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NUCLEAR
Nuclear plant backed by Blair is £600m 'white elephant'
Burn, baby, burn: Why we're back to nuclear power
U.S. Sneaks Uranium Out of Iraq; UN Team Returns with Limited Mandate
Jordan plays down radiation fears from Israel's nuclear plant
NO WAY OUT FOR VANUNU
Japan considering military capability to attack enemy bases: report
METI: Japan's oil use to fall; gas, nuclear to increase
N Korea rejects US offer of Gadaffi-style deal
DPRK rejects U.S. proposal
UN says focus on terrorist WMD causing disarmament 'stalemate'
US weapons research industry grinds to halt amid missing data scandal
MILITARY
Afghan President Announces Candidacy
A Fugitive To Some, But a Hero To Others
Bioshield Too Little for Drug Industry
Taiwan halts visit by US military delegation: report
E.U. Threatens Sanctions On Sudan if Crisis Persists
Official Warns of Iranian Infiltration
Israel will be 'wiped off earth' if it attacks Iran: Revolutionary Guards
Iraqi defence minister warns Iran over sending of spies and saboteurs
Officers Question Visibility of Army in Iraq
Iraqi Forces Kill 13 Insurgents
Suicide Bombing Kills 3 Near U.S. Base in Northern Iraq
AID Western Ways Force Iraq to Trim Water Projects
Cash becomes part of U.S. arsenal in dealing with Iraqis
6 Palestinians Killed at Restaurant
Thousands Join Hands to Fight Withdrawal of Israel From Gaza
Palestinian Turmoil Threatens to Erode Arafat's Power
Israel Reroutes Barrier on Court Order
Settler reparation plan unveiled
NATO military HQ targetted by terror threat
Pak Helped Bin Laden Set Up Base In Afghanistan: Report
Russia's Putin talks military cooperation with Uzbek leader
RUSSIA SEEKS TO RESTRUCTURE DEFENSE INDUSTRY
Bush Stands By His Space Plan
Kidnapping of bin Laden Was Rehearsed in '98
U.S. Using Cash as a Defensive Weapon
Soldiers tell stories about Iraq
U.S. Bases Overseas Show New Strategy
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
Panel Chiefs Are Seen as Candidates for Post
Some Steps Put in Place to Aid Border Security
Security Excess
Police chase false alarms at convention
Pentagon providing wide range of military support for convention
Unprecedented security prowls Boston
FBI Completes Search At Fort Detrick Search Connected To Anthrax Mailings
U.S. 'Correctional Population' Hits New High
POLITICS
South Korea axes three-star general over North Korea leak
In Canada, Exceptions Are Rule for Al-Jazeera
Network Anchors Hold Fast to Their Dwindling 15 Minutes
Political Papers Become Dailies to Blanket the Conventions
Bush Set to Act on Advice of 9/11 Panel
Senate Hopefuls Are Convention No-Shows
Archivist's Resignation Questioned
OTHER
Pentagon Finds Contamination at 14 Bases
Nations Collaborate to Take Planet's 'Pulse'
ACTIVISTS
Israeli supreme court maintains restrictions on Vanunu
Peace marchers, anti-abortion picket clash
Convention a 'coming-out for bloggers'
Protesters march to FleetCenter
Seen and heard around and about the DNC
Demonstrators Steer Clear of Their Designated Space
Contest Between Liberties and Security at Convention
Report from Boston: Stay Out of the "Free Speech Zone"
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- britain
Nuclear plant backed by Blair is £600m 'white elephant'
Guardian
07/26/04
http://mathaba.net/x.htm?http://mathaba.net/0_index.shtml?x=62491
A nuclear fuel factory which was personally approved by Tony Blair has so far cost the taxpayer more than £600m - and rising - without producing a single saleable item, a Guardian investigation has established.
The factory at Sellafield in Cumbria was designed to process plutonium and uranium from used nuclear fuel rods to power reactors for overseas customers of British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL), but it is eight years behind schedule.
The Guardian has learned that the prime minister brushed aside the doubts of ministers to order the plant to begin production in 2001, after a four-year wrangle within Whitehall. Ministers had warned Mr Blair that the factory would be a financial disaster.
With the support of the trade secretary, Patricia Hewitt, Mr Blair also overrode opposition from the Irish and Norwegian governments and green campaigners who protested that the factory would cause radioactive contamination of the environment.
The scale of the factory's financial woes is only now coming to light. It has emerged that the factory, which started up in December 2001, is not yet working properly and has yet to produce any revenue.
BNFL has been forced to halt all production for several months to carry out "modifications and improvement".
But the public purse will continue to be drained as Stephen Timms, the energy minister, has conceded that the plant is not expected to be operating fully until the end of 2005 at the earliest. In the meantime, BNFL has to pay for the upkeep of the factory, including the wages of hundreds of workers.
The disclosures come soon after Mr Blair announced that he was considering building a new generation of nuclear power stations as a way of controlling climate change.
The idea behind the factory is to use plutonium and uranium recovered from reprocessing, which would otherwise be useless, to make a new form of nuclear fuel. The factory is generally known as the Mox plant because the fuel is made from mixed oxides of plutonium and uranium.
BNFL built the Mox plant in the 1990s with taxpayers' money. Plutonium and uranium stockpiled at Sellafield, Cumbria, for foreign customers from Japan, Germany, Switzerland and Sweden could be returned to them as useful fuel.
The Mox plant was also supposed to be the flagship foreign exchange earner for the beleaguered state-owned BNFL. Instead, it has pushed the already technically bankrupt company further into the red, with the company's chief executive blaming part of the company's £310m loss this year on the failure of the plant.
The depth of BNFL's troubles was underlined this year when the company, in the absence of any product from the plant, was forced to contract out orders and buy batches of readymade Mox fuel from Belgium to sell on to one of its overseas customers and keep them satisfied. The cost of this emergency manoeuvre is being kept secret.
Documents passed to the Guardian show that before the plant began operations, the government was told that only four countries might place orders with the Mox plant.
These forecasts were contained in telegrams sent back to London by British diplomats in nine countries who had been asked to assess markets for the Mox fuel.
Japan was seen as vital to the success of the plant. Norman Askew, then chief executive of BNFL, said in September 2000: "Without Japanese orders, we cannot justify opening the Mox plant. We have until about next January or February to convince the Japanese, otherwise we will have to abandon the project."
An optimistic assessment from the British embassy in Japan said Japan's Mox programme would proceed "more or less on schedule", but this has proved to be wrong. Even the pro-Mox lobby in Japan now thinks that Japan cannot place any orders until 2007, and even then the fuel will be supplied by France, not BNFL.
BNFL has always claimed that there would be enough orders to make the plant pay. But today, there have been just two - from Germany and from Sweden. The value of both orders is secret. Although there are still no orders from Japan, BNFL remains confident that the chances of getting them are "robust".
Mr Blair decided to press ahead with Mox three years ago despite warnings from ministers and officials that the plant would be a financial white elephant. He made his decision on the basis of two papers by financial advisers, kept secret by the government.
Critics outside the government also criticised the financial calculations to justify the existence of the Mox plant.
Martin Forwood, of Cumbrians Opposed to Radioactive Environment, called them "voodoo economics", while Charles Secrett, then director of Friends of the Earth, termed them "Alice in Wonderland" mathematics.
The opponents' assessment was based on the fact that the construction costs of the plant, by then being quoted as £472m, were ignored in the official calculations of future profit or loss. Even then, only counting the operating costs, the plant is only officially forecast to make £216m profit in its lifetime - assuming there were enough foreign orders to keep it working for 10 years.
A No 10 spokesman refused to comment on Mr Blair's role in approving the Mox plant.
A spokesman for the Department of Trade and Industry, which is responsible for BNFL, said : "The economic and environmental case for the [Mox plant] remains as strong as ever. The plant turns plutonium and uranium into fuel and will help to transform the world's plutonium into electricity."
A BNFL spokesman said : "Our economic assessment shows that there is still a sound economic case for the plant. Furthermore, the operation of the plant is important to provide a route to return plutonium to overseas customers."
He added that the delays in operating the plant were because of "extended regulatory and government approval processes". He also said that production has been halted for "modifications and improvement", delaying the delivery of the first batch of Mox fuel.
Mr Blair had repeatedly run into stiff opposition from the Irish government when he decided to go ahead with the plant, as shown in documents released to the Guardian under the Irish Freedom of Information Act. Bertie Ahern, the Irish prime minister, told Mr Blair of his government's "total opposition, dismay and disappointment" in a private meeting in October 2001. Mr Ahern was worried that the Mox plant would "perpetuate" the life of the Sellafield complex and leave more radioactive pollution on Irish shores.
According to one document, the Irish, persistent opponents of BNFL, argued that the Mox plant "would add to the multiplicity of facilities and operations at Sellafield, thereby increasing accident/security threat". BNFL's order book
The hopes and reality.
Japan
British embassy, Tokyo, reported "confidence in Japan that the Mox programme will go ahead more or less on schedule". It initially predicted the first Mox fuel would be loaded by 2001, and there would be a steady rise to 16-18 reactors using Mox by 2010.
Current situation: No Mox is in use in Japan, and none is expected before 2007. There are no orders for BNFL.
Germany
British embassy, Berlin: "Existing contracts between German utilities and BNFL envisage plutonium will be converted into Mox".
Current situation: One contract signed between a German utility company and BNFL, which BNFL says is 15% of the necessary order book to break even.
Canada
British embassy, Ottawa: "There is considerable public disquiet over the very limited nature of Canadian testing of Mox fuel. There are cheaper alternatives available in this energy-rich country. We see no prospect for BNFL in this market".
Current situation: No orders for BNFL
France, Netherlands, Spain and Italy
Embassies reported that there was little likelihood of orders from any of these countries at present or in the future. France makes its own Mox fuel at two sites.
Current situation: No orders for BNFL by Paul Brown and Rob Evans
-------- canada
Burn, baby, burn: Why we're back to nuclear power
From the Globe & Mail, Toronto
By WILLIAM THORSELL
Monday, July 26, 2004 - Page A13
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20040726/COTHOR26/TPNational/Canada
As the anniversary of Ontario's power blackout approaches, the volatility of energy markets rises around the globe. Our social survival depends on the consumption of energy, especially electricity. Oil requires a military perspective on the world. The environment weighs in. And so we contemplate the resurrection of nuclear power.
The Chinese are running out of electricity to feed their economic boom; brownouts and shutdowns have been common this summer as hot weather drains power for air conditioning even as manufacturing continues to expand. While Ontario plans to shut down five coal-fired generating plants by 2007, China is striving to open at least 16 by the same date, as well as gas and nuclear plants.
Approved new power plants in China will create almost twice the electrical capacity of Britain in 10 years. And China is just getting started on the road to much higher power consumption as a neo-capitalist society thrilled to be back in economic action after a dark age.
Throw in the explosion of car sales in Asia and the emergence of India and Russia in the global economy, and it's "burn, baby, burn." If consuming fossil fuels creates global warming, we are in for a lot of global warming.
We are also in for supply restrictions and higher prices on oil and natural gas. Global demand for oil is expected to expand by 50 per cent in the next 25 years, as developing countries take up the torch. Unlike the occasional restriction of oil supply through OPEC's political actions, the growth in demand tips the market toward shortage. At the same time, the world's major sources of oil have rarely been more politically insecure.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the U.S. military has been spending $4 to $5 a barrel to protect oil exports by sea from the Middle East since the early 1980s, a transaction cost growing higher as the adventure in Iraq ignites Arab-on-Arab terrorism. New supplies elsewhere do not promise to fill any void created by Middle East internecine passions.
North America, meanwhile, is no longer replacing its consumption of natural gas with new reserves.
No surprise, then, that we are turning more attention to nuclear power. What else offers more security at digestible cost with little environmental consequence? What provides more insurance against external events? Wind? Solar? Hydrogen power cells?
Ontario has just announced a $900-million refit of another generator at its old Pickering nuclear power plant, an inevitable consequence of the decision to close the coal-fired plants. Coal supplies about 22 per cent of the province's current electricity demand, so Ontario has to replace that and create additional supply as well. With nuclear power already producing 40 per cent of the province's power, its seems inevitable that additional nuclear capacity will soon be required.
Natural gas supplies will be volatile and expensive over time. And the priority claim on natural gas should be home heating.
Conservation will not close the gap. Wind does not have the credibility yet, either in its capacity or price, on which to bet the welfare of 12 million Ontarians. The same goes for small-scale generators here and there. Water is pretty much exhausted except in Manitoba and Quebec. So nuclear it is.
According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, there are 442 nuclear power plants in the world, with another 27 under construction, 18 of them in Asia. There is little current development in North America and Western Europe, where fears for safety, some concern for cost, and a dollop of ideology have interrupted things.
But France, Finland and Ontario look to be moving back into the nuclear market, as the options become more stark. On all three major grounds -- security of supply, environmental weight and cost -- nuclear comes through quite nicely, compared with the alternatives. The challenge for hapless Ontario will be producing new capacity competently, perhaps through new suppliers.
The handling of nuclear waste is not a pressing technical issue, and can be safely enmeshed in endless public hearings, where its essentially political nature ensures harmless inaction.
With nuclear back in favour, prospects for supply brighten, but the dependability of distribution remains at issue, as we saw Aug. 14. Technical and terrorist threats to this centralized system remain significant, and contingency planning for long-term distribution interruptions appears inadequate.
What is the emergency plan for 30 days without any home heating or water in Toronto in January if the power goes down because of a distribution failure? Maybe there just can't be one, given the certainty of chaos, so a dependable supply of electricity is the closest equation there is these days to peace, order and good government. Lose electricity and we lose the social order.
Medicare gets all the political attention, while the much more fundamental question of our energy supplies and systems percolates off-stage. The first duty of the state is the security of the citizen, not the care of the ill. We got a glimpse of that last August.
William Thorsell is director and CEO of the Royal Ontario Museum.
-------- iraq / inspections
U.S. Sneaks Uranium Out of Iraq; UN Team Returns with Limited Mandate
by Lisa Ashkenaz Croke
July 26, 2004
The NewStandard
http://newstandardnews.net/content/?action=show_item&itemid=732
Jul 26 - Two weeks after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) confirmed that the US had secretly shipped nuclear materials out of Iraq, the Agency has been invited back for the first time in over a year.
The US-installed interim Iraqi government requested the return of international inspectors. The Agency's director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, confirmed to reporters Wednesday in Cairo that a team would return to Baghdad. Before the US-led invasion last year, the Agency was responsible for ensuring that Iraq's nuclear material and facilities were not being used for military purposes.
Agence France-Presse quotes ElBaradei as saying the IAEA's return "is an absolute necessity, not to search for weapons of mass destruction, but to draft the final report on the absence of WMDs in Iraq so that the international community can lift the [remaining] sanctions on Iraq." The director general also stated that inspectors "will complete the mission [the UN had] assigned to them before the invasion."
However, various press reports cite IAEA spokesperson Melissa Fleming referring to the upcoming mission as a routine, UN-mandated inventory of the Tuwaitha Nuclear Complex, not a search related to weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
Yanked out of Iraq just days before the March 2003 invasion, the IAEA was at that time unable to fulfill its dual mandate: to find evidence of weapons of mass destruction, and to conduct routine audits of nuclear materials sealed and warehoused after the 1991 Gulf War. The inspectors have been asked to return just once, in June 2003, after frantic media reports of missing low-level nuclear materials and contamination surrounding the Tuwaitha Facility, just south of Baghdad, prompted the US to call on the IAEA for help.
According to ElBaradei's report to the UN after that mission, at least 10 kg of uranium compounds "could have been disbursed" into the residential areas surrounding the site, though ElBaradei stated that neither the type nor quality of the material would be useful for weapons purposes.
In the war's aftermath, with occupation forces providing inadequate if any security for facilities throughout the country, looters broke into at least five Iraqi nuclear facilities. The Washington Post reported in May 2003 that the Tuwaitha Storage Facility and the Baghdad Nuclear Research Center, the Ash Shaykhili Nuclear Facility, the Baghdad New Nuclear Design Center and the Tahadi Nuclear Establishment were all "damaged or effectively destroyed."
The IAEA did not inspect any of the other sites, nor does its report mention the risks of radiation sickness to the community, as inspectors were not allowed to leave the facility itself. But Greenpeace and other nongovernmental organizations found overwhelming evidence that the materials from Tuwaitha had proliferated throughout the surrounding areas and by last summer were causing highly exaggerated radioactivity levels and severe illnesses.
As ElBaradei noted at the time, "The [US-run Coalition Provisional] Authority has informed the Agency that it would assume responsibility for nuclear safety. The Agency mission therefore did not look into possible safety and health effects of the looting of nuclear material or radioactive sources." He added, "I trust that the [Coalition Provisional] Authority will monitor any impact on the safety and health of the surrounding population and will share its findings with the Agency."
Returning inspectors may soon determine if that trust was warranted.
Questions have also been raised about the legality of last month's transfer of low-grade uranium and other radioactive materials, airlifted from Iraq to the United States.
Confirming the transfer in a July 6 statement, the US Department of Energy asserted the mission was "consistent with [US] authorities and relevant United Nations Security Council Resolutions."
However, the Associated Press reports that an unnamed UN official questioned the legality of the move, saying the nuclear material belonged to Iraq and was under the control and supervision of the IAEA. The United States did not notify the UN Agency of the transfer until June 30, after the joint effort between the US departments of Defense and Energy was completed and the materials secured at undisclosed locations in the United States.
''The American authorities just informed us of their intention to remove the materials, but they never sought authorization from us,'' IAEA official Gustavo Zlauvinen told the AP.
ElBaradei addressed the transfer in a letter to the UN Security Council, revealing that the US had notified IAEA on June 19, 2003 that, due to security concerns, nuclear materials would be taken to the United States from the Tuwaitha nuclear facility "at a future date." The US asked the Agency to keep the matter confidential. A year later, the move was made with no further notice.
Interestingly, ElBaradei had recently made it a point to address the issue of possible relocation of materials not disclosed to the Agency. In an April 14 briefing to Security Council President Gunter Plueger, ElBaradei called attention to UN Resolution 1051, requiring parties notify the IAEA of related imports or exports. "The Agency has received no such declaration or notification since it withdrew from Iraq a year ago," asserted ElBaradei, ten months after the apparent understanding with between US and IAEA officials.
The director general also recently expressed concern that IAEA's ability to resume its full mandate may have already been compromised by activity suspected to include large-scale industrial piracy. Satellite imagery shows "extensive removal of equipment and, in some instances, removal of entire buildings" from previously contained nuclear sites in Iraq. Meanwhile, contaminated scrap metal has been found in other countries, including Jordan, to which it was shipped by the truckload.
"It is not clear whether the removal of these items has been the result of looting activities in the after matter of the recent war in Iraq, or as part of systematic efforts to rehabilitate some of the locations," assessed ElBaradei. "In any event, these activities may have a significant impact on the Agency's continuity of knowledge of Iraq's remaining nuclear-related capabilities and raise a concern with regard to the proliferation risk associated with dual use material and equipment disappearing to unknown destinations."
While ElBaradei refused to assign blame in his April briefing, he had less than generous words for the former occupation authorities this week.
"It does not fall within the competence of the Coalition forces... to prove or disprove the possession by Iraq of weapons of mass destruction," said ElBaradei, commenting on his inspectors' limited mandate, which still does not include a final search regimen that could prove Iraq's compliance with prior resolutions. It remains to be seen whether ElBaradei's Agency will be able to finally close the books on Iraq's status as an alleged nuclear threat.
-------- israel
Jordan plays down radiation fears from Israel's nuclear plant
AMMAN (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726124320.ow1cov2d.html
The Jordanian government on Monday played down any immediate fear of contamination from neighbouring Israel's aging Dimona nuclear plant and stressed that radiation levels were normal.
"Until now, no abnormal levels for industrial radiation, which is the harmful radiation, have been observed," government spokeswoman Asma Khodr said at her weekly press conference.
Israel's nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu, in comment published Sunday, said the Middle East was at risk of a "second Chernobyl" in the event of an accident at his country's 40-year-old Dimona plant.
Jordan should test residents in the border regions with Israel to be sure they have not already been exposed to radiation and administer the necessary medication, he said.
Khodr acknowledged that the prospects of a radiation leak from Dimona due to an explosion or accident were a cause for concern in Jordan but stressed the kingdom was taking the necessary precautions.
Jordan supports calls to create a nuclear-free zone in the region and to ensure international monitoring of atomic energy activities, she said.
The director of Jordan's nuclear energy agency, Ziad Qudah, meanwhile, said his organisation operated three centres for radiation detection through continuous monitoring, as well as four early-warning centres.
"Results so far show that Jordan's air is not polluted with any nuclear radiation", Qudah told the press conference.
The issue "does not concern Jordan alone. In case of a nuclear catastrophe, Israel and the whole region will be affected before it affects Jordan," the official said.
Despite Israel's longstanding policy of "strategic ambiguity" on its nuclear programme and a lack of international monitoring, most foreign experts believe the Jewish state has an arsenal of up to 200 nuclear warheads.
--------
NO WAY OUT FOR VANUNU
sky.com
July 26, 2004
http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30200-13168875,00.html
Israel's supreme court has refused to lift a ban on nuclear scientist Mordechai Vanunu leaving the country.
The ban was imposed after Vanunu's release from an 18-year prison sentence for revealing Israel's nuclear secrets.
After the ruling he said: "This is a very sad day and shameful day."
The government maintains that the 49-year-old is still a security threat.
The Christian convert spilled Israel's nuclear secrets to the Sunday Times newspaper in 1986.
He was later kidnapped by Israeli secret agents and imprisoned.
Mr Vanunu insists he has no more secrets to tell and there is no reason he should not travel abroad.
He has been living in Jerusalem since his release from prison in April, but says he wants to settle in the USA or Europe.
-------- japan
Japan considering military capability to attack enemy bases: report
TOKYO (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726042013.snsz57s7.html
Japanese defense officials were considering giving the nation's military the capability to attack enemy bases, in a proposal that could radically change Tokyo's defense policy, a news report said Monday.
A Japan Defense Agency panel headed by director general Shigeru Ishiba was discussing whether the agency should possess weapons capable of striking enemy bases to prevent an invasion of Japan, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper said.
The panel has discussed acquiring the US missile Harpoon 2, with a range of 200 kilometers (125 miles), the Tomahawk cruise missile, with a range of 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles), and light aircraft carriers, the Asahi said.
Since 1959, Japan has based its defense policy on pure defense, relying on US forces to attack enemy bases when and if necessary, said a spokeswoman for the Japan Defense Agency.
She declined to comment on the Asahi report.
The report came as the agency formulates a new defense plan to spell out long-term defense policies, the Asahi said.
Some government officials were wary of the proposal Asahi said.
"This may threaten Asian nations and could become a diplomatic problem," a government source told the Asahi.
In March last year, Ishiba, widely regarded as a hawkish defense chief, told parliament the government was ready to examine whether Tokyo should possess an offensive military capability to counter future missile attacks.
A month earlier, he suggested in an interview that Japan could launch a military strike against North Korea if it had firm evidence Pyongyang was ready to launch ballistic missiles against it.
----
METI: Japan's oil use to fall; gas, nuclear to increase
By OGJ editors
http://ogj.pennnet.com/articles/web_article_display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticles&ARTICLE_CATEGORY=GenIn&ARTICLE_ID=208982
HOUSTON, July 26 -- Japan's reliance on oil and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) will drop, both in the near and distant future, while its reliance upon nuclear energy will continue to grow significantly, according to Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI) in its latest energy supply-demand outlook for FY2010 and FY2030, said Tomoko Hosoe of FACTS Inc., Honolulu. Hosoe summarized METI's outlook in its July Energy Briefs report. The summary followed FACTS' evaluation of Japan's energy plan in May and its view of the METI forecast in June.
METI's report, the official revision of its June 2001 outlook, considered a base case and two other case scenarios for each of the 2 years forecast. These cases, in turn, are compared with actual supply figures for FY2000. Each fiscal year begins Apr. 1.
Under the base case, Japan's reliance on Oil-LPG in 2010 will fall to 46% of total primary energy supply from 50% in 2000 and will decline even further to 42% in 2030. This year METI broke out LPG separately in the table to better indicate its growth, compared with other energy supply.
METI's assumptions for Japan's electric power generation for 2010 and 2030, in all three cases are predicated on the assumption that four nuclear generation units currently under construction will be completed by 2010. Previously, Japan intended to add 9-12 nuclear reactors by 2010 in an effort to achieve the country's obligation under the Kyoto Protocol. According to METI, as many as 6 additional nuclear generation units may be added during 2010-30 if there is sufficient demand. The share of nuclear energy in Japan's total primary energy will increase to 14% in 2010 and 15% in 2030, from 13% in 2000, the study indicated.
The share of natural gas also will increase steadily to 15% in 2010 and 18% in 2030, compared with 13% in 2000. While use of gas increases, Japan's dependency on coal will decline-to 17% in 2030 from 18% in 2000 and 2010.
Case comparisons METI bases its Case 1 for supply distribution in 2010 on assumptions that the current measures for reducing greenhouse gas emissions will continue to be implemented "studiously," Hosoe said. The "Oil-LPG" and the "New energy-others" categories would differ from the base case under this scenario, with the New energy-others share increasing to 4%, from 2% in 2000, compared with 3% under the base case. Meanwhile, the share of Oil-LPG would fall further, to 45% from 50% in 2000, compared with 46% under the base case. Japan's total energy supply in 2010 under Case 1 would fall to 584 million kl of oil equivalent.
Case 2 for 2010 is based on METI's assumptions that Japan will employ even more-advanced measures for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, in which case the shares of Oil-LPG and natural gas would be even lower than in Case 1. Meanwhile, the shares of nuclear, and New energy-others would be higher than Case 1. Total supply would drop to 569 million kl of oil equivalent.
Japan scenarios in 2030 In the 2030 Case 3 scenario, METI assumes precise implementation of advanced energy and conservation measures, Hosoe said. Total energy supply would be 536 million kl of oil equivalent, compared with 607 million kl of oil equivalent under the base case. Under Case 3, shares of Oil-LPG and natural gas would be lower, at 40% and 16% respectively, compared with 42% and 18% under the base case. On the other hand, the share of nuclear would rise to 18%, compared with 15% under the base case.
The Case 4 scenario for 2030 is based on the assumptions that Japan will achieve further penetrations of new alternative energy. The country's total energy supply would be 609 million kl of oil equivalent. Under Case 4, the share of New energy-others would jump to 7% in the total supply, up from 3% in 2000, compared with 4% under the base case. The share of natural gas would be 16%, compared with 18% under the base case.
-------- korea
N Korea rejects US offer of Gadaffi-style deal
By Andrew Ward in Seoul
July 26 2004
Financial Times
http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT/FullStory&c=StoryFT&cid=1087373973341
North Korea has dismissed as a "sham" US proposals that it should follow Libya's example by dismantling its nuclear weapons programme in return for future political and economic rewards.
The comments followed last week's tour of east Asia by John Bolton, US undersecretary of state for arms control, who urged North Korean leader Kim Jong-il to make the same "strategic choice" as Libyan leader Colonel Muammer Gadaffi.
North Korea's foreign ministry said it was a "daydream" to think the state would "lay down its arms" unless the US first dropped its "hostile policy" and lifted economic sanctions. However, North Korea said it remained committed to the "general goal" of denuclearisation and was prepared to freeze its nuclear facilities as a first step towards dismantlement if the US offered incentives in advance.
The statement, issued over the weekend, showed that several weeks of intense diplomatic activity have failed to close the gap between Pyongyang and Washington. Both have stressed their willingness to find a peaceful solution to the nuclear dispute but lack of trust means neither side is prepared to make the first concession.
In a significant new proposal by President George W. Bush's administration, the US last month said it was prepared to approve a package of political and economic incentives for North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions.
But the proposed deal required Pyongyang to move quickly towards verifiable dismantlement of both its plutonium-based programme and its alleged uranium enrichment activities.
North Korea has said it is prepared to freeze its plutonium-based facilities at Yongbyon, its main nuclear complex, in return for immediate political and economic rewards but has denied the existence of any uranium-based facilities. Washington has said it will only accept a deal that puts both alleged programmes permanently out of use.
In its statement on Saturday, the North Korean foreign ministry said the US offer was "little worthy to be considered any longer", while the proposal of a Libyan-style settlement was "worse still".
Libya agreed last December to scrap its nuclear programme in return for a promise of better political and economic relations with the international community. However, North Korea's nuclear capability is much more advanced than Libya's was, encouraging Pyongyang to ask a higher price for giving it up.
US officials believe North Korea may already possess up to eight nuclear weapons, whereas Libya had yet to produce its first bomb.
North Korea's weekend comments reinforced the widespread belief that Pyongyang was awaiting the outcome of the US presidential election in November before engaging in serious negotiations. Mr Kim may hope for a better deal should John Kerry, the Democratic candidate, be elected.
However, the US has appeared more eager in recent weeks to find a solution, aware of growing frustration among its Asian allies and partners about the stalemate.
The US, China, Japan, Russia and the two Koreas are expected to meet in Beijing in September for a fourth round of six-party talks about the nuclear issue.
--------
DPRK rejects U.S. proposal
2004 07 26
(SD-Agencies)
http://www.sznews.com/szdaily/20040726/ca1064587.htm
THE Democratic People's Republic of Korea on Saturday rejected a U.S. suggestion that it follow the example of Libya and abandon its nuclear weapons programs to open the way for economic aid and improved ties with Washington.
Calling the American proposal "nothing but a sham offer," the DPRK reiterated that it would freeze its nuclear facilities as a first step toward their dismantling, but only if Washington provides energy aid, lifts economic sanctions and delists the DPRK as a sponsor of terrorism.
"It is a daydream for the United States to contemplate forcing the DPRK to lay down arms first under the situation where both are in a state of armistice and at war technically," said an unidentified spokesman of the DPRK's Foreign Ministry.
U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton said Wednesday that lessons learned from Libya's pledge to eliminate weapons of mass destruction could be used in six-party talks aimed at resolving the DPRK nuclear standoff.
Three rounds of talks on the issue have been held in Beijing since last year, but none has produced a breakthrough. China, the United States, Russia, Japan and the two Koreas took part.
The DPRK said it would never scrap its nuclear programs first and hope to get reward later. Instead, it insisted on "reward for freeze," because "there is no confidence between the DPRK and the United States."
In 2002, U.S. officials said the DPRK admitted running a secret nuclear program in violation of international agreements and a 1994 pledge to Washington that it would not develop nuclear bombs. The DPRK has since restarted its old plutonium program frozen under the 1994 pact..(SD-Agencies)
-------- u.n.
UN says focus on terrorist WMD causing disarmament 'stalemate'
TOKYO (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726105551.ji1e52nh.html
Fears of terrorists acquiring weapons of mass destruction following the September 11 attacks now dominate the disarmament debate and have resulted in a "stalemate", a senior UN official said Monday.
The resulting delays on measures to tackle the issue were increasing the risk of extremists getting hold of such arms, UN under-secretary general for Disarmament Affairs Nobuyasu Abe warned.
The "horrible devastation" of 9/11 and concerns that next time terrorists may try to use weapons of mass destruction (WMD) were now behind "almost every discussion concerning WMD and other disarmament issues," Abe said in a speech at the opening of a UN disarmament conference in northern Japan.
That focus made the adoption in April by UN Security Council of a resolution urging states to keep WMD from terrorists far from easy, Abe said.
"While accepting the need to stop the spread of WMD to terrorists, some member states did not want the emphasis to be placed only on proliferation questions while leaving disarmament questions untouched," he said.
"This, in a way, reflects the basic confrontation underlying the current disarmament debates, which are largely to blame for the stalemate surrounding disarmament issues."
Abe lamented the failure of a committee to agree on an agenda ahead of a review of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty next year, as well as a Geneva disarmament conference's seven-year inability to agree on a negotiating mandate.
"Slow progress in nuclear disarmament should not be used to condone proliferation. Nor should continuing concern about proliferation be used to justify retention of nuclear arsenals," he said.
"The longer we wait for progress in WMD disarmament or non-proliferation, the greater the risk of those weapons falling into the hands of terrorists."
The 16th annual UN Conference on Disarmament Issues began a four-day meeting in Sapporo Monday, attended by around 80 delegates from 15 countries including China, Russia, India, Pakistan, the United States, Japan and South Korea.
------- u.s. nuc weapons
US weapons research industry grinds to halt amid missing data scandal
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726013954.yl62z1gp.html
Most of the US nuclear weapons research industry will grind to a halt Monday in an unprecedented move prompted by a burgeoning scandal at Los Alamos National Laboratory, the birthplace of America's nuclear bomb shaken by a spate of security breaches.
The suspension, ordered Friday by Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, comes amid a broadening investigation at Los Alamos, New Mexico, where two classified computer zip drives were reported missing July 7 and have not been accounted for since.
Abraham has called the situation "unacceptable" and ordered the halt of all secret weapons work involving removable hard drives or computer disks at all facilities that come under the jurisdiction of the Department of Energy.
Jeanne Lopatto, spokeswoman for the department, explained the suspension, which takes effect Monday, will affect about two dozen institutions, including the department's leading research laboratories.
She declined to elaborate, but when asked how much work the seemingly technical order will affect, she acknowledged, "Yes, the majority of the work."
Under Abraham's directive, all nuclear weapons researchers will begin the week by taking stock of their computer files. They will not be able to return to normal work until each and everyone of these storage devices are accounted for.
"They have to begin an inventory, and they have to fulfill the protocols set out by the secretary's order and certify that they have the new accounting procedures in process and certify that back to the Department of Energy," Lopatto said.
After the inventory is completed, scientists will no longer be allowed to keep the disks at their desks but rather at special heavily guarded repositories.
"These procedures are designed to guarantee a complete inventory of our classified electronic holdings and make certain that specific individuals can be held responsible and accountable for future problems," said Abraham in a terse statement.
He assured the suspension was being ordered as a precaution, and there was no evidence that the breaches similar to those at Los Alamos had been detected elsewhere.
But energy officials could not say how long the standdown would last.
Although played out largely behind closed doors, the security investigation at Los Alamos is now beginning to take a dramatic turn.
As many as 19 laboratory employees, including 15 scientists who had access to the missing disks, have been placed on administrative leave, and Director Peter Nanos hinted Thursday heads would soon roll.
"If I have to restart the laboratory with 10 people, I will," he said.
Industry watchers warned, however, that both laboratory management and their bosses in Washington were not, publicly owning up to the full scope of the problem.
According to the Project on Government Oversight, a group that monitors the nuclear weapons complex, Los Alamos employees sent classified information over an unclassified email system 17 times over a recent two month period.
In June, the laboratory lost two keys to Technical Area 18, a site that contains highly enriched uranium and plutonium, while about a year ago, lab officials lost two vials of plutonium, the group said.
On Wednesday, the project called for the resignation of Linton Brooks, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration. with the group's executive director, Danielle Brian, charging the administration "wants to protect the status quo at all costs."
Los Alamos gave birth to the world's first nuclear bomb in 1945 as part of the supersecret Manhattan Project aimed at establishing America's leadership in nuclear weapons technology.
The laboratory is now said to be involved in monitoring the national nuclear weapons stockpile as well as in research on new "bunker-busting" bombs.
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
Afghan President Announces Candidacy
July 26, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Afghan-Election.html?hp
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- Afghan President Hamid Karzai announced his candidacy Monday for landmark October elections after several days of heated political wrangling that prompted a show of force by NATO peacekeepers worried about instability.
In a surprise move, he dropped Defense Minister Mohammed Fahim, arguably the nation's most powerful warlord, from his ticket, replacing him with Ahmad Zia Massood, the brother of Afghanistan's greatest resistance hero.
``I hope the Afghan people will recognize us as a good team, and I hope the people of Afghanistan will vote for us,'' Karzai said at a news conference in a shady courtyard of the presidential palace.
Ahmad Zia Massood is Afghanistan's current ambassador to Russia and the brother of slain resistance hero Ahmad Shah Massood, who was killed by al-Qaida terrorists on Sept. 9, 2001. Karzai named ethnic Hazara leader Karim Khalili his choice for second vice president.
Fahim was conspicuously absent from the news conference. The president said he was ``sorry'' the defense minister was not there, and went on to praise him as ``our brother'' and ``a great warrior.''
A close aide to Fahim said he would now throw his weight behind a rival candidate, Education Minister Yunus Qanooni, who also came forward at the last minute to run against the president. ``He strongly supports Qanooni's candidacy,'' said Mohammed Abil, the aide. ``But there's no problem between him and Karzai.''
Thousands of militia soldiers, most of them loyal to Fahim, remain in the capital, including a division still untouched by a drive to round up and remove heavy weapons from the city.
NATO peacekeepers were taking no chance on potential trouble.
Convoys of German and Canadian armored vehicles picked their way through crowded thoroughfares and thundered through back streets.
American troops parked two Humvees at the top of streets leading to the country's electoral office, which was sealed off by Afghan National Army troops and intelligence officers.
Cdr. Chris Henderson, a spokesman for the NATO-led security force in the capital, said it had increased patrols in the city because of the rising political temperature.
``We are very confident that this is a peaceful political dialogue that is going on and that it will be resolved peacefully, but military organizations have to take prudent measures in case things turn out differently,'' he said.
Karzai scuttled a state visit to Pakistan scheduled to begin Monday because of the wrangling, and he did not announce his candidacy until the last possible minute. Monday was the deadline for presidential hopefuls to file papers for the Oct. 9 vote.
The U.S.-backed Karzai is the overwhelming favorite to beat about a dozen challengers and win a five-year term. He said he saw Massood as the best candidate to replace Fahim.
``I thought he'd be the best choice to serve this country of ours, together with me, for a better, more prosperous future,'' he said.
The vote, the first direct presidential election in Afghan history, is seen as a referendum on international efforts to rebuild this country after more than two decades of war.
Under new electoral laws, all candidates except the president must temporarily resign from their posts, meaning Fahim would have had to relinquish his grip on the Defense Ministry in order to stand as Karzai's vice presidential pick. He was reportedly pushing to install a loyalist as defense chief to rule the ministry in his stead.
Karzai said recently that militias rather than Taliban insurgents pose the biggest obstacle to pacifying and rebuilding the country after more than two decades of fighting.
But his government remains dominated by militia commanders such as Fahim, who was named defense minister after commanding the Northern Alliance forces that helped the United States drive out the Taliban in late 2001.
Fahim has failed to deliver on pledges to disarm the factions that still control much of the country. His allies hold powerful positions in each of the country's four main provincial cities.
-------- balkans
A Fugitive To Some, But a Hero To Others
Karadzic's Flight Keeps Bosnian Hatreds Alive
By Daniel Williams
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A14110-2004Jul25?language=printer
SOKOLAC, Bosnia -- When Milovan Bjelica, a Bosnian Serb nationalist, invites visitors to speak with him, he chooses a windswept hill cemetery that he calls his office.
Meeting people among the dozens of white crosses marked with photos of young soldiers and some civilians gives him comfort, he said. The setting reminds him of the sacrifices of the 1992-95 ethnic war in Bosnia, which by his account was a sacred struggle for the right of Serbs to live apart from Bosnian Muslims.
The cemetery also allows him to avoid the prying eyes of international peacekeeping troops who suspect him of helping hide Radovan Karadzic, the president of the Bosnian Serbs' breakaway state during the war and now in his ninth year on the run from war crimes charges.
"If I visit with someone in a private office, then that office and its owners will become tainted," he said in a conversation at the cemetery. "They will be harassed for letting me in. So I meet with people here. Here I am among Serbs who cannot be bothered anymore."
The manhunt, including occasional raids on suspected hideouts and detentions of suspected associates, has failed to collar Karadzic. A U.N. war crimes tribunal accuses Karadzic of responsibility for the deaths in 1995 of more than 7,000 Muslim captives in the Bosnian hamlet of Srebenica. He is also charged in connection with the shelling of the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo, and the capture of international peacekeepers for use as human shields.
Karadzic's continued flight has set back efforts to end the bitter hatreds of Bosnia's three-sided Muslim-Serb-Croat ethnic war and put the country on the path to joining the European Union. In June, NATO delayed Bosnia's membership in the Partnership for Peace, an apprentice program for full membership in the Atlantic alliance, pending Karadzic's detention.
Similarly, the fruitless hunt for Karadzic's former military commander, Ratko Mladic, has complicated the E.U. aspirations of the neighboring country of Serbia and Montenegro, where he is believed to be hiding. The country's new president, Boris Tadic, has promised to cooperate with international efforts to apprehend him.
International officials who help administer and police Bosnia say the fugitives remain at large in part because many Serbs see them as heroes who protected their ethnic community during the upheavals of the 1990s. Some people help them actively; others help passively by keeping quiet.
In May, soldiers from the NATO-led contingent known formally as the Stabilization Force (SFOR) detained Bjelica and held him a month for interrogation. International officials say he has funneled money to Karadzic and helped maintain his security detail.
Bjelica denies such a role and says that NATO is simply flailing with frustration. "Does this look like a real manhunt to you? If they are really trying to find him, they will. They have the troops, the technical ability, everything," he said.
The nine years of futility has eroded belief among Bosnia's citizens that NATO is really trying. Now the search for a man whose harsh nationalist rhetoric and mass of gray hair were familiar symbols of Serb militancy has entered a phase of finger-pointing among the international agencies tasked with bringing him to justice.
In mid-July, Florence Hartmann, a spokeswoman for chief U.N. war crimes prosecutor Carla del Ponte, accused NATO peacekeepers of failing to follow up on leads about Karadzic's whereabouts.
Last February, Hartmann said, tribunal investigators determined that Karadzic was in Zaovine, a hamlet near the Bosnian border, and gave the information to commanders of the peacekeeping force. "We didn't see any further steps," she said. "We were not happy with this experience."
"You can never be 100 percent sure about the information," she said. "But NATO just stalled. They asked for more information instead of checking things out themselves."
"NATO is sending out a confusing message," she said. "They are hinting that it is not their mandate to go after Karadzic. But it is."
In Sarajevo, a member of the war crimes tribunal tracking team that actively hunts for Karadzic said NATO officials demanded an exact address of the house where Karadzic was hiding, details on the house's door, whether the house had a garage or a garden, and other information.
"Zaovine has only 15 houses. All they had to do was send a few troops and surround it," said the tracker, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Mark Hope, a British naval lieutenant commander and SFOR spokesman, said the February information was not as precise as Hartmann indicated. "We do get such information. If it is sufficient to act on, we do so," he said. A senior international official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the information provided by the war crimes trackers placed Karadzic not in Bosnia, but in neighboring Serbia, which NATO forces cannot enter.
Hope pointed out that SFOR has detained 28 war crimes suspects over the past several years. But he said that its 12,000-member force was not large enough to mount an operation on the scale of the manhunts for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan or for deposed president Saddam Hussein last year in Iraq. He noted that despite the resources available in Afghanistan, "Osama bin Laden has evaded capture for three years."
It is "primarily the responsibility of Serb authorities" to catch Karadzic, he added. But he said NATO sees the capture as in line with its primary mission to make Bosnia safe and secure.
International civilian officials in Sarajevo have been pressuring Bosnian Serb leaders and suspected Karadzic sympathizers to help find him. Last month, Paddy Ashdown, the internationally appointed administrator in Bosnia, fired 59 Serbs from government positions in the Serb-run administrative zone.
Ashdown, whose authority derives from the 1995 Dayton Accords that ended the war, said at the time that Serb officials were aiding Karadzic by creating "a climate of secrecy and impunity. . . . The Serb Republic has been in the grip of a small band of corrupt politicians and criminals for far too long."
In a subsequent interview, Ashdown said that although Serb officials hinder Karadzic's capture, it is NATO's responsibility to track him down. "NATO has the only people with the military power to catch him," he said. "But the Serb Republic has scandalously failed to fulfill its commitment to cooperate. Do you see posters from the Serb Republic calling for Karadzic to give up? They haven't made a single arrest of a suspect in nine years," he said.
Zoran Zuza, a former journalist who lost his job as an aide to a Serb parliamentary official, is one of those fired by Ashdown. He said he had no information about Karadzic and had not been asked about him by NATO.
Zuza said Ashdown was correct in saying that a culture of silence surrounded Karadzic. Crime was one of the reasons, Zuza said. "Smuggling survived the war and a small group of people became rich and they are holding on to what they have. Some of the cream goes to Radovan," he said.
"But there is also the feeling that the war crimes court is unfair, and that Radovan is right to avoid it," he said. "It is an old Serb attitude and it is long-lasting."
Ashdown dismissed Bjelica from his post as chairman of a Serb neighborhood assembly near Sarajevo last year, accusing him of presiding over a network of legal and illegal businesses that helped protect Karadzic.
Bjelica said that because of his pariah status, he can no longer earn a living and gets by with the help of friends. Nonetheless, he remains defiant and is organizing an expansion of the Sokolac cemetery to accommodate the bodies of Serbs brought from Sarajevo for reburial.
Serbs fled that city by the thousands after war ended. "We want to have a complete break from the Muslims," he said. "We did not want to live with them and we don't want to be buried near them." In his view, Bosnia has no future as a single state and the three ethnic groups should go their own way.
He acknowledges having had contact with Karadzic's family in the town of Pale, 15 miles southeast of Sarajevo, after the war, but said he had since dropped them. "I used to be a kind of family postman," he said.
During detention, he said, interrogators asked about his contacts with Karadzic, whether he knew others who had contacts, whether the Serbian Orthodox Church was helping the fugitive and who gave money to him.
"They asked and asked, and finally, one said I was a victim of bad information," Bjelica said, meaning a false tip had led to his arrest. "It is easy to get someone to accuse someone else of a crime here. I am a small fish. I am not the key to the search," he continued.
But Bjelica makes no effort to hide his admiration for Karadzic: "I knew him during the war and I followed him. I would not like anything bad to happen to Radovan."
-------- biological weapons
Bioshield Too Little for Drug Industry
Companies Want More Protection From Financial Loss
By Michael Barbaro
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page E01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A13873-2004Jul25?language=printer
When President Bush signed Project Bioshield into law last week, few companies seemed to have more to celebrate than Human Genome Sciences Inc., a Rockville biotechnology firm that has spent more than $10 million to develop a drug to prevent and treat anthrax infections.
Anthrax infections are rare, so the drug has little appeal to the average consumer. But Project Bioshield, which sets aside $5.6 billion for the government to stockpile a medical arsenal against biological weapons, gives Human Genome Sciences exactly what it needs: a buyer.
Yet executives at Human Genome Sciences are hardly cheering. The drug has cleared several tests, but the government has not ordered a single dose. And even if it does, it may buy only a small amount, making it hard for the company to earn much of a profit.
"There is just a lot of uncertainty," said James H. Davis, Human Genome Science's general counsel.
Bioshield, which the government has billed as the first step in creating a biodefense industry in the United States, has received a largely lukewarm response from the companies it was designed to help.
The bill authorizes the use of federal money over 10 years to buy drugs and vaccines to counter a wide range of pathogens. Under the law, federal health officials can contract to buy drugs still under development, with purchases contingent upon tests establishing that the treatments work.
It allows the Food and Drug Administration to authorize use of unapproved products in emergencies and gives the National Institutes of Health the power to speed up biodefense research.
Industry executives and analysts say that developing medicines for use after a biological attack remains a highly risky business, with long development times, slim profit margins and the possibility of devastating patient lawsuits if a drug fails.
"I can't blame companies for not wanting to get involved," said Charles L. Bailey, executive director of research at the National Center for Biodefense at George Mason University. "It is not a very attractive market."
Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that by guaranteeing the government will purchase a successful product under contract, Bioshield has removed a major roadblock for companies.
"Companies would be hesitant to develop something if they didn't know what was at the end of the rainbow," Fauci said. "If you deliver the product, we will guarantee you get money."
Dozens of companies backed the new program. But, executives say, Bioshield doesn't remove all the uncertainties of developing the drugs. They complain that it does not offer complete liability protection should a drug have adverse effects on patients or fail to protect them against a pathogen, which could lead to lawsuits. It also doesn't eliminate the chance that another company will develop a better product that the government wants more.
Few companies have shown much enthusiasm for diverting staff and money from programs to develop drugs, such as cancer and cholesterol treatments, with bigger and more established markets. Of about 1,000 U.S. biotechnology companies, about 100 are working on biodefense projects, according to the Biotechnology Industry Organization, an industry trade group.
Human Genome Sciences' anthrax treatment is being tested for safety in humans. But because it would be unethical to expose people to deadly pathogens, it cannot be tested for effectiveness. Companies can't know if a drug can protect people from a given biological agent until after an attack.
"Until the liability question is solved, we're not going to see big drug companies come to the table," said Frank M. Rapoport, who represents vaccine maker Aventis Pasteur SA. "They have too much to lose."
Other Washington companies working in biodefense say Bioshield is unlikely to substantially alter their business plans.
Two of them, Dynport Vaccine Co. of Frederick and GenVec Corp. of Gaithersburg, are working on vaccines for the military and said they are exploring the possibility of applying for Bioshield money.
Cambrex Corp. of East Rutherford, N.J., which has offices in Baltimore and Walkersville, Md., and Invitrogen Corp. of Carlsbad, Calif., which this year bought BioReliance Corp. of Rockville, perform contract testing and manufacturing services for companies in biodefense. Both expect new clients as smaller biotechnology companies, with limited space and staff, apply for Bioshield funding.
Still, C. Robert Eaton, president of MdBio Inc., a Maryland trade group for biotechnology companies, said, "I don't think companies are going to turn on a dime to start chasing this money."
Congress rejected industry efforts to include in the Bioshield bill stronger incentives such as research and development tax credits, the extension of existing patents and stronger liability protection.
But Fauci said he expects Congress to address the industry's biggest concerns, such as liability. "Bioshield does not solve all the disincentives a company may have to get involved," he said. "But it's a very good start."
-------- china
Taiwan halts visit by US military delegation: report
TAIPEI (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726065556.qj7t5031.html
Taiwan has quietly cancelled a visit by a US military delegation due to growing domestic objection to a controversial plan to buy advanced US weaponry worth billions of dollars, it was reported Monday.
The trip by the US military group, which was set to arrive in Taipei two weeks ago to discuss the massive arms sales plan, was cancelled on the eve of their departure, the China Times said, without identifying the source.
"An evaluation showed it was not a good time for the visit before a consensus can be arrived at here," the source was quoted as saying.
"The arms sales must be handled carefully, or it might cause unnecessary problems," the source added.
The defense ministry declined to comment on the report.
The government has recently faced rising calls to spend more on relief for central Taiwan after it was devastated by floods sparked by a typhoon in early July.
Taiwan's cabinet on June 2 approved a special budget of 610 billion Taiwan dollars (18.2 billion US) to buy advanced weaponry amid tensions with China.
The draft budget, pending parliament's final approval, covers eight submarines, a modified version of the Patriot anti-missile system PAC-III and a fleet of anti-submarine aircraft over a 15-year period beginning 2005.
But some critics have said Taiwan cannot afford the massive spending spree, while others say the new weaponry will not be delivered in time to help the island fend off a possible attack from China in coming years.
The report came three days after Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing told the commander of US forces in the Pacific Admiral, Thomas Fargo, that military exchanges with Taiwan must stop, given the "seriousness" of the standoff.
Beijing objects any arms sales to Taiwan, which it regards as part of its territory waiting to be reunified by force if necessary.
Since the March re-election of Taiwan's pro-independence president Chen Shui-bian, Beijing has ratcheted up its rhetoric, reiterating its vow to take the island by force should Chen move it towards formal independence.
-------- europe
E.U. Threatens Sanctions On Sudan if Crisis Persists
By Paul Geitner
Associated Press
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A16
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14080-2004Jul25.html
BRUSSELS, July 25 -- The European Union joined the United States in threatening sanctions against Sudan, hoping to pressure its government to end the conflict in its western region of Darfur.
Citing "grave concern" at reports of massive human rights violations that some have called genocide, E.U. ministers were scheduled to meet Monday in Brussels to push the Sudanese government and rebel groups to resume peace talks and improve access by relief groups to those displaced by the violence.
"It's almost certain the international community will take further measures if this situation does not improve," said Dutch Foreign Minister Ben Bot, whose country holds the rotating E.U. presidency, after meeting his Sudanese counterpart, Mustafa Osman Ismail.
On Sunday, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer and Secretary of State Colin L. Powell agreed in a phone call that Sudan should face international sanctions unless it quickly disarms Arab militias responsible for the killings.
The violence began more than 16 months ago when two rebel groups from Darfur's African tribes took up arms in a struggle over land and resources with Arab countrymen. Arab militias known as Janjaweed then began a brutal campaign to drive out the black Africans.
As many as 30,000 people, most of them black Africans, have been killed and more than 1 million people have fled their homes. About 2.2 million are in urgent need of food or medical attention, aid groups have said.
The 25-nation European Union, the United States and humanitarian groups have accused the Sudanese government of backing the militias -- a claim it denies.
Peace talks in Ethiopia last week ended early when Darfur's rebel groups walked out, insisting that Sudan's government first honor the terms of previous agreements.
After meeting Bot in The Hague, Sudan's foreign minister insisted that his country would prosecute the militias but again denied that the attacks amounted to genocide.
In Washington, the House and Senate passed resolutions last week characterizing the violence in Darfur as genocide.
Pope John Paul II urged the international community on Sunday to help end the Darfur conflict, saying it "brings with it ever more poverty, desperation and death."
By the end of the year, the United Nations plans to send a peacekeeping mission to Darfur, a region the size of Iraq with a population of 6.7 million. Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said Sunday that his country likely would contribute troops to the force. The African Union is sending 300 troops and 150 unarmed observers.
-------- iran
Official Warns of Iranian Infiltration
Iraqi Government Worries That Old Enemies Are Exploiting Open Borders
By Doug Struck
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A14
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13981-2004Jul25.html
BAGHDAD, July 25 -- Hazim Shalan, Iraq's defense minister, charged in an interview that Iran has taken over Iraqi border positions, sent spies and saboteurs into the country and infiltrated the new government -- including his own ministry. Iran remains "the first enemy of Iraq," he declared.
Shalan's comments were the clearest sign the new government is concerned that the country's open borders are being exploited by old enemies, turning Iraq into a battleground for Middle Eastern opponents of the United States.
"I've seen clear interference in Iraqi issues by Iran," Shalan said Saturday. "Iran interferes in order to kill democracy."
Shalan accused Iran of supporting "terrorism and bringing enemies into Iraq." Spreading out a hand-drawn map on his desk in the Defense Ministry, an ornate former government building secluded in the former Green Zone, Shalan pointed out what he said were numerous Iraqi border positions that Iran has taken over.
Shalan said that former fighters from Afghanistan have been caught in Iraq and that they have admitted receiving help from Iranian security forces. A Sudanese man with Iranian intelligence contacts was caught in April with a "very powerful poison," Shalan said, and planned to contaminate drinking water in Diwaniyah, 100 miles south of Baghdad. Two other people who were "working with Iranian intelligence" were seized in northeastern Iraq three weeks ago, he said.
Shalan bluntly warned Iran: "We can send the death to Tehran's streets, like they do to us. But we can't do it if we are a democracy. But if my people say do it now, I will do it."
Iraq and Iran fought a war from 1980 to 1988 in which about 1 million people were killed. The war touched the lives of vast numbers of Iraqis, and many still harbor deep suspicions about Iran. The government of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, however, has talked about restoring ties with Tehran.
Officials at the Iranian Embassy in Baghdad, a palm tree-lined compound of brown stone buildings, declined to comment on Shalan's remarks.
Iraqi Deputy Foreign Minister Labeed Abbawi, using softer language, said, "We do have troubles with neighboring countries in general."
"They see an American army on their doorstep. This raises a lot of apprehension with them," Abbawi said. The authoritarian governments are worried that a democratic and pluralistic Iraq could foment unrest in their own countries, he said, and some of those countries want to continue the attacks against the United States to keep the Americans on the defensive.
"With our borders wide open, so many of these organizations and people who have their own ends see Iraq as a good stage for this battle," Abbawi said in an interview Sunday. "They are coming from Iran, from Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. We don't accuse the governments, but we think they are not doing enough at the borders to prevent infiltration."
Abbawi said that "there might be some religious elements" in Iran sending recruits to Iraq and that he "wouldn't be surprised if there is an intelligence component here. A lot of countries are sending spies."
The influence of Iran, which is predominantly Shiite Muslim, on Iraqi Shiites, who make up an estimated 60 percent of the population, has long been of concern to the United States. But Shiites in Iraq have remained relatively quiet during the transition of power, patient to see how their new government emerges. The exception has been Moqtada Sadr, a young cleric based in Najaf, whose Mahdi Army militia fought a two-month pitched battle with U.S. forces and who remains a fierce critic of the U.S. presence.
Allawi is currently on a trip to neighboring Arab countries, in part to try to persuade them to seal their borders and reduce the number of foreigners taking part in the violence, including car bombings and ambushes, across Iraq. Allawi has visited Jordan, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon, and was headed this week to the Persian Gulf states. In each of the border states, Allawi has appealed for tougher border controls. He has said he would like to establish good relations with Iran.
Although Allawi is an interim prime minister, with elections scheduled for next January, he has used this trip to try to establish his -- and his government's -- credentials in the Arab world. He won promises of assistance in Jordan and Egypt. Syria, which had long harbored opponents to Saddam Hussein's government, promised to help "achieve security and stability in Iraq," and Allawi promised restoration of diplomatic ties.
----
Israel will be 'wiped off earth' if it attacks Iran: Revolutionary Guards
TEHRAN (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726191153.ga41gt81.html
Iran will wipe Israel "off the face of the earth" if it dared to attack the Islamic republic's nuclear facilities, a spokesman for Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards was quoted as saying Monday.
"The United States is showing off by threatening to use its wild dog, Israel," the public relations head of the Revolutionary Guards, Commander Seyed Masood Jazayeri, was quoted as saying by the Iranian student news agency
"They will not hesitate to strike Iran if they are capable of it. However, their threats to attack Irans nuclear facilities cannot be realised. They are aware Tehrans reaction will be so harsh that Israel will be wiped off the face of the earth and US interests will be easily damaged," he warned.
The commander asserted that Iran would not initiate a conflict, but in retaliation to any attack has proved itself to be "harsh, assertive, hard-hitting and destructive."
Iran's controversial bid to generate nuclear power is seen by arch-enemies Israel and the United States as a cover for nuclear weapons development, allegations that Iran denies.
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Iraqi defence minister warns Iran over sending of spies and saboteurs
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726173352.cbdrhtcc.html
Iraq's defence minister Hazem al-Shaalan said that neighbouring Iran remains his country's "first enemy" in an interview with the Washington Post published Monday.
"I've seen clear interference in Iraqi issues by Iran," the minister said in the interview in Baghdad. "Iran interferes in order to kill democracy."
The two neighbours fought a protracted war from 1980 to 1988 that left hundreds of thousands of dead.
Shaalan accused Iran of taking over some Iraqi border posts and sending spies and saboteurs into Iraq. He said former fighters in Afghanistan had been helped by Iran to get into Iraq.
He said a Sudanese man with Iranian intelligence contacts was detained in April carrying a "very powerful poison". The man was reportedly preparing to poison the water supply in Diwaniyah, a city 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Baghdad.
Shaalan said Iran was supporting "terrorism and bringing enemies into Iraq" and that two other people working with Iranian intelligence had been detained in northeast Iraq three weeks ago.
Despite lingering suspicions on both sides of the Iranian-Iraqi frontier, the interim Iraqi government has talked of the possibility of establishing diplomatic ties with its neighbour.
Shaalan sent a strong warning to Iran, however. "We can send the death to Teheran's streets, like they do to us. But we can't do it if we are a democracy. But if my people say do it now, I will do it."
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Officers Question Visibility of Army in Iraq
Some in Military Urge Lower Troop Profile
By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14015-2004Jul25.html
Some top U.S. military officers are questioning whether the practice of keeping U.S. troops highly visible in Iraq is doing more harm than good, challenging a key tenet of the Army's approach to occupying the country.
Advocates of the new approach say U.S. troops would be more effective if they were kept out of view of the Iraqi public, and even removed to remote desert bases, appearing only when needed to conduct operations beyond the capacity of Iraqi security forces.
For most of the Iraq occupation, the U.S. military has assumed -- based on lessons drawn from peacekeeping missions in Bosnia and Kosovo -- that maintaining "presence" through extensive patrols, large-scale raids and other highly visible operations would increase stability. Now, however, some officers are saying that such operations are doing more to inflame anti-American feelings among Iraqis than to secure the streets, and the resulting debate may shape the military's future structure and tactics in Iraq.
"Sometimes the best way is to be less present, and to be focused in your presence and successful in what you do," Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army chief of staff, said in little-noticed comments made last week during the final moments of a hearing of the House Armed Services Committee. "And by exposing more and more of your formation to this kind of [guerrilla] warfare may not be the smartest thing to do. And we're looking and working very hard to do that through the commanders over there."
The view that high-profile U.S. military operations may be counterproductive departs from the basic U.S. military approach in Iraq over the past year. As one 1st Armored Division soldier put it in summarizing his unit's operations in Baghdad for the past 14 months, "We were everywhere all the time day and night 24-7 for a year -- I mean everywhere. You could not go anywhere in Baghdad without seeing a 1st AD patrol or convoy or soldiers on some point."
The changing view on presence also presents a new challenge to critics of the Bush administration's Iraq policy, such as Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), who have called for boosting the number of U.S. troops there. In May, Murtha, a decorated Marine veteran of the Vietnam War, said the administration should either increase its troop strength in Iraq or withdraw. Until now, U.S. commanders have generally agreed with the need for troops, postponing plans for cuts this summer and instead maintaining a level of about 145,000 troops.
Somewhat belatedly, the revised approach to presence also provides new ammunition for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's approach to Iraq, which, beginning with the government- toppling campaign in the spring of 2003, favored maneuverability and speed over sheer bulk and big troop numbers.
Asked Wednesday about the continuing debate over troop levels, Rumsfeld said, "There's no magical number. There's no formula for this." But he went on to say at a Pentagon news conference that the Soviet Union had a large troop presence in Afghanistan during its war there in the 1980s, while the U.S. military had just "a few handfuls" in its own offensive there in the fall of 2001. "The Soviets lost and we won," he pointedly noted.
The new argument against "presence" as a military goal was put most strongly by Keith W. Mines, a former Special Forces officer who served a tour last year as the U.S. occupation authority's representative for Al Anbar Province in western Iraq. "The presence of foreign security forces is provoking the very instability that must diminish in order for the process to work," Mines, who is now a State Department diplomat, wrote in an essay published by the Foreign Policy Research Institute, a pro-defense think tank that tends to espouse mainstream Republican views. "Coalition forces are not only not stopping most of the violence, they are the active force which is provoking it."
In a follow-up internal cable sent last month on the State Department's formal "dissent channel," Mines also argued for a phased withdrawal of U.S. troops, with a reduction from dozens of bases now to just seven in January, followed by a complete pullout in the spring.
Some Army officers, especially those who specialize in civil affairs, the art of military relations with the local population, say they agree with Mines's thesis.
"I certainly think Mines is on to something," said Army Maj. Christopher Varhola, a reservist who served in Iraq earlier this year. Varhola, who is writing an academic study titled "The American Military in Iraq: Are We Our Own Worst Enemy?," said he came away from Iraq believing that U.S. military operations "have alienated parts of the Iraqi population, and continue to do so."
Not everyone in the Army supports that view. Capt. Oscar Estrada, an Army Reserve civil affairs specialist, found that out the hard way when he published an article in The Washington Post last month detailing his concerns that even feel-good missions, such as fixing water plants, are harmful if soldiers shoot at Iraqis on the way to and from the task. In response, he was transferred to a post near the Iranian border, resulting in the loss of a home leave during which he planned to get married. According to the Army Times newspaper, he also was reprimanded by his brigade commander, Col. Dana J.H. Pittard, who told him he was "aiding the enemy."
Likewise, Brig. Gen. Mark P. Hertling, deputy commander of the 1st Armored Division, which occupied Baghdad for most of the past year, argued that Mines's views are "interesting, but also somewhat slanted, geared toward what he saw in Al Anbar (versus the entire nation, which has different challenges in each area) and uninformed."
At the same time, Hertling said the Army already has taken many of the steps Mines advocates. He said the 1st Armored Division has long conducted the kind of focused operations Mines says are necessary. "If our units didn't have a specific mission, the soldiers didn't go out," he said. In addition, he said, the division steadily reduced its number of outposts in the capital from 60 in spring 2003 to eight early this summer.
Maj. Gen. Charles Swannack Jr., who commanded the 82nd Airborne Division in western Iraq for much of the past year, said he generally endorses the idea of putting Iraqi security forces at the fore while U.S. troops move to the background. The problem, he said in a talk in Washington last month, was that the U.S. aid program has been too sluggish to put that theory into practice. "I never got to the point where we had the equipment to do that," said Swannack, who worked with Mines in Al Anbar. "I couldn't get the flak vests, communications and vehicles to do that."
Even so, the new view is clearly gathering steam. Defense analyst Michael Vickers, who has long advocated sharply cutting U.S. troop levels in Iraq, said that some Pentagon insiders agree with him that it would be possible to have the same military effect in Iraq with half the number of U.S. troops. "They're moving in the right direction," he said, by making U.S. operations less obtrusive. But he said the Bush administration will not sharply reduce troop numbers for fear of looking as if it is cutting and running from Iraq.
The alternative approach is finding support in Congress. Rep. Jim Marshall (D-Ga.) said he learned as a reconnaissance platoon sergeant fighting in Vietnam that "just being out there poking around . . . is strategically counterproductive."
Reducing the U.S. profile as appears to be already happening in some parts of the country almost certainly will reduce U.S. casualties -- which could be significant in Iraq and the United States as the presidential election approaches. However, the tactical shift also is likely to place new burdens on Iraqi security forces, which in several instances proved not up to the job in the last major spike in violence in April.
Marshall, who has made two trips to Iraq in the past year, said the issue for U.S. commanders will be finding a way to reduce their presence without simply surrendering turf to insurgents. "The real dilemma is when you leave a vacuum," he said, "because that lawless environment will be filled by hard-liners, so there's a balance that needs to be struck."
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Iraqi Forces Kill 13 Insurgents
Guard and Police Are More Visible, but Still Not Ready to Take Control
By Jackie Spinner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A14
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A12704-2004Jul25.html
BAGHDAD, July 25 -- Iraqi National Guard and police forces killed at least 13 insurgents Sunday after the forces were ambushed while providing security for U.S. troops conducting raids north of Baghdad.
The Iraqi forces, who were attacked by gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades, pursued the insurgents into the town of Buhriz, about 35 miles north of Baghdad. No Iraqi forces or U.S. soldiers were hurt in the hour-long clash with the insurgents, many of whom were dressed in black and wore masks, televised footage of the operation showed. It was one of the first major battles the new Iraqi forces have faced.
Iraqi security forces have become more visible since the U.S. transfer of political authority to an interim government on June 28. Iraqi and U.S. officials concede that the forces are not ready to assume full control of security operations, but they are becoming more involved in operations, including manning additional checkpoints throughout the capital in the past two days.
At a pharmacy on Sadoun Street in central Baghdad on Sunday, a pharmacist and his customers welcomed the increasing visibility of the forces.
"The situation is getting better because the Iraqis are controlling the security and the Iraqi streets," said Ali Adnan, 45, the pharmacist. "What they need is time and supplies. And I think that only Iraqis are able to control the situation because they are part of this country, and they know how to deal with the people."
But he added, "They are not ready to control everything."
"What the Iraqi forces are doing is great," said Fatima Mohammad, 38, a teacher who was buying medicine. "The U.S. forces are not like before; we see the Iraqi forces more than we see the American forces nowadays."
Mohammad also said that U.S. troops must continue to support the Iraqi police.
"We consider the new forces are newly born," she said. "Like the baby who is newly born, they need some care. If the American forces leave the country, there will be no country named Iraq."
[In a Baghdad suburb, insurgents assassinated a former government official and his son in a drive-by shooting on Sunday. Brig. Khaled Dawoud was head of the Nahyia district in southern Iraq in the government of ousted president Saddam Hussein, police Lt. Mustafa Abdullah Dulaimi told the Associated Press.
A soldier injured Saturday in a roadside bomb attack while escorting a fuel convoy near Baiji, about 125 miles northwest of Baghdad, died from his wounds, the U.S. military said. Another soldier was injured in the attack.]
Meanwhile, the Pakistani government announced Sunday that two of its citizens who disappeared Friday as they drove through Baghdad were believed kidnapped. No group has asserted responsibility for the possible abductions.
More than 70 people have been kidnapped in Iraq since April. On Saturday, the most recent victim, Raad Adnan, general director of the Iraqi-owned Al-Mansour Contracting Co., was snatched in daylight in an affluent neighborhood of Baghdad. His kidnapping came a day after the abduction of Mohamed Mamdouh Helmi Qutb, a senior Egyptian diplomat who was seized as he emerged from a mosque in the capital. Qutb was the first foreign diplomat kidnapped in postwar Iraq.
Al-Arabiya television reported that the kidnappers of seven truck drivers taken last week while working for a Kuwaiti firm have appointed a senior tribal leader to negotiate their release. A group calling itself the Holders of the Black Banners said in a statement that it had appointed Sheik Hisham Dulaymi, head of the National Group of Iraqi Tribal Leaders, to negotiate with the Kuwaiti firm and the hostages' embassies, al-Arabiya reported. The hostages are from Kenya, India and Egypt.
Elsewhere in Iraq, the U.S. military said it captured 15 people during a raid near Mandeli, northeast of Baghdad. The military said the detainees were members of a terrorist cell.
Also Sunday, Kuwaiti police said they disrupted a plot to assassinate the Iraqi prime minister, Ayad Allawi, during a visit to the country, al-Arabiya reported. No further information was available. Allawi is now in Lebanon.
The checkpoints set up Sunday in Baghdad by Iraqi and U.S. forces turned the city center into a giant parking lot of overheated vehicles. Drivers called it the worst traffic jam in recent memory.
Muhammad Hadyr, 49, who had pulled his beat-up Toyota to the side of Sadoun Street to buy a soft drink, watched the traffic creep in front of him. Hadyr, a taxi driver, said he was unable to work because of the jam.
Aqeel Kattab, 28, pulled his overheated car to the side of Sadoun Street. He stood in front of it with the hood up, pouring water over his bare feet to try to cool himself. Beads of sweat dripped into his eyes. He grimaced and wiped the sweat from his face.
"I hope this thing will not continue for tomorrow and the day after," he said. "Is this the new Iraq? It's going to be like this? We wished to have freedom and democracy. And what we gained is explosions and bad traffic. . . . Saddam was bad, but at least there was a system. Now we lost the bad guy, and we lost the system."
Special correspondents Bassam Sebti and Naseer Nouri contributed to this report.
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Suicide Bombing Kills 3 Near U.S. Base in Northern Iraq
July 26, 2004
By JAMES GLANZ
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/international/middleeast/26CND-IRAQ.html?hp=&pagewanted=all&position=
BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 26 - A car loaded with explosives blew up near the main gate of an airfield in the northern city of Mosul today, killing three people including the driver and injuring five people, three of them American soldiers, the American military said in a statement.
Two of those killed were a civilian and a child, the statement said, while Iraqi guard forces were among the wounded.
In Baghdad, an Iraqi official from the ministry of interior, identified as Musab al-Awdah, was fatally shot when he came out of his home with bodyguards, and kidnappers said they were holding two Jordanian drivers and two Pakistani civilians hostage, according to the Arabic television station Al Jazeera.
The two Pakistani civilians working in Iraq were reported missing on Sunday. The Jordanians were described in the statement on the Al Jazeera Web site as drivers.
High ranking government officials have been the target of insurgents through assassinations and attempted killings. Insurgents have developed hostage-taking as their most powerful weapon in recent days and issued fresh threats against other foreign nations.
The United States military reported that 15 insurgents had been killed on Sunday by American and Iraqi forces in an hourlong battle north of Baghdad that involved small-arms fire, rocket-propelled grenades and artillery fire. No Iraqi or American forces were reported killed.
Today, an American military statement said Iraqi national guard and police forces killed the insurgents.
The missing Pakistanis, a truck driver and an engineer working for Al Tamimi Group, a Kuwait company, disappeared as they were driving to Baghdad along heavily traveled supply routes. The family of one of the men made an emotional appeal on Sunday for his release, speaking from their village 55 miles south of Islamabad.
"I miss my father very much," said the 21-year-old daughter of the missing man, Azad Khan, as she wept, according to the Reuters news agency. "I urge the Pakistani government and Iraqi people to help find my father."
In another display of their increasing ability to track and kidnap foreigners, hostage-takers seized an Egyptian diplomat as he left a mosque on Friday, and on Sunday appeared to flaunt their unchallenged control.
The television channel Al Arabiya reported that the kidnappers of seven employees of a Kuwaiti transport company from Kenya, India and Egypt had appointed a tribal leader, Sheik Hisham al-Dulaymi, to negotiate for their release.
It is unclear to what extent, if any, insurgent groups in Iraq are coordinating the kidnappings of foreigners.
But it is clear that they have grown more clever and adept at using kidnapping as a tool of intimidation and publicity since the successful abduction of a Filipino hostage, who was released last Tuesday.
The Filipino hostage, Angelo dela Cruz, was freed after his government withdrew 51 Philippine soldiers and police officers from Iraq. The insurgents - in what has also become a standard technique - had threatened to behead Mr. dela Cruz if his countrymen did not pull out.
The police in India said the wife of one Indian trucker who had been taken hostage was hospitalized in a state of shock after having pleaded for the release of her husband, Agence France-Presse reported.
Roughly 20 foreigners are either being held hostage or have already been killed by their captors in Iraq. In a new threat, a group identifying itself as an affiliate of Al Qaeda threatened to plant bombs throughout Australia if that nation did not withdraw from Iraq.
Abducting foreigners "is like putting pressure on the painful parts of the body," said Abdul Sattar Abdul al-Jabbar, deputy spokesman for the Muslim Scholars Association, a moderate group that has condemned the kidnappings but is critical of the continuing American presence in Iraq.
"It's very easy to kidnap foreigners in Iraq," Mr. Jabbar said. "It doesn't cost them anything," he said, referring to the insurgents.
George Sada, a spokesman for Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, asserted that the outbreak of hostage-taking had come about as insurgents had recoiled from what he called the increasing power of Iraqi security forces. But Mr. Sada conceded that each hostage turned into a highly visible statement by the insurgents that Iraq was a dangerous place to live and work.
"Of course, they are embarrassing the government by these acts," Mr. Sada said.
The United States military reported on Sunday that 15 insurgents had been killed on Sunday by American and Iraqi forces in an hourlong battle north of Baghdad that involved small-arms fire, rocket-propelled grenades and artillery fire. No Iraqi or American forces were reported killed.
The firefight took place at Buhriz, 35 miles north of Baghdad, the United States military said. It followed a raid by the Iraqis in farm country there. American troops took part in the battle with artillery fire, air support and soldiers who were described on Sunday as "providing security" during the fighting.
Today, an American military statement said Iraqi national guard and police forces killed the insurgents.
The Americans have persistently sought to portray the Iraqi forces as growing more competent and in control of the country.
The hostage-taking tactic emerged in a major way during the first intense outbreak of insurgency in April. Since that time, at least 60 hostages have been reported freed, along with those who have been reported killed or are still missing.
More important, the taking of hostages has separated itself from the generalized violence in Iraq and become a prime weapon on its own. The method has the advantage, from the insurgency's point of view, of being cheap and almost entirely free of the risk run when American or Iraqi troops are confronted directly.
The personal nature of the tactic, usually involving video of the individual hostages with their captors and the threat of beheading, also ensures that each incident is given enormous exposure in the international media. As demonstrated by the pullout of the Philippine soldiers, which took place in the face of overwhelming public pressure in the Philippines to save Mr. dela Cruz, that exposure translates into a force that can move nations.
More specifically, the truckers who have been the focus of several recent incidents are part of an indispensable series of supply lines that bring materials in from surrounding countries. If those lines were to be disrupted, the entire American-backed effort to create stability and the conditions for a new government in Iraq could suffer.
"It's difficult to stop it, but we are trying to find the measures to decrease the number," said Hamid al-Bayati, the deputy foreign minister for political affairs and bilateral relations.
"We regret that some countries are really giving up to the terrorists," said Mr. Bayati, who is also a member of the central committee of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
"But we respect their decisions," he said.
Christine Hauser contributed reporting from New York for this article.
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AID Western Ways Force Iraq to Trim Water Projects
July 26, 2004
By JAMES GLANZ
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/international/middleeast/26wate.html?pagewanted=all&position=
BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 25 - Rising security and other overhead costs of Western contractors are cutting into the billions of dollars set aside for some 90 planned water projects, allowing them to supply only half the potable water originally expected, Iraqi officials say.
Scaling back the projects by that much would vastly reduce the benefits for the citizens of a country that already meets no more than 60 to 80 percent of the demand for water on a given day, depending on the region. The Iraqi government estimates may also have wider repercussions, because they provide the first concrete measure of how the continuing violence in Iraq could affect the $18.4 billion reconstruction program approved by Congress last fall.
That program covers numerous infrastructure areas, including transportation, oil, electricity, sewage - and of course water, the sector covered by the Iraqi estimates. Over all, about $4.3 billion was set aside for water and public works, of which about $2.8 billion has been released so far.
"A big chunk of that money is going to administration and security," said Nesreen Berwari, the minister of municipalities and public works, the sector of the Iraqi government that has responsibility for water projects outside Baghdad.
"Everything we planned for, because of the budget limitations, what's available for construction is half," Ms. Berwari said.
Steve Susens, a spokesman for the Project and Contracting Office, which is affiliated with both the Defense Department and the United States Embassy in Baghdad, said estimates for security costs and other overhead had risen somewhat since the first estimates on the size of the projects were made early this year, before the insurgency erupted. But he said the office and its contractors were seeking innovative ways of softening the impact of the rising costs, like seeking new donors or reworking the engineering designs.
"There's no reason to dispute the figures," Mr. Susens said of the Iraqi calculations. He added that "security costs are the one thing we can't control. It's controlled by the enemy."
Another official at the contracting office, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the overall scope of the work was beyond what Iraqi companies, which would have far lower overhead costs but have little experience with billion-dollar projects, could handle - even though much of the construction work will actually be carried out by Iraqi subcontractors chosen by the Western companies.
"If you compare it to what they've done in the past - in the past 20-some years - it exceeds anything they've done," the official said.
The official also said some of the original Iraqi estimates might have been based on optimistic assumptions about what the American money could buy and that they did not take into account potential measures like combining several projects that are close to one another in order to save money and increase capacity.
But Keith Ashdown, who as vice president for planning at Taxpayers for Common Sense in Washington has studied contracting in Iraq, said it was "shocking in the extreme that we're basically cutting our efforts on these projects because of administrative and security costs."
"We're going to get more bang for our buck in project performance when we get Iraqis doing the work - not just subcontracting the work but actually managing the work themselves," Mr. Ashdown said.
The projected reduction was described by officials in the Ministry of Municipalities and Public Works, who based their estimates on detailed calculations for four major projects totaling about $234 million.
The Iraqi officials said that delays, often unexplained by the Americans and lasting as long as six months, had kept many of the approximately 90 new projects from moving much beyond the planning stage. Those four - in the northern cities of Halabja, Erbil and Baquba and the southern city of Nasiriya - are among the furthest along in their design.
Halabja is infamous as the Kurdish town that Saddam Hussein's government gassed in 1988, killing thousands. Erbil is a historic town that is also in Kurdish territory, while Baquba is a city just north of Baghdad that has been continually racked by violence. Nasiriya has suffered only minor disturbances since the American-led invasion last year.
Iraqi engineers had originally estimated that those four projects alone would provide about 235 million gallons of potable water a day for about 1.7 million people. But after security and other costs for the Western companies were factored in, the number of gallons they could be expected to supply dropped to about 118 million a day.
An official in the Ministry of Municipalities and Public Works who is intimately familiar with the numbers confirmed that most of the extra costs come about because the prime contractors are Western. Western companies typically hire large numbers of private security guards, set up elaborate base camps and travel only in heavily guarded convoys, offer much higher salaries than Iraqi companies, pay skyrocketing insurance premiums and require much more administrative support in order to comply with stringent American regulations.
Together, those items averaged 25 percent of the entire contract, the official said. But as with most construction projects that require capital-intensive items - in this case, miles of soft iron pipe, expensive pumps and other hardware - the cuts will have a disproportionate effect, reducing the ultimate capacity by half.
There has also been talk of eliminating some projects in order to pay for others, but the ministry has resisted such suggestions, saying that all of the work is critical in a nation suffering from water shortages. Ministry officials say that American officials have also pressed to scale back projects on the argument that they could be designed to cover short-term needs in certain parts of the country, and be expanded in the future when more money is available.
The normal procedure for such expensive projects is to design them to cover needs for the next two to three decades, said Mahmood A. Ahmed, the ministry's director general for water. But he said that in the Western companies' estimates of the costs, "there is a security part; this is very sensitive for them."
Mr. Ahmed expressed gratitude that the United States was spending so much money in the first place and said that even if the projects have to be cut by half, "it's better than nothing for now."
But Mr. Ahmed also described an American reconstruction program in the throes of lengthy delays. He said that after early estimates for the projects were made last February, the ministry was forced to wait for months while the Americans ground through their contracting procedures.
"If you give us the money in the beginning of this year, in January or February, I think now we will be finished," Mr. Ahmed said.
Officials at the contracting office disputed that assertion, saying that the time was required to go through the normal process of assuring that American taxpayer money is being spent responsibly. Mr. Susens called the reconstruction an enormous task and called to mind the length of time it has taken to carry out the Big Dig in downtown Boston - except that there are some 2,300 different projects to carry out in Iraq.
"As far as construction projects," Mr. Susens said, "these are like lightning."
Many of the new water projects have been contracted to a joint venture of major American and British contractors and named Fluor-Amec. Other companies that have received major contracts in the general area of water resources are Washington International Group and Black and Veatch.
Mr. Ahmed leveled severe criticisms at Bechtel, a company that received some $500 million in earlier government contracts for water work through the United States Agency for International Development. Mr. Ahmed said that Bechtel failed to consult with the ministry in everything from its choice of Iraqi contractors to its decisions of when and how to undertake major repairs of water systems, especially in the parched south of the country.
As a result, Mr. Ahmed said, Bechtel has done business with shady contractors and is now in the middle of repair projects, reducing water supplies during the peak demand of summer - something he said Iraqi companies would know should be avoided.
"American companies, they don't know the criteria of projects in Iraq," Mr. Ahmed said.
But Greg Pruett, a spokesman for Bechtel, said that the company was being as flexible as it could in accommodating requests from the ministries in carrying out projects. He said that the company was constantly grappling with the security situation in Iraq, adding that "if that means that a project is not going to proceed as quickly as we would like it, then we're going to accept a slowing of the project to ensure the safety of our workers."
A press officer for the development agency, Steve Tupper, said that Iraqi companies did not generally have the ability to comply with American rules on accountability and transparency in the use of public funds.
Under pressure from the citizenry, Iraqi officials "want quick fixes," Mr. Tupper said.
"But quick fixes won't work," he said. "Without proper installation and regular maintenance you'll end up with the same deteriorating infrastructure that we started with."
Asked if he was concerned about the performance of the new contractors, Mr. Ahmed said, with a note of fatalism that is typical of Iraq: "It's out of our control. What can we do? But they will learn."
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Cash becomes part of U.S. arsenal in dealing with Iraqis
By Doug Struck
The Washington Post
July 26, 2004
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2001988432_iraqcash26.html
TIKRIT, Iraq - Cash has become the U.S. military's first line of defense in some parts of Iraq.
Even patrol leaders now carry envelopes of cash. The money comes from brigade commanders, who get as much as $50,000 to $100,000 a month to distribute for local rehabilitation and emergency welfare projects through the Commanders Emergency Response Program.
But there are few restrictions on the expenditures, and officers acknowledge they consider the money another weapon. The targets are the restless legions of unemployed Iraqi men, many of them former soldiers, policemen and low-level members of the Baath Party of ousted President Saddam Hussein who were put out of work last year when the U.S. administrator, L. Paul Bremer, ordered a de-Baathification of Iraq.
U.S. soldiers say those men are vulnerable to entreaties to carry out an attack on the Americans for pay.
"I have met two guys now who say, 'I don't love you and I don't hate you. But somebody's offered me $200 to set up a mortar or a (roadside bomb), and there's a bonus if we kill you,' " said Lt. Col. Randall Potterf, the civil-affairs officer for the Army's 1st Infantry Division.
Restive central Iraq is full of men who "are young, unemployed, without hope," said Maj. Gen. John Batiste, the division commander. "We are trying to reach out to them. Whenever we get the money, we are trying to apply it to pull over as many of these men as we can to our side."
His local commanders have the go-ahead to dish out tens, hundreds and thousands of dollars with little more paperwork than a signed receipt. Often, the cash is paid in return for a promise to perform a small community project, but it also is given to Iraqis to buy items they say are necessary.
Lt. Col. Jeffrey Sinclair, commander of the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment in Tikrit, said he had paid $500 so a driver could get his car repaired, paid "benevolent" money to the family of a victim of violence, paid people to clean streets, bought soccer uniforms for a team and repaired a swimming pool, among other expenditures. Other officers have given money to ice-cream vendors, chicken farmers and hardware suppliers to get their businesses going.
For more than a year, the Commanders Emergency Response Program was funded with $105 million taken from oil-generated Iraqi reconstruction funds.
But the Defense Department has agreed to begin paying for the program and has requested $300 million as part of its fiscal 2005 budget request to Congress. The program is popular with some members of Congress, who see it as bypassing the bureaucracy of the Iraq reconstruction program.
"This is economic warfare," said Lt. Col. Courtney Paul, executive officer of the 1st Infantry's engineer brigade headquartered in Tikrit.
"The anti-Iraqi forces are paying $50 to take part in an attack. That's one-third of the monthly pay of an Iraqi National Guardsman." By countering those payments, Paul said, "hopefully, we will be ready to dry up their supply of soldiers ready to do attacks."
The projects are "never going to get them to love America," said Potterf, the civil-affairs officer. "Nobody is going to ever be waving an American flag. But I just want them to be neutral, to stop planting explosives."
-------- israel / palestine
6 Palestinians Killed at Restaurant
Undercover Israeli Forces Attack in West Bank;
Thousands Protest Gaza Plan
By Molly Moore
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13945-2004Jul25.html
JERUSALEM, July 25 -- Undercover Israeli security forces shot and killed five Palestinian members of a militant organization and an 18-year-old bystander at a restaurant Sunday night in the West Bank city of Tulkarm, about 20 miles northeast of Tel Aviv, according to Palestinian security forces.
Fifteen members of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, an armed group affiliated with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's mainstream Fatah political movement, were eating dinner inside the restaurant or standing guard outside when undercover troops in a white Volkswagen opened fire, hitting six Palestinian men in the head and injuring at least one other in the leg as he fled, Palestinian security officials said.
An Israeli military spokeswoman said that "six gunmen," including a senior al-Aqsa leader in the city, were killed in the attack at 8:30 p.m. It could not be learned whether the Palestinians returned fire.
The attack resulted in the highest number of Palestinian fatalities in the West Bank in recent weeks as Israeli soldiers, border police and other security agencies have conducted continual raids against armed groups and their leaders. Hundreds of residents poured into the streets of Tulkarm late Sunday to protest the attack, witnesses said.
The raid was part of a long day of violence and political protest across Israel and the Palestinian territories.
In Israel, tens of thousands of Israelis linked hands and formed a human chain stretching from the edge of the Gaza Strip to the Old City in Jerusalem to protest Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's intentions to withdraw soldiers and Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip within the next several years. Police and organizers of the group said the line stretched about 55 miles, though the chain was broken in several places. Organizers said more than 130,000 people participated in the demonstration; police estimated the number at about 70,000 people.
In the southern Gaza Strip, Palestinians fired an antitank rocket into the Jewish settlement of Neve Dekalim on Sunday afternoon, slightly injuring six children when it struck near a community center compound, an Israeli military spokeswoman said. A second rocket or mortar landed on a building in the same settlement later in the day but caused no injuries, she said.
The Israeli air force launched two missile attacks on a house in a crowded Gaza City neighborhood Sunday. Aircraft fired two missiles into the house during the afternoon, and fired more missiles at the same building Sunday night, according to Palestinian security forces. The house was vacant during both strikes, witnesses told the Associated Press.
An Israeli military spokesman said the air force attacked the house because it was being used to manufacture weapons, such as the crude Qassam rockets that Palestinians frequently fire across the Gaza border into Israel. No deaths were reported in either attack.
--------
Thousands Join Hands to Fight Withdrawal of Israel From Gaza
July 26, 2004
By JOSEPH BERGER
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/international/middleeast/26mide.html
JERUSALEM, July 25 - Tens of thousands of Israelis held hands on Sunday to form a colorful human chain - broken in places, but formidable nonetheless - that stretched 56 miles, from the Gaza Strip to the Western Wall in the Old City here, as a protest against Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to dismantle Jewish settlements and withdraw Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip.
The size of the demonstration - organizers estimated that 200,000 Israelis took part, though the police put the number at 70,000 - represented perhaps the gravest challenge yet to Mr. Sharon's disengagement plan under which Israel would withdraw from the 26-mile-long Gaza Strip and four northern settlements in the West Bank.
Mr. Sharon, who is hanging onto power without a majority government, must get Parliament to ratify and finance his plan. In May, he failed to get his own Likud Party on board, though he did succeed in getting cabinet approval in early June.
The organizers said 30 members of Parliament took part in the protest, including the speaker, Reuven Rivlin.
The demonstrators stretched along some of the nation's major highways. Finding footholds on brush-covered slopes or enduring a blazing late afternoon sun in dusty road junctions, they waved Israeli flags and held banners denigrating Mr. Sharon. The most fervent demonstrators chanted psalms.
The chain - arranged by the settlers movement using 900 buses - was far from complete, with people unable to stand along some long stretches of roadway because of rocky bluffs, thick bushes or speeding traffic. But shortly after 7 p.m., thousands locked hands, stretched as far as they could and sang "Hatikvah," the national anthem.
Although the protesters caught the country's attention, the violent conflict between the Palestinians and Israelis continued. Five members of Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, including two local leaders, Mahdi Tambouz, 25, and Hani Awaida, 27, were shot to death in Tulkarm by Israeli undercover agents who had ridden toward them in a white minibus and surprised them while they were eating dinner outside a shuttered restaurant. The Aksa movement has claimed responsibility for many suicide bombings in Israel. Witnesses said an 18-year-old passer-by was also killed, but Israeli military officials described him as a gunman.
In the Gaza Strip, Israeli helicopters hit a building in Gaza City that residents said was the home of a militant member of Hamas, Reuters reported. The Israeli Army said it was a workshop used by Hamas. Medics said four people had been wounded.
Palestinian militants fired shells at a community center in the heavily populated settlement of Neve Dekalim, wounding six Israeli children, including a 10-year-old whose injuries were serious, Israeli officials said.
The Sharon government issued no official response to the human chain demonstration, but a senior government official said "a demonstration does not create a majority, and Mr. Sharon enjoys a wide majority among Israelis for his disengagement plan."
"The problem," the official added, "is translating that majority into a parliamentary majority, which is not easy in the complicated Israeli government."
The demonstrators included many of the almost 240,000 settlers of the West Bank and Gaza, and also secular and Orthodox Israelis from around the country. Many dismissed Mr. Sharon's argument that it is foolish to send hundreds of Israeli troops to protect 7,500 Jewish settlers living among 1.3 million Palestinians. "If we give up the Gaza Strip, by the same token we can give up Israel," said Chaim Markuza, a 62-year-old retired businessman who was standing near the Latrun junction about 15 miles outside Jerusalem.
Ayelet Schwartz, a 24-year-old teacher from the northern West Bank settlement of Dumim who had her 2 1/2-year-old daughter, Shira, in a stroller, said, "If we believe in the Torah, then we believe that all of the land of Israel belongs to us."
The chain began in the Gaza settlement of Nisanit. The first link was a grandmother, Shulamit Beter, who lived in the Gaza settlement of Kfar Dorom before it was abandoned in the 1948 war. The settlement was revived after Israel captured the Gaza Strip. The last person in the chain was Mrs. Beter's 6-year-old granddaughter, Yael, who lives in Neve Dekalim.
One of the people at the wall was David Hatuel, whose pregnant wife and four daughters were killed last May in a roadside ambush by two Palestinian gunmen in Gaza. "Peace should be made with people who want peace," he said. "The Palestinians don't educate their children to want peace, and you can't have a peace with someone who doesn't dream about peace."
--------
NEWS ANALYSIS
Palestinian Turmoil Threatens to Erode Arafat's Power
July 26, 2004
By GREG MYRE
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/international/middleeast/26CND-MIDE.html
RAMALLAH, West Bank, July 26 - Yasir Arafat, the politician, has had a rough 10 days. Gunmen turned their weapons on his security forces in the Gaza Strip, his prime minister submitted his resignation, and parliament sent him a rare rebuke. But Yasir Arafat, the icon, appears to have suffered only minor scratches.
The recent turmoil displayed an easy-to-miss truth about Mr. Arafat's place among the Palestinians. His policies have become fair game for criticism and even expressions of despair, yet he remains the enduring symbol of Palestinian aspirations to full nationhood. Even as violence flared in the streets of Gaza, his staunchest Palestinian critics were not making explicit calls for his ouster.
Many of the sharpest complaints about corruption and ineffectiveness in the Palestinian leadership have come not from rivals, but from within Mr. Arafat's own Fatah movement, the core of his support. Almost anywhere else, this would signal that a leader is in trouble.
In Mr. Arafat's case, it has meant something more subtle: enduring harsh criticism, and perhaps being forced into some political concessions. Still, many Palestinian and Israeli political experts agree, there is no serious threat to his position, at least for now.
Mr. Arafat and his prime minister, Ahmed Qurei, planned to meet Tuesday amid hints they were patching up their dispute, and that Mr. Qurei might be willing to rescind his resignation, delivered on July 17.
Mr. Arafat said on Saturday that he would support any cabinet changes sought by the prime minister. However, it was not clear whether Mr. Arafat was prepared to yield on the most important issue, his tight control over the Palestinian security forces.
Mr. Qurei said he was quitting because of the chaos in Gaza and the disarray in the security agencies, and he has expressed frustration at the limited powers allotted to the prime minister under Mr. Arafat.
In Gaza, militants linked to Fatah have carried out a series of kidnappings and battled members of the Palestinian security forces. The fighting embarrassed Mr. Arafat and reflected his inability to rein in the factions in Gaza, where Israel's government says it intends to pull out soldiers and settlers. Yet the militants identified the problem as the corrupt security chiefs appointed by Mr. Arafat, not Mr. Arafat himself.
The militants, from the Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, say they are waging a vigilante campaign against corruption, while remaining loyal to Mr. Arafat.
"We do not like taking the law into our hands," the group said in a statement last week. But it added, "The leadership is neglecting our plight and suffering."
But indicting "the leadership" did not include Mr. Arafat. Instead, Al Aksa described Mr. Arafat as "the symbol of our struggle," and called on him "to seriously and immediately go after those who are corrupt."
And when Palestinian lawmakers gathered in Ramallah to address the crisis, they too opted for an indirect approach. They said Mr. Arafat should accept Mr. Qurei's resignation and appoint a new government with expanded powers to combat lawlessness. In effect, they turned to Mr. Arafat as the man who could fix the problem, not as the one who had helped create it.
"We have a saying in Arabic: the man sees the wolf but prefers to just follow his tracks," said Salah Tamari, the minister of youth and sports. "Arafat is the wolf, and we should have had the guts to confront him, and not just work around him."
So Mr. Arafat has remained on familiar political ground: maneuvering amid infighting Palestinian factions, an exercise he has been consistently successful at for more than 30 years.
Mr. Arafat often seems to thrive in times of crisis, embracing his role as a unifying figure for the Palestinians, a people of many competing groups without either a state or strong institutions.
There are Islamic fundamentalists like Hamas and more secular nationalists like Fatah. Some leaders seek a bargain with Israel on a two-state solution, while groups like Hamas reject any acceptance of a Jewish state. There are rivalries between Palestinians who stayed in the West Bank and Gaza all through the Israeli occupation, and others who went into exile with Mr. Arafat for more than a quarter-century.
Mr. Arafat, 74, has seen his powers whittled away in the past few years, and he now presides over a crumbling and impoverished Palestinian Authority.
Israel has confined him to his battered compound in Ramallah for more than two years, while the United States and some European countries have stopped sending diplomats to visit.
Mr. Arafat has found it increasingly difficult to exercise day-to-day leadership, but there is little doubt his voice would still carry the day on any substantive issue affecting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"From his point of view, I'm sure he feels he has survived many crises like this one," said Ziad Abu Amr, a Palestinian legislator and a critic of Mr. Arafat. "He can probably outmaneuver his rivals in this crisis, but I'm skeptical that he is prepared to make any real changes."
Most Israelis are happy to see Mr. Arafat squirm, but they also believe there will be no resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as long as he remains in power.
Shlomo Avineri, a political science professor at Hebrew University, sees Mr. Arafat as skilled in exploiting a tradition that avoids direct attacks on political rulers.
"There is no tradition of legitimate criticism against the leader, and this is true throughout the Arab world," Mr. Avineri said. "You can criticize corruption, or maybe a particular policy, but not the leader himself."
--------
Israel Reroutes Barrier on Court Order
Associated Press Writer
By LAURIE COPANS
Jul 26, 2004
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=716&e=4&u=/ap/20040726/ap_on_re_mi_ea/israel_palestinians
JERUSALEM - Israel's Defense Ministry has mapped out a new route for the separation barrier in the West Bank that heeds a Supreme Court order to reduce hardships for Palestinians and runs closer to the Israel's 1967 border, officials said Monday.
Word of the new route came as Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites) insisted he would go ahead with his plan to pull soldiers and settlers out of the Gaza Strip (news - web sites) despite a huge demonstration against it Sunday, when about 100,000 protesters created a human chain across some 55 miles from Gaza to Jerusalem.
"I decided to proceed with the disengagement plan because it is clear that Israel cannot remain in the Gaza Strip forever," Sharon said in a statement issued by his office. His plan calls for evacuating the 8,000 settlers from Gaza next year, but many members of his own Likud Party oppose it.
A senior American envoy, Elliot Abrams, is to visit Israel next week to discuss Sharon's "unilateral disengagement" plan, U.S. officials said.
In the West Bank, a solution appeared near in the political crisis for Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat (news - web sites), as his prime minister was reported ready to rescind his resignation. Palestinian officials said Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia was weighing assurances from Arafat that he would have more authority to make reforms.
Qureia could announce the withdrawal of his resignation letter after a meeting Tuesday with Arafat, a move which would end a two-week standoff and ease the turmoil in the Palestinian territories. The prime minister resigned earlier this month in frustration at Arafat's refusal to let him carry out reform in the security forces and deal with growing turmoil in the Palestinian areas.
Elements of the new route for the barrier will be presented this week to Sharon and Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz for their approval, security officials said on condition of anonymity. Details of the new map were not available, but the officials said it would run much closer to the internationally recognized cease-fire line of 1967 than originally planned.
The decision to redraw the route was in line with an order by the Israeli Supreme Court last month to make the barrier less disruptive of Palestinian lives. But it ignored a ruling by the International Court of Justice - the United Nations (news - web sites)' highest judicial body - that the barrier is illegal and must be completely torn down.
Acting on the world court's judgment, the U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a resolution last week calling on Israel to dismantle the barrier and compensate Palestinians whose lands were confiscated.
The system of fences, walls and razor wire cuts into the West Bank at several points, keeping many Palestinians from reaching their jobs, schools and farms. About one-fourth of the barrier, which will eventually run 425 miles, has been built.
Israel says the structure prevents suicide bombers infiltrating from the West Bank. Nearly 1,000 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks in nearly four years of fighting. Palestinians argue that the barrier could become a new political boundary, effectively annexing large parts of the West Bank.
The Supreme Court ordered Israel to reroute about 20 miles in the Jerusalem area, responding to a specific appeal by residents.
But Defense Ministry experts also were altering the route significantly in the southern sections of the West Bank where construction has not yet begun, the security officials said.
In Jerusalem, the route encircles east Jerusalem, the Arab-populated half of the city that was part of Jordan until Israel captured it in 1967 and annexed it shortly afterward.
Israel built large Jewish residential areas in the annexed part of the city, which Palestinians consider to be part of the occupied territory.
Palestinian Cabinet Minister Saeb Erekat said the new changes were inadequate. The barrier should adhere to the 1967 border, allowing Palestinians control over east Jerusalem, he said.
Also Monday, Israeli troops shot and killed a 50-year-old Palestinian woman in the Gaza Strip town of Khan Younis as she slept in her bed, Palestinian witnesses said. The Israeli army said troops in the area came under fire and shot back, but knew nothing of about any casualties.
A 12-year-old girl wounded in the morning shooting died in a hospital later, Palestinians said.
Tensions were high in the Khan Younis area after Palestinians fired mortars at the nearby Jewish settlement of Neve Dekalim on Sunday, wounding six children. Israeli tanks returned fire, wounding nine people.
--------
Settler reparation plan unveiled
BBC
26 July, 2004
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3925999.stm
The Israeli government is to provide settlers evacuated from the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank with a choice of four compensation plans.
Israeli media reported that the plans, drawn up by the government's compensation committee, would affect around 1,600 families.
The compensation amount will depend on the value of their homes and businesses, and their salaried incomes.
The compensation plan is to be voted on by the cabinet in the autumn.
The announcement followed protests on Sunday against the withdrawal, with tens of thousands of Israelis forming a human chain between the Gaza Strip and Jerusalem.
Pullout from all 21 settlements in Gaza and 4 in West Bank Preparation period due to end by March 2005 Four-stage evacuation to be completed by end of 2005 Each stage requires cabinet vote Israel is planning to pull all its 7,000 settlers from Gaza and the troops that protect them as part of a disengagement plan. Israel will maintain control of Gaza's borders, coastline and airspace.
Four West Bank settlements are also to be evacuated.
All settlements are considered illegal under international law and Israel has committed itself to freezing settlement activity under the international peace plan known as the roadmap.
About 1,500 families will be eligible for compensation in Gaza and another 100 in the West Bank, the Haaretz newspaper reported.
Housing compensation will depend on how long the family has lived in the settlement and where it chooses to re-locate to, it said.
The daily outlined the committee's four options:
- People who have lived in their settlement for more than four years will be entitled to a replacement house of similar quality and type
- Those who have lived there for less than four years or who own property in the settlement but live elsewhere will be given an amount based on a government estimate of the value of that property
- Settlers can be re-settled in communities in areas of Israel chosen by the government, enabling them to maintain the current framework of their community
- Any settler who wishes to choose a new location independently of the government can receive direct compensation for the value of his of her house on an individual basis.
-------- nato
NATO military HQ targetted by terror threat
BRUSSELS (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726184352.3eeugqmt.html
Security was stepped up at NATO's military command headquarters in Europe over the weekend after an Interpol report of a threatened terrorist attack, an official said Monday.
Checks were tightened on all vehicles and people entering and leaving the SHAPE (Supreme Heaquarters Allied Powers Europe) base near Mons in southern Belgium after the warning last Friday, said the official.
The state of alert was downgraded on Monday, he said, adding that an Interpol tip-off from Trieste, Italy, said that four terrorists were planning to attack the headquarters. "It is all over now," he told AFP.
Belgium's RTL television reported that the four alleged Islamic terrorists were from Greece, adding that the attack was planned for Sunday. The NATO official could not confirm this.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, whose main base is in Brussels, has been listed among threatened targets by Islamic militants warning of al-Qaeda attacks in Europe.
The alliance last year took over command of a peacekeeping force in Afghanistan, which it agreed to expand further outside Kabul expand last month at a meeting which also saw NATO leaders agreed to train Iraqi security forces.
-------- pakistan / india
Pak Helped Bin Laden Set Up Base In Afghanistan: Report
Monday, July 26, 2004
(NNN)
http://www.indolink.com/displayArticleS.php?id=072404105409
Washington, July 25: The final report of the 9/11 probe panel has said that Pakistan helped Osama bin Laden set up base in Afghanistan.
The report, which reviews the circumstances that allowed a group of terrorists to attack the United States on Sept 11, 2001, said that after the 1977 coup, Pakistan military leaders turned to Islamic groups for support, and fundamentalists became more prominent.
Pakistan military rulers, the report said, found "ardent young Afghans" educated at privately madressas "a source of potential trouble at home but potentially useful abroad."
They believed that the Taleban movement could bring order in chaotic Afghanistan and make it a cooperative ally. Pakistani generals also thought that the Taleban might give Pakistan greater security on one of the several borders where Pakistani military officers hoped for what they called "strategic depth," the report said.
"It is unlikely that Osama could have returned to Afghanistan had Pakistan disapproved. The Pakistan military intelligence service probably had advance knowledge of his coming, and its officers may have facilitated his travel," the report said.
The report claimed that during his entire time in Sudan, Osama had maintained guesthouses and training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan. These were part of a larger network used by diverse organizations for recruiting and training fighters for Islamic insurgencies in such places as Tajikistan, Kashmir, and Chechnya.
"Pakistani intelligence officers reportedly introduced Osama to Taleban leaders in Kandahar, their main base of power, to aid his reassertion of control over camps near Khost. In doing so, Pakistani generals hoped that Osama would expand the camps and make them available for training Kashmiri militants," the report said.
When arrived in Afghanistan, the Taleban controlled much of Afghanistan, but key centers, including Kabul, were still held by rival warlords. According to the report, Osama went initially to Jalalabad, probably because it was in an area controlled by a provincial council of Muslim leaders who were not major contenders for national power. He found lodgings with Younis Khalis, the head of one of the main Mujahideen factions.
After September 1996, when first Jalalabad and then Kabul fell to the Taleban, Osama cemented his ties with them. The Taleban, like the Sudanese, would eventually hear warnings, including from the Saudi monarchy. The Taleban leader Mullah Omar "invited" Osama to move to Kandahar, after he gave a controversial interview to the CNN, hoping that this would allow him to exercise greater control over the Saudi dissident.
Osama eventually enjoyed a strong financial position in Afghanistan, thanks to Saudi and other financiers associated with his network. Through his relationship with Mullah Omar, Osama was able to circumvent restrictions; Mullah Omar would stand by him even when other Taleban leaders raised objections.
-------- russia
Russia's Putin talks military cooperation with Uzbek leader
MOSCOW (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726171419.xzu05qon.html
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Uzbek counterpart Islam Karimov met Monday to discuss military cooperation between the two former Soviet republics, said a spokesman for the Russian leader.
The two leaders met in Ukraine's southern city of Yalta, where Putin is on a working visit and Karimov is on holiday, said Alexei Gromov.
The two leaders agreed to hold joint "military exercises in the mountains of Uzbekistan with the participation of air forces," the RIA Novosti news agency quoted Gromov as saying.
The two leaders also "discussed the issues of military cooperation and providing aid to building Uzbekistan's armed forces," he said.
Following the September 11, attacks in New York and Washington in 2001, several of former Soviet republics, including Uzbekistan, have hosted US troops on their soil for operations in neighboring Afghanistan.
Russia, the former master in Central Asia, did not object to the initial deployment but has since sought to boost its influence in the region.
In mid-July, Washington froze millions of dollars in aid to Uzbekistan because of a lack of progress in democratic reforms in the country, which Karimov has run with an iron fist since the Soviet Union fell apart in 1991.
Last year US Congress-approved aid delivered to Uzbekistan totalled some 86 million dollars and was due to come to 18 million dollars this year.
--------
RUSSIA SEEKS TO RESTRUCTURE DEFENSE INDUSTRY
MOSCOW [MENL]
26 Jul 2004
http://menewsline.com/stories/2004/july/07_27_4.html
Officials said Russia's defense contractors have been pressing the government in Moscow to streamline the state-owned industry. They said the contractors want the state-owned firms to consolidate in an effort to eliminate duplication and streamline marketing and production.
"We must consolidate if we want to ensure the future of the industry," Victor Livanov, director-general of Ilyushin, said. "If we don't it will disappear."
Officials said the restructuring -- ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2000 -- must include defense contractors in other countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States, or the former Soviet Union. They said defense firms from Belarus and Ukraine have been major competitors of Russian contractors, particularly in the Middle East.
-------- space
Bush Stands By His Space Plan
"The president has not said anything publicly since his Jan. 14 speech announcing the new space exploration vision, and there has been speculation his silence evidenced second thoughts or a backing away from the plan."
July 26, 2004
by Frank Sietzen
Washington, (UPI)
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/spacetravel-04zp.html
President George W. Bush's new space exploration plan has received a burst of hard-core support in Congress, aimed at blocking any attempt to cut its funding, and backed up by a rare veto threat from the president himself.
This development has emerged in the wake of action by a House appropriations subcommittee last week, which cut the administration's NASA budget request for fiscal year 2005 by more than $1 billion.
Bush had sought an FY 2005 NASA budget of $16.2 billion, a $866 million increase over the current year. The subcommittee, however, approved a NASA budget of $15.149 billion. That amount would not only slash the entire increase the administration had requested, but also would cut NASA to $229 million below the FY 2004 amount. Every element of the new space exploration plan was cut, as were all other programs related to it.
The proposed new manned spaceship, the Crew Exploration Vehicle, was cut $436 million. Programs to begin to mature the technology for the manned moon and Mars mission, totaling $30 million, also were stripped from the bill. A $230 million project to develop a new atomic rocket and deep space power system called Project Prometheus -- begun prior to the Bush proposal but folded into the effort -- was deleted. Other new initiatives likewise were slashed.
Strange, but the House bill did contain words of support for the vision. It just did not provide any funds for it.
The only human spaceflight programs contained in Bush's request that went unscathed were full funding for the space shuttle and space station programs -- both of which were earmarked by the president for, respectively, retirement and withdrawal.
The president has not said anything publicly since his Jan. 14 speech announcing the new space exploration vision, and there has been speculation his silence evidenced second thoughts or a backing away from the plan.
NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe has repeatedly said in public that Bush's support remained strong, but without any direct evidence from the president, the inference has been the space plan had slipped to the back burner in this hectic election year.
Now, the space plan's supporters have received a clear signal of continued White House support -- even though it has arrived in an unprecedented form.
Josh Bolten, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, last week sent a letter to Rep. C.W. Bill Young, R-Fla., the House Appropriations committee chair. The letter, dated July 22, drew a line in the sand over the intended cuts in NASA spending Young's full committee had approved the day before.
The administration, however, would not support House passage of the FY 2005 VA/HUD Appropriations bill as it is currently drafted, Bolten's letter said, referring to the measure within which the NASA appropriations were contained.
The funding levels provided by the committee would drastically delay plans for FY 2005 critical technology design efforts that are needed to begin to implement the president's vision, Bolten wrote. If the final version of this bill that is presented to the president does not include adequate funding levels ... his senior advisers would recommend that he veto the bill.
Presidential veto threats have been a rarity in the Bush White House. Also, no U.S. president has ever vetoed a spending bill because it contained too little money for space programs.
How did the veto threat emerge?
To a great extent, NASA's fortunes currently are riding with House Majority Leader Tom Delay, R-Texas. Delay, who has been the most enthusiastic supporter of the space plan in the House, threatened to doom Young's bill from ever getting a full vote on the floor when Congress reconvenes in September.
Sources close to Delay said this was not an idle threat.
Preventing the bill from reaching a final vote has become the first layer of defense for space plan supporters.
Delay has moved to establish a second layer, however. Administration sources told United Press International that Delay asked the White House for the veto threat -- and got it. If the cuts in space spending approved by the House appropriators reach Bush's desk in the fall, he will not sign the measure.
For a sitting President in an election year to threaten to veto a bill containing appropriations for veterans and housing because of its space spending provisions is a clear signal Bush has not backed away from his space plan. It also is another sign NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe's legislative strategy -- what some have called a game of political chicken -- has several layers in place before supporter's options are exhausted.
The Senate's action on NASA funding is yet to come. Former O'Keefe mentor Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, is widely expected to make sure the full Bush request for space plan funding will be contained in the Senate's mark-up of the legislation. If so, it would set up yet another chance for NASA to prevail, because the House-Senate conference would have to reconcile both versions of space spending.
With the veto threats, threats to undo the Republican budgeteer's work, and the Republican House leadership divided, the unusual and unexpected space budget battle will come right up to the beginnings of FY 2005 before its outcome becomes certain.
We're in a tough neighborhood, Sean O'Keefe told UPI last week, meaning NASA is by no means out of the woods.
-------- spies
THE C.I.A.
Kidnapping of bin Laden Was Rehearsed in '98 but Scrapped, 9/11 Report Says
July 26, 2004
By THOMAS CRAMPTON
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/politics/26raid.html?pagewanted=all&position=
WASHINGTON, July 23 - In May 1998, George J. Tenet, then director of central intelligence, scrapped a heavily rehearsed raid to kidnap Osama bin Laden from his compound in Kandahar, Afghanistan, according to the report by the Sept. 11 commission.
Under the plan, developed from satellite photographs and on-the-ground intelligence, Afghan operatives would execute a daring kidnapping and later hand over Mr. bin Laden, the leader of the Al Qaeda terrorist network, to the Central Intelligence Agency.
"No capture plan before 9/11 ever again attained the same level of detail and preparation," the report said. "Working-level C.I.A. officers were disappointed."
The tale of the canceled raid, as described in the commission's report, tells of senior C.I.A. and national security officials balancing the operation's potential rewards against concerns about jeopardizing the lives of operatives and the repercussions that would follow if the gambit failed. Ultimately, senior C.I.A. officials decided the plan was too dangerous, according to the report.
Aspects of the raid have been described in books by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism chief, and Steve Coll, a journalist with The Washington Post. The commission's report provides a detailed account of deliberations involving the Clinton White House, the C.I.A. and the Pentagon.
The agency's counterterrorist center conceived of the nighttime raid on Mr. bin Laden's compound after Afghan tribal leaders described to agency officials a failed roadside ambush they had tried.
The bin Laden compound, known as Tarnak Farms, contained about 80 concrete or mud-brick buildings surrounded by a 10-foot wall on a vast stretch of isolated and treeless desert near the Kandahar airport.
C.I.A. officers mapped the site, identifying houses that belonged to Mr. bin Laden's wives and the one where he would be most likely to sleep.
Working with the tribal leaders, the agency drew up plans for a raid and ran two complete rehearsals in the fall of 1997, the report said.
Planners at the agency were ready to seek White House approval by early 1998. Mr. Tenet walked the national security adviser, Samuel R. Berger, through the operation on Feb. 13 and in a paper titled "Next Steps Against Usama bin Ladin."
Guards at the compound would be subdued by a group of Afghan operatives, who would enter Tarnak Farms to stealthily grab Mr. bin Laden, the report said. Taking him to a site in the desert outside Kandahar, the tribal leaders would turn Mr. bin Laden over to a second group of tribal leaders, and they would take him to a desert landing zone for a handoff to the C.I.A. From there, the agency was to fly Mr. bin Laden to New York, an Arab capital, or wherever he was to be arraigned.
The briefing papers presented to Mr. Berger acknowledged several risks, including the possibility that people would be killed during the raid and that Mr. bin Laden's supporters in Afghanistan might retaliate by kidnapping American citizens in Kandahar.
The briefing papers also highlighted other options for C.I.A. action against Mr. bin Laden, including paramilitary or sabotage attacks in Kandahar and Sudan as well as providing intelligence support for military strikes.
Each plan had shortcomings, but so did inaction, the briefing papers said.
"Sooner or later," the papers said, "bin Laden will attack United States interests, perhaps using W.M.D."
Mr. Clarke told the agency to carry on with planning and begin drafting the legal documents necessary for covert action.
In March 1998, planners conducted a third rehearsal and briefed Mr. Clarke on the outcome. In a note to Mr. Berger on March 7, Mr. Clarke described the operation as "somewhat embryonic" and the C.I.A. as "months away from doing anything."
The chief of the bin Laden unit at the agency thought the plan was "the perfect operation." The required infrastructure was minimal, and the plan had been modified to keep Mr. bin Laden in hiding for up to a month before handing him over to the United States, thus enhancing the chances of keeping American involvement hidden.
The C.I.A. field officer in charge, Gary Schroen, called the tribal leaders' abilities "professional and detailed," according to the report. Mr. Schroen said the plan was "about as good as it can be," meaning a 40 percent chance of capturing or killing Mr. bin Laden. Yet even the best planning, he added, would not prevent that point when "we step back and keep our fingers crossed."
Military officers reviewed the capture plan and, the bin Laden station chief said, "found no showstoppers."
There were, however, concerns, according to the report. The commander of Delta Force, the elite military unit, felt "uncomfortable" leaving Mr. bin Laden a captive of the tribal leaders for so long, while the commander of joint special operations forces, Lt. Gen. Michael Canavan, feared for the safety of the tribal leaders within Tarnak Farms.
At that point, however, Mr. Berger worried about what would be done with Mr. bin Laden if he was captured. The hard evidence against Mr. bin Laden that would lead to any conviction was still skimpy, Mr. Berger said, and there was a danger of bringing him back to the United States only to see him acquitted.
A May 18 review of draft documents legally authorizing the capture operation prompted discussion among agency managers about what might happen if something were to go wrong on the ground.
James Pavitt, the assistant head of the directorate of operations, worried that the operation had "a slight flavor of a plan for an assassination," the commission's report said. Despite Mr. Pavitt's misgivings, the agency cleared the draft memorandum and sent it to the National Security Council.
Counterterrorist center officers briefing Attorney General Janet Reno and the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Louis J. Freeh, declared that the operation had a 30 percent chance of success. In a separate briefing, the chief of the counterterrorist center warned that someone would surely be killed in the operation.
From May 20 to 24, the C.I.A. ran another rehearsal with F.B.I. participation that was spread over three time zones and even brought in personnel from the region. A post-rehearsal briefing gave the date of the raid as June 23, with Mr. bin Laden coming out of Afghanistan no later than July 23.
On May 29, however, the bin Laden unit chief cabled his field operatives to "stand down on the operation for the time being." Cabinet-level officials, the unit chief wrote, thought the risk of civilian casualties too high.
While many senior officials, including Mr. Clarke and Mr. Berger, had raised concerns about the plan, Mr. Tenet told the commission he had made the decision based on the recommendation of his chief operations officers.
"He alone had decided to 'turn off' the operation," the commission report said of Mr. Tenet.
The window for action quickly became smaller.
"The tribals' reported readiness to act diminished," the report said. "And bin Laden's security precautions and defenses became more elaborate and formidable."
-------- us
U.S. Using Cash as a Defensive Weapon
By Doug Struck
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A14
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14044-2004Jul25.html
TIKRIT, Iraq -- Cash has become the U.S. military's first line of defense in some parts of Iraq, where U.S. soldiers are distributing money to encourage goodwill and to counter their enemies' offers of money to unemployed Iraqis willing to attack Americans, according to officers here.
Even patrol leaders now carry envelopes of cash to spend in their areas. The money comes from brigade commanders, who get as much as $50,000 to $100,000 a month to distribute for local rehabilitation and emergency welfare projects through the Commanders Emergency Response Program.
There are few restrictions on the expenditures, and officers acknowledge they consider the money another weapon. The targets at which it is aimed are the restless legions of unemployed Iraqi men, many of them former soldiers, policemen and low-level members of the Baath Party of the ousted president, Saddam Hussein. They were put out of work when the U.S. administrator, L. Paul Bremer, ordered a de-Baathification of Iraq. U.S. soldiers say those men are vulnerable to entreaties to carry out an attack on the Americans for pay.
"I have met two guys now who say, 'I don't love you and I don't hate you. But somebody's offered me $200 to set up a mortar or a [roadside bomb], and there's a bonus if we kill you,' " said Lt. Col. Randall Potterf, the civil affairs officer for the Army's 1st Infantry Division.
Maj. Gen. John R.S. Batiste, the division commander, said restive central Iraq is full of men who "are young, unemployed, without hope. We are trying to reach out to them. Whenever we get the money, we are trying to apply it to pull over as many of these men as we can to our side."
His local commanders have the go-ahead to dish out tens, hundreds and thousands of dollars with little more paperwork than a signed receipt. Often, the cash is paid in return for a promise to perform a small community project, but it is also given to Iraqis to buy items they say are necessary.
Capt. David Krzycki, 35, a company commander operating on the outskirts of Tikrit, recently plunked down $350 to get local residents to haul rubbish from their street and another $770 to clean out an irrigation ditch.
Lt. Col. Jeffrey A. Sinclair, commander of the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment in Tikrit, said he had paid $500 to a driver to get his car repaired, paid "benevolent" money to the family of a victim of violence, paid people to clean streets, bought soccer uniforms for a local team and repaired a local swimming pool, among other expenditures.
Other officers have given money to ice cream vendors, chicken farmers and hardware suppliers to get their businesses going.
"I'm trying to give them something to do rather than take shots at someone," said Sinclair, who said he gets $50,000 every three or four weeks to distribute. "It's not bribery. It's priming the pump. And it works well."
For more than a year, the Commanders Emergency Response Program was funded with $105 million taken from Iraqi reconstruction funds. But the Defense Department has agreed to begin paying for the program and has requested $300 million as part of its fiscal 2005 budget request to Congress. The program is popular with some members of Congress, who see it as bypassing the bureaucracy of the slow-moving Iraq reconstruction program.
"This is economic warfare," said Lt. Col. Courtney Paul, executive officer of the 1st Infantry's engineer brigade headquartered in Tikrit. "The anti-Iraqi forces are paying $50 to take part in an attack. That's one-third of the monthly pay of an Iraqi National Guardsman."
The projects are "never going to get them to love America," said Potterf, the civil affairs officer. "Nobody is going to ever be waving an American flag. But I just want them to be neutral, to stop planting explosives."
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Soldiers tell stories about Iraq
The Republican
By NATALIA MUÑOZ nmunoz@repub.com
July 26, 2004
http://fairuse.1accesshost.com/news2/mass1.htm
NORTHAMPTON - When his turn came to speak at the community dialogue on the Iraq War, Staff Sgt. Jimmy Massey of the United States Marines Corps chewed his gum slowly and slowly scanned the 150 people in the audience. What he was about to say required deliberation.
"We shot a man with his hands up," he said, "We even shot women and children."
Massey was one of three Iraq War veterans to speak yesterday at a forum sponsored by the Veterans Education Project and the American Friends Service Committee.
The event, held at the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Michael Curtin Post, in the Florence neighborhood, offered the audience and opportunity to hear first-hand experiences of veterans who hold varying opinions on the war in Iraq.
Air Force Reserve Tech. Sgt. Pablo Rodriguez, a Northampton police officer, and Army National Guard Sgt. Richard Riley of Amherst, spoke about their experiences in Iraq.
Both Rodriguez and Riley said they were proud to serve in Iraq, and if called they would go back.
"I'm glad I had an opportunity to serve," said Rodriguez, who did security details at the Baghdad Airport.
Riley, who served with the Guard's 180th Engineering Detachment, built bridges as well as housing and other facilities for GIs in Iraq and Kuwait.
Massey told the audience of his disillusionment with the war. The only one of the three to engage in combat, the 12-year veteran from North Carolina said he was fully prepared to kill or be killed. But that was before the war.
Today he said he takes five different anti-depressant and anti-anxiety pills to help him deal with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Firing on civilians and securing oil fields was not the duty he signed up for, he said.
"Why are Marines learning to shut down oil wells - are we the Environmental Protection Agency now?" he asked as he told the audience of his realization that this war was not one he agreed with.
He started asking questions and was reassigned to combat duty.
"I'm in the desert, I'm gung-ho, ready to kill," he said, putting "your tax dollars to work. Unfortunately, your tax dollars went into a lot of civilians. I was there. I pulled the trigger.
"My main purpose in life, for 12 years, was to meet the enemy on the battlefield and destroy him," he said. "When I left to go to Iraq I didn't care whether or not I died. If you die in combat, that's an honor."
There were days when he thought to himself, "Today is a good day to die," said Massey, who received an honorable discharge.
But earlier in the evening, as people streamed into the hall and the sun lit up his face he realized yet again, "I'm glad to be in the sun."
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U.S. Bases Overseas Show New Strategy
July 26, 2004
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pennsylvania)
By Michael Mainville
http://www.globalsecurity.org/org/news/2004/040726-us-bases.htm
MANAS AIR FIELD, Kyrgyzstan -- As he supervised a crew of mechanics working on a C-130 Hercules supply plane, U.S. Air Force Capt. Dale Linafelter marveled at finding himself at a dusty, long-abandoned bomber base in what was once the Soviet Union.
"I'd never even heard of Kyrgyzstan," Linafelter said.
The captain has got a lot company.
Manas Air Field near the capital of Kyrgyzstan now hosts more than 1,150 U.S. servicemen, the largest American military presence in Central Asia outside Afghanistan.
Yet "some of them still don't know where they are," joked Lt. Col. Stan Giles, the base chaplain. "You know, there's an old saying: 'War is God's way of teaching geography to Americans.' "
More geography lessons are on the way.
In the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Pentagon is planning the greatest shake-up in America's overseas military deployments since the end of the second World War.
Gone are the days of massive bases in places like Germany, Japan and South Korea that look like small U.S. towns. Replacing them will be a global network of what Pentagon planners call "lily pads" -- small forward bases in remote, dangerous corners of the world that can act as jumping-off points when crises arise.
Bases like the one at Manas Air Field, Kyrgyzstan.
"This marks a new epoch in American force posturing," said John Pike, director of globalsecurity.org, a Washington clearinghouse for strategic intelligence. "It's one of only a half-dozen similar reposturings since the American Revolution. It's a very significant change."
On July 13, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy, Andy Hoehn, said in Washington that defense officials will present their redeployment proposals to President Bush within several weeks. Hoehn said he expects the changes to start taking effect in late 2005 or early 2006.
The strategy, experts say, is to position U.S. forces along an "arc of instability" that runs through the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia and southern Asia. It is in these parts of the world --generally poor, insular and unstable --that military planners see the major future threats to U.S. interests.
The Pentagon believes that spreading U.S. forces through a large number of small, flexible bases within this arc would better position them to strike faster at remote hot spots. The U.S. military presence in these areas also could act as a stabilizing factor, preventing them from becoming hot spots in the first place.
"We don't know exactly where the next threat will be. It could be Iran, North Korea, China or other parts of the world. This redeployment is designed to allow us to quickly respond to any of those challenges," Pike said.
The U.S. military presence in Kyrgyzstan --a mountainous Muslim country bordering Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and China --provides a glimpse of what is to come.
U.S. bases abroad cannot be named after individuals, but unofficially this facility is known as the Peter J. Ganci base, after a New York fire chief killed when the World Trade Center collapsed on Sept. 11, 2001.
Unlike the big garrison bases that have traditionally housed more than 80 percent of U.S. forces overseas, the Manas air base is small, simple and largely isolated from the surrounding community. There are no families, schools, fast-food chains or department stores.
Contact with local villagers and access to the nearby capital city of Bishkek are strictly limited. Postings rarely last longer than three or four months and accommodations consist of eight-man tents.
Initially set up as a temporary staging ground for incursions into neighboring Afghanistan, today the base serves primarily as a strategic airlift hub and launching area for air refueling missions -- exactly the kind of "lily pad" Pentagon planners envisage for other parts of the world.
About 10 flights a day depart from Manas -- either C-130 Hercules planes ferrying troops and supplies to bases in Afghanistan or KC-135 Stratotankers refueling American planes over Afghan airspace.
Whether the base is having the kind of stabilizing effect military planners are hoping for still isn't clear.
Kyrgyz officials credit the presence of U.S. forces with helping deter attacks from Islamic fundamentalists based in the Ferghana Valley, which straddles Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
One extremist group, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which is believed to be responsible for a string of attacks that left 47 people dead in Uzbekistan in April, launched incursions into Kyrgyzstan in 1999 and 2000 that the Kyrgyz military repelled only after taking heavy casualties.
"There haven't been any incursions since we got here," said Capt. Jason Decker, public affairs officer for the Manas base. "It's not why we're here, but we're happy to make it a more stable world."
Still, radical Islamic groups have condemned the Kyrgyz government for cooperating with the Americans, and in April four men were jailed for plotting to blow up the base. Two other attacks were averted over the past year, Decker said. Earlier this month, the Kyrgyz government also arrested six people, including four government employees, for allegedly spying for Islamic extremists abroad.
The presence of U.S. forces also has increased tensions between Central Asian countries and their former imperial master, Russia. Disliking American troops in its backyard, Moscow has pressured Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan --all of which now host U.S. forces --to ask them to leave.
Last year, the Kremlin convinced the Kyrgyz government to allow the Russian Air Force to set up its own base less than 70 miles from Manas. The Kant base marked the first foreign deployment of Russian forces abroad since the collapse of the Soviet Union. It is home to Su-27 fighter planes, Su-25 ground-attack aircraft and Mi-8 helicopters, which conduct training exercises in Kyrgyz airspace. Decker said there has been no contact between American and Russian forces.
For ordinary Kyrgyz, the presence of the American base is less of a political issue than an economic one, said a senior Western official who has spent the past seven years in Bishkek.
In poverty-stricken Kyrgyzstan, the presence of even a relatively small number of American troops can have an enormous impact. The base employs more than 500 locals, paying them up to 10 times the average monthly wage of about $100. The base is pumping about $156,000 a day into the local economy and last year accounted for 5 percent of Kyrgyzstan's entire gross domestic product.
"The general attitude among people here is that they'll take it for what it's worth" the Western official said. "The advent of the American base has actually helped to create something of a middle class in Bishkek."
There are no signs that U.S. forces might abandon Manas any time soon. In fact, the Air Force is spending $60 million this year to replace the base tents with more permanent buildings constructed from shipping containers.
"This is not any kind of indication of moving to a permanent base," Decker insisted. "On the other hand, we're not leaving tomorrow. Our mission is going on until the global war on terrorism is done, until the Kyrgyz government doesn't want us here or until America decides to send us home."
NOTES:
Michael Mainville is a freelance journalist based in Moscow. He can be reached at michael_mainville@yahoo.ca.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
-------- homeland security / national intelligence
Panel Chiefs Are Seen as Candidates for Post
July 26, 2004
By PHILIP SHENON
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/politics/26panel.html
The chairman and vice chairman of the commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks said in an interview broadcast yesterday that they had established an "extraordinary partnership" and did nothing to tamp down speculation that they might be candidates for a newly created post of national intelligence director. The establishment of such a post was the commission's central recommendation.
The speculation has been offered privately in the past by members of the bipartisan commission, who were unanimous both in their final report and in their praise for the panel's chairman, Thomas H. Kean, the former Republican governor of New Jersey, and its vice chairman, Lee H. Hamilton, a former Democratic House member from Indiana and a former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
Asked yesterday on the NBC program "Meet the Press" whether they would consider some sort of joint appointment if proposed by President Bush, neither Mr. Kean nor Mr. Hamilton rejected the idea.
"I'd do anything with Lee Hamilton," said Mr. Kean, who was among the most popular governors in New Jersey's history and who retired from politics in 1990 to accept the presidency of Drew University in Madison, N.J. "We've established a partnership here that is extraordinary."
"Extraordinary," agreed Mr. Hamilton, who served 34 years in the House and is now the director of the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington. "That's a very speculative question. I'd have to think about it. I've had a marvelous experience working with Tom Kean, and I think it's been a productive one, but that's a presidential call."
White House officials said Mr. Bush had read parts of the report at his ranch in Crawford, Tex., and had been discussing its recommendations by phone with top advisers including Andrew H. Card Jr., his chief of staff, and Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser. Ms. Rice is to join Mr. Bush at his ranch on Monday to discuss how to respond to the report, White House officials said.
Underscoring the political pressure on the administration to act quickly on the recommendations - or at least to be seen as responding aggressively to the security shortcomings highlighted by the commission's report - White House officials said Mr. Bush might endorse some of the proposals within days.
But they suggested that Mr. Bush's initial response might be limited to some less controversial steps recommended by the commission.
On Friday, Mr. Bush instructed Mr. Card to work with cabinet secretaries and senior intelligence and law-enforcement officials to review the recommendations and report back as soon as possible with their advice about how to proceed.
But the White House and Congress are under pressure to move quickly to act on the commission's findings, especially in light of recent intelligence warnings that Al Qaeda intends to strike before the November elections.
And given that trial balloons in Washington often turn into policy decisions if they are to the political advantage of the White House and lawmakers, members of the commission and its spokesman said in interviews yesterday that Mr. Kean and Mr. Hamilton might offer just what is needed: wise bipartisan leadership of intelligence agencies that the commission's report identified as dysfunctional.
A poll released last week by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that 61 percent of respondents believed the commission had done a good job, and that the support was nearly equal among Democrats and Republicans.
"It's the president's choice, and I'm not going to get out ahead of the president," said James R. Thompson, a Republican on the panel and a former governor of Illinois.
But Mr. Thompson said he would "absolutely" support the idea of Mr. Kean or Mr. Hamilton, or perhaps both, serving in the office of a national intelligence director, possibly with one as director and one as deputy director. He said he thought a joint appointment to the top job would be ill advised, because the commission's idea was to have "one person who the president can turn to, one person who Congress can turn to, and say, 'You're in charge.' "
Al Felzenberg, the commission's chief spokesman, also did not try to knock down the speculation. "Here are two men who have offered tremendous service to their country," Mr. Felzenberg said. "They have busy lives and busy jobs. But if they were called upon to help make the country safer, if there is some way they can be of help, I can't imagine either one of them saying no."
In interviews on the Sunday morning television talk shows, Mr. Kean, Mr. Hamilton and other members of the panel said that Congress needed to move quickly on the commission's recommendations, including the creation of the national intelligence director's job, a position that would oversee the nation's 15 intelligence-gathering agencies.
"I would say before the election," said Bob Kerrey, a Democratic member of the panel and a former senator from Nebraska. Appearing on "This Week" on ABC, Mr. Kerrey said, "The question is, do you want to wait more time, until the United States of America gets attacked, and then turn to the recommendations of the report?"
Mr. Hamilton said that the signal sent by Congress's decision to leave last week for a six-week summer recess was "not a very good one, in my mind - we all agree on the risk of this." He said that the commission wanted to convey a message to Congress: "Get your house in order. Act as quickly as you can. Every day that passes is a day of increased risk."
The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee announced last week that, in a major break with tradition, it would call members back to Washington for hearings in August, during the recess, on the commission's proposals.
Richard W. Stevenson contributed reporting from Crawford, Tex., for this article.
--------
DOMESTIC SECURITY
Some Steps Put in Place to Aid Border Security
July 26, 2004
By RACHEL L. SWARNS
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/politics/26border.html
WASHINGTON, July 25 - Immigration officials said they had already started taking some of the urgent steps recommended last week by the Sept. 11 commission to enhance border security, but with intelligence reports describing the threat of a new attack as extraordinarily high, the effort remains far from complete.
The Department of Homeland Security, created after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has collected digital fingerprints and photographs from more than six million foreign visitors since January, the first move toward creating a comprehensive system to screen travelers as they arrive and depart. State Department officials, who were criticized for issuing visas to the hijackers, started collecting similar data in December as foreigners applied for visas in 174 of 211 visa-issuing embassies and consulates around the world.
Over the past six months, officials said, the two departments have turned away hundreds of criminals, travelers with fraudulent passports and fake documents and others barred from entry to the United States after immigration workers screening visitors in airports and State Department officials interviewing visa applicants in embassies compared their names, fingerprints and photographs to those in available security databases.
Significant loopholes remain, however. There is no plan yet to screen systematically millions of visitors from Mexico and Canada, a problem cited in the commission's report. Most travelers from those countries, who make up the bulk of foreign visitors here, enter and leave the United States without any automated analysis of their photographs or fingerprints.
The system intended to track the departures of foreign visitors with digital technology - a security measure set up to ensure that travelers do not vanish into the shadows after their arrival in the country - might take several years longer than expected to implement at land crossings.
"It is not clear the system can be installed before 2010, but even this timetable may be too slow, given the possible security dangers," the commission said of efforts to expand the entry-exit screening system.
Meanwhile, the Bush administration is still working to integrate its terrorist watch lists so that border agents screening travelers have that data at their fingertips. And the United States has yet to develop federal standards for issuing driver's licenses and birth certificates, a problem highlighted by the ease with which the Sept. 11 hijackers were able to obtain such documents.
The Sept. 11 commission called for such national standards, but proposed legislation governing them has yet to pass Congress while individual states have adopted an array of competing regulations for issuing driver's licenses.
Barry Steinhardt of the American Civil Liberties Association said civil libertarians would closely monitor efforts to develop national standards for identification and file lawsuits to block any legislation that infringes on privacy rights.
Civil libertarians have also raised concerns about the State Department's plan to begin issuing American passports embedded with facial recognition technology and other detailed biographic data next year. The commission said American citizens should be required to carry such passports, which are much harder to counterfeit.
"The reality is that it's not going to happen overnight," said David Z. Plavin, president of the Airports Council International of North America, reflecting on the various security measures under way and under consideration. The council represents the operators of about 150 airports in the United States.
"I think a lot of this stuff is appropriately set with a target date, but we're going to have to accept the reality that the final implementation dates may very well slip," said Mr. Plavin, pointing to the difficulties involved in developing a system to track departing visitors. "It's not because people aren't working on it. It's because it's really complicated."
Asa Hutchinson, the under secretary in charge of border security at the Department of Homeland Security, said his department was moving as swiftly as possible to protect the nation's borders. Officials noted that the department began using digital technology to fingerprint and photograph travelers in airports as part of the entry-exit screening program, called U.S.-Visit, about 10 months ahead of schedule.
Homeland security officials also noted that a pilot program to track travelers' departure data will begin at O'Hare Airport in Chicago in August and expand to 12 additional airports in September.
"This initiative has added to security substantially by reducing a tool of terrorists, and that is fraudulent passports," Mr. Hutchinson said of the U.S.-Visit program.
Members of Congress have been urging the government to expand the use of biometric technology, which captures digital fingerprints and photographs of travelers and compares them to fingerprints and photographs in security databases. At a hearing last month, Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, urged the department to move speedily to implement the new technology.
"Every day that biometric identifiers are not utilized, our country and its citizens are more vulnerable to terrorist attacks," Mr. Hatch, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a statement.
Mr. Hutchinson, who hailed the Sept. 11 commission's report as "very constructive" and "thoughtful," acknowledged that gaps remained. He said he hoped the report would lend urgency to his efforts to expand U.S.-Visit and help the agency garner additional financing from Congress, which has allocated less to the program than President Bush requested.
"It's obvious that the program needs to be expanded," Mr. Hutchinson said. "The report will help generate support for having that funded and for an aggressive time line for its implementation."
--------
Security Excess
The U.S. Secret Service has closed off a main highway and taken away trash cans in Boston. Boy, we feel safer now.
The American Prospect
By Robert Kuttner
07.26.04
http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewWeb&articleId=8205
When it comes to convention security, Boston is a case of wretched excess. They've closed Route 93, the major north-south commuter road into (and out of) town, between 4 p.m. and 1 a.m. And, to add insult to injury, they've also shut North Station, one of the mail commuter-rail hubs. Many Boston merchants are literally sleeping in their stores.
Who is the genius behind this decision? The U.S. Secret Service. Once a city requests Secret Service protection for a "national-security event," city officials and Secret Service officials form a joint task force and try to work out a plan, but the Secret Service has the last word in the event of a disagreement.
Why shut down the main highway? Because it runs right by the Fleet Center, and North Station is just next door. Someone could put a large bomb on the highway, or in the station, and blow away the convention. Of course, it's not clear why it would be OK to blow up half of downtown Boston the other 361 days of the year. Why not just shut down all the main arteries all the time?
Another lame decision: They've removed the trash cans from several major streets, apparently on the premise that someone could hide a bomb. But wouldn't a bomber be savvy enough to find another hiding place?
Oddly, there are also other, equally random lapses. Once a news organization is approved for a certain number of press passes to secure areas, a designee picks up the passes, and they can then be given to anyone. Party VIPs get no special screening, either.
The block around John Kerry's Beacon Hill home is closed off, but a Realtor friend says she just rented an apartment "with a perfect sightline to Kerry's house" to a fellow who obviously got no special screening. "He could have been Lee Harvey Oswald," she says.
Meanwhile, down in New York, the local cops don't roll over so easily. Madison Square Garden, like its Boston counterpart, stands right next to a major rail hub. But during the Republican national convention, Penn Station will stay open.
Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect.
-----
Police chase false alarms at convention
ASSOCIATED PRESS
By DENISE LAVOIE
July 26, 2004
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=CVN%20Security
BOSTON -- As the Democratic National Convention opened under extraordinary security Monday, police spent much of the day chasing false alarms.
Even an unattended baby stroller briefly became cause for alarm. Commuter rail service on the Framingham line was stopped for about an hour while hazardous materials teams boarded the train in Southboro, about 25 miles west of Boston, only to discover the stroller was empty.
Police responded to numerous reports of unattended or suspicious packages, including one left in a restroom at the FleetCenter, the downtown arena where the convention is being held this week. All the packages were harmless.
"Everything - knock on wood - is going as planned, and pretty quiet, actually," said Ann Roman, a spokeswoman for the Secret Service.
In Haverhill, 35 miles north of Boston, a state police bomb squad evacuated 15 homes after a stolen truck carrying 14 propane tanks was found abandoned there. The truck, which disappeared from a party supply store overnight, was vandalized, but the propane tanks were left on the truck. The tanks and cooking equipment had been intended for a clambake.
Signs of heightened security were evident around the city. Police were stationed outside the subway stop at Government Center, in the heart of the city. Passengers on subways and commuter rail trains were subjected to random bag inspections, both in Boston and outlying suburbs.
Scores of police officers were stationed at South Station, the city's main transportation hub for South Shore commuters, while North Station, the hub for commuters heading into the city from the north, has been closed since Friday because it runs underneath the FleetCenter. Boston Public Works dump trucks were brought in to block streets near the FleetCenter.
The fortress-like look around the FleetCenter belied the relative quiet in the streets. At demonstrations across the city, police were nearly as abundant as protesters. A few dozen people gathered inside a fenced-in "free speech zone" near the FleetCenter, while a march through the city by a self-proclaimed anarchist group drew about 200 demonstrators.
Police spent the early morning hours Monday searching rooftops near the FleetCenter after receiving a report of a possible parachuter. Commissioner Kathleen O'Toole said even though the report was a false alarm, it provided a useful drill for police who are on high alert for the first national political convention since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
"It caused us all to sit up and take notice, and it was a good test of our systems," she said.
-----
Pentagon providing wide range of military support for convention
ASSOCIATED PRESS
By Robert Burns
July 26, 2004
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/politics/20040726-1451-cvn-militaryrole.html
BOSTON - The Pentagon has quietly positioned air, land and sea forces in and around Boston in an unprecedented level of military support for a national political convention, a military spokesman said Monday. "We have provided security for past conventions but nothing to the extent we have now," said Michael Kucharek, a spokesman for U.S. Northern Command, which was created after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to ensure that the military is prepared for security threats inside U.S. borders.
"This is somewhat of a precedent-setting situation," given that the Democratic National Convention is the first political convention since the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, he said.
Most of the security visible on the streets of Boston is state and local police. Kucharek said the military's main role is behind-the-scenes coordination and preparation to respond to a major emergency.
Kucharek said he could not disclose numbers or other details of the military presence in Boston. He said it includes representatives of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard - both active duty and National Guard.
The Air Force is flying combat air patrols in the vicinity of Boston, he said, as is normal for what the military calls a "special security event," like the Super Bowl held in Houston last winter.
In addition to active duty forces, the Massachusetts and Maine National Guards make up "Joint Task Force-Democratic National Convention," Kucharek said. It is commanded by Army Brig. Gen. Gary A. Pappas, who is commander of the Massachusetts Army National Guard.
Kucharek said a similar arrangement would be made for the Republican National Convention in New York in late August.
By federal law the U.S. military is barred from performing domestic law enforcement duties, but Kucharek said the arrangement made for Boston this week enables the military to provide crisis support if requested by the U.S. Secret Service. He offered no specifics, but typically that means the military might be called upon to help mitigate the effects of, say, a chemical or biological weapons attack through its extensive decontamination and medical evacuation resources.
The Coast Guard has said it planned to use infrared and night-vision cameras in Boston Harbor and to randomly board commercial ships for security checks.
-------- police
Unprecedented security prowls Boston
July 26, 2004
By Frank J. Murray
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040726-122306-6014r.htm
BOSTON - Police brandished machine guns on downtown streets, jet fighters patrolled overhead and soldiers guarded press offices as Boston yesterday began hosting its first national political convention amid unprecedented security for an American political gathering.
The city that once stood alert with "one if by land and two if by sea" looked ready on both fronts - from uniformed troops swarming outside the Government Center subway station to battle-ready boats cruising the harbor that surrounds much of the convention zone.
Most of the 4,964 delegates and alternates flooding into town for the first sessions today have yet to confront the specter of camouflaged soldiers patrolling elevated train tracks above the newly paved expanse where delegates will be bused.
"For all the things you can see, imagine what you can't see. Double that, and that's our capability. ... I wouldn't want to mess with us," Coast Guard Petty Officer Lisa Hennings told CBS News.
Police officers derided as "overkill" the tight protective net around historic Bullfinch Triangle, but the Secret Service was calling all the shots at the first Democratic National Convention designated a "national security event."
In an interview with ESPN during a Red Sox-Yankees game last night at Fenway Park, Mr. Kerry was asked about the security in Boston.
"I'm absolutely confident about the level of security. I don't think we have a thing to worry about," he said.
Outside the gates of the FleetCenter, officers listened to complaints about a credentials mix-up that kept hundreds of journalists cooling their heels outside for a time.
One officer in civilian clothes supervising searches at "Magnetometer Village" said officers require people entering with opened bottles to sip from them as proof they are not dangerous. A team of U.S. Capitol Police who appeared to be wearing body armor carried automatic weapons outside the pricey Boston Harbor Hotel.
Large trucks and heavy equipment blockaded streets in neighborhoods surrounding the Fleet Center, where Democrats will nominate John Kerry and John Edwards in their bid to remove President Bush from the White House.
Republican delegates meet in New York from Aug. 30 to Sept. 2 under a security blanket that, if anything, promises to be even tighter. New York has 36,500 total police officers, compared with just more than 2,000 in Boston proper.
Since the end of Friday's rush hour, Beantown crews have been completing the process of shutting down key streets, isolating 18th-century buildings in neighborhoods where families are being asked to cope for a week, and stringing fence lines whose gates are protected by ram-proof barriers.
"These next few hours certainly will be important as different units and agencies are settling into their roles," Massachusetts State Police Sgt. David Paine said. "But it's nothing new to these people. They're ready."
Not far from Paul Revere's grave and the Old North Church, technicians were monitoring air quality to guard against chemical, biological or nuclear weapons. Bomb-sniffing dogs were on the job as well.
Emphasis on security appeared to have scared Bostonians away, and the city was quiet for a sunny summer day tailor made for crowds of tourists.
State officials prepared for this afternoon's shutdown of Interstate 93, which passes about 10 yards from the Fleet Center. Trains that normally pass beneath the hall were detoured or canceled for the week.
During the convention, a six-mile stretch of I-93 will be shut down from 4 p.m. to 1 a.m.
"It is a massive undertaking and we're trying to do it in a way that has the least impact on commuters," said Mariellen Burns, spokeswoman for the group coordinating security and transportation for the event. "But there's definitely going to be inconveniences. We know that."
The Federal Aviation Administration banned all corporate and private flights in and out of Logan International Airport during the convention as well as traffic helicopters that could help motorists maneuver around the blockages.
Only regularly scheduled commercial flights, and flights for law enforcement, military and emergency medical teams can come within 10 miles of Logan Airport.
--------
FBI Completes Search At Fort Detrick Search Connected To Anthrax Mailings
The Associated Press
July 26, 2004
http://www.nbc4.com/news/3577094/detail.html
FREDERICK, Md. -- The FBI says investigators have finished an intensive weeklong search that temporarily closed some of the laboratories at Fort Detrick, in Frederick, Md.
The search was connected to the probe of the deadly 2001 anthrax mailings.
FBI spokeswoman Debbie Weierman said agents completed the search Friday night at Fort Detrick's U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases.
Investigators have regularly visited the facility since the anthrax attacks killed five people and sickened 17.
-------- prisons / prisoners
U.S. 'Correctional Population' Hits New High
July 26, 2004
By FOX BUTTERFIELD
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/national/26parole.html
The number of Americans under the control of the criminal justice system grew by 130,700 last year to reach a new high of nearly 6.9 million, according to a Justice Department report released today.
The total includes people in jail and prison as well as those on probation and parole. This is about 3.2 percent of the adult population in the United States, the report said.
The growth in what the report termed the "correctional population" comes at a time when the crime rate nationwide has been relatively stable for several years. It also comes when many states, faced with budget deficits, have passed new, less strict sentencing laws in an attempt to reduce the number of inmates.
The report does not address why the number of men and women in jail and prison and on probation and parole has continued to increase. But experts say the most likely reason is the cumulative effect of the tougher sentencing laws passed in the 1990's, which led to more people's being sent to prison and being required to serve longer terms.
The report found that there were 691,301 people in local and county jails and 1,387,269 in state and federal prisons last year, for a total of 2,078,570. That was an increase of 3.9 percent in the jail population and 2.3 percent in the prison population.
At the same time, the report said, there were 4,073,987 Americans on probation at the end of last year, an increase of 1.2 percent from the end of 2002, and 774,588 on parole, up 3.1 percent.
In general, people on probation have been placed there after being convicted of a crime instead of being sent to jail or prison. People on parole have usually already served prison time and are kept on parole for further supervision.
About 41 percent of adults on parole last year were black; 40 percent were white.
The number of women on parole has steadily increased in recent years, the report found. The percentage of parolees who were women was 13 percent at the end of 2003, up from 10 percent at the end of 1995. This increase reflects a slow but steady growth in the number of women being arrested for and convicted of serious crimes.
Of those people discharged from parole in 2003, 38 percent were returned to prison, either because of a technical violation like failing a drug urine test or because they were charged with committing a new crime. Another 9 percent absconded and could not be located by law enforcement, the report said.
The 3.1 percent increase in the number of people on parole, the biggest in at least a decade, troubles many police and prosecutors, because they believe that newly released inmates are likely to return to a life of crime and are a major source of violence in some cities, including Boston, Chicago and Los Angeles.
Texas led the nation with 534,260 people on probation or parole, followed by California, with 485,039.
-------- POLITICS
-------- propaganda wars
South Korea axes three-star general over North Korea leak
SEOUL (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726052153.mg4q8jmw.html
South Korea's defense ministry on Monday axed a three-star general for leaking sensitive information about a naval confrontation with North Korea to the media, officials said.
Lieutenant General Park Sung-Choon was fired from his job as head of the defense intelligence agency at the Joint Chiefs of Staff and will retire from the military, they said.
"The defense ministry has dismissed the director of the defense intelligence agency from the post," ministry spokesman Nam Dai-Yeon said in a statement.
It said Park would retire from the military "to take responsibility for causing trouble to the president and the entire military."
The dismissal came after five senior military officials including Park were reprimanded for filing an incomplete report concerning the confrontation between South and North Korean navies earlier this month.
On July 14, South Korean navy ships fired warning shots to drive away a North Korean patrol boat that had intruded into southern waters in the Yellow Sea.
In its report on the incident, the South Korea's navy and Joint Chiefs of Staff omitted to note that ship-to-ship radio contact between the two Koreas had taken place at the time of the confrontation.
Later, Park disclosed to the media the contents of the radio exchanges, which showed that North Korea had sought to mislead the South Korean navy by claiming that the intruding North Korean naval vessel was a Chinese fishing boat.
Park reportedly said that he had leaked the information in an effort to justify the South Korean navy's handling of the confrontation, including the decision to fire warning shots.
The navies of South and North Korean agreed last month to open radio contact for the first time in an effort to reduce tension and the chance of confrontation along the disputed maritime border in the Yellow Sea, scene of fatal naval clashes in the past.
--------
In Canada, Exceptions Are Rule for Al-Jazeera
Distributors Must Monitor, May Alter Programs
By DeNeen L. Brown
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14009-2004Jul25.html
TORONTO -- At a market on Lawrence Avenue in Toronto, where halal meat is sold and customers trade news from home as they buy olives, fresh chickens and whole lambs, Mostafa Elmnini wondered aloud why the Canadian government recently approved broadcasts of the Arabic-language news channel al-Jazeera, but imposed such severe restrictions that it may be impossible for the network to be aired legally in this country.
Last week, the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission announced that it had approved al-Jazeera, but required cable and satellite distributors to monitor its programs 24 hours a day. The agency also took an unprecedented step in allowing cable companies to alter or delete "abusive comments" from al-Jazeera programs. Currently, it is illegal for distributors to delete programming, but in this case, the commission made an exception.
The decision has provoked a debate among Canada's 500,000 people of Arab descent, with some saying the ruling amounts to censorship. In Canada, where the government encourages immigrant groups to maintain their cultural identity, more than 148,000 people say that Arabic is their mother tongue.
"This is just a way of keeping al-Jazeera off the air," said Mohamed Elmasry, national president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, a nongovernmental organization for Muslims in Canada. "The conditions are almost impossible to put into practice. In effect they did deny a license to al-Jazeera."
Elmnini walked out from behind his counter, where he sells meat conforming to Islamic dietary laws, to explain. Most people he knows already watch al-Jazeera, buying it from unauthorized satellite systems. Does he know it's illegal? He shrugs. It is the only news he trusts.
"It's what goes on in the Middle East. This is what keeps us connected back home," said Elmnini, 37, who moved here from Lebanon. He said he disagreed with the government's decision to allow the programming to be censored. "We like it as it is. We get the full truth."
Al-Jazeera, one of the largest and most controversial news channels covering the Middle East, has gained a reputation worldwide for having reporters in places Western reporters are unable to reach and for giving what some viewers call the other side of the war in Iraq. Many of its reporters have been trained by the BBC. Based in Qatar, the station became famous after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, when it aired messages from Osama bin Laden.
The commission said in a statement that the channel met the main criterion for approval: It did not compete with existing Canadian stations. But during the application process, a number of groups raised concerns about the content of previous broadcasts.
Canadian officials said they could not bar the station, which had never violated Canadian regulations because it had never been allowed to air legally in Canada. Instead, the agency decided to require that cable distributors be responsible for the channel's content. The agency mandated that the distributors keep tapes of the program but left it largely up to cable companies to decide how they would regulate the broadcasts.
The agency, known as the CRTC, declined to make officials available for interviews on the subject.
Elie Kawkabani, president of Reach Media, a Los Angeles-based media marketing and distribution company, which holds the rights to distribute al-Jazeera, said the channel has been marketed in the United States since 1998 with no such restrictions. "A big percentage of Arab-Americans pay for the channel," he said. "The State Department has it, the White House has it."
Kawkabani said that the Canadian restrictions pose impossible hurdles for distribution in Canada and that his company and cable firms plan to appeal the decision. "They've given us approval but made it difficult for cable companies and satellite companies to carry it. They are not set up to monitor and decide what is appropriate or not appropriate. Their role is not censorship," Kawkabani said. "They should not be concerned or involved in the content they deliver. The CRTC has made it impossible for us to find distribution in Canada."
Kawkabani said al-Jazeera is no more controversial than other channels. "It's on the sky in England, France and the United States. It is an established channel," he said. "Canada needs to join the rest of the world in media distribution laws. It doesn't endanger anybody. It just reports the news. It doesn't take sides. It is a news reporting station much like CNN or Fox."
But the Canadian Jewish Congress argued to the commission that al-Jazeera has disseminated anti-Semitic hate speech, providing a platform for "hatemongers" and broadcasting "stereotypical characterizations of Jews that resort to classic Judeophobic themes such as the image of the Jews an alien, evil, world-dominating conspiratorial force," according to commission records. "Moreover, the CJC argued that al-Jazeera has gone further by broadcasting threats to the physical security of Jews and engaging in Holocaust denial."
According to Audrey Jamal, executive director of the Canadian Arab Federation, a national umbrella organization representing Canadians of Arab descent, broadcasts of al-Jazeera are not restricted in Israel.
Al-Jazeera recently released a code of ethics, pledging to draw a line between news and commentary to avoid "the trap of propaganda and speculation." The service, founded in 1996, promised to acknowledge a mistake "as soon as it is made and take the initiative to correct it and avoid repeating it."
Nesreen Melek, an employment counselor at the Canadian Arab Federation, says she watches the news station with friends. "I'm Iraqi and I do watch al-Jazeera. I don't know why they are making a big deal out of al-Jazeera. On 'The Simpsons,' they make fun of Arabs. They never ban those cartoons. But when it comes to al-Jazeera, it is not fair."
Melek said she saw images of the Iraq war on al-Jazeera that she had not seen on other stations. She remembers the image of the Iraqi boy who lost his legs and arms to U.S. bombing. "The first channel that showed the picture was al-Jazeera," she said. "CNN showed when they took him to Kuwait like they were saviors."
Al-Jazeera, Melek said, is broadcasting "out of real life. They are not making it up."
--------
THE NEWS MEDIA
Network Anchors Hold Fast to Their Dwindling 15 Minutes
July 26, 2004
By JIM RUTENBERG
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/politics/campaign/26anchors.html?pagewanted=all&position=
BOSTON, July 25 - Peter Jennings, the ABC News anchor, explaining how he and Tom Brokaw, his rival at NBC News, have different philosophies about the political conventions, said: "Perhaps for Tom it's as much a social occasion as it is for some of the delegates. I think of it more as a target of opportunity.''
Mr. Brokaw, in turn, ridiculed Mr. Jennings's plans to cover the convention on the Internet and on digital television. "If I were Peter I'd be frustrated,'' he said. "They can talk all they want about the two-person digital channel, or whatever it is - I'm not sure they even understand it. They will have eight people exposed to what he's doing gavel to gavel.'' While he clearly relished the sniping, Dan Rather, the CBS News anchor, dared not join in, saying, "I'm not going to touch that one with a 15-foot pole.''
For four decades, the nominating conventions served as great gladiator coliseums for the three old-line networks and their anchors. The conventions were where they went all out to be the first to break news over several hours of broadcast television coverage. But in separate interviews in New York last week, as they were preparing once again for one of their highest-profile roles presiding in their high-tech booths, the three anchors seemed oddly diminished. They may be known by more Americans than John Kerry, but besides sniping at one another, the anchors expressed their resignation that they are not quite the giants they were as they fight for more prominence in a media world crowded by newcomers, a political world where conventions have become far more scripted and a corporate culture that is unwilling to give them more than one hour a night - for just three of the four nights - to cover them.
This has left the anchors seeking new ways to stand out on a landscape that has changed vastly since Mr. Rather, 72, Mr. Jennings, 65, and Mr. Brokaw, 64, covered their first conventions in 1956, 1964 and 1968, respectively.
In a particularly uncomfortable moment, the three men found themselves on the wrong end of a lecture on Sunday about their networks' paltry convention plans in a panel discussion at Harvard University. Stern words came from the PBS anchor Jim Lehrer and the CNN anchor Judy Woodruff, both of whom work for networks that are offering many more hours of coverage.
"We're about to elect a president of the United States at a time when we have young people dying in our name overseas, we just had a report from the 9/11 commission which says we are not safe as a nation, and one of these two groups of people is going to run our country,'' Mr. Lehrer said. "The fact that you three networks decided it was not important enough to run in prime time, the message that gives the American people is huge.''
As the lecture hall echoed with applause and the three men bristled, Mr. Lehrer added, "As a citizen, it bothers me.''
The three anchors of the biggest networks - whose newscasts' combined audience of nearly 30 million still dwarfs that of cable news - were hardly in a position to disagree.
"I can't believe that anybody in the news business who enjoys politics and thinks particularly this year that politics are important is not somewhat frustrated that we're not doing more on ABC, NBC and CBS,'' Mr. Jennings said in an interview on Tuesday. "This is clear to my bosses, it's clear to my colleagues; I think you'll find the same thing in every newsroom. Could we, should we be doing more than one hour a night in prime time? The answer is yes.''
But the networks have been increasingly unwilling to give their news divisions much time to cover the conventions, arguing that they produce too little real news to warrant the pre-emption of lucrative reality shows, sitcoms and dramas.
David Westin, the ABC News president, said he did not see fit to ask for more time from the ABC network headquarters in Burbank, Calif. "If I think there is really a justified claim, I will go to the mat like the dickens to get that done,'' Mr. Westin said. "What we've been given is not something I can take to the West Coast in good conscience and say this is something we need to cover on the broadcast television network.''
Mr. Brokaw said he came up against the same sentiment at his network when he asked for more time, which, he said, he did again this weekend only to be rebuffed.
"We'd always like to have more time,'' said Mr. Brokaw, for whom these will be the last conventions as NBC anchor, as he is leaving his post after the election. "On the other hand, can I go and make a strong editorial argument for the necessity of having more time? These conventions are so managed, and over-managed.''
Mr. Brokaw said Senator John Kerry's campaign staff was trying to control what the networks did to an unusual degree.
"Any entrepreneurship that we show on booking guests or unilaterally calling up people and trying to get them to come to our booth, we get a call 15 minutes later from the Kerry operation saying 'No, no, that's not part of our booking procedure,' '' Mr. Brokaw said. "There is a politburo running this convention.'' (Stephanie Cutter, a spokeswoman for Mr. Kerry, said the campaign's booking operation was set up to facilitate interviews, not restrict them.)
The campaign went so far as to try to limit the kind of questions Mr. Brokaw and Mr. Rather were to ask Mr. Kerry here on Wednesday afternoon. The staff wanted the questions to concern Mr. Kerry's expectations for the convention, nothing more, according to people at both networks. It was the sort of terms-setting that few have dared to ask of network anchors. The request was swiftly denied.
Mr. Kerry did not help matters when he failed to appear until nearly an hour before the evening newscasts, leaving the anchors to wait at Faneuil Hall with increasing anxiety. (Mr. Kerry was not running late in returning from a campaign stop but rather from his vacation home in Nantucket.)
"What that said to me was that either they don't have their stuff together, or he's ultimately responsible, or he just took it lightly,'' Mr. Rather complained.
Until now, Mr. Rather has been one of the most outspoken supporters of the conventions, an early opponent of network plans to cut back their coverage, a process that began in earnest in the 1990's.
"I argued the conventions were part of the dance of democracy and that rituals are important and that they remained an important ritual,'' he said. "I found myself increasingly like the Mohicans, forced farther and farther back into the wilderness and eventually eliminated.''
In an interview at his office, Mr. Rather reminisced about the grandeur of conventions past, when the parties could go into them not knowing who would be their nominees. "We broke the story in 1980 - stunned the world, if you will - that Ronald Reagan's first choice for vice-presidential running mate was Gerald Ford,'' he said, adding that he expected no such news now. "If Ralph Nader comes to the Democratic Convention and announces he's withdrawing and throwing his support to John Kerry and the Democrats, that would be news,'' he said. "I think you're more likely to see a rhinoceros in the anchor booth.''
Mr. Rather is doing the least of the three anchors when he is not the anchor of "CBS Evening News" or the network's prime-time convention coverage. His network has no cable outlet, and Mr. Rather said he was not interested in taking an increased role in the CBS News broadband coverage, which he equated with "shouting into a wind tunnel."
Mr. Jennings said he was unsure how many people would tune to the ABC digital channels - available to people with digital television receivers or digital cable in certain markets - and the ABC News broadband news service. But, he said, at least they were providing him an opportunity to be the anchor of gavel-to-gavel coverage, as in the old days. "I've been told for several years that broadband is the wave of the future," he said. "Well, it's the wave of the future available to me at the moment, and we have a really good political team, and what a waste if the political team were only consigned to one hour a night."
More people will most likely see Mr. Brokaw when he is host of a daily convention special at 4 p.m. on MSNBC. But while NBC is the top-rated network news division, MSNBC is in third place on cable behind the top-rated Fox News Channel and CNN. And on cable Mr. Brokaw will also face new competition from World Wrestling Entertainment on Spike, and even from ESPN, whose morning program "Cold Pizza" is planning some convention-related coverage.
Yet he and Mr. Rather and Mr. Jennings agreed that the real competition would take place on broadcast television - though at this point that competition would be restricted to a precious few minutes when the main speakers are not speaking.
"I take a back seat to nobody in being competitive - I want to win," Mr. Rather said, "whatever win is." He added, "It's pretty hard to figure out these days."
--------
Political Papers Become Dailies to Blanket the Conventions
July 26, 2004
By JACQUES STEINBERG
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/business/media/26paper.html
he instant small town inhabited by an estimated 5,000 delegates and 15,000 reporters at this week's Democratic National Convention in Boston has spawned its own newspaper war.
And the jousting should be evident to conventioneers from the moment they open their hotel room doors Monday morning.
There at their feet they can expect to find complimentary copies not just of the country's major dailies but also of at least four publications based in Washington - National Journal, Congressional Quarterly, Roll Call and The Hill.
The news staffs of these political publications have temporarily relocated to Boston to publish special daily editions crammed only with convention news. Late next month, all four will move to the Republican National Convention in New York, where they will be joined by at least one other competitor, New York magazine, which plans to publish daily during the four-day convention.
In covering the conventions from the vantage point of neighborhood children perched in a tree house, each publication is seeking to be not only the gatherings' paper of record but also the conventioneers' first read. In the process, they have managed to coax advertisers like Microsoft, Anheuser-Busch, Toyota and NBC to spend as much $10,000 for a full-page ad aimed at a readership heavy with people of influence.
"Sure, there's no real news at the convention,'' said John Fox Sullivan, the president and publisher of National Journal, a weekly published by the National Journal Group. "But what you have got is 20,000 people, the political and media leadership of this country, in effect in a cocoon for a week. And all they're interested in is who's up, who's down, what parties are going on, what are the overnight polls and how'd Kerry do last night.
"As a publisher,'' he added, "I get a kick out of people seeing our work, and comparing it with what The New York Times and Washington Post do.''
While National Journal has published daily editions at the political conventions since 1984, it faced little sustained competition before this year. That the field at the conventions has become crowded so suddenly is a reflection, at least in part, of the recent success that other publications have had covering events in a similar way. Us Weekly printed special issues during Fashion Week in New York, and People did the same during the week of this year's Academy Awards.
But the traveling street fight among the political papers, none of which has a circulation of more than 21,000, is in large part an extension of their escalating rivalry in Washington. In January 2003, for example, Roll Call, a tabloid published by the Economist Group, went from publishing twice a week when Congress is in session to three times a week, then expanded to four times a week last September. Over roughly the same period, The Hill, a tabloid owned by News Communications, expanded from a weekly to a thrice-weekly.
To stand out among its competitors, the special Boston edition of The Hill has lined up several prominent Democratic bylines for its opinion pages - including Senator Edward M. Kennedy and Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont and former presidential candidate - and will publish some material to be produced by The New Republic. It plans to make available 15,000 copies a day, Monday through Thursday, with all but the first day's issues printed at a plant in the Boston area.
"What this is,'' said Hugo Gurdon, editor in chief of The Hill and a veteran of Fleet Street in London, "is a newspaper war to make oneself the most important read among a limited number of people: that A-list of readers that controls trillions of dollars of cash.''
To make its own splash in Boston, Roll Call will airlift 20,000 copies from its printer in Washington area each morning to be delivered with The Boston Globe. That way conventioneers can get their fix of its closely read gossip column, "Heard on the Hill,'' along with articles by its regular columnists, including Morton Kondracke and Stuart Rothenberg.
Congressional Quarterly, owned by the Poynter Institute, a journalism education organization, publishes a daily newsletter in Washington called CQ Today that will also be sent to Boston by air and delivered to hotel rooms with The New York Times. It also plans its own convention-centered gossip column ("Hollywood on the Charles'') as well as concentrated coverage of delegates from so-called battleground states.
This year, National Journal, which its peers acknowledge is the paper to beat, has assembled a convention staff of 90 - nearly four times as large as those of its rivals in the political press and among the biggest rosters of any news media organization - to produce a daily, 48-page tabloid.
In addition to covering whatever might be happening at the main podium, National Journal's convention daily will include reviews of Boston restaurants (by Corby Kummer, an editor at The Atlantic Monthly, a sister publication) as well as a social calendar and detailed maps of where delegations and news organizations are located. Every two hours, the publication will send out electronic bulletins via e-mail, to people who sign up in advance for the service.
Such blanket coverage does not come cheap. Mr. Sullivan estimates National Journal will spend more than $1 million over the course of the two conventions. But having sold more than 300 pages of ads, Mr. Sullivan said he expected the convention ventures to turn a profit.
Ben Goddard, president of Goddard Claussen Strategic Advocacy, a Washington firm that specializes in issue-oriented advertising, said he had placed some of the ads on behalf of several clients - including the American Council of Life Insurers and the Educational Testing Service.
And he said he considered the money well spent, in large part because so little in the way of real news is expected to be generated.
"You've got a lot of people with time on their hands, sitting around looking for something to do,'' he said. "It's easy to sit there and read these daily briefings of what's going on.''
-------- us politics
Bush Set to Act on Advice of 9/11 Panel
President May Not Wait for Congress
By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A14011-2004Jul25?language=printer
CRAWFORD, Tex., July 25 -- President Bush plans to begin making decisions about restructuring the nation's intelligence machinery within days and may enact some changes by executive order or regulatory action without waiting for Congress, White House officials said Sunday.
Aides suggested for the first time that despite the opposition of some in the administration, Bush is headed toward backing some variation of the Sept. 11 commission's call for a national intelligence director who would report directly to the president. Some White House officials have questioned whether the intelligence director would be considered independent if the position were under White House control. Aides said Bush is considering mechanisms to make the job less political, such as a term that does not overlap the president's.
The commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center delivered its recommendations Thursday for broad changes to intelligence agencies, and aides said Bush began reading the report on Friday as he flew to his ranch in Crawford, where he will spend the week of the Democratic National Convention. Bush will discuss the options with his national security team via videoconference on Monday, a White House official said.
"We will move on all fronts very aggressively in the coming days and weeks," the official said. "We're going to focus on all the recommendations and determine which ones can be done through executive branch action. The president said he wants this on a fast track."
The White House comments, a day before Democrats open their nominating convention in Boston, show what a major issue the fallout from Sept. 11 has become in the close presidential race.
The urgent pace, and the White House's willingness to discuss it, reflects the realization by Bush's aides that he is now vulnerable to charges that he could be doing more to protect the nation against terrorism, when claiming leadership on the issue was central to his reelection strategy, Republican advisers said.
Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kerry released his plans for intelligence reform six days ahead of the commission report, and he plans to argue at the convention that he would be more effective than Bush at guarding the nation against terrorism.
Kerry sent a letter to the commission's leaders Saturday endorsing their blueprint, calling for "immediate action" and identifying 16 recommendations on which he said the "president can act alone."
"I am committed to do all I can to make sure that your efforts will be met with action," Kerry said in the letter.
Kerry said Thursday that if he were elected and not enough progress had been made on the recommendations, he would convene an "emergency security summit" to bring together congressional leaders of both parties and heads of the intelligence agencies. "Mark my words," he said after a campaign appearance in Detroit, "if I am elected president and there still has not been sufficient progress rapidly in these next months on these issues, then I will lead."
The commission recommended that the current position of director of central intelligence be replaced with a national intelligence director, in the executive office of the president, who would oversee and control the budget of the 15-agency intelligence community.
The commissioners said that without a more integrated approach to intelligence, "it is not possible to 'connect the dots' " about terrorist intentions.
The report also called for a national counterterrorism center to pool intelligence about domestic and foreign terrorist organizations. The commissioners acknowledged arguments against reorganizing the government while the nation is at war but wrote, "Surely the country cannot wait until the struggle against Islamist terrorism is over."
The White House, which had initially responded by saying Bush would take the recommendations under advisement, is facing pressure from commission members of both parties, who are making the rounds of talk shows to say that swift work is needed and that another attack is probably coming. Republican leaders in Congress once had said they would not get to the matter until October, but said Friday that they will hold hearings in August, between the two political conventions.
Bush's aides said that the White House staff worked over the weekend to figure out what it could do on its own, and that it was looking for changes that would not cost money and thus require authorization from Congress. Specifically, the White House is looking at the commission's call for the creation of incentives for agencies to share intelligence about transnational terrorism, with the report saying the " 'need to share' must replace 'need to know.' " The White House contends the president has already taken action to tighten access to ports, airports and borders, and to crack down on terrorists' funding sources. But the commission report says more must be done, and Bush's aides said announcements may be made in those areas.
Bush's aides said that the panel's most ambitious recommendations, including creation of the counterterrorism center and national intelligence director, are likely to require approval from Congress. But with Republicans controlling both chambers, Bush's endorsement could prod action before the Nov. 2 election.
National security adviser Condoleezza Rice is to arrive at the ranch on Monday to work with Bush on his response to the report. Last week, Bush directed White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. to convene a task force of national security and homeland security officials to work on intelligence changes.
Rand Beers, Kerry's national security adviser, said from Boston that the Massachusetts senator "has fully embraced the commission's recommendations and believes we need to act on them without further delay."
"In particular, we urgently need a comprehensive strategy to deal with terrorism and Islamic fundamentalism, a global coalition of nations working together and a real director of national intelligence who can lead the reform throughout the intelligence community," Beers said. "Time is not on our side."
The commission's chairman, Thomas H. Kean, said on CNN's "Late Edition" that he is encouraged by the growing acknowledgment by the nation's leaders that "there is an emergency, that these terrorists plan to attack us again as soon as possible, and therefore Congress has got to act now and not next year sometime."
Kean and the panel's vice chairman, Lee H. Hamilton, asked on NBC's "Meet the Press" whether they would consider jointly running the new intelligence agency, appeared to welcome the idea.
"I'd do anything with Lee Hamilton," Kean said. "We've established a partnership here that is -- "
"Extraordinary," Hamilton interjected.
"Extraordinary," Kean repeated.
"I'd have to think about it," Hamilton said. "I've had a marvelous experience working with Tom Kean, and I think it's been a productive one, but that's a presidential call."
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Senate Hopefuls Are Convention No-Shows
Some Fear Being Tied to Democratic Ticket
By Charles Babington
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14013-2004Jul25.html
BOSTON, July 25 -- Boston is the place for Democrats this week, but some will be conspicuous by their absence Thursday night, when John F. Kerry accepts the presidential nomination. The top Democratic candidates from seven of the eight most competitive Senate races will be back home, as will dozens of House candidates.
Publicly, these candidates say they need to spend every possible minute campaigning at home. Privately, some acknowledge they do not want to hand their Republican opponents a ready-made campaign ad linking them to the Democratic Party's more liberal figures, such as Massachusetts Sens. Kerry and Edward M. Kennedy, who will loom large here.
The list of who's going and who's not is telling: Democratic candidates from states that look strong for Kerry generally plan to attend the convention, while most of those in tight races in states leaning toward President Bush are staying away.
In the eight Senate races seen as virtual tossups, the Democratic nominees or front-runners from North Carolina, Oklahoma and Alaska are skipping Boston altogether. Inez Tenenbaum, the Senate nominee in South Carolina, mingled with her state's delegation Sunday night but goes home Monday, when the four-day convention begins.
Rep. Chris John, the Democrats' top contender for a Senate seat in Louisiana -- and a "super delegate" by virtue of being a House member -- will be here Monday and Tuesday. Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle of South Dakota and Senate candidate Betty Castor of Florida will attend Monday through Wednesday, but not Thursday.
The only Democrat in a tossup Senate race who plans to be at the convention Thursday is Ken Salazar of Colorado, who will arrive Wednesday.
The story is similar among House candidates. Of the "Texas Five" -- five House Democrats seriously threatened by their state's redistricting -- only Rep. Charles W. Stenholm will appear in Boston. He is jetting in for a dinner Tuesday that will honor him and other prominent players in agriculture -- Stenholm is the ranking Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee -- and then he is going right back to his west Texas district.
"I'm not running on anybody's coattails but my own," Stenholm said recently when asked whether he was trying to avoid Kerry's big event. "My time is better spent campaigning" against Rep. Randy Neugebauer, his GOP opponent, Stenholm said. The four other targeted Texans -- Reps. Chet Edwards, Martin Frost, Nick Lampson and Max Sandlin -- are staying home.
Whether to attend the convention "is a hard decision for Democrats from conservative states," said Jim Jordan, Kerry's former campaign manager and a veteran of several Senate campaigns. Those who skip it may save themselves from an attack ad, he said, but they also miss a four-day fundraising extravaganza.
"It's hard for a cash-strapped candidate not to go and mingle with the party's donor base," Jordan said.
The convention's most prominent Senate candidate will be Tuesday night's featured speaker, Barack Obama, who is strongly favored to win in Illinois. He runs little risk of a backlash because his state is considered safe for Kerry.
But an aide to a Senate candidate in a state that Kerry is almost certain to lose -- and who spoke only on background because of the subject's sensitivity -- said his boss is staying away from Boston because the campaign wants to avoid the fate of Brian Schweitzer four years ago. Schweitzer, who was trying to oust Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.), spoke at the 2000 Democratic convention in Los Angeles about the need to lower prescription drug costs, his pet campaign issue.
In an interview last week, Schweitzer said his convention appearance backfired. Burns "ran television ads with me speaking at the podium," he recalled. "They said, 'Brian Schweitzer, he's just like Al Gore.' " Gore won only 38 percent of Montana's presidential vote, and Schweitzer lost much more narrowly to Burns.
Asked whether he would do it all again, Schweitzer -- who is running for Montana governor this fall -- said, "I probably wouldn't." He added, "I'm not going to Boston."
The leaders of the Democrats' Senate and House campaign committees, Sen. Jon S. Corzine (N.J.) and Rep. Robert T. Matsui (Calif.), respectively, have given candidates the green light to stay away from Boston if they believe their time is better spent campaigning and raising money back home.
"We say they should do what's best for them," said Brad Woodhouse, spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. "There are very few people in Boston voting for Inez Tenenbaum."
But Woodhouse's Republican counterpart, Dan Allen, notes with pleasure that Corzine recently urged convention planners to give more speaking time to Senate candidates. "A lot of the Senate Democratic candidates realize the top of their ticket, being as liberal as it is with Kerry and [John] Edwards, is going to burden them," Allen said.
Some Democrats, however, say the GOP will wrap the national ticket around them whether they attend the convention or not. "Certainly the Republicans try to spin it that way" when a Democrat attends a nominating convention, said Sandlin, one of the hard-pressed Texans staying home this week. "But it's no different from what they do each and every day. . . . It's the same old tired song."
"I would love to go to the convention, but they are largely ceremonial now," Sandlin said. "I have government work I need to do in Texas and some limited campaigning." In his race, he said, "the main issue is independence."
That's an easier theme for Sandlin to push from Marshall, Tex., than from Boston.
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Archivist's Resignation Questioned
Democrats Seek Reason for His Being Pushed Out
By George Lardner Jr.
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A17
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13913-2004Jul25.html
Archivist of the United States John W. Carlin was pushed by the White House in December to submit his resignation without being given any reason, Senate Democrats disclosed last week at a hearing to consider President Bush's nomination of his successor.
The Democrats said the White House should explain why it asked Carlin to resign. He said in a letter to Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) that White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales called him Dec. 5 and told him "the administration would like to appoint a new archivist." Carlin said, "I asked why, and there was no reason given."
Critics have suggested Bush may have wanted a new archivist to help keep his or his father's sensitive presidential records under wraps. Under the Presidential Records Act of 1978, many of President George H.W. Bush's papers are due to become public in January.
The 1984 law establishing the National Archives and Records Administration provides that the archivist will serve an indefinite term and can be replaced if he resigns or is removed by the president. If he is removed, "the president shall communicate the reasons for any such removal" to Congress, the law says.
Disclosure of the circumstances surrounding Carlin's decision to step down overshadowed the testimony of Bush's nominee, Allen Weinstein, and could delay any plans to confirm him before the November elections.
Carlin said in his July 22 letter to Levin he would like to remain in his post for four more months so he could complete several initiatives he had undertaken. They include getting congressional funding for development of "a groundbreaking system that will allow the government to manage and preserve any kind of electronic records, now and in the future."
Two weeks after the call from Gonzales, Carlin told the president he would resign -- the Dec. 19 letter contained no hint of what prompted his decision. Democrats on the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee said it amounted to a forced removal, and Bush should be required to give his reasons for it.
Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-Maine) pointed out that Carlin has not quit yet. Appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1995, Carlin wrote Bush that he would submit his formal resignation "upon the confirmation and swearing in" of the next archivist.
The White House had no immediate comment when asked why the president wanted to replace Carlin. White House spokeswoman Erin Healey said only that "Mr. Carlin has submitted a letter stating his intention to resign, and Mr. Bush has a responsibility to appoint someone to fill that position."
Weinstein, a historian and an expert on emerging democracies, won praise for what both Republicans and Democrats called remarkably candid testimony about his determination to open as many government records as possible and his disdain for partisan considerations.
Asked about an executive order restricting release of presidential records that Bush issued in 2001, Weinstein expressed distaste for it as a private citizen. He said it "tilts the balance -- at least temporarily -- in favor of greater confidentiality and less public disclosure." If confirmed, he said he would work to change it but would feel obliged to defend the order against a lawsuit by the American Historical Association seeking to overturn it.
Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) said Weinstein should put the Presidential Records Act first. It envisions disclosure of confidential presidential records 12 years after a president leaves office, but Bush's order establishes new hurdles to access to such records.
Weinstein rejected the notion that he had made a deal to keep the Bushes' papers secret. He said no one at the White House had raised the issue. If anyone had, he said, he would have declined the nomination.
At the same time, Weinstein offered a chronology that reflected an early White House determination to get rid of Carlin. Weinstein said he was invited to meet with Dina Powell, director of presidential personnel, on Sept. 23 to talk about the possibility of his nomination.
In late November and early December, Weinstein said he was asked to fill out White House and FBI investigative forms for the job. Bush announced the nomination April 8.
In an interview earlier this year, Weinstein said that when he was first contacted about the job, he noted he was a Democrat.
Weinstein, a former professor at Boston University, Georgetown University and Smith College, has written several books, notably "Perjury: The Hiss-Chambers Case."
-------- OTHER
-------- environment
Pentagon Finds Contamination at 14 Bases
Mon Jul 26, 2004
By ERICA WERNER,
Associated Press Writer
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=542&ncid=542&e=2&u=/ap/20040726/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/rocket_fuel_pollution_1
WASHINGTON - The Pentagon says it found contamination from a toxic chemical, perchlorate, at 14 abandoned or scheduled to be closed military bases nationwide. But a Democratic senator said Friday more facilities should have been examined.
In the report sent to lawmakers, the Pentagon said it found the chemical in ground water and soil samples at closed sites in 10 states.
Perchlorate, a toxic chemical from rocket fuel and weapons production, has been linked to thyroid damage.
The amounts found ranged from 1.2 parts per billion in ground water at Fort McClellan in Alabama, to as high as 2,890 parts per billion in some samples of ground water at Fort Wingate Depot in New Mexico.
There is debate about what constitutes dangerous levels of perchlorate, but the Environmental Protection Agency's draft proposal for drinking water is one part per billion. Some but not all drinking water supplies draw on ground water.
Perchlorate has been found in drinking water supplies in 29 states and has also been found in vegetables.
The eight-page report, issued in response to a congressional mandate, was more than two months overdue. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif., released a letter to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld Friday saying it didn't meet congressional demands.
Feinstein said the report should have addressed 74 potentially contaminated closed bases - a number contained in a General Accounting Office report from 2003.
She also complained that the Pentagon shouldn't wait for the EPA to issue a final national standard for perchlorate to develop clean-up plans. The final standard isn't expected until 2006 and the report indicates clean-up at most bases will wait until then.
"This report makes clear that the Defense Department intends to continue to drag its feet until a federal standard for perchlorate is adopted, wasting precious time and exposing millions of Americans to the hazardous effects of perchlorate contamination of water supplies," Feinstein wrote. "This is an irresponsible and unacceptable approach to a serious problem."
A Pentagon official defended the report, contending that in some cases remediation wasn't needed because the amounts of perchlorate found weren't significant.
"We believe that our response to the congressional request for the report was responsive, and that the concerns that Sen. Feinstein has raised were really outside the request of the report," said Alex Beehler, assistant deputy undersecretary of defense for the environment, safety and occupational health.
The 14 bases listed in the Pentagon report were:
Fort McClellan in Alabama; Fort Ord, El Toro Marine Corps Base, McClellan Air Force Base and Mather Air Force Base in California; Pueblo Chemical Depot in Colorado; Savanna Army Depot and Chanute Air Force Base in Illinois;
Jefferson Proving Ground in Indiana; Fort Wingate Depot in New Mexico; Umatilla Chemical Depot in Oregon; Red River Army Depot in Texas, which is open, but scheduled to be closed; Camp Bonneville in Washington; and White Oak Naval Special Warfare Group in Maryland.
(SUBs last graf to correct that Red River Army Depot is not closed but schedule for closing; SUBs 1st graf to add that some sites in study still open but to be closed.)
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Nations Collaborate to Take Planet's 'Pulse'
Vast Network Will Monitor Environment
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, July 26, 2004; Page A07
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A13737-2004Jul25?language=printer
Seventeen federal agencies are about to take a step toward wiring the world -- and taking its pulse, temperature and blood pressure on a round-the-clock basis.
The grandly titled Global Earth Observation System of Systems, which boasts nearly 50 countries as participants, is an ambitious attempt by governments, scientists and industry to launch a network that will continuously monitor the land, sea and air. If it meets expectations, it could transform the way farmers plant their crops, sailors plot their voyages and doctors work to prevent the spread of disease in remote regions.
For starters, the network would link data from 10,000 manned and automated weather stations, 1,000 buoys and 100,000 daily observations by 7,000 ships and 3,000 aircraft, officials said. Ultimately, it would vacuum up information from myriad other sources, including satellites monitoring ground and air movements, and feed it all into computers that will process it.
"It's a great step forward in understanding the basis of life and our society and our economy," said retired Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, who heads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is spearheading the project.
The federal agencies have spent years on the idea, and it gained steam last year at the urging of Lautenbacher and other Bush administration officials. The United States will outline its draft plan by the end of next month, NOAA officials said. In mid-February, the project's international coalition will unveil a 10-year plan to accomplish its mission.
Its scope is enormous. Environmental Protection Agency administrator Mike Leavitt predicted it will allow countries across the globe to get "a pulse of the planet."
"It will foster an atmosphere of cooperative collaboration that will produce the next frontier of human productivity," he said in an interview last week. "It's the power of a network."
The international partners include such unlikely nations as Sudan and Uzbekistan, which have embraced the idea of sharing weather and geological information that can inform their countries' decision making.
"This is not a power grab by the United States or ultra-extremist organizations trying to seize control of the Earth," Lautenbacher said, adding that some nations are joining even though they "don't like our Iraqi policy. They certainly don't like our Kyoto policy" -- the Bush administration's decision to reject the 1997 pact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming.
The project amounts to a massive information management system, in which countries would trade data they collect on an array of subjects. Officials are still contemplating how they will disseminate all the information: Although they will rely on existing networks at first, they will probably need powerful new computers, NOAA officials said, in addition to using the Internet and some satellites' broadcasting abilities.
Much of the sensing capacity is already in place: There are 50 satellites collecting environmental data from orbit; 68 moored buoys operated by the United States and Japan monitor the equatorial Pacific; 14 nations collaborate on a network of another 1,288 buoys that constantly rise and sink over a two-week period, from the ocean's surface to more than a mile below, to measure temperature and salinity, then transmit the data to satellites. There will be 3,000 such buoys in the next three years, Lautenbacher said.
Other technology still in development, such as a synthetic aperture radar that will be flown on a satellite, can help predict volcano eruptions by measuring "how land is moving, down to a few millimeters," said Greg Withee, a NOAA assistant administrator. At the other end of the technology spectrum, data will also come from monitoring devices as simple as buckets that collect rainfall or human spotters who look out from towers for signs of smoke to detect wildfires.
Despite all the sensors already in use, scientists often struggle to make long-term weather predictions, monitor pollution or detect Earth's movements. By sharing information, they hope to do better.
"The U.S. cannot do it alone," said Kathie L. Olsen, an associate director at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
Many scientists -- including critics of President Bush's decision to opt out of the Kyoto treaty -- have endorsed the push for global monitoring. American Meteorological Society Executive Director Ronald D. McPherson says he is "a passionate supporter" of the project. "From the point of view of weather and climate-sensitive economic sectors, this is one of the most important investments taxpayers can do to provide better information," McPherson said.
NOAA officials said it was difficult to give an exact cost estimate. The United States already spends a few billion dollars a year monitoring the environment, and it will make an incremental investment in coordination and new technology.
The payoff will come in such things as better drought prediction, which could save American farmers $8 billion a year, NOAA estimates. In Portland, Maine, a recent experiment found that a single oil tanker saved $10,000 on one voyage when it got better weather and current information, because it spent less time idle in port.
Industry groups such as the National Ocean Industries Association, whose members conduct offshore energy exploration, say the system will detect underwater cyclonic currents that can stress oil rig platforms.
"There are a lot of unknowns," said Thomas Michels, the association's spokesman. "It would be great if we could know when to pull up stakes and move out of the way."
More accurate climate data could also ease humanitarian and health crises, aiding scientists who are focusing on the link between ecology and disease, said Paul Epstein, associate director of Harvard University's Center for Health and the Global Environment.
Jonathan Patz, an associate professor at the University of Wisconsin who uses satellites to track conditions that promote diseases, said that by systematically collecting such data, "you can get more time for health prevention and you can focus attention in specific areas."
A few environmentalists complain that the administration is focusing on information gathering as a way to avoid making tough decisions, but most say better monitoring will foster better policies.
"Ecosystems are the lifeblood of civilization," said Mark Schaefer, president of NatureServe, whose group conducts analyses for conservation groups and federal agencies. "It's really important we monitor changes and put information in the hands of decision makers that is scientifically valid, so they can make sound decisions."
-------- ACTIVISTS
Israeli supreme court maintains restrictions on Vanunu
JERUSALEM (AFP)
Jul 26, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040726080858.rqsluz9j.html
Israel's nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu angrily denounced a decision by the supreme court Monday not to lift the severe restrictions imposed on him since his release from prison in April.
Former technician Vanunu, who served an 18-year prison sentence for lifting the lid on the inner workings at the Dimona nuclear plant, had been trying to persuade judges that the conditions of his realese were preventing him from leading a normal life and that he had no more secrets to reveal.
But the judges turned down his appeal and ordered that the restrictions, which prevent him from leaving the country and associating with foreigners, remain in place.
Outside the court, Vanunu insisted that he had no more secrets to reveal and said that the ruling breached his fundamental human rights.
"The court proved it does not respect freedom of expression, freedom of travel and other basic rights," Vanunu said.
"I don't have any secrets to reveal about nuclear weapons ... The only one who has is the Israeli government."
Vanunu has said that he wants to leave Israel where he is widely reviled as a traitor after not only lifting the lid on the country's nuclear ambitions but also converting to Christianity.
"My country is not Israel. My country is outside of Israel. Israel didn't respect me for 18 years. For 18 years, Israel condemned me as a traitor, as a spy.
"I don't like Israel, I don't want to live in Israel. I want to be free and to leave Israel," Vanunu said.
In their verdict, the judges said that Vanunu remained "a real threat" to national security after they had studied submissions from the security services.
Although banned from speaking to foreign journalists without prior authorisation from the Israeli authorities, Vanunu has given interviews since his release in which he has denounced Israel's nuclear programme.
Vanunu first spilled the beans on Dimona to Britain's Sunday Times newspaper back in 1986. He was subsequently lured to Italy by an Israeli female secret agent where he was drugged and smuggled back by boat to Israel before being convicted of espionage.
He was quoted by the London-based Al-Hayat newspaer on Sunday as saying that the 40-year-old Dimona plant in the southern Negev desert could constitute a "second Chernobyl" through any "leaking of nuclear radiation, threatening millions of people in neighbouring countries," following a possible accident.
He also said that according to "near-certain indications", US president John F. Kennedy was assassinated due to "pressure he exerted on Israel's then head of government, David Ben-Gurion, to shed light on Dimona's nuclear reactor."
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Peace marchers, anti-abortion picket clash
July 26, 2004
(UPI)
http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/20040725-103138-5132r.htm
Boston, MA, Jul. 25 -- A peace march in Boston was disrupted Sunday when a man carrying an anti-gay, anti-abortion sign was reportedly assaulted by anti-war demonstrators.
About 2,000 peace advocates gathered at noon on the historic Common, site of 1775's Boston Massacre, to protest the war in Iraq while, several blocks away, about 1,000 anti-abortion protestors gathered at Faneuil Hall, the historic meeting house where patriots gathered before the American Revolution, and set off on their own march to the FleetCenter.
The two groups crossed paths at an intersection and exchanged angry words that led to a scuffle between the peace marches and a man carrying an anti-abortion sign who was pushed to the ground.
Witnesses said the man's shirt was torn but that he otherwise appeared unhurt.
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Convention a 'coming-out for bloggers'
July 26, 2004
By William Glanz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Politicians have found a way to embrace the Internet.
For the first time, writers who post their work directly to the Internet on Web logs - or blogs - have earned press credentials to cover the Democratic National Convention this week in Boston. The bloggers will add their independent, unpredictable voices to the din of political coverage generated by thousands of print and broadcast reporters.
Democrats invited the bloggers - Web-savvy, political junkies - to get the word out to a growing audience of people who turn to the Internet for information.
Republicans plan to credential bloggers for their convention next month.
"It is a national coming-out for bloggers. It's given the blogosphere a whole new level of visibility," said Markos Moulitsas, who works in Berkeley, Calif., and posts his political analysis on DailyKos.com.
The 2-year-old Web site gets about 150,000 visitors a day.
Including bloggers also has raised concerns. Conservatives argue that Democrats are stifling opposing views by not inviting more Republican bloggers. Academics warn all bloggers are suspect sources for accurate information because they have no obligation to remain objective.
Mr. Moulitsas is one of about 30 bloggers invited to work alongside print and broadcast reporters. The convention committee hasn't disclosed the precise number of bloggers or mainstream journalists granted credentials.
Recruiting bloggers to cover the convention is a strategic move to reach people who may not read newspapers or watch television for convention coverage. An estimated 11 percent of Internet users have read blogs, according to a report published in February by the Pew Internet and American Life Project.
Blogs have had an impact. Two blogs are credited with first reporting comments in 2002 by Sen. Trent Lott, Mississippi Republican, then majority leader, who praised Sen. Strom Thurmond's 1948 presidential bid. Mr. Thurmond promoted segregation. ABCNews.com's blog, the Note, and Joshua Micah Marshall's TalkingPointsMemo.com included stories about Mr. Lott's remarks before mainstream news outlets reported the story.
"When you want to get the message out, you have to go where the people are. More and more, they are going to blogs. Many blogs have a readership that some [newspapers] would die for," said Eric Schnure, the official blogger for the Democratic National Convention Committee who also helped organize the party's effort to invite bloggers.
Republicans will invite 10 to 20 bloggers to cover the party convention in New York City, said Alyssa McClenning, deputy press secretary for the convention.
Newspapers and wire services are joining the trend. The Associated Press, Miami Herald and Chicago Tribune will have reporters writing blogs during the Democratic convention.
Ana Marie Cox, a blogger based in the District who runs Wonkette.com, is posting blogs on her Web site when she isn't covering the convention for MTV.
Nearly all the bloggers with press credentials for the convention in Boston are Democrats. Only two bloggers invited - Oxblog.com and Command-post.org - commonly post conservative messages or are sympathetic to the Bush administration's position on the war in Iraq.
The Democratic National Convention Committee should have invited more conservative voices, said Bill Ardolino, a conservative blogger based in the District who keeps his online journal at INDCJournal.com.
Mr. Ardolino said he is out $250 for a nonrefundable airline ticket he bought after the Democrats invited him this month, then revoked the offer a day later.
"They said it was an administrative error. The whole thing was very unprofessional," said Mr. Ardolino, who started his blog in January and gets about 1,500 visits a day on the site.
Mr. Schnure said the convention committee mistakenly invited 20 more bloggers than they could accommodate, but said they didn't target conservatives for exclusion. Most bloggers who requested credentials run liberal blogs, so most who had credentials revoked are Democrats, he said.
Mr. Ardolino said he suspects political ideology might have been involved in the decision to revoke his credentials, "but I don't think it's the big reason. I think they just messed up."
Many bloggers make no effort to be objective, so people read their posts carefully, said Alex S. Jones, former New York Times media reporter and director of the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
"If anybody is expecting objectivity from bloggers, they are out of their mind," Mr. Jones said.
That subjectivity also makes blogs popular, Mr. Schnure said.
----
Protesters march to FleetCenter
Monday, July 26, 2004
The Republican
By DAN RING dring@repub.com
http://www.masslive.com/hampfrank/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1090829874233170.xml
BOSTON - While delegates converged on Boston for the Democratic National Convention yesterday, poor people and activists from Western Massachusetts joined thousands of protesters in a march against the war in Iraq.
About 2,000 protesters gathered at noon on the Boston Common and then marched about a half-mile to the FleetCenter, where delegates this week will nominate U.S. Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts for president.
At the common, Christina Densmore, 31, stood on a stage and told the crowd that she and other homeless people in Springfield are waging "our own war" for basic rights such as a home and food.
"Every day ... people die ... cold and homeless in the streets," said Densmore, a resident of "Sanctuary City," an encampment of homeless people living in tents at the Open Pantry lot at School and Temple streets in Springfield. "I'm not talking about Iraq. I'm talking about America."
Sponsored by Act Now to Stop War and End Racism in Washington, the march included people rallying for everything from a ban on assault weapons to lifting U.S. sanctions against Cuba. Billed as a "National March on the Democratic Convention," the event was also held to push for civil rights such as gay marriage.
Bet Power, 54, of Northampton, said he was marching because Kerry opposes gay marriage. Kerry supports civil unions for gays, but Power said civil unions are not acceptable.
Nicholas C. Camerota, a philosophy professor at Springfield Technical Community College and a volunteer with the Act Now group, said the purpose of the protest was to advocate more public money for jobs, education, health care and housing.
"We're here to protest the policies embraced by both (major political) parties ... that have led to these wars and military occupations," Camerota said.
The anti-war protesters clashed briefly with about 1,000 people against abortion who marched to the FleetCenter from Faneuil Hall. The two different protest marches came to a point where they converged. About a half-dozen of the anti-abortion protesters then lay in a street in fetal positions, while others drew white lines around them with chalk.
Police moved the anti-abortion protesters from the streets and the two different marches took separate paths.
During the protests, state police, clad in helmets, pads and other riot gear, lined Beacon Street and other streets near the FleetCenter. Members of the National Lawyers Guild in New York City provided legal observers to document any arrests or possible violations of civil rights.
At the common protest, Sunny V. Miller, executive director of the Traprock Peace Center in Deerfield, handed out information about the U.S. military's use of depleted uranium in ordnance such as tank and aircraft shells.
Miller said the uranium could be a cause of "Gulf War Syndrome," an illness among some veterans of the Persian Gulf War in 1991.
Activists yesterday said they would boycott "the free-speech zone," a 26,000-square-foot asphalt lot near the FleetCenter. The city of Boston set aside the area to meet court-mandated requirements that protesters be allowed within sight of delegates to the convention.
Protesters compared the zone to an "internment camp" since it is surrounded by wire fence, nets and cement barriers. The zone is next to a parking lot for buses for delegates." That's the detention pen," said Michaelann C. Bewsee, 56, president of Arise for Social Justice in Springfield, an advocacy group for the poor. "My free speech ... is not inside that pen."
"This is horrible for the Democrats to be party to this," said Peggy S. Hotes, a public school teacher from Bellevue, Wash., as she stood inside the free-speech zone yesterday afternoon. "This is really tragic."
By late yesterday afternoon, the protests were largely peaceful. By late yesterday afternoon, there were two people taken into custody, one a woman who was arrested near Faneuil Hall on disorderly charges, the Secret Service said. One anti-war protester was taken into custody for questioning, but he was not arrested, the Secret Service said.
Material from the Associated Press was used in this story.
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Seen and heard around and about the DNC
Los Angeles Times staff
July 26, 2004,
http://www.dailypress.com/news/sns-dnc-0726notes,0,3475433.story?coll=dp-breaking-news
BOSTON -- Although many Democrats are trying to get the 2000 election debacle off their minds, the editors at the Washington Post are still living in the past. The front page of their Monday special section on the Democratic National Convention featured a giant photo of Sen. John F. Kerry and running mate Sen. John Edwards - under the heading "Election 2000." --Times researcher Susannah Rosenblatt
At a California delegation breakfast today, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco said: "George Bush's war of choice in going to Iraq has cost us many more lives than it should have, hundreds of billions of dollars more than it should have. And it cost us our reputation in the world. George Bush has got to go." The crowd erupted in cheers. Rep. Bob Matsui of California also struck a harsh tone, calling Bush "clueless or incompetent - or maybe both." --Times staff writer Michael Finnegan
"John Kerry is a better man than George Bush. My guy is like a real, real tested guy. America needs a real leader, not an Andover cheerleader this time." --Democratic strategist James Carville, emceeing the first-ever Democratic veterans caucus at a Boston hotel this afternoon. --Times staff writer Maria L. LaGanga
Kerry campaign strategists Mary Beth Cahill and Tad Devine poked fun at talk show host Jerry Springer's efforts to become an at-large Democratic delegate from Ohio. Springer, former Cincinnati mayor, has helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for large and small Democratic campaigns this year. Joked Cahill: "It cost him $500,000 to become a delegate, I read." Devine responded, "He should have hired us.... It would have been cheaper." --Times staff writer Doyle McManus
While John F. Kerry was throwing out the first pitch Sunday evening at the Red Sox-Yankee game at Fenway Park, backers of a major Latino outreach initiative to help put him in the White House were partying nearby. The Washington-based group known as the New Democrat Network has showcased New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, Rep. Robert J. Menendez of New Jersey and Rep. Loretta Sanchez of Anaheim in the most extensive Spanish-language advertising campaign so far this year - spending more than $3 million in Florida, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Arizona to promote Democrats and attack Bush. While the network's financial backers ate hors d'oeuvres such as tuna ceviche on taro root chips and Dungeness crab cakes with cumin aioli, Sanchez thanked them for "working with our community and making sure that Latinos understand we are the party with principles, with values and policies that are going to move our community to the future." Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano told the crowd: "This ad campaign is one of the shrewdest I have ever seen." Noting that 7 million to 8 million Latino voters are expected to turn out in November, Miami-based pollster Sergio Bendixen said: "In 2000, the Republicans did a terrific job of Latino outreach. How the world has changed in four years. The Democrats have realized they're going to have to fight for the Hispanic vote." ---Times staff writer Nick Anderson
Sunday "We're here right now in Columbus, a place which has always been heartland America, the birthplace of eight United States presidents. May I today find somebody to adopt me, quickly? I want a little bit of that pedigree." --Kerry speaking to Columbus residents during a "front porch visit" Sunday. --Times staff writer Matea Gold
BOSTON -- Perhaps 300 protesters of various stripes displayed their complaints on the Boston Commons, directing more of their energy at George W. Bush than at John F. Kerry. There was the rapper who made up a song about the dangers of depleted uranium. There were socialists. There was someone from a group called Peace, Please, urging civility and polite behavior in the expression of opposition to war. Two women from New York, Tasha Dow, a political scientist, and Zazel Loven, a photographer, were selling items of clothing with various expressions - largely unmentionable - taking issue with Bush. "We found that the panties are an incredibly exciting vehicle to mobilize the core demographic of youth and women," said Dow, speaking every bit the language of an entrepreneur and doctor of political science. --Times staff writers Elizabeth Mehren and James Gerstenzang
BOSTON -- "Abort the elephant/Scrap the donkey/Vote for the horse and the fish!" That's what protester Brian Hart's homemade sign said on a corner of Boston Common this afternoon. The meaning of Hart's cryptic poster? "Whatever makes your conscience feel good," said Hart, 59, an artist and writer from Jamaica Plain, Mass. "I guess I'm a surrealist at heart." --Times researcher Susannah Rosenblatt
BOSTON -- Democrat, Republican ... woodchuck? For a pair of protesters parked on Boston Common today, the two major parties are no match for their favorite woodland creature. "Equal representation for all species!" proclaimed Robert Kimberk, 55, a scientist from Newton, Mass. Kimberk, who favors electing the small mammal to office in place of either Sen. John F. Kerry or President Bush, sported a homemade sandwich board that read: "The Earth is better without us/No more human tyranny." Kimberk, who opposes the war same as the larger group of demonstrators gathered at the park's other end Sunday afternoon, was fed up with both parties - not to mention the entire human race. "We're just ... bad monkeys soiling our own nest," said Kimberk, milling in front of the Park Street T (Boston's subway) station. The woodchucks are just a symbol for the animal kingdom at large, explained fellow woodchuck supporter Jim Brett, 43, of Watertown, Mass. But, Brett said, the animal's cuteness factor does boost its political viability. "With the attention the Democrats are putting into their hair, they're making sure they're getting all the cuteness factor they can," Brett said. The men have no formal organization, but, Brett said, enjoy the support of "millions of woodchucks." --Times researcher Susannah Rosenblatt
"What I'm struck by is how much people just want practical, common sense solutions to the concrete problems that they're experiencing. What they don't want to hear is a bunch of partisan bickering, and those who practice those dark arts I don't think are going to do particularly well come November." Illinois state Rep. Barack Obama, Democratic Senate candidate and keynote speaker, on CBS' "Face the Nation."
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THE PROTESTS
Demonstrators Steer Clear of Their Designated Space
July 26, 2004
By JOHN KIFNER
NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/politics/campaign/26street.html
BOSTON, July 25 - The streets around the Democratic National Convention site resembled an armed camp on Sunday - helicopters overhead, bomb-sniffing dogs and their handlers, police officers and soldiers lining the intersections, many kinds of barriers, and an officially designated "Free Speech Zone" sealed off with cyclone fencing and razor wire.
It looked like an empty cage.
The designated demonstration area, a dank place under abandoned elevated tracks, failed its first test on Sunday when what will probably be the largest demonstration of the convention period simply walked right by it.
"We never intended to use it," said Rachel Nasca of Boston Answer, the main protest coalition, marching at the head of the line. "We never even bothered to take it to court. Did you see that thing?"
Indeed, the Free Speech Zone is rapidly becoming the hottest local issue of the convention, with most of the protest groups vowing to boycott it. The only protesters to embrace it were members of a pro-Palestinian group that says the cyclone fencing and barbed wire provide an ideal visual backdrop to their message of opposition to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank.
"We want to draw attention to what Palestinians have been subjected to for years," said Marilyn Levin of the group, United for Justice With Peace. "We can leave our cage, but Palestinians cannot leave theirs."
Sunday's demonstrators, mostly antiwar, numbering about 3,000 by police estimate, marched for about two hours in a big circle from the Boston Common over the top of Beacon Hill past the FleetCenter, the convention site, proceeding back past Government Center to the common, without serious incident. There was a brief scuffle with one of many anti-abortion protesters, who were also out in force.
"Bring the troops home now," chanted the antiwar demonstrators, who supported a variety of causes, including women's rights and opposition to what was termed the occupation of Iraq, Afghanistan, Puerto Rico and Haiti, as well as Boston school bus drivers working without a contract.
The demonstrators were escorted by hundreds of city and state police officers, preceded by policemen on bicycles pedaling at a gruelingly slow pace, and trailed by police S.U.V.'s, correction department detention wagons and even school buses, to be used in case of large-scale arrests. Lines of police - city to the left, state to the right - moved alongside, flanking the demonstrators, and there were phalanxes of officers at the intersections.
The police turnout was only one indication of the security precautions that have turned the FleetCenter into a virtual fortress. Helicopters and jet fighters patrol overhead, and Coast Guard and police gunboats cruise the harbor. National Guardsmen in camouflage patrolled around the convention center, which is surrounded by double rows of iron fencing.
An embarrassing threat to the Democrats was lifted when a contract dispute involving Boston's firefighters union was resolved on Sunday. The firefighters had threatened to picket 30 welcoming parties scheduled for Democratic state delegations on Sunday night, and Boston's police union had pledged to join the picketing even though a state arbitrator issued a decision on Thursday resolving the police union's own contract dispute.
Those threats had unnerved some Democratic delegates, many of whom were reluctant to cross picket lines. In response to the threats, the Ohio and Michigan delegations had canceled their welcoming parties.
The firefighters announced Sunday morning that they would not picket the parties, minutes after an arbitrator announced a contract award for the firefighters: a 10.5 percent raise over three years, compared with the 14.5 percent raise over four years the arbitrator awarded to the 1,400-member police union.
While the labor dispute was settled, the battle over the Free Speech Zone continues. After the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Lawyers Guild filed suit against the zone, Judge Douglas P. Woodlock of Federal District Court toured the site last week and said that while he intitially doubted the lawyers' claim that the site resembled "an internment camp," he concluded that the comparison was "an understatement."
"One cannot concieve of other elements put in place to create a space that's more of an affront to the idea of free expression than the designated demonstration zone," he said in a ruling on Thursday.
Nevertheless, Judge Woodcock said, there was no alternative. He told the lawyers: "There really isn't any other place. You're stuck under the tracks."
Putting finishing touches on the area this morning, a workman, who asked that his name not be used, took in the fencing and the razor wire wrapped around the overhead track.
"Does it look like a concentration camp?" he said. "I'm Jewish. It looks like a concentration camp."
Later, as the demonstrators gathered on the common in a welter of speeches, posters and pamphlets, Robert Aili, 50, said of the Free Speech Zone: "I think it is obviously an obscenity and an insult to the First Amendment."
Steven Greenhouse contributed reporting for this article.
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Contest Between Liberties and Security at Convention
July 26, 2004
By DIANE CARDWELL
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/26/nyregion/26protest.html?pagewanted=all&position=
When city officials recently denied a permit for use of the Great Lawn in Central Park for what could become the largest protest of the Republican National Convention, they cited potential damage to the grass as their chief concern.
But according to a horticultural expert who worked on refurbishing the lawn, it was designed to withstand the abuse of large crowds since the grass was planted in a special soil mix so that it could take the weight and traffic without reverting to the great dust bowl it had once been.
In rejecting the notion of political protest on the Great Lawn, officials clearly had something more on their minds than just the health of the bluegrass, ryegrass and fescue planted there. In fact, the decision to move the expected 250,000 demonstrators of United for Peace and Justice away from the park to the far West Side of Manhattan has become the clearest illustration yet of the Bloomberg administration's fundamental feelings about civil protest, an often-tense relationship that has been deeply affected by the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's distaste for disorder.
In an interview on Friday, Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly cited the terror attacks as the principal reason why the protesters, no less than any other Americans, must face new limits on their liberties, as much for their own safety as the city's.
"The danger is that people think that we're doing it somehow to intimidate a demonstration, so that's kind of the dilemma we find ourselves in," Mr. Kelly said, adding that any congregation of significant numbers of people constitutes a terrorist target because of the potential for mass casualties. "When we bring these issues up, it's: 'Why are you hiding behind the terrorist threat? You're looking to restrict demonstrations just because you don't want demonstrations,' " he said. "I think demonstrators have to recognize that everybody's lives have changed, and they need some accommodation and some acceptance of the fact that it's a different environment that we're all living in now." He added that he has seen few signs the demonstrators recognize that.
Many free-speech advocates and protest organizers are bitter about the administration's decision to declare vast swaths of Central Park, like the Great Lawn and the North Meadow, off-limits to protest for fear of damage to the turf.
"The parks are not too precious for protests that don't have a libretto," said Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, noting that the city regularly allows audiences for classical music and opera on the grass. "The city can't take a time-honored public space out of circulation. I think putting the park off-limits to protest is a serious problem, and it's one that is not going to go away and will ultimately end up in the courts if it doesn't change."
Indeed, the fight over Central Park reflects the degree to which the city's constant refurbishing appears to be about to collide with its traditional role as a hub for free speech. As the city's public spaces have become ever-more welcome gathering spots for residents, workers and tourists, they have become more complicated for those wishing to organize large protests.
"There has been a closing up of public space where you can have a demonstration," said Leslie Cagan, a veteran organizer who is coordinating the huge protest by United for Peace and Justice on Aug. 29, the day before the convention begins. "Some of that has good intentions, parks that get renovated where they put in sculptures and benches," she said, adding that some city plazas had been improved in similar ways. "It's all very nice if you're going for lunch, but it means that there really isn't any place where you can assemble a large crowd. You can still demonstrate, but you don't get the same sense of a whole."
Parks Department officials counter that they are not closing the park to protesting, and cite permits they have issued for smaller rallies, including one granted Friday to the New York chapter of the National Organization for Women, which had originally sought the Great Lawn, for about 50,000 people to protest on the East Meadow. The parks commissioner, Adrian Benepe, said in a recent interview that it was a more appropriate location for protest activities and would remain so even if renovated, because its surface, largely bare dirt, is not susceptible to the same kind of damage.
The standoff between the city and United for Peace and Justice has left each side angry and mistrustful of the other. City officials argue that they are letting the protesters have their say while minimizing the disruption to the rest of the city, a Bloomberg administration priority, but the protesters, who ultimately settled on a rally site along the West Side Highway, feel they are being forced like barely tolerated stepchildren into a marginal location with no meaning for average New Yorkers.
"Protesters think about having a peaceful demonstration," said Robert J. McGuire, a security consultant who was police commissioner in the early 1980's when demonstrators held a huge Central Park rally against nuclear weapons. "But the Police Department is always doing the worst-case planning exercise: What if a bomb goes off in the middle of a demonstration? It's just a very different perspective."
That perspective was profoundly altered by the attacks on the World Trade Center. Since then, law enforcement officials in the city, like their counterparts across the country, have grappled with balancing the hovering terror threat and ordinary crowd-control issues with the right to demonstrate.
Commissioner Kelly said many police tactics considered intimidating or chilling by protest organizers - the whirring helicopters, the long stretches of metal barricades, the bag searches, the heavily armed Hercules teams - are simply the needed security elements in these times at any large gathering, whether to protest the war in Iraq or to celebrate the opening of the professional football season.
Still, even the worst street protests in recent years, like the rampage through Seattle during the World Trade Organization meeting in 1999, produced mostly vandalism and looting, not terrorism. The tendency of the Bloomberg administration to invoke the fear of terrorism when speaking of protest has led many to wonder whether the mayor is simply placing too high a premium on order at the expense of civil liberties.
"Giving people the right to direct-petition for the redress of grievances is sloppy, but that's the way that democracy works," said Douglas Muzzio, a professor at the School of Public Affairs at Baruch College, acknowledging that the city faces legitimate security issues. "But there's a difference between civic breakdown - between high crime rates, dirty streets and subways that don't work - and a structured, organized demonstration. I don't know if this administration fears that, or the perception of it, but there's just a dislike of disorder."
The distinction between terror and anarchy, however, is often too narrow for police officials, who are obliged to prepare for and to quell disruption in whatever form it takes.
"In terms of policing it, in terms of trying to prevent these acts, they kind of morph to a certain extent," Mr. Kelly said. "They come together in a way and make it very difficult for the authorities, for the police to distinguish one from the other." Then too, it is always possible, he said, for terrorists to infiltrate a protest.
Still, protest organizers and civil libertarians point to what they consider missteps by the Bloomberg administration that have led to the suspicion that officials want to restrict freedom of speech and assembly. While they prefer this administration to that of Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, they still say there have been some questionable tactics.
"Giuliani was ruthless in his attacks on the First Amendment, and the Bloomberg administration is on a totally different plane and has at least shown a certain amount of flexibility in certain important regards," said Ms. Lieberman, whose group, the New York Civil Liberties Union, has been negotiating with the city for protests during the convention on behalf of several organizations.
Still, she said, officials have made "terrible mistakes," including refusing to allow marching during the Feb. 15, 2003, war protest, and using a "demonstration debriefing form" that asked people who had been arrested at a political event for their educational and protest history. (The form has since been abandoned.)
For now, the struggle between the city and protest groups will enter a new and unscripted phase, hammering out arrangements for sound systems, portable toilets and drinking water as well as the highly charged issues of searches and barriers configuration. What emerges from August's clamor could set the tone for future demonstrations in a new age.
"We value constitutional freedoms that have always been very fundamental to us, but there is also this very real danger lurking in the background," said Joseph P. Viteritti, a public policy professor at Hunter College. "I'm not sure we really have a full understanding of how we balance these things, and we work our way through it every time."
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Report from Boston: Stay Out of the "Free Speech Zone"
nyc.indymedia.org
by Gan Golan
26 Jul 2004
http://nyc.indymedia.org/feature/display/98452/index.php
Last night, I had my first direct experience with the so-called free speech zone. It left me with one conclusion: whatever you do, do NOT go inside. It's not only a blatant offense to free speech, but also highly dangerous and unsafe. I would suggest protesting anywhere in Boston but inside of it.
No amount of hyperbole can accurately describe how disastrous the interior actually is. It's like a scene from some post-apocalyptic movie - a futuristic, industrial detention area from a Mad Max film. You are surrounded on all sides by concrete blocks and steel fencing, with razor wire lining the perimeter. Then, there is a giant black net over the entire space.
That's not even the worst part. 80% of the space is actually beneath a construction site. You heard me, most of the zone is actually under a partially constructed building, broken up by gates, iron girders and wooden rafters, in the darkness.
No helicopter will ever be able to see an aerial shot of the people assembled, negating the major points of mass protest: to let the rest of the public see your numbers. This forced'invisibility' is so painfully obvious, that it is hard to believe it resulted from pure negligence. What's more, the space fits only 1000 maximum by law, so the 1001st person who wants to express their rights, is shit out of luck.
That's not all. If you go inside, you won't be left safely alone with your fellow protesters. Right above you will be a suspended catwalk of wooden rafters traveling down the middle of the protest area. This strip is not only covered with reams of barbed wire, but officers (or national guardsmen) will be strolling above you just feet from your head. After walking in, it took us about 2 seconds to agree; "there is no fucking way we are stepping into this trap".
And if you think that the civility of individual officers will make up for it, think again. As we were casually walking through the pen, our jaws open in dis-belief, a group of officers quickly surrounded us. Twenty-four of them. The first officer (Officer 'Gately') approached us swiftly, and declared, "Do you know that the willful destruction of public property in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a felony that carries 5 year in jail!" We were taken aback by this introduction. Other people in suit and ties were walking by, using the zone as a pedestrian shortcut. a bunch of peaceniks were walking through in our shorts and backpacks and we were immediately suspect of committing a criminal act. I guess this explains the meaning of the rule about those wearing 'inappropriate clothing' being searched. The overtly intimidating tone of the interaction didn't cease, so we soon left.
I called the BPD headquarters and asked to talk to the district 2 duty officer, in order to file a complaint about the rude treatment. When I asked him (Sgt. Ross) for Officer Gately's ID#, he stated that he could not give me that information because after all, I could be "a member of the press, or an anarchist". I guess myself (along with the press and anarchists) are no longer allowed to hold the police accountable for their actions.
A word of advice: Do not make the mistake of making your first visit to the free speech zone on your day of protest. It will be too late to realize what you are getting into.
It's crazy to think that this is happening in Boston, a city that fronts a reputation of being a cradle of constitutional values. The city has tried to force free speech into a cage where it cannot survive. The only reasonable response is to exercise our rights everywhere but the protest zone.
By giving free speech an unacceptable location, the City of Boston has unwittingly declared that the entire city is now a free speech zone.
This work is in the public domain.
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