Saddam Hussein to al-Qaeda and the attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.
Americans will be chilled by an independent commission's reconstruction of what might have been - a Doomsday attack by 10 hijacked aircraft across the US, with the synchronised mid-air explosion of more aircraft over the Pacific.
The additional hijacked aircraft would have been crashed into nuclear power plants and symbolic buildings on both coasts. On one commercial jet all of the male passengers were to have been murdered before the plane was landed as a grotesque show-and-tell for the media at a big US airport.
The reconstruction, the damnation of the Bush effort to hold Saddam responsible, and the commission's detailed portrait of life and business in al-Qaeda were based on more than 1000 interviews, including records of the interrogation of prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay since their capture by US forces in Afghanistan in the war that followed the September 11 attacks.
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States is not scheduled to make its final report public until July 26, only three months before the US presidential vote.
But a report by its investigative staff concludes with conviction: "We have no credible evidence that Iraq and al-Qaeda co-operated on attacks against the United States."
The report kicked the legs from under another long-held White House justification for war when it declared that there was no evidence to support the theory that the lead hijacker, Mohammed Atta, had met an Iraqi intelligence agent in Prague before the attacks.
Going even further, it left the White House exposed by reporting that bin Laden had "explored possible co-operation with Iraq" while he was based in Sudan in the early 1990s.
He had requested space in Iraq for training camps and sought assistance in procuring weapons, but these efforts "do not appear to have resulted in a collaborative relationship".
The inquiry's investigators say that bin Laden apparently scaled back to a four-aircraft attack on September 11 because he worried that the original plan was too complex to pull off.
Estimating that the final plan cost no more than $US550,000 ($800,000), they portray in graphic detail how ragged its execution was.
"The 9/11 conspirators confronted operational difficulties, internal disagreements and even dissenting opinions within the leadership of al-Qaeda," the investigators say, detailing clashes over targets, timing and scope of the long-planned attacks.
Meanwhile, FBI and CIA officials giving evidence on the last hearing days of the inquiry, appointed by President George Bush, warned that al-Qaeda operatives were preparing fresh attacks inside the US.
While conceding that they knew little about al-Qaeda's capacity in the US, the officials insisted that functioning terrorist cells were still operating in the country.
Authorities had probably prevented a few aviation attacks since 2001, but "there are operatives involved in those plots that we still cannot account for", one of the officials told the 10-man commission.
An FBI special agent, Mary Deborah Doran, who has specialised in the al-Qaeda investigation, said the terrorist network could still look for help from sympathisers in the US.
But Ms Doran emphasised that any large-scale terrorist attack would require new operatives who had been infiltrated into the US. "The threat comes from outside," she said.
The Bush Administration is already under pressure over the failure of another of its justifications for the Iraq war - the supposed existence of weapons of mass destruction in the country that might have been channelled to terrorist groups.
In recent weeks it has also been criticised over the abuse and torture of prisoners in Iraq and elsewhere.
Responding to the new disclosures, Senator John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, said that the Bush Administration had "misled America ... it had reached too far".
-----
White House Lawyer Questioned in CIA Leak
By TERENCE HUNT
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53885-2004Jun18.html
WASHINGTON - The White House's top lawyer was questioned by a federal grand jury Friday in the criminal investigation of who in the Bush administration leaked the name of a covert CIA operative last year.
White House counsel Alberto Gonzales underwent questioning at the federal courthouse. He was the latest in a string of administration officials to be asked about the unauthorized disclosure of the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame, wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to the news media.
"The president directed the White House to cooperate fully, and Judge Gonzales was just doing his part to cooperate," said White House press secretary Scott McClellan, who also has gone before the grand jury.
Vice President Dick Cheney was recently questioned by investigators, and President Bush has indicated that he, too, expects to be questioned. Bush has consulted with a private attorney about the case, since the White House counsel can represent him only on official matters.
Disclosure of an undercover officer's identity can be a federal crime.
Syndicated columnist Robert Novak revealed Plame's work for the CIA a week after Wilson publicly criticized Bush's claim that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium from the African nation of Niger.
Wilson had earlier been sent to Niger by the CIA to check out the allegation and concluded it was unfounded. Bush stated subsequently in his State of the Union address that Iraq had sought to buy uranium in Africa.
Wilson has said that revealing his wife's name was an attempt to discredit him. In printing Plame's name, Novak wrote that two administration officials said Wilson's wife suggested sending him on the Niger trip.
Wilson has suggested in a book that the leaker was Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Cheney's chief of staff.
The White House denies the claim and accuses Wilson of seeking to bolster the campaign of Democrat John Kerry, for whom he has acted as a foreign policy adviser.
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9/11 Panel to Eye Ways to Prevent Attacks
By HOPE YEN
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004; 6:33 AM
WASHINGTON - The many missed chances to disrupt the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks spanned years: The hijackers methodically devised and implemented their plot beginning in 1996. One of the hijacked jetliners flew undetected for 36 minutes because of a radar glitch.
Yet nearly three years later, the United States remains vulnerable to a sophisticated al-Qaida organization ready to exploit security gaps, the commission investigating the attacks said in its final hearing Thursday.
"Its intent to inflict harm is clear; its capability today to harm us is unclear - and our efforts to collect intelligence on al-Qaida can and must improve," said Democratic vice chairman Lee Hamilton, a former representative from Indiana.
The 10-member commission held a two-day hearing on the Sept. 11 plot and the nation's emergency response that was geared toward "closing the circle" on the panel's 1 1/2-year investigation. The group's final report is due July 26.
In the report it released Thursday, the panel depicted the Federal Aviation Administration as slow to alert the military to the hijackings - even failing to pass along word that one of the planes had been seized.
In testimony before the panel, Gen. Ralph Eberhart said military pilots would have been able to "shoot down the airplanes" if word of the hijackings had been immediate. The commission, though, made no such claim.
Some military pilots "were never briefed about the reason they were scrambled," the panel said. The Secret Service, worried about a plane approaching the capital, went "outside the chain of command" to ask for warplanes to be sent aloft.
President Bush, in Florida when the terrorists struck, was not immune to communications woes. The commander in chief later told interviewers he had been frustrated that day at delays in establishing secure phone links with officials in a capital city feared under attack.
"There was a real problem with communications that morning," the commission's Republican chairman, former New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean, told reporters. "There were a lot of people who should have been in the loop who were not in the loop."
The commission sketched this picture near the end of its extensive investigation into terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000. Terrorists seized four planes on a single day, flying two of them into the World Trade Center and one into the Pentagon.
The fourth, headed for Washington, crashed in the Pennsylvania countryside after passengers struggled with their hijackers.
"The nation owes a debt to the passengers. ... Their actions saved the lives of countless others and may have saved either the U.S. Capitol or the White House from destruction," the commission's report said.
Among other findings over the two-day hearing:
-Because of a radar glitch, air traffic controllers didn't realize American Airlines Flight 77 - which took off from Dulles Airport outside Washington - might be hijacked when it mysteriously started veering off course at 8:54 a.m. The plane traveled undetected for a critical 36 minutes.
-The plot originally envisioned up to 26 hijackers taking over 10 planes that would strike additional targets such as CIA and FBI headquarters, nuclear plants and tall buildings in California and Washington state. That plan was rejected by Osama bin Laden as too complex.
-The hijackers were able to carry out the devastating attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people at a cost of just over $500,000.
-No evidence exists that the Saudi government funded al-Qaida, although it might have "turned a blind eye" to active fund-raising activities there.
The commission will now focus on reaching agreement on its final report, a draft of which is under review.
Commissioners say there is general consensus on a factual accounting of events that sharply criticizes the FBI and CIA. But members haven't agreed on widespread reforms that could include a new domestic intelligence agency modeled after Britain's MI5.
"Now we have the full picture of the origins of al-Qaida and the nation's response. We know the threat is not a passing phenomenon. Simply killing Osama bin Laden isn't enough," said Republican commissioner John Lehman, a former Navy secretary.
"It's a deeply rooted phenomenon, and it's going to take a lot to address," he said.
On the Net:
Sept. 11 panel:http://www.9-11commission.gov
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9/11 Report Cites Lack of Preparation
FAA Too Slow in Alerting Military, Panel Says
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50791-2004Jun17?language=printer
U.S. aviation and military officials were woefully unprepared for the brazen terrorist assault carried out on Sept. 11, 2001, and were so blinded and disorganized that jet fighters were sent to chase phantom aircraft while real airliners crashed undisturbed into their targets, according to a report issued yesterday.
In a detailed re-creation of U.S. air defense efforts that day, the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks found that the Federal Aviation Administration was so slow to notify military commanders about the hijackings that U.S. fighter jets had no chance to intercept any of the aircraft.
The military did not learn about United Airlines Flight 175 until the minute it hit the South Tower of the World Trade Center. For 36 minutes, the FAA lost track altogether of American Airlines Flight 77, which was able to turn around and fly east toward the Pentagon, undetected by radar. And the military was not notified about United Flight 93 until after it crashed in Pennsylvania.
The head of the U.S. air defense system told the commission yesterday that if the FAA had notified military authorities immediately when the planes were hijacked, fighter jets could have reached all four jetliners in time. "If that is the case, yes, we could shoot down the airplanes," testified Air Force Gen. Ralph E. Eberhart, commander of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD).
Yet the Sept. 11 commission's report, issued during the panel's final public hearing in Washington yesterday, cast serious doubt on Eberhart's claim, finding that even if the fighter pilots had had more time, an executive order by Vice President Cheney that gave the military permission to shoot down hostile aircraft that morning did not come until long after the last hijacked airliner had crashed. Furthermore, the panel found, the instruction was never passed on to fighter pilots scrambled from Virginia's Langley Air Force Base to Washington because of uncertainty about the order's ramifications.
"The details of what happened on the morning of September 11 are complex," the commission's investigators concluded. "But the details play out a simple theme. NORAD and the FAA were unprepared for the type of attacks launched against the United States on September 11, 2001. They struggled, under difficult circumstances, to improvise a homeland defense against an unprecedented challenge they had never encountered and had never trained to meet."
The panel also concluded that jets probably would not have been able to stop the last airplane, United Flight 93, from barreling into the White House or the Capitol if it had not crashed in Pennsylvania.
"We are sure that the nation owes a debt to the passengers of United 93," the report's authors wrote, referring to an apparent effort by passengers to foil the hijackers' plans. "Their actions saved the lives of countless others, and may have saved either the U.S. Capitol or the White House from destruction."
The stark conclusions came as part of the last interim report to be issued by the staff of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, which is racing to complete a book-length final report by the end of next month.
Among the new information contained in the latest report is a detailed reconstruction of the reactions of President Bush, Cheney and other top government leaders on the morning of Sept. 11.
Relatives of Sept. 11 victims, scattered throughout the sparsely attended final public hearing in L'Enfant Plaza yesterday, also listened through tears to recordings of two hijackers' voices, which were captured in radio transmissions picked up by air traffic controllers.
"We have some planes," an unidentified hijacker, who may be ringleader Mohamed Atta, said in heavily accented English from American Flight 11 at 8:24 a.m. "Just stay quiet and you'll be okay. We are returning to the airport." A few seconds later, he says: "Nobody move. Everything will be okay. If you try to make any moves, you'll endanger yourself and the airplane. Just stay quiet." The plane was the first to crash, hitting the North Tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m. The commission's report documents a succession of mistakes, wrong assumptions and puzzling errors made on the morning of Sept. 11 by air defense and aviation employees, who often did not communicate with one another and frequently seemed unsure of how to respond to the attacks.
Panel investigators also tersely concluded that authorities with NORAD repeatedly misinformed the commission in testimony last fall about its scrambling of fighters from Langley. NORAD officials indicated at the time that the jets were responding to either United Flight 93 or American Flight 77. In fact, the panel found, they were chasing "a phantom aircraft," American Flight 11, which had already struck the World Trade Center. The commission found that officials were confronted with numerous false reports of hijacked aircraft that morning. "We fought many phantoms that day," testified Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The commission also found no evidence that FAA headquarters ever issued an order to implement cockpit security measures once it became clear that airplanes were being hijacked. The FAA office in Boston recommended to FAA headquarters that such action be taken before the hijackers had taken over United Flight 93, but their suggestion was not taken. The new account essentially shifts the terms of the debate about air-defense response that day, because it indicates that it is unlikely that any of the jetliners could have been intercepted given the time available. But the report also suggests that the amount of time to respond might have been lengthened if the FAA had communicated the status of the flights to NORAD more quickly.
Several commission members were critical of the FAA's response, arguing that headquarters was too slow to act and ignored the entreaties of some underlings. The FAA's unprecedented decision to ground all 4,500 aircraft in the skies originated with a command center rather than headquarters.
"If there was one unmistakable failure, it is the failure of the headquarters at FAA," said Republican commissioner John F. Lehman, a former Navy secretary.
Democratic commissioner Bob Kerrey, a former Nebraska senator, said, "I think headquarters blew it."
Monte Belger, the acting deputy administrator of the FAA at the time of the attacks, said his attention on Sept. 11 quickly became focused on getting airborne planes safely on the ground. He also said he never received intelligence reports suggesting that al Qaeda was determined to strike the United States or that one suspect, Zacarias Moussaoui, had been arrested on suspicion of training for a hijacking.
But one current FAA official, Benedict Sliney, who made the decision to ground all aircraft that morning, told commissioners that problems persist, recounting a recent incident in which he could not receive an answer from FAA headquarters as to whether he had the authority to scramble fighter jets in response to a suspicious aircraft. "I don't think the lines of communication are as clear as they should be," he said.
Chairman Thomas H. Kean said after yesterday's testimony that he was not satisfied with the answers from FAA officials and that the agency should have been better prepared for terrorist acts. The panel's vice chairman, Lee H. Hamilton, a Democratic former congressman from Indiana, cited a "failure of imagination" and said, "Our policy people simply were not able to imagine using an airplane as a weapon."
Kean also said he found it "very disturbing" that Cheney's shoot-down order, authorized by Bush, would go unheeded. "When the president of the United States gives a shoot-down order, and the pilots who are supposed to carry it out do not get that order, then that's about as serious as it gets as far as the defense of this country goes," Kean said.
Eberhart defended one general's decision not to hesitate before passing on the shoot-down order to the Langley fighters, saying it was not clear at the time that there were more confirmed hijackings. "Let's make sure we understand this order, convey it properly, that in fact we do not make a mistake."
He said his belief that NORAD could have intercepted all four flights if given proper notice by the FAA was based on computer modeling. He also said that changes implemented since the attacks, including NORAD access to domestic radar and immediate notification procedures, would allow the interception of all the flights.
Eberhart pointed to the example of American Flight 11, which crashed nine minutes after the military had been notified. "Today we believe we would have at least 17 minutes to make that decision," he testified. "On 9/11, we were 153 miles away. Today, we would be in a position to fire" in eight minutes.
Staff writer William Branigin contributed to this report.
-------- propaganda wars
US groups want Moore film banned
BBC
18 June, 2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3817993.stm
Michael Moore's documentary film opens across the US next week US conservative groups have launched a campaign to have Michael Moore's "misleading and grotesque" film Fahrenheit 9/11 banned from cinemas.
The film alleges connections between President George Bush and top Saudi families, including the Bin Ladens.
Move America Forward has begun a letter-writing campaign, while Citizens United is making TV and internet adverts which criticise Moore.
The documentary film will be shown around the US from 25 June.
'Support'
Move America Forward members were behind a letter-writing campaign that led US channel CBS to drop TV movie The Reagans last November, claiming the film distorted history.
The group has received several thousand e-mails of support for its Fahrenheit 9/11 campaign, said executive director Siobhan Guiney, a former Republican Party lobbyist.
"Since we are the customers of the American movie theatres it is important for us to speak up loudly and tell the industry executives that we don't want this misleading and grotesque movie being shown at our local cinema," the group said on its website, listing contact details for various US cinemas. It seems to be left to us to make sure that the media is educated, as well as the American people are educated, as to just what they're up to David Bossie, Citizens United Ms Guiney said: "(Moore) is critical of what's happening right now, and there's no problem with being critical - but his movie is not a documentary, it's a piece of propaganda."
Citizens United is headed by former Republican congressional aide David Bossie, who is also targeting George Soros, a billionaire who donated nearly $13m (£7m) to groups seeking to defeat President Bush.
Mr Bossie said: "Look, this guy (Moore) is simply producing and advertising this movie at this time to try to affect the election."
"It seems to be left to us to make sure that the media is educated, as well as the American people are educated, as to just what they're up to."
Move America Forward members urged CBS to ban The Reagans Despite the campaign by the two independent groups, US cinema chain Regal Entertainment Group said it intended to go ahead and screen the film as planned.
And US liberal advocacy group MoveOn.org has asked its supporters to write to cinemas on Move America Forward's list, urging them not to give in to pressure to block the film.
Fahrenheit 9/11's US distributor Lions Gate Films believes the plan to have the film banned will fail.
"My guess is that their efforts will backfire and only rally support for the film, which will be terrific as far as I'm concerned," said president Tom Ortenberg.
"We need less censorship in this country, not more."
Fahrenheit 9/11 won the Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes Film Festival, and will be released in the UK on 9 July.
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Inside Al-Jazeera
inthesetimes.com
By Kevin Y. Kim
June 18, 2004
http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/inside_al_jazeera/
Samir Khader has covered and observed the war on terror through his work with the Arab news network, Al-Jazeera, which he joined after working as a journalist for French and Jordanian television. Khader's insights recently landed him a lead role in Control Room, a new documentary by Jehane Noujaim about the war in Iraq. In These Times spoke with Khader in New York.
Blunt question: Were you against the U.S. war in Iraq?
Of course I was against the war. Imagine yourself an Arab citizen, living in the Middle East, with a foreign power coming to invade and occupy an Arab country whose population you consider as brothers, as Arabs like you. Most Arabs acknowledge Saddam Hussein was a dictator and should be toppled. But our feeling is that he should be toppled by his own people, his own army-not a foreign power. And we're concerned that the Iraqi population was living under siege and complete embargo for over 13 really miserable years. You want to wage war on Hussein? OK, but who will suffer? It's not Saddam; it's the Iraqi population, which means you have to look at the cost of war. Even if war was justified, there is a human cost.
Soldiers your network reported on?
Yes, young Americans who joined the Army to learn, have a living, a future-whose government is sending them thousands of miles from their homes to wage a war for reasons about which they have no clue. Very young people, just following orders-it's very sad to see them in this situation.
You're critical of Bush's policies. At the same time you have an avowed appreciation for American values and democracy-to the point that you'd like to send your kids to college here. How do you square that?
Look, look, look. We at Al-Jazeera try to make a difference between a country's government and its people. We try our best to explain to viewers that this U.S. foreign policy has nothing to do with the American people, values, ethics, ideals and dreams. But people tend to always confuse the government with the people, so we try to emphasize this is the policy of this particular administration, with discrepancies among its members. Take, for example, the position of the U.S. secretary of defense [Donald Rumsfeld] and secretary of state [Colin Powell]. Sometimes, personally, I wonder how these two men can coexist in the same administration. In our coverage, we make distinctions between them.
Isn't Al-Jazeera what the United States truly wants for the region: an Arab channel with a Western-influenced way of providing information?
For decades, American administrations fully supported Arab dictatorships under the pretext that these governments allied with the United States in the war against communism. They didn't care that the Arab world lacked democracy and freedom. After 9/11, they discovered this policy has transformed some Arab countries into factories producing terrorists. Now the United States wants to change things by introducing democracy to the Arab world. But how can they do that with guns? Therefore, we see ourselves at Al-Jazeera as the manifestation of the change that should happen in the Middle East. We introduce free speech, pluralism, openness to the Arab world. We were the first, only network to cross red lines. To break taboos. To uncover corruption in the Arab world. This is why we are Enemy No. 1 of many Arab governments. So when you see America attacking Al-Jazeera, you wonder what they really want for this Middle East.
How shocked were you by the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal?
Very. I never expected this from Americans. We had a lot of information on prisoner abuse before the scandal exploded in the United States, but because we are a TV station, if we wanted to say something, we had to prove it by picture. We didn't have pictures; we had unverified testimonies.
The United States is at pains creating its own media in the Arab world, partly in response to Al-Jazeera. It seems the United States wants democracy in the Middle East but on its terms, in its image.
There is no American democracy. There is democracy, period. If the United States wants to build a new press in Iraq or elsewhere, to compete with Al-Jazeera, fine. This is better for us, because you excel and get better when facing good competition.
Al-Jazeera has taken a lot of negative criticism for its coverage.
When an American official appears on TV and says, "Al Jazeera always tells lies," this is bad, destructive criticism. We have a daily audience of about 40 million people around the world. Would 40 million keep watching if we are telling lies? If a live guest insults the United States, however, it's up to the anchor to challenge the guest. If our anchor doesn't, a constructive criticism can be made and we'd try to explain this to the anchor.
A Muslim friend once told me the Arab world right now is going through its own Dark Ages, with many illiterate people being led by religious zealots, committing atrocities in the name of God.
Completely, I agree completely. And I hope this is the Dark Ages, because it's worse than that.
Why, because it's more bloody?
Oppression isn't always bloody. It can mean you are denied your basic rights, your dignity as a human being-that your citizenship can be revoked at any time. I hope these Arab governments start thinking of themselves as representatives of the people instead of rulers in charge of sheep. Of course, there are differences from one government to another. My home country, Jordan, has always been considered one of the Arab world's most moderate regimes. You cannot compare my status as a Jordanian with a Syrian's or Libyan's. Still, that is not enough.
In the long run, maybe the heavy cost of the war will come to be outweighed by the war's benefits to the Iraqi people.
You have to ask the Iraqis themselves. When I was there, I found they had mixed feelings. On one side, they are glad somebody came and liberated them from Hussein's dictatorship. But the cost they are paying is the occupation of their country, the denial of their sovereignty. What will happen in the future nobody knows, not even the Bush administration. We have to wait and see how things develop-but believe me, everybody inside and outside Iraq in the Middle East has only one wish: that Iraq will emerge from this nightmare and become a modern, stabilized, peaceful state. I think the Bush administration hopes for that but doesn't know how to do it.
You got a friendly tip for Bush, then?
Five minutes to set a new policy for George Bush in Iraq? (laughing). Here's a small suggestion. Mr. Bush, leave military efforts to the American military but give the British the chance to run the country. Yes, they have a past of colonialism, but as a result they know the region very well. They've occupied Iraq for more than half a century. They know all the tribes and colonies there. In the areas where the British are, there aren't many problems. They know how to deal with people. I'll give you one simple example. It's easy, but surprisingly, no American has ever done it.
When Baghdad fell, the Americans, led by Jay Garner at the time, said: "We are now in charge. We are the occupation authority." You know what the British did? They went looking for the chief of one of the biggest tribes in the south. They found him and told him: "Sheikh, you are in charge. We are here to help you." Of course the British were truly in charge, but at least they made this gesture. America knows how to fight and win wars, but its problem is what to do after victory. The war on terrorism is a just cause. It should be followed by everybody, every country in the world. But the way Bush is tackling this problem in the Middle East is harming the population, freedom and democracy. In the name of combating terrorism, people are getting imprisoned, killed, tortured. What's important for Arab public opinion is U.S. foreign policy. And U.S. foreign policy-much because of its role in the Israel-Palestine conflict, yes-has unfortunately never had any credibility in the Middle East.
At least American media coverage of Iraq is improving.
It was more patriotic, less objective during the war. It's getting better and better. They are now realizing they were fooled by the administration. But whatever we can say about the American media, I wish Al-Jazeera one day becomes similar to the American media in some respects, but without losing our identity, values and perspective.
You must get this question often. Regarding the "accidental" bombings of Al-Jazeera offices in Kabul and Baghdad, do you feel the U.S. military might be, in any way, targeting you?
If you ask this of 100 Al-Jazeera journalists, you will get 100 answers. I will give you my answer. I think they did it on purpose as a way to give a message: Beware, you are harming our interests. This is the message.
--------
Rumsfeld clears higher-ups in abuse probe
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
By Rowan Scarborough
June 18, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040617-114935-9252r.htm
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld yesterday said his review has revealed no evidence that a senior civilian or military officer ordered the abuse of Iraqi detainees in the war on terrorism.
The military has started a series of investigations into the maltreatment of Iraqi insurgents and criminal suspects last fall at the Abu Ghraib prison and other detention facilities. One major question has been whether the physical, and in some cases, sexual abuse was ordered by senior commanders.
Mr. Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon press conference yesterday he has been briefed on most of the probes and that the scandal does not reach higher-ups.
"I have high confidence that I have not seen anything that suggests that a senior civilian or military official of the United States of America has acted in a manner that's inconsistent with the president's request that everyone be treated humanely," the defense secretary said.
He said there was no order that "could be characterized as ordering or authorizing or permitting torture or acts that are inconsistent with our international treaty obligations or our laws or our values as a country."
Mr. Rumsfeld is the latest high-profile Bush administration official to meet with the press to explain Iraq policy as the June 30 Iraqi sovereignty handover date approaches.
The defense secretary was particular critical of the Washington press corps coverage of Iraq as Saddam Hussein loyalists and foreign terrorists continue to kill Americans and their Iraqi allies.
"This much is certain," Mr. Rumsfeld said on a day when scores of Iraqis were killed by another terrorist's car bomb. "Coalition forces cannot be defeated on the battlefield.
"The only way this effort could fail is if people were to be persuaded that the cause is lost, or that it's not worth the pain - or if those who seem to measure progress in Iraq against a more perfect world convince others to throw in the towel. I'm confident that that will not happen."
To date, the Army has charged seven military police soldiers, who served as Abu Ghraib guards, with abusing Iraqi detainees. One has pleaded guilty at a court-martial.
The Army continues to conduct a criminal probe that could result in charges against members of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade. The unit was under pressure from higher-ups to extract information from a group of detainees who had information on cells of insurgents killing American troops.
Pentagon lawyers have ruled that all detainees in Iraq are covered by rules of the Geneva Conventions that guarantee humane treatment.
This differs with the policy for terror suspects captured in Afghanistan, whom the military deems enemy combatants, not prisoners of war, although the Pentagon says their treatment follows Geneva standards.
Even under the conventions, U.S. officials believe they can put pressure on detainees to provide information on terror networks or planned attacks. The techniques may include sleep- and light-deprivation, and restricted rations.
Mr. Rumsfeld was asked about his order in October not to notify the International Committee of the Red Cross about the capture of a member of the terrorist group Ansar al-Islam. The secretary said it was done at the request of CIA Director George J. Tenet.
The captive was a senior Ansar al-Islam member and perhaps had information on Abu Mousab Zarqawi, whose beheading of American Nicholas Berg was videotaped. Officials say they did not want the Red Cross to interrupt the interrogation.
Daniel J. Dell'Orto, the Defense Department's principal deputy general counsel, said the Pentagon made a mistake.
"We should have registered him much sooner than we did," he said. "It didn't have to be at the very instant we brought him into our custody. And that's something that we'll just have to examine as to whether there was a breakdown in the quickness with which we registered him."
-------- us politics
Bush Censure by Envoys May Be a First, Historians Say (Update2)
(Bloomberg)
June 18 2004
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=alMjDzShgJkQ&refer=us
-- The statement by 27 former diplomats and military officers on Wednesday calling for the defeat of U.S. President George W. Bush may be unprecedented.
``Their prominence and seniority and influence when in their diplomatic or military posts, and their number, is really remarkable,'' said Richard Kohn, the Pentagon's chief Air Force historian from 1981-1991 and chairman of the University of North Carolina's peace, war and defense curriculum in Chapel Hill.
The group, which includes Democrats and Republicans, said Bush's foreign policy and the war in Iraq have damaged U.S. security. Its statement may sway voters already concerned by reports of abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. soldiers and the conclusion by a bipartisan commission that Saddam Hussein had no connection to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The investigative commission, appointed by the president, found no evidence that Hussein's regime worked with the al-Qaeda terrorist organization to plan the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. Bush, 57, responded that Hussein and al-Qaeda had ``numerous contacts'' outside of the attacks that justified the U.S. war in Iraq.
``Bush's credibility has been damaged by Iraq,'' said Greg Valliere, chief political strategist at Schwab Soundview Capital Markets in Washington. Democratic presidential candidate and Massachusetts Senator John Kerry ``has greater potential to get traction on issues like this,'' Valliere said.
Group's Statement
``From the outset, George W. Bush adopted an overbearing approach to America's role in the world, relying upon military might and righteousness, insensitive to the concerns of traditional friends and allies, and disdainful of the United Nations,'' said the group, Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change, in a statement Wednesday. They said Bush should be defeated, without explicitly endorsing Kerry, 60.
The group included Jack Matlock Jr., President Ronald Reagan's ambassador to the Soviet Union; retired Admiral William Crowe, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman under Reagan; Charles Freeman, President George H.W. Bush's ambassador to Saudi Arabia; and retired Air Force Chief of Staff Merrill McPeak, who is advising Kerry's campaign.
``I can't remember anything comparable to that,'' said historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr., 86, who was an adviser to President John F. Kennedy, a Democrat. ``I can't remember a precedent.'' Schlesinger won the Pulitzer Prize for his 1965 book, ``A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House.''
`Questionable Entries'
The Bush campaign said at least 20 of the signatories have been active politically before and at least 13 have contributed to Democrats, making the group a partisan one.
``There are some questionable entries'' who can't claim to be neutral, said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. Crowe, for example, endorsed Democrat Bill Clinton for president in 1992, he said.
``There's always some naysayers that get rounded up by the opposition,'' said Edwin Meese, 72, who served as attorney general under Reagan. ``I don't think it'll have much effect at all in the election, in as much as their statements seem inconsistent with their past positions.''
Bush's approval rating among adults in the U.S. climbed in the last month as more Americans said the military effort in Iraq was going well, a poll from the Pew Research Center found.
Bush Gains
The survey, conducted June 3-13, found the president's overall approval rating rose to 48 percent, from 44 percent in May. He also gained in the presidential race against Kerry, pulling into a statistical tie after trailing by 5 percentage points, according to the Washington-based Pew Center.
Professors such as Michael Munger, chairman of the political science department at Duke University, as well as former diplomats and military officials said the group's charges won't resonate with most voters. The people paying the most attention are the so-called swing voters, who may go either way, they said.
``These are people who don't get their crank turned by the main issues,'' Munger said. ``Iraq bears no resemblance to Vietnam militarily, but it may start to resemble Vietnam politically. What is the mission? When will it end?''
In the latest Los Angeles Times poll, Kerry led Bush by a margin of 51 percent to 44 percent. Fifty-five percent of voters said they disapproved of Bush's handling of the war in Iraq, up from 46 percent in March. The June 5-8 poll of 1,230 registered voters nationwide had a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
Open Season?
Crowe laid the groundwork for such a group when he endorsed Clinton, said Thomas Keaney, executive director of the foreign policy institute at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies in Washington. At the time, it was rare even for a retired military officer to speak out, he said.
``Today that is more and more prevalent,'' said Keaney, a retired Air Force Colonel who has also been a professor at the National War College. For diplomats and ex-military officials, political acts ``ought to remain extraordinary,'' Keaney said. ``It will hurt if the code changes, if it becomes open season.''
In the Vietnam War era, the types of people speaking out were lower-ranked officers or soldiers without commissions, said Phyllis Bennis, a fellow with the Institute for Policy Studies, a Washington research group that promotes democracy and human rights. Kerry, a Navy lieutenant in Vietnam who earned three Purple Hearts for injuries, a Silver Star for gallantry in action and a Bronze Star for valor, was one of those protesters.
The War Issue
``I don't remember a group of this stature before this war,'' Bennis said. ``The war is a crucial issue for every voting bloc -- those that are uncertain where they stand will take this as a very serious consideration.''
In the late 1950s, high-ranking retired military officials publicly denounced President Dwight Eisenhower's military strategy against the Soviet Union, said Christopher Preble, director of foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, a Washington public policy group that advocates limited government and libertarian issues. They acted as individuals, he said.
``We have seen this on specific issues at times, expressing some unhappiness, but not a broad blast at the administration like this,'' said Casimir Yost, director of the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University.
The U.S. group may have been following counterparts in the U.K. In an open letter released April 26, 52 former U.K. ambassadors and international officials criticized Prime Minister Tony Blair for his support of the U.S. administration's policies in Iraq and in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Powell Response
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell on Wednesday said the U.S. group's statement was politically motivated. ``I disagree with their point of view,'' Powell, 67, said in an interview with the Arab television channel Al-Jazeera. ``They wish to see President Bush not reelected. I do not believe that will be the judgment of the American people.''
The Bush campaign has more than 80,000 veteran and military volunteers and 49 Medal of Honor recipients who support the president, spokesman Scott Stanzel said. There are just 130 living recipients of the highest U.S. military award, according to the Web site http://www.medalofhonor.com .
``We are not surprised that John Kerry has the support of people who share his belief that the threat of terror is exaggerated,'' Stanzel said. ``This is a group of partisan individuals who have been previously active in politics. They certainly have a right to express their Democratic views, but we're not concerned with their activity.''
Veterans' Role
Military issues have gained more attention in the 2004 election because of Iraq and Kerry's efforts to organize 1 million veterans to help him.
``To be involved in an act that will be seen by many as political if not partisan is for many of us a new experience,'' said Phyllis Oakley, a career diplomat who served as assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research under Clinton and signed the statement. ``As career government officials, we have served loyally both Republican and Democratic administrations.''
Bush, commenting yesterday on the Sept. 11 commission report, said ``there was a relationship'' with al-Qaeda. ``This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al-Qaeda. We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda,'' he said.
That nuance may be lost on voters, said Ted Carpenter, an analyst at the Cato Institute. ``The Bush message that Iraq was in league with terrorists is fairly simple to understand, but he will not get the distinction between his message and the commission's message,'' Carpenter said. ``The commission report will have an impact; it will resonate with undecided voters.''
Vice President Dick Cheney, 63, reiterated the administration's position in a CNBC television interview last night, calling the evidence of a connection between the terrorists and Iraq ``overwhelming.''
-----
Kerry adopts Edwards' ideas
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
By Charles Hurt
June 18, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040617-114936-2128r.htm
DETROIT - Democrat John Kerry might not be quite ready to pick Sen. John Edwards as his presidential running mate, but he's already picking apart the North Carolina senator's populist nomination campaign and using parts of it as his own.
Mr. Kerry is talking about optimism, keeping children close to home, the rising costs of college tuition and stopping the flow of jobs overseas - all staples of Mr. Edwards' stump speech during the Democratic primary season.
Phrases from Mr. Kerry's recent speeches are nearly identical to those of Mr. Edwards' from earlier this year.
Although Mr. Kerry refuses to talk about the process for selecting a running mate, he and his staff seem to enjoy all the speculation and buzz about who it will be.
"I read with amusement about aides who don't know what they're talking about with respect to my schedule because I haven't made a decision," the candidate said in Detroit yesterday.
Mr. Kerry caused quite a stir among reporters traveling with him when he invited the Rev. Al Sharpton to travel on his campaign plane yesterday to appear and to help raise money in Detroit, where Mr. Sharpton did very well in the primaries.
"We've talked," said Mr. Sharpton when asked whether he was under consideration for the vice-presidential slot. "And I'm sure he and I will talk more today."
Mr. Kerry was in Washington on Wednesday afternoon and spent time meeting with lawmakers in his hideaway, the small office that most senior senators have in the Capitol.
The Kerry campaign has tried to keep a tight lid on Mr. Kerry's search, but the location of his hideaway - on the third floor, a few hundred paces from the Senate Press Gallery - made that seem futile. Mr. Kerry did meet with Rep. Richard A. Gephardt, Missouri Democrat and a former presidential candidate.
Meanwhile, the Hill newspaper reported that 22 members of the House have signed a letter asking Mr. Kerry to pick Mr. Edwards, a blow to Mr. Gephardt, who gave up his post as House Democratic leader to run for president.
But Mr. Edwards, the one-term Southern senator who finished second in the primary campaign, is the person most Democrats want as Mr. Kerry's running mate.
A poll earlier this month showed that Democrats nationally preferred Mr. Edwards over the other possibilities for a vice-presidential candidate, and a Kerry-Edwards ticket has the best poll numbers against President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
One Democratic party official said he doubted that a Kerry-Edwards ticket because it would show Mr. Kerry bending to political pressure, an area where Mr. Kerry already is perceived as weak.
It turns out, however, that Mr. Kerry has diligently cannibalized some of the most resonant messages from Mr. Edwards's campaign.
Mr. Edwards' optimistic message about helping the American worker compete on an even playing field with those in other countries has become a cornerstone of Mr. Kerry's campaign.
In his stump speeches, Mr. Kerry complains about the current economy, saying, "A rising tide is supposed to lift all boats, not just those of the captains" - an analogy Mr. Edwards routinely used to describe the Bush administration's tax cuts.
"It is clear that when our president is someone who understands that a rising tide lifts all boats, America prospers and grows stronger," Mr. Edwards said in a campaign swing through California in February. "And when our president is someone who believes that a rising tide is there only to get the yachts out of the harbor, then America suffers."
Earlier this week, Mr. Kerry spoke of how people are forced by the economy to move around for work, sometimes leaving the homes where they were born and grew up. He spoke of people's yearning to "work and live in a place where they grew up," a cornerstone of Mr. Edwards' campaign directed at rural Americans.
•Stephen Dinan contributed to this report from Washington.
-------- ENERGY
-------- energy
Iraq likely to resume oil exports today
LONDON (AP)
June 18, 2004
http://www.washtimes.com/business/20040617-101116-5722r.htm
- Iraq could resume exporting limited amounts of oil today, analysts said, with repair crews nearing completion of work on the smaller of two pipelines crippled in a sabotage attack.
If no more attacks occur, Iraq could restore and maintain normal shipments of at least 1.5 million barrels a day from its southern oil fields by next week, the analysts said yesterday.
An attack on the two southern pipelines forced Iraq to suspend all crude shipments from the Persian Gulf on Wednesday. The explosion north of the coastal town of Faw was the second such attack in three days.
The disruption in exports deprives Iraq of its main source of income and comes as Iraqis prepare to take over political power from the U.S.-led coalition on June 30. The outage prompted the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to signal plans to boost output to keep crude prices from rising.
The attack damaged a 23-foot section of the two pipelines that carry crude from some of Iraq's largest fields to tankers waiting at offshore terminals.
Repairs on the smaller, 42-inch diameter pipeline could be finished by today, said Paul Horsnell of Barclays Capital in London. Iraq could then begin exporting 600,000-to-700,000 barrels a day, he said.
Repairs on the larger, 48-inch pipeline could be completed by the middle of next week, he said.
Edward Morse of HETCO, a New York energy trading firm, expected partial exports of 450,000 to 500,000 barrels a day to resume by this weekend. A similar volume of crude should begin flowing "in a few days" from oil fields in northern Iraq to the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, Turkey.
Iraq's northern pipeline has operated only rarely since the toppling of Saddam Hussein, because of attacks by saboteurs, and the southern pipeline system has become the country's main economic artery.
If Iraq can restart exports through both systems, it could begin shipping about 1 million barrels this weekend, Mr. Morse said.
A senior Iraqi Oil Ministry source said oil would start flowing at normal volumes as soon as the pipelines are repaired.
However, the risk is high that saboteurs might intensify their attacks on Iraqi oil facilities ahead of June 30. If so, authorities might be forced again to reduce or halt exports.
Mr. Morse estimates the chances of another such attack at 90 percent.
Iraq has the world's second-largest oil reserves, and earnings from crude exports are essential to the country's reconstruction and political stability.
However, years of war, U.N. sanctions and mismanagement have left Iraq with dilapidated and obsolete oil facilities, and Iraqis have failed to restore crude exports to prewar levels of more than 2 million barrels a day.
On futures markets, contracts of U.S. light crude for July delivery traded 3 cents higher at $37.35 per barrel in New York. August contracts of North Sea Brent crude rose 24 cents at $35.44 in London.
-------- OTHER
-------- health
Food irradiation, Health risks, Misleading consumers, Misuse of the technology
18 Jun 2004
Medical News Today
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=9620
Food irradiation is being promoted by some international bodies and industry groups as the answer to the growing problem of food poisoning, and as a means to combat world hunger by reducing spoilage and extending food shelf life.A proposal to relax the global standards governing food irradiation, including the removal of the current maximum irradiation dose limit, is now under discussion.
The European Commission is also deliberating over whether to extend its list of foods permitted for irradiation in all EU member states. The current list includes only herbs, spices and vegetable seasonings, but the possible extension would mean many other foods could be irradiated in all member states. Yet consumer concerns persist over the numerous potential negative impacts of irradiating food.
HEALTH RISKS
-- Food irradiation can result in loss of nutrients, for example vitamin E levels can be reduced by 25% after irradiation and vitamin C by 5-10%. This is compounded by the longer storage times of irradiated foods, and by loss of nutrients during cooking, which can result in the food finally eaten by the consumer to contain little more than 'empty calories'. This is potentially damaging to the long and short-term health of consumers, particularly for sections of society already failing to obtain adequate nutrition.
-- When food is exposed to high doses of ionising radiation, the chemical composition and nutritional content of food can change. Radiolytic by-products are often formed in irradiated food. Very few of these chemicals have been adequately studied for toxicity. One such chemical - 2-DCB - can cause DNA damage in rat colon cells at high doses.
-- Food irradiation does not inactivate dangerous toxins which have already been produced by bacteria prior to irradiation. In some cases, such as C. botulinum, it is the toxin produced by the bacteria, rather than the bacteria itself, which poses the health hazard.
-- Extension of the EU list of foods permitted for irradiation could mean that in future a significant part of the diet of consumers will consist of irradiated foods. The long-term impacts of this to health remain unknown. Far more research is required prior to exposing populations to such a diet.
-- Irradiating products such as mechanically recovered chicken meat, offal and egg white, could mislead consumers into thinking these are safer. There is therefore a risk that consumers will fail to take necessary measures to prevent cross-contamination. The risk of recontamination of food after irradiation is very serious as a near sterile food is an ideal medium for very rapid growth of re-introduced bacteria. Irradiated food must therefore be handled with even greater care in homes and restaurants.
-- Irradiation can cause mutations in bacteria and viruses leading to potentially resistant strains.
MISLEADING CONSUMERS
-- Irradiating fruit and vegetables to extend their shelf life can mislead consumers by making 'old' food look 'fresh'. The greater the age of fruit and vegetables, the lower their nutritional value, not to mention the effects of ageing on their tastes and flavours.
-- Consumers may be dangerously misled because irradiation also unavoidably kills off bacteria that produce warning smells indicating that the food is going 'off'.
-- The irradiation of some products, such as dried fruit and flakes or germs of cereal, often considered as health foods (eg. muesli), could lead them to become misperceived by consumers as inherently contaminated food types.
MISUSE OF THE TECHNOLOGY
-- Food irradiation can and has been used to mask poor hygiene practices in food production. With irradiation, contamination can be sterilised. This reduces the incentive to clean up sloppy food processing operations - the industry is provided with a 'quick fix' as an alternative to dealing with the sources of the problem. The consumer has a right to expect clean food, yet irradiation can lead to the increased production of food contaminated with dirt -'clean' dirt.
-- Irradiation can be used to maintain or even worsen poor standards of animal husbandry. Overcrowding of animals whist rearing and prior to slaughter, as well as the use of cheap but inappropriate feeds, all contribute to contamination of animal products such as meat, poultry and eggs. Cleaning up these products at the end of the production line removes the incentive to improve animal welfare.
-- Breaches of existing labelling legislation have occurred in European countries, with the sale of unlabelled irradiated foods. This was recently discovered to be occurring again by a UK government detection survey which found that nearly half the food supplements sampled were illegally irradiated and unlabelled (see press releases). Under these circumstances the consumers' right to choice is flouted. Relaxation of irradiation standards could worsen this situation.
-- If they succeed, on-going industry efforts in the US to substitute the term 'irradiation' on irradiated food labels with terms such as 'cold pasteurisation' could serve to confuse and mislead consumers.
THE SAFETY OF WORKERS
-- Workers risk accidental exposure to dangerous levels of radiation, particularly at irradiation plants using radioactive sources.
-- The use of irradiation to sterilise meat at the end of the production line allows slaughter lines to be run at dangerously high speeds, since the greater contamination that occurs during high speed carving of carcasses can be 'cleaned up' at the end of the line. This approach increases the risk of accidents and fatalities by forcing meat packers to work faster than ever.
SOCIO-ECONOMIC COSTS
-- Food irradiation is not a low-cost method. Irradiation plants are expensive and could help large multinationals to eliminate smaller and more local producers. Requirements for improved security measures at all facilities holding radioactive materials, are likely to increase the costs of irradiation plants, leading to an increase in the prices of irradiated foods.
-- Irradiation supports greater globalisation of food production and supply, threatening local farmers and food processors.
SECURITY RISKS
-- It has been reported that numerous unrecovered losses and thefts of radioactive materials occur each year. Recent events have raised concerns over the potential for terrorists to obtain these materials for use in 'dirty bombs'. A dirty bomb uses conventional explosives to disperse radioactive materials. Such an attack could cause radiation contamination over several city blocks, but probably no deaths from radiation because of the low doses as the material is dispersed. Such an attack could spread panic and have significant economic impacts. It would require lengthy cleanup operations, although these materials are fairly easily detected.
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS
-- Accidents at radioactive irradiation plants have already led to radioactive spills and contamination of surrounding land and water resources. This could happen again.
-- The construction of more irradiation plants could necessitate more transportation of radioactive materials, entailing risks of accidents and radioactive leaks over a wider area.
-- Irradiation allows food to be transported over greater distances, leading to greater air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions which contribute to global warming.
THE FOOD IRRADIATION CAMPAIGN BELIEVES THAT:
-- the precautionary principle should be asserted until chemical by-products formed in irradiated foods have been adequately studied for toxicity in compliance with modern scientific protocols, and are proven safe for consumption.
-- food irradiation is no solution for cleaning up foods that are contaminated due to unhygienic production lines.
-- priority should focus on improving production, storage, and processing, rather than on killing off contamination at the last stage.
-- food irradiation benefits the industry rather than consumers, and large multinational companies rather than local and small-scale producers.
-- food irradiation works against local food supplies and its application for mass commodities is likely to undermine sustainability.
-- good food doesn't need irradiating.
This article comes from The Food Commission, UK - http://www.foodcomm.org.uk/irradiation_probs.htm
-------- ACTIVISTS
Hong Kong Leader Tries to Head Off March
By MARGARET WONG
The Associated Press
Friday, June 18, 2004
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51469-2004Jun18.html
HONG KONG - Hong Kong's leader met with opposition leaders Friday in an apparent effort to head off a repeat of last year's embarrassing democracy march that brought a half-million protesters to the streets.
Many in Hong Kong are angered by what they see as an erosion of their civil liberties since the former British colony reverted to Chinese rule in 1997.
Activists are organizing a major protest on July 1, the first anniversary of a huge demonstration against a proposed national security bill many had feared would undermine their freedom.
About 500,000 people turned out for last year's march, forcing Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa to indefinitely withdraw the Beijing-backed bill.
On Friday, Tung met separately with members of the main opposition Democratic Party and pro-democracy lawyers, discussing issues including political reform, economic development and education policies.
He called the talks "useful" and said he would hold similar meetings in the future, while cautioning that any breakthrough would take time.
"Through communication and exchanges, we can work together to move forward Hong Kong's development," he said.
Tensions between Beijing and Hong Kong's opposition have been high since April, when the central government quashed demands for full democracy by ruling that Hong Kong cannot hold direct elections for its next leader in 2007 and all lawmakers in 2008.
Tung said opposition groups should respect Beijing's ruling.
But he reiterated his promise to push for talks between Beijing and Hong Kong's opposition, and to urge Beijing to let opposition lawmakers travel to mainland China. Beijing bars many of Hong Kong's pro-democracy figures, viewing them as troublemakers.
Opposition lawmaker Martin Lee welcomed the move.
"I hope this will lead to a meaningful face-to-face dialogue between the democrats and the Beijing leaders," Lee said. "Once we can sit down, I think a lot of things can be achieved."
But political observers said it remains to be seen if Tung's new push is genuine.
"This is an important yet a very preliminary step for the both sides to achieve a future reconciliation," said Li Pang-kwong, a politics professor at Lingnan University.
"Talks don't automatically produce solutions," Li said. "It all depends whether they are willing to reach a consensus."
Law Yuk-kai, director of the nongovernment organization Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor, said too much compromise would be "political suicide" for the opposition.
"If they abandon their stand, they will lose the majority of their support," Law said. "It will take a very long time before we can see an ease in tension between the two sides."
Tung is a former shipping tycoon who was picked by an 800-member pro-Beijing committee.
Ordinary citizens have no say in choosing the chief executive and elected only 24 of 60 sitting lawmakers - though that number will rise to 30 this September. The rest will be chosen by special interest groups, such as bankers and lawyers.
Despite Tung's recent attempts to smooth relations between the government and pro-democracy activists, Li said he expected 200,000-300,000 to take to the street on July 1 - also the seventh anniversary of Hong Kong's return to China.
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