NucNews - December 25, 2005 -------- NUCLEAR -------- india India-UK ties blossom in 2005 (Press Trust of India) London, Dec 25, 2005 http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2005/dec/1239384.htm (PTI) The India-UK ties blossomed as never before in the year 2005 with the two countries deciding to cooperate in the civilian nuclear energy sector following New Delhi's landmark nuclear deal with Washington, and the bilateral trade crossing 6.3 billion pounds. The year also witnessed the deadly July 7 London blasts which killed 56 people, second wedding of Prince Charles to his long-time sweetheart Camilla, re-election of the Labour Party for the third consecutive term under the leadership of Tony Blair, death of former UK Foreign Secretary Robin Cook, who was a friend of India, and emergence of NRI steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal as the richest person not only in Britan but the entire Europe. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Britain in July for the G-8 summit, which was overshadowed by the deadly London blasts, while his British counterpart Blair came to India in September when the two countries agreed to cooperate in civilian nuclear energy sector and also finalised accords covering cooperation in hydrocarbons and some other areas. While Indian High Commissioner to UK, Kamalesh Sharma, said the bilateral ties had entered a "golden period," Blair noted the India-UK ties were the best-ever in last 60 years. At the annual luncheon meeting of the Labour Friends of India, Blair said "I am immensely proud that it was under a Labour Government that India secured her independence, and I am also immensely proud that nearly 60 years on, the relationship between our two countries today is probably the strongest in the last six decades." Prime Minister Singh, during his visit to the UK, also had a sentimental journey to Oxford to receive an honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Law. During the year, the UK-India trade of goods and services registered an almost 120 per cent growth and the bilateral trade crossed 6.3 billion pounds. Former Miss World and actress Aishwarya Rai received the Global Diversity Award here from the European Union and melody queen Lata Mangeshkar was conferred the Life Time Achievement award by Merrill Lynch investment managers and Adora, India's second largest diamond exporter. While the Indian community here came in for praise for their hard work and outstanding achievements in various fields, the best words came from Britain's Minister for Immigration and Asylum Tony McNulty, who said his government's efforts now is not how to stop Indians coming over here, but how to prevent talented, educated graduates of Indian origin leaving the UK to work in India. More and more British companies are outsourcing to India and what began as a trickle has turned out to be a flood. Xansa, the UK-based IT services company, plans to increase its workforce in India by about 7,000 in the next five years while Orange, the UK's biggest mobile phone operator, intends to outsource about 1,500 jobs to India as part of a drive by its parent France Telecom to cut costs. British Gas, leading energy company, plans to outsource 1,000 jobs to India. According to a study, British companies can cut their costs by up to 60 per cent by moving some of their operations to countries like India. There were also a series of high-level ministerial meetings between the two countries. Prominent among the Indian ministers who visited here and made a mark are the Finance Minister P Chidambaram, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar, Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel, Tourism Minister Renuka Chowdhury, Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal, and then External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh. Besides the ministerial visits from Britain, a high-level Parliamentary delegation led by NRI industrialist Lord Swraj Paul visited India to further boost the UK-India trade and parliamentary relations. Symbolic of the growing Indo-British ties, India's batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar inaugurated a magnificent 'India Room' at the newly built 25-million-pound stand at the Oval cricket stadium here. It was another year of outstanding achievements for 53-year-old steel tycoon Mittal, who owns the world's largest steel company Mittal Steel, as he became the richest person in Europe. Mittal was also named Europe Businessman of the Year by 'Fortune' magazine. Another NRI entrepreneur Karan Bilimoria, founder and CEO of Cobra beer, became the youngest University Chancellor when he accepted to head the Thames Valley University. Bilimoria follows the late Lord Hamlyn, Lord Swraj Paul and Sir William Stubbs as the University's fourth Chancellor. Bilimoria also won the first Indo-British Partnership Award instituted by the NRI Institute, UK Chapter for his outstanding achievements. Ratan Tata, Chairman of the Tata Group, was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Warwick, one of the top universities in the UK in recognition of his vision, flair and skill in transforming Tata Group into a globally-competitive firm. Lord Navnit Dholakia, leading NRI and Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats Party in the House of Lords, was presented the 'Pride of India Award' by London-based India International Foundation for his outstanding contribution to the Indian community in the UK. Versatile actor Kabir Bedi was chosen for the Asian Jewel Lifetime Achievement Award while NRI hotelier Joginder Sangar won the Entrepreneur Excellence Award. India's tennis sensation Sania Mirza was listed as one of the ten people capable of changing the world by London's intellectual weekly 'New Statesman'. Three innovators from India won the 2005 Ashden Awards, considered the 'Green Oscar' for their outstanding and innovative projects and scooped 30,000 pounds each. They are Hyderabad-based Dharmappa Barki, Chairman and Managing Director of Noble Energy Solar Technologies Ltd (NEST), Chandigarh-based Ramesh Kumar Nibhoria of Nishant Bio Energy Consultancy and Bangalore-Based Harish Hande. Leading Indian conservation scientist, Charudutt Mishra, won this year's Whitley Gold Award, UK's top conservation award and cash prize of 60,000 pounds for his work to save the last snow leopards of the Himalayan altitudes from extinction. NRI actor, writer and TV personality Meera Syal won this year's Leadership and Diversity Hammer Award instituted by leading bilingual 'Garavi Gujarat', popularly known as GG2. -------- iran Iran denies getting Russia nuke proposal 12/25/2005 (AP) http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-12-25-iran-russia_x.htm TEHRAN, Iran — Iran denied on Sunday that it received a proposal to move its uranium enrichment facilities to Russian soil, a compromise Europe is seeking to resolve a standoff over Iran's nuclear program. Russia had announced Saturday that it sent the formal proposal to Tehran, which has insisted it would not agree to moving enrichment abroad. The two nations' contradictory statements may be the result of an Iranian attempt to gain time without directly rejecting a proposal from Moscow, a longtime ally. "We have not received any particular plan yet," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters. "It's quite clear that Iran will look positively at any proposal that recognizes its right to have nuclear enrichment on its soil." Uranium enrichment is a key step in the nuclear process that produces either fuel for a reactor or the material needed for a warhead. The United States has accused Iran of seeking to develop nuclear weapons. Iran insists its program is aimed only at generating electricity. Negotiators from Germany, France and Britain want to solve the dispute by having enrichment moved to Russia to ensure Iran cannot divert uranium to a weapons program. Meanwhile, tensions have been mounting between Iran and the West, with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency saying it is growing impatient with Tehran's resistance to European proposals. At the same time, Europe and the U.S. have expressed outrage at recent comments by Iran's hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, calling for Israel to be destroyed and labeling the Holocaust as a "myth." After a five-month break, the European negotiators held a new round of talks with the Iranians Wednesday, achieving no progress but agreeing to hold further negotiations in January. Asefi praised this week's negotiations, saying the agreement to continue was "a kind of progress." "It means the parties see a room for future. If Europe respects Iran's rights then there will be more room," he said. Washington is pushing for Tehran to be brought before the United Nations Security Council, where it could face economic sanctions over the dispute. Russia and China, which have vetoes on the council, oppose referral and the West has stopped short of forcing a vote. Iran hid its enrichment program from U.N. inspectors for nearly two decades until its secret nuclear activities were revealed close to three years ago. Since then, a probe by the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency has unearthed Iranian experiments, blueprints and equipment that have either "dual-use" applications or seemingly no non-military function. No clear evidence of a weapons program has been found, however. Russia is building a nuclear power plant in Iran in a deal that has drawn strong U.S. criticism. -------- israel Israel's War Deadline Iran in the Crosshairs By JAMES PETRAS Counterpunch Weekend Edition December 24/25, 2005 http://www.counterpunch.org/petras12242005.html Never has an imminent war been so loudly and publicly advertised as Israel's forthcoming military attack against Iran. When the Israeli Military Chief of Staff, Daniel Halutz, was asked how far Israel was ready to go to stop Iran's nuclear energy program, he said "Two thousand kilometers" ­ the distance of an air assault. More specifically Israeli military sources reveal that Israel's current and probably next Prime Minister Ariel Sharon ordered Israel's armed forces to prepare for air strikes on uranium enrichment sites in Iran According to the London Times the order to prepare for attack went through the Israeli defense ministry to the Chief of Staff. During the first week in December, "sources inside the special forces command confirmed that 'G' readiness ­ the highest state ­ for an operation was announced" (Times, December 11, 2005). On December 9, Israeli Minister of Defense, Shaul Mofaz, affirmed that in view of Teheran's nuclear plans, Tel Aviv should "not count on diplomatic negotiations but prepare other solutions". In early December, Ahron Zoevi Farkash, the Israeli military intelligence chief told the Israeli parliament (Knesset) that "if by the end of March, the international community is unable to refer the Iranian issue to the United Nations Security Council, then we can say that the international effort has run its course". In other words, if international diplomatic negotiations fail to comply with Israel's timetable, Israel will unilaterally, militarily attack Iran. Benjamin Netanyahu, leader of the Likud Party and candidate for Prime Minister, stated that if Sharon did not act against Iran, "then when I form the new Israeli government (after the March 2006 elections) we'll do what we did in the past against Saddam's reactor." In June 1981 Israel bombed the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq. Even the pro-Labor newspaper, Haaretz, while disagreeing with the time and place of Netanyahu's pronouncements, agreed with its substance. Haaretz criticized "(those who) publicly recommend an Israeli military option" because it "presents Israel as pushing (via powerful pro-Israel organizations in the US) the United States into a major war." However, Haaretz adds "Israel must go about making its preparations quietly and securely ­ not at election rallies." (Haaretz, December 6, 2005). Haaretz's position, like that of the Labor Party, is that Israel not advocate war against Iran before multi-lateral negotiations are over and the International Atomic Energy Agency makes a decision. Israeli public opinion apparently does not share the political elite's plans for a military strike against Iran's nuclear program. A survey in the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, reported by Reuters (December 16, 2005) shows that 58 per cent of the Israelis polled believed the dispute over Iran's nuclear program should be handled diplomatically while only 36 per cent said its reactors should be destroyed in a military strike. All top Israeli officials have pronounced the end of March, 2006, as the deadline for launching a military assault on Iran. The thinking behind this date is to heighten the pressure on the US to force the sanctions issue in the Security Council. The tactic is to blackmail Washington with the "war or else" threat, into pressuring Europe (namely Great Britain, France, Germany and Russia) into approving sanctions. Israel knows that its acts of war will endanger thousands of American soldiers in Iraq, and it knows that Washington (and Europe) cannot afford a third war at this time. The end of March date also coincides with the IAEA report to the UN on Iran's nuclear energy program. Israeli policymakers believe that their threats may influence the report, or at least force the kind of ambiguities, which can be exploited by its overseas supporters to promote Security Council sanctions or justify Israeli military action. A March date also focusses the political activities of the pro-Israel organizations in the United States. The major pro-Israel lobbies have lined up a majority in the US Congress and Senate to push for the UN Security Council to implement economic sanctions against Iran or, failing that, endorse Israeli "defensive" action. On the side of the Israeli war policy are practically all the major and most influential Jewish organizations, the pro-Israeli lobbies, their political action committees, a sector of the White House, a majority of subsidized Congressional representatives and state, local and party leaders. On the other side are sectors of the Pentagon, State Department, a minority of Congressional members, a majority of public opinion, a minority of American Jews and the majority of active and retired military commanders who have served or are serving in Iraq. Most discussion in the US on Israel's war agenda has been dominated by the pro-Israeli organizations that transmit the Israeli state positions. The Jewish weekly newspaper, Forward, has reported a number of Israeli attacks on the Bush Administration for not acting more aggressively on behalf of Israel's policy. According to the Forward, "Jerusalem is increasingly concerned that the Bush Administration is not doing enough to block Teheran from acquiring nuclear weapons" (December 9, 2005). Further stark differences occurred during the semi-annual strategic dialog between Israeli and US security officials, in which the Israelis opposed a US push for regime change in Syria, fearing a possible, more radical Islamic regime. Israeli officials also criticized the US for forcing Israel to agree to open the Rafah border crossing and upsetting their stranglehold on the economy in Gaza. Predictably the biggest Jewish organization in the US, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations immediately echoed the Israeli state line. Malcolm Hoenlan, President of the Conference, lambasted Washington for a "failure of leadership on Iran" and "contracting the issue to Europe" (Forward, December 9, 2005). He went on to attack the Bush Administration for not following Israel's demands by delaying referral of Iran to the UN Security Council for sanction. Hoenlan then turned on French, German and British negotiators accusing them of "appeasement and weakness", and of not having a "game plan for decisive action" ­ presumably for not following Israel's 'sanction or bomb them' game plan. The role of AIPAC, the Conference and other pro-Israeli organizations as transmission belts for Israel's war plans was evident in their November 28, 2005 condemnation of the Bush Administration agreement to give Russia a chance to negotiate a plan under which Iran would be allowed to enrich uranium for non-military purposes under international supervision. AIPAC's rejection of negotiations and demands for an immediate confrontation were based on the specious argument that it would "facilitate Iran's quest for nuclear weapons" ­ an argument which flies in the face of all known intelligence data (including Israel's) which says Iran is at least 3 to 10 years away from even approaching nuclear weaponry. AIPAC's unconditional and uncritical transmission of Israeli demands and criticism is usually clothed in the rhetoric of US interests or security in order to manipulate US policy. AIPAC chastised the Bush regime for endangering US security. By relying on negotiations, AIPAC accused the Bush Administration of "giving Iran yet another chance to manipulate (sic) the international community" and "pose a severe danger to the United States" (Forward, Dec. 9, 2005). Leading US spokesmen for Israel opposed President Bush's instruction to his Ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khaklilzad, to open a dialog with Iran's Ambassador to Iraq. In addition, Israel's official "restrained" reaction to Russia's sale to Teheran of more than a billion dollars worth of defensive anti-aircraft missiles, which might protect Iran from an Israeli air strike, was predictably echoed by the major Jewish organizations in the US. Pushing the US into a confrontation with Iran, via economic sanctions and military attack has been a top priority for Israel and its supporters in the US for more than a decade (Jewish Times/ Jewish Telegraph Agency, Dec. 6, 2005). In line with its policy of forcing a US confrontation with Iran, AIPAC, the Israeli PACs (political action committees) and the Conference of Presidents have successfully lined up a majority of Congress people to challenge what they describe as the "appeasement" of Iran. Representative Illeana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida), who has the dubious distinction of being a collaborator with Cuban exile terrorist groups and unconditional backer of Israel's war policy, is chairwoman of the US House of Representative Middle East subcommittee. From that platform she has denounced "European appeasement and arming the terrorist regime in Teheran". She boasted that her Iran sanctions bill has the support of 75 per cent of the members of Congress and that she is lining up additional so-sponsors. Despite pro-Israeli attacks on US policy for its 'weakness' on Iran, Washington has moved as aggressively as circumstances permit. Facing European opposition to an immediate confrontation (as AIPAC and Israeli politicians demand) Washington supports European negotiations but imposes extremely limiting conditions, namely a rejection of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which allows uranium enrichment for peaceful purposes. The European "compromise" of forcing Iran to turn over the enrichment process to a foreign country (Russia), is not only a violation of its sovereignty, but is a policy that no other country using nuclear energy practices. Given this transparently unacceptable "mandate", it is clear that Washington's 'support for negotiations' is a device to provoke an Iranian rejection, and a means of securing Europe's support for a Security Council referral for international sanctions. Despite the near unanimous support and widespread influence of the major Jewish organizations, 20 per cent of American Jews do not support Israel in its conflict with the Palestinians. Even more significantly, 61 per cent of Jews almost never talk about Israel or defend Israel in conversation with non-Jews (Jerusalem Post, Dec 1, 2005). Only 29 per cent of Jews are active promoters of Israel. The Israel First crowd represents less than a third of the Jewish community. In fact, there is more opposition to Israel among Jews than there is in the US Congress. Having said that, however, most Jewish critics of Israel are not influential in the big Jewish organizations and the Israel lobby, excluded from the mass media and mostly intimidated from speaking out, especially on Israel's war preparations against Iran. The Myth of the Iranian Nuclear Threat The Israeli Defense Forces Chief of Staff, Daniel Halutz, has categorically denied that Iran represents an immediate nuclear threat to Israel, let along the United States. According to Haaretz (12/14/05), Halutz stated that it would take Iran time to be able to produce a nuclear bomb ­ which he estimated might happen between 2008 and 2015. Israel's Labor Party officials do not believe that Iran represents an immediate nuclear threat and that the Sharon government and the Likud war propaganda is an electoral ploy. According to Haaretz, "Labor Party officialsaccused Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and other defense officials of using the Iran issue in their election campaigns in an effort to divert public debate from social issues". In a message directed at the Israeli Right but equally applicable to AIPAC and the Presidents of the Major Jewish Organizations in the US, Labor member of the Knesset, Benjamin Ben-Eliezer rejected electoral warmongering: "I hope the upcoming elections won't motivate the prime minister and defense minister to stray from government policy and place Israel on the frontlines of confrontation with Iran. The nuclear issue is an international issue and there is no reason for Israel to play a major role in it" (Haaretz, December 14, 2005). Israeli intelligence has determined that Iran has neither the enriched uranium nor the capability to produce an atomic weapon now or in the immediate future, in contrast to the hysterical claims publicized by the US pro-Israel lobbies. Mohammed El Baradei, head of the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has inspected Iran for several years, has pointed out that the IAEA has found no proof that Iran is trying to construct nuclear weapons. He criticized Israeli and US war plans indirectly by warning that a "military solution would be completely un-productive". More recently, Iran, in a clear move to clarify the issue of the future use of enriched uranium, "opened the door for US help in building a nuclear power plant". Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hamid Reza Asefi, stated "America can take part in the international bidding for the construction of Iran's nuclear power plant if they observe the basic standards and quality" (USA Today, Dec. 11, 2005). Iran also plans to build several other nuclear power plants with foreign help. This Iranian call for foreign assistance is hardly the strategy of a country trying to conduct a covert atomic bomb program, especially one directed at involving one of its principal accusers. The Iranians are at an elementary stage in the processing of uranium, not even reaching the point of uranium enrichment, which in turn will take still a number of years, and overcoming many complex technical problems before it can build a bomb. There is no factual basis for arguing that Iran represents a nuclear threat to Israel or to the US forces in the Middle East. Scores of countries with nuclear reactors by necessity use enriched uranium. The Iranian decision to advance to processing enriched uranium is its sovereign right as it is for all countries, which possess nuclear reactors in Europe, Asia and North America. Israel and AIPAC's resort to the vague formulation of Iran's potential nuclear capacity is so open-ended that it could apply to scores of countries with a minimum scientific infrastructure. The European Quartet has raised a bogus issue by evading the issue of whether or not Iran has atomic weapons or is manufacturing them and focused on attacking Iran's capacity to produce nuclear energy ­ namely the production of enriched uranium. The Quartet has conflated enriched uranium with a nuclear threat and nuclear potential with the danger of an imminent nuclear attack on Western countries, troops and Israel. The Europeans, especially Great Britain, have two options in mind: To impose an Iranian acceptance of limits on its sovereignty, more specifically on its energy policy; or to force Iran to reject the arbitrary addendum to the Non-Proliferation Agreement and then to propagandize the rejection as an indication of Iran's evil intention to create atomic bombs and target pro-Western countries. The Western media would echo the US and European governments position that Iran was responsible for the breakdown of negotiations. The Europeans would then convince their public that since "reason" failed, the only recourse it to follow the US to take the issue to the Security Council and approve international sanctions against Iran. The US then would attempt to pressure Russia and China to vote in favor of sanctions or to abstain. There is reason to doubt that either or both countries would agree, given the importance of the multi-billion dollar oil, arms, nuclear and trade deals between Iran and these two countries. Having tried and failed in the Security Council, the US and Israel would, on the scenario of the War Party, move toward a military attack. An air attack on suspected Iranian nuclear facilities would entail the bombing of heavily populated as well as remote regions leading to large-scale loss of life. The principal result will be a huge escalation of war throughout the Middle East. Iran, a country of 70 million, with several times the military forces that Iraq possessed and with highly motivated and committed military and paramilitary forces could be expected to cross into Iraq. Iraqi Shiites sympathetic to or allied with Iran would most likely break their ties with Washington and go into combat. US military bases, troops and clients would be under fierce attack. US military casualties would multiply. All troop withdrawal plans would be disrupted. The 'Iraqization' strategy would disintegrate. Most likely new terrorist incidents would occur in Western Europe, North America, and Australia and against US multinationals Sanctions on Iran would not work, because oil is a scarce and essential commodity. China, India and other fast-growing Asian countries would balk at a boycott. Turkey and other Muslim countries would not cooperate. The sanction policy would be destined to failure; its only result to raise the price of oil even higher. Here in the United States there are few if any influential organized lobbies challenging the pro-war Israel lobby either from the perspective of working for coexistence in the Middle East or even in defending US national interests when they diverge from Israel. Although numerous former diplomats, generals, intelligence officials, Reformed Jews, retired National Security advisers and State Department professionals have publicly denounced the Iran war agenda and even criticized the Israel First lobbies, their newspaper ads and media interviews have not been backed by any national political organization that can compete for influence in the White House and Congress. As we draw closer to a major confrontation with Iran and Israeli officials set short-term deadlines for igniting a Middle East conflagration, it seems that we are doomed to learn from future catastrophic losses that Americans must organize to defeat political lobbies based on overseas allegiances. James Petras, a former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York, owns a 50 year membership in the class struggle, is an adviser to the landless and jobless in brazil and argentina and is co-author of Globalization Unmasked (Zed). His new book with Henry Veltmeyer, Social Movements and the State: Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia and Argentina, will be published in October 2005. He can be reached at: jpetras@binghamton.edu -------- russia Russia deploys new nuclear missiles From correspondents in Moscow 25dec05 Australian http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,17659860%255E23109,00.html THE chief of Russia's strategic forces attended the deployment of a new set of state-of-the art intercontinental ballistic missiles today, boasting of their capability to penetrate any prospective missile defence, news reports said. THE chief of Russia's strategic forces attended the deployment of a new set of state-of-the art intercontinental ballistic missiles today, boasting of their capability to penetrate any prospective missile defence, news reports said. Colonel-General Nikolai Solovtsov, chief of the Strategic Missile Forces, took part in a ceremony that marked the commissioning of the latest set of Topol-M missiles at a missile base in Tatishchevo in the Volga River's Saratov region. Solovtsov said the new missile "is capable of penetrating any missile defence system", the RIA Novosti and Interfax news agencies reported. Russian officials have called prospective US missile defences destabilising and boasted repeatedly that Russia's new missiles could pierce any nation's missile shield. The Russian military commissioned the first group of Topol-Ms in December 1998, but the deployment has proceeded slower than planned because of a shortage of funds, and Soviet-built ballistic missiles have remained the backbone of the nation's nuclear forces. The Topol-M missiles, capable of hitting targets more than 10,000 kilometers away, have so far been deployed in silos. The mobile version, mounted on a heavy off-road vehicle, is to enter combat service next year, Solovtsov said. Russian media reports have said the Topol-M lifts off faster than its predecessors and manoeuvres in a way that makes it more difficult to spot and intercept. It is also reportedly capable of blasting off even after a nuclear explosion close to its silo. The deployed Topol-Ms have been fitted with single nuclear warheads, but officials have considered plans to equip each missile with three individually targeted warheads. -- Russia Deploys New Set of 'Unbeatable' Missiles 25.12.2005 MosNews http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/12/25/topolm.shtml The chief of Russia’s strategic forces on Saturday attended the deployment of a new set of state-of-the art intercontinental ballistic missiles, boasting of their capability to penetrate any prospective missile defense, news reports quoted by AP said. Colonel General Nikolai Solovtsov, chief of the Strategic Missile Forces, took part in a ceremony that marked the commissioning of the latest set of Topol-M missiles at a missile base in Tatishchevo in the Volga River’s Saratov region. Solovtsov said that the new missile “is capable of penetrating any missile defense system,” the RIA Novosti and Interfax news agencies reported. Russian officials have called prospective U.S. missile defenses destabilizing and boasted repeatedly that Russia’s new missiles could pierce any nation’s missile shield. The Russian military commissioned the first group of Topol-Ms in December 1998, but the deployment has proceeded slower than planned because of a shortage of funds, and Soviet-built ballistic missiles have remained the backbone of the nation’s nuclear forces. The Topol-M missiles, capable of hitting targets more than 10,000 kilometers away, have so far been deployed in silos. The mobile version, mounted on a heavy off-road vehicle, is to enter combat service next year, Solovtsov said. -------- MILITARY -------- iraq U.S.: No Handover of Prisons to Iraq Sun Dec 25, 2005 12:22 PM ET http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051225/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_prisons BAGHDAD, Iraq - The U.S. military said Sunday it will not hand over detention facilities or individual detainees to Iraqi officials until they have demonstrated higher standards of care. Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a military spokesman, said the facilities will be transferred over time but that the Iraqis must first demonstrate they are following international law and not violating detainees' human rights. "A specific timeline for doing this is difficult to project at this stage with so many variables," Johnson said, confirming a report in Sunday's New York Times. "The Iraqis are committed to doing this right and will not rush to failure. The transition will be based on meeting standards, not on a timeline." U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said earlier this month that at least 120 abused prisoners were found in two detention facilities run by the Shiite-led Interior Ministry. Even before then, Sunni Arabs had complained about abuse and torture by Interior Ministry security forces. Interior Minister Bayan Jabr has said torture allegations have been exaggerated by people who sympathize with the Sunni-led insurgency. The Iraqi government and multinational forces are planning and coordinating for the Iraqis to take full control ultimately of detention facilities. The U.S. Department of Justice is training Iraqi prison guards, Johnson said, and about 300 Iraqis have already completed the course. -------- israel / palestine Israel predicts PA collapse Official: Abbas could be unable to impose law and order Sunday 25 December 2005, 15:09 Makka Time, 12:09 GMT Aljazeera http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/7F6AB5BE-F71D-4E04-8E6C-7DE0FF732815.htm Israel is prepared for a possible "collapse" in the Palestinian Authority that could render Mahmoud Abbas incapable of imposing law and order. A senior Israeli official, speaking to AFP on Sunday, said: "We are prepared for a possible collapse in the Palestinian Authority that could risk seeing Mahmoud Abbas unable to impose law and order on the ground as well as within his own Fatah party. "At this point, Mahmoud Abbas is so weak in relation to Hamas that he is unable to implement the smallest decision." The powerful Hamas movement is gearing up to contest its first Palestinian parliamentary election on 25 January, posing a serious challenge to Fatah's decade-long grip on power. The official accused the Palestinian leader of being content to point the finger at Israel. "We cannot always blame others for our own weakness," he said. Israel's liberal Haaretz newspaper on Sunday quoted senior military officials as saying that Abbas was at an all-time political low since succeeding Yasser Arafat, who died in November 2004. Sharon resumes work Meanwhile, Ariel Sharon, the prime minister, was preparing to return to a full schedule of work after recovering from a mild stroke he suffered last week. Sharon was to meet ministers at cabinet on Sunday Sharon was to meet ministers at a weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday, his office said. He was taken to hospital a week ago after complaining that he felt unwell. Doctors later said he suffered a mild stroke that had not caused any permanent damage. Sharon's blood pressure and cholesterol levels are normal even though he is overweight, the doctors told Israeli media. Speculations about Sharon's weight have preoccupied Israelis, with the media reporting that it is between 117 and 142 kilogrammes. The mass circulation daily Yediot Ahronot reported on Sunday that Sharon had lost a kilo since the stroke. Sharon's doctors are scheduled to hold a press conference on Monday, Haaretz reported on Sunday. Agencies -------- latin america Bolivia's expectations high for its first Indian president Patrick J. McDonnell, Los Angeles Times Sunday, December 25, 2005 http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/12/25/MNGD3GBJER1.DTL La Paz , Bolivia -- He was reared in an adobe hut with a thatched roof. Four of his siblings didn't survive childhood. He only made it past a difficult birth because a traditional healer intervened. As a boy, he herded his family's llamas, kicked soccer balls on a dusty pitch and scavenged orange peels tossed by travelers in passing buses. "One of my great aspirations was to travel in one of those buses," he says. Today, Evo Morales crisscrosses Bolivia in a private plane and faces the daunting task of meeting the expectations he has raised among the country's angry masses. The 46-year-old former bricklayer, baker, sugarcane cutter and trumpet player is poised to be Bolivia's next president, and the first Indian president in the nation's history. Unofficial returns give Morales about 51 percent of the vote, which, if confirmed, would give the stocky union man and his Movement to Socialism the largest vote margin of any Bolivian president since the country's shaky return to democracy in 1982 after a series of military governments. Heads of state can come and go quickly in Bolivia, where popular protests have chased two presidents since 2003; dozens of military coups have marked the country's contentious history. So already, some community leaders are talking about giving Morales 90 days from his scheduled inauguration Jan. 22 to make good on his many promises, among them nationalizing the oil and gas industries, convening a constitutional assembly and revamping the entire government and economic structure. "This is not about one or three months," Morales replied recently, noting that foreign exploitation of Bolivia's resources and people dated to the Spanish conquest. "One can't erase a debt of 500 years in that time." Morales, an admirer of Fidel Castro and Venezuela's populist President Hugo Chavez, also opposes U.S. anti-drug efforts. He has pledged to be a nightmare for U.S. policymakers. In windswept hamlets on the barren altiplano, the high-plains homeland where Morales was born, people speak bitterly about U.S.-backed neoliberal economic policies that, in their view, have brought further impoverishment to South America's poorest nation. The theme was a mantra at every Morales campaign stop. Whether Morales and his team of economic neophytes come up with something better is an open question. He doesn't face an easy path. His party is unlikely to have a majority in the new Congress. He is not especially popular in the relatively prosperous lowlands to the east, including the city of Santa Cruz. The U.S. Embassy last week seemed to recognize the inevitable. "We congratulate Evo Morales on his apparent victory," the embassy said. "The quality of our relationship will depend on the policies of the new government on a wide range of issues, most importantly on strong respect for democratic institutions." Earlier in the day, Morales said Washington wasn't among the many capitals that had been in contact to congratulate him. "I don't expect anything from that government," snapped Morales. With so much anti-U.S. sentiment here, it was difficult for Morales' chief opponent, Jorge "Tuto" Quiroga, a U.S.-educated former interim president, to make much headway. He was often accused of being Washington's candidate. The early results show him with about 31 percent of the vote, some 20 points behind Morales. A dejected Quiroga conceded and congratulated Morales. Among all its other challenges abroad, the Bush administration now has to live with Morales as a head of state in the fractious heartland of South America. Morales' rise has caused ripples throughout a region where left-of-center, but generally pragmatic presidents have come to office in recent years in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. "Did Evo Morales win in Bolivia or did Hugo Chavez open his first outlet ... in the Andean region?" the conservative Argentine daily La Nacion asked. The lightning rod issue in U.S.-Bolivian relations remains the cultivation of the coca leaf, the raw ingredient in cocaine. Washington views the U.S.-backed coca-eradication program here as a great success in reducing the flow of Bolivian cocaine to the United States. Once a major supplier to the United States, Bolivia is now well behind Colombia and Peru, officials say. Morales, who rose to national prominence as leader of the coca-growers' federation based in the subtropical Chapare region, has already said he would seek to end the eradication scheme and other legal restrictions on coca cultivation. Rather than eradication, Morales spoke optimistically of a new industrialization of coca production for legal purposes, such as brewing tea, chewing and ceremonial uses. U.S. officials say the legally sanctioned coca-leaf quota here already satisfies such uses. Morales says he is against cocaine and has repeatedly denied links to traffickers, charges that got him temporarily thrown out of Bolivia's Congress in 2002. Although they won't say so in public, U.S. officials are concerned that Morales will open the country to unfettered coca production. Three years ago, when Morales first ran for president, his popularity soared after the then-U.S. ambassador, Manuel Rocha, warned U.S. aid would likely diminish if Morales were elected. Morales thereafter referred in jest to the U.S. ambassador as his campaign manager. But the coca issue, while high on the priority list of U.S. concerns, is only part of the broad, populist agenda that swept Morales to power. He parlayed his humble origins and coca-union activism into a national platform that tapped into Bolivians' deep disgust with a political status quo long dominated by a white and mixed-race elite with close ties to Washington and multinational corporations. "Evo is something new, not the same old corrupt leaders who have sold our patrimony," said Vilma Lobos, a 21-year-old shopkeeper in La Paz, expressing a common sentiment. "I think he will be able to keep his promises, unlike all the other politicians." -------- POLITICS -------- investigations For Agency's `Rendering' Teams, A Lavish Overseas Lifestyle December 25, 2005 By JOHN CREWDSON, Chicago Tribune http://www.courant.com/news/yahoo/hc-renditioncost1225.artdec25,0,209553.story?coll=hc-aol-yahoo-nws-hed MILAN, Italy -- When the CIA decides to "render" a terrorism suspect living abroad for interrogation in Egypt or another friendly Middle East nation, it spares no expense. Italian prosecutors wrote in court papers that the CIA spent "enormous amounts of money" during the six weeks it took the agency to figure out how to grab a 39-year-old Muslim preacher called Abu Omar off the streets of Milan, throw him into a van and drive him to the airport. First to arrive in Milan was the surveillance team, and the hotels they chose were among the best Europe has to offer. Especially popular was the gilt-and-crystal Principe di Savoia, with acres of burnished wood paneling and plush carpets, where a single room costs $588 a night, a club sandwich goes for $28.75, and a Diet Coke adds another $9.35. According to hotel records later obtained by the Milan police investigating Abu Omar's disappearance, two CIA operatives managed to ring up more than $9,000 in room charges alone. The CIA's bill at the Principe for seven operatives came to $39,995, not counting meals, parking and other hotel services. Another group of seven operatives managed to spend $40,098 on room charges at the Westin Palace, a five-star hotel across the Piazza della Repubblica from the Principe, where a club sandwich is only $20. A former CIA officer who has worked undercover abroad said those prices were "way over" the CIA's allowed rates for foreign travel. "But you can get away with it if you claim you needed the hotel `to maintain your cover,'" he said. "They would have had to pose as high-flying businessmen." Judging from the photographs on the passports they displayed when checking into their hotels and the international driving licenses they used to rent cars, not many of the Milan operatives could have passed as "high-flying businessmen." In all, records show, the CIA paid 10 Milan hotels at least $158,000 in room charges. Although the Milan police obtained the hotel bills of 22 alleged CIA operatives, they say at least 59 cellphones were used in the weeks leading up to the abduction. Even allowing for the possibility that some operatives used more than one phone, prosecutors believe that a significant number of operatives remain unidentified. A senior U.S. official said the agency's deployment in Milan was "about usual for that kind of operation." But in December 2001, when the CIA arrived in frigid Stockholm to transport two suspected Islamic militants to Cairo, it sent eight rendition experts to do the job, according to a Swedish television documentary. When a rendition team showed up in Macedonia in January 2004 to collect a Kuwait-born Germany citizen, Khalid el-Masri, and fly him to Afghanistan, there were only 11 operatives on the plane, according to a Spanish police report. At the beginning of February 2003, with the abduction still three weeks away, 10 of the operatives, who presumably had been spending their days charting Abu Omar's movements as he walked from his apartment to the local mosque and back, left Milan to spend the weekend in a hotel overlooking the harbor at La Spezia, on Italy's Mediterranean coast. Some male and female operatives shared the same hotel rooms, records show. Before heading back to Milan, five members of the group detoured to Florence, where they checked into the renowned Grand Hotel Baglioni. Once Abu Omar was safely behind bars in Cairo, some of the operatives who had helped put him there split up into twos and threes and headed for luxury resort hotels in the Italian Alps, Tuscany and Venice. Hotel records indicate at least two couples on those trips shared the same rooms. Asked if there had been some operational or other official reason for the ultra-expensive hotels and side trips, the senior U.S. official shrugged. "They work hard," he said. One expense the CIA did spare the U.S. taxpayers was the dozen traffic tickets generated when the agency's rented cars were photographed by police cameras driving illegally in the city's bus and taxi lanes. Because the cars had been rented using false names and addresses, the $500 in fines was paid by the car rental agencies. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the U.S. intelligence budget has been increased by Congress to an estimated $40 billion a year, an all-time record. In their travels around Europe, some of the CIA's rendition teams gravitated to another vacation resort spot, the Mediterranean island of Palma de Mallorca, according to a recent report by a Spanish police agency, The Guardia Civil. At least three planes believed to be owned or operated by the CIA - including a Boeing 737 that rendered el-Masri to Afghanistan and the Gulfstream executive jet that Italian prosecutors say flew Abu Omar to Cairo - made at least 10 stops on Mallorca during 2004. The Spanish government says it has been assured by the Bush administration that none of the CIA planes stopping on Spanish soil had prisoners on board or otherwise infringed Spanish law. At least some of the Mallorcan stopovers were used to take on fuel after arriving from, or before departing for, the United States. But according to the Guardia's report, the 737 spent five days on Mallorca in April of last year before departing for Libya - more time than required for refueling. Another of the Mallorcan stopovers lasted three days. There were five two-day visits, and three others that lasted a single day and night. The police say most of the passengers on those flights spent the layovers at two of Palma's most exclusive hotels, the Mallorca Marriott and the Gran Melia Victoria. The five-star Gran Melia charges $1,018 a night for a suite during the month of September, when several of the stopovers occurred, although it is not known whether they rented a suite. The $1,018 price does not include breakfast. At the Marriott, a junior suite goes for $300 a night, and an executive suite for $325. Access to the hotel's golf course is $65. According to the local newspaper, the Diario de Mallorca, the hotel bills incurred during some of those layovers included greens fees, massages and $78 bottles of Pesquera red wine. Chicago Tribune correspondents Drew Crosby and Samuel Loewenberg in Madrid contributed to this report. -------- ENERGY -------- alternative energy Trying to Catch the Wind By STEVE STRUNSKY Published: December 25, 2005 New York Times ATLANTIC CITY http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/25/nyregion/nyregionspecial2/25njCOVER.ready.html ED McDONALD, a low roller at the Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa, was waiting for a jitney when he paused to gawk at what may turn out to be yet another of this city's tourist attractions - the nation's first coastal wind farm, whose sleek 380-foot-high turbines stand like immense kinetic sculptures at the entrance to this seaside resort. "It's clean energy, it's futuristic, it doesn't block the view," said Mr. McDonald, 52, an unemployed warehouse worker who had just quit the blackjack tables after four hours and enough losing hands for one day. "Offshore, out in the water, then I would say they'd be a problem, then you're taking away from the seashore itself, the view and everything." Federal and state officials are betting on wind power as an environmentally friendly and economically viable way to help reduce the ever-growing dependence on fossil fuels for generating electricity, particularly along New Jersey's rapidly growing Shore communities. The Jersey-Atlantic Wind Farm will be operated here by a Pennsylvania company known as Community Energy. It will be on the grounds of the Atlantic County Utility Authority's water treatment plant. Once they begin operating early next year, the farm's five wind turbines, built by GE Wind Energy, a division of General Electric, will spin out a total of 7.5 megawatts of electricity, enough to supply 60 percent of the treatment plant's power needs and electrify 2,500 households. Thousands of private and commercial turbines already harvest gusts along ridgelines, farm fields and windswept plains in 30 states, according to the American Wind Energy Association, a trade group in Washington. But the Atlantic City project, which state and industry officials say will be the first coastal wind farm in the United States, is perhaps most important because of its role as a demonstration project at a crucial moment in the development of wind power in New Jersey and the nation. "I think our project will give people a sense of what is being discussed," said Richard Dovey, executive director of the utility authority. But government and industry officials say New Jersey's real wind power potential lies offshore, where the strength and regularity of the wind far exceeds overland breezes. And in windmill circles, much of the discussion these days is on an ambitious proposal to plant a total of 1,019 turbines like those in Atlantic City in the seabed a few miles off that hallowed source of state pride and tourism dollars known as the Jersey Shore. Fueling doubts, speculation and controversy over the proposal is the fact that there have never been offshore windmills in United States waters, though Winergy is just one of several companies that have applied for permits to erect them in at least a half-dozen states. The issue is particularly sensitive in New Jersey, where residents take special pride in the state's 127-mile coastline, and much of the state's huge tourism industry depends on it. Opponents of offshore windmills can be assured that Winergy's plans, which call for five distinct wind farms from Seaside Heights to Cape May, are not likely to be realized soon. The Department of the Interiors Minerals Management Service, an agency that was given permitting and regulatory authority over offshore windmills by federal legislation in August, has tabled all but two proposals, one off Long Island and the other in Nantucket Sound, while it drafts permitting and operating guidelines for the nascent offshore wind power industry. A Moratorium and a Final Report Gary Strasburg, a spokesman for the minerals service, which also regulates natural gas and oil extraction on the continental shelf, said the wind regulations should be complete by May, when the agency will resume reviewing permit applications. The minerals service inherited the wind jurisdiction from the Army Corps of Engineers, which will continue to be involved in the permit process. Apart from any delays in approval resulting from the regulatory handoff, there is currently a moratorium in place on state financing or permitting of offshore wind projects that was imposed by Acting Gov. Richard J. Codey last December, when he also appointed a panel to study the issue. Even outside state waters, the federal Coastal Zone Management Act gives states a say in projects likely to have an effect on their coastlines. Last month, the nine-member panel appointed by Mr. Codey, formally known as the Blue Ribbon Panel on Development of Wind Turbine Facilities in Coastal Waters issued an interim report laying out the environmental, aesthetic and economic pros and cons of offshore windmills. In March, when the moratorium is scheduled to be lifted, the panel is to present a final report, with recommendations, to the new governor, Jon S. Corzine. The panel, which is being headed by Mayor Edward J. McKenna Jr. of Red Bank, includes leaders and officials from the environmental, tourism and energy fields. One member, Jeanne M. Fox, who is president of the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, seemed to be leaning in favor of offshore wind power in remarks she made after a Dec. 12 dedication ceremony for Atlantic City's project, the state's first utility-level wind farm. "It's a small step in reducing fossil-fuel carbon emissions, but it's important in that millions of people who come to Atlantic City every year will be seeing these wind turbines," Ms. Fox said. "Even though they are not offshore, they are about as close to offshore as you can get." She and others are counting on wind to play a major role in the state's plans to reduce carbon emissions from fossil fuels. In 1999, the Legislature approved a law requiring energy companies to include renewable energy sources like the sun, wind and wood-burning furnaces, in their power portfolios. Standards developed by the utilities board call for 6.5 percent of the electricity used in New Jersey be from renewable sources. In September, the Board of Public Utilities proposed increasing the number to 20 percent by 2020. Nothing New in Europe Europe - where windmills compete with tulips as national symbols and Cervantes tilted his quixotic hero at them 400 years ago - is far ahead of the United States in the use of wind power, with more than 34,000 megawatts of capacity in 2004, or nearly two thirds of the world's wind energy supply, according to the European Wind Energy Association. Denmark, for example, derives about 20 percent of its electricity from the wind. The United States, by comparison, had a total wind power capacity of just 6,740 megawatts in 2004, providing less than one percent of the country's power, said Christine Real de Azua, a spokeswoman for the American Wind Energy Association, an affiliate of the European group under the Global Wind Energy Council. So far, Europe accounts for all of the world's offshore wind power, Ms. Azua said. The largest offshore facility is at Nysted, Denmark, where 72 light-gray turbines rise 360 feet above the North Sea, generating up to 165 megawatts of electricity, or enough to power 145,000 homes. But even in Europe, offshore wind power is still uncommon, accounting for only 600 megawatts in 2004. Right now, virtually none of New Jersey's electricity is generated by wind turbines. Rather, the state gets about half its power from its four nuclear reactors (the national average is 20 percent), while 30 percent is generated by natural gas, according to the federal Energy Information Administration. The state's third leading energy source, at 18 percent in 2004, is coal. The wind panel noted in its interim report that New Jersey consumes more electricity than it produces, forcing the state's power companies to import electricity from other plants within the Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Maryland (PJM) power grid, including upwind coal-burning plants that emit deadly sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide particles. "Many of these out-of-state facilities use fossil fuels and are upwind of New Jersey, adding to the state's air quality problems," the report says. "All are beyond the state's regulatory authority to control air pollutants." The report also notes the state's demand for energy is increasing at about 1.4 percent a year, much of that fueled by the growth of New Jersey's Shore communities. Other advantages to developing wind power cited in the report include reduced dependence on often-volatile foreign oil supplies, and potential cost savings; unlike oil prices, the cost of wind does not fluctuate. The disadvantages of wind power listed in the report include the hazards that turbine blades and poles pose to birds, boaters, fisherman and the shipping industry; disruption of the ocean floor and marine life during construction; potential contamination from lubricating oil; and their aesthetic impact and any resulting decline in tourism, which generates $32 billion a year in economic activity and accounts for 430,000 jobs, 40 percent of which are in the state's four oceanfront counties - Monmouth, Ocean, Atlantic and Cape May. "Anybody who cares about New Jersey cares about the tourism industry," said Ms. Fox. Beyond New Jersey, federal permits have been sought for offshore farms in Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia and elsewhere. The Long Island Power Authority and a Florida company, FPL Energy, are jointly seeking a permit for a wind farm off Jones Beach. "We are in a bit of a race," said Bert Cunningham, a spokesman for the Long Island Power Authority. Controversy in Nantucket Sound But the most visible and most controversial proposal so far is one by a Massachusetts company known as Cape Wind Associates, which wants to erect 130 turbines in Nantucket Sound. A final decision on the project is scheduled for January 2007, following public hearings this summer, said Mr. Strasburg, the spokesman for the minerals service. The project has been vigorously opposed by Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and his nephew, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., senior counsel to the Environmental Defense Fund, who has said he supports offshore wind power - particularly once deep-water technology is developed - but that he opposes the Cape Wind project on the ground that it would spoil a marine wilderness and recreation area, and because a study suggests it would cost the local economy over a billion dollars a year and more than 2,500 tourism jobs. "Cape Wind's proposal involves construction of 130 giant turbines whose windmill arms will reach 417 feet above the water and be visible for up to 26 miles," Mr. Kennedy wrote this month in an Op-Ed article in The New York Times. "These turbines are less than six miles from shore and would be seen from Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. Hundreds of flashing lights to warn airplanes away from the turbines will steal the stars and nighttime views." An amendment to a federal Coast Guard financing bill, now pending before a House-Senate conference committee, would bar wind farms within 1.5 miles of shipping lanes, and effectively kill the Cape Wind project. Mark Rogers, a spokesman for Cape Wind, noted that the project would be in view of the famous Kennedy family compound in Hyannisport, and he said that Mr. Kennedy was taking an all-too-common position on offshore windmills: they sound like a good idea, but not in my backyard - or in this case, not off my beach. "I don't know what it means, frankly, to say you're in favor of wind energy as an abstract concept, but then to oppose real-world, practical projects that can be achieved soon and start delivering the benefits of wind energy to your community," Mr. Rogers said. Likewise, Mr. Cunningham said that Long Islanders were initially supportive of wind power, but that the reaction to the Jones Beach proposal was decidedly mixed once its location became clear. Specifics of Winergy's plans have not been subject to public hearings and the attendant news media coverage, and so far, the battle over offshore wind power in New Jersey has not been nearly as pitched as in Massachusetts. But once the debate begins, it seems likely to be intense, considering the scale of the project and the importance of the Shore in New Jersey's very identity. A Plan for 5 Farms Offshore According to the company's Web site (www.winergyllc.com), the New Jersey plans call for five farms set between 3.5 and 6.4 miles offshore, in 48 to 60 feet of water, spread over an area of 234 square miles. In all, the five farms would have a generating capacity of 3,648 megawatts of electricity, more than half the total generating capacity of all existing windmills in the entire United States. The largest of the five farms, known as Five Fathom Bank 1, would include 335 turbines spread over 88 square miles and be situated 3.5 miles off Cape May Point. The northernmost site, off the coast of Asbury Park, calls for 98 turbines set 3.5 miles off the beach. There is no cost estimate for the proposal, said Dennis Quaranta, the president of Winergy. Winergy originally applied for permits in 2002. There is no anticipated time frame for a response, said Mr. Strasburg, the spokesman for the Minerals Management Service. In the meantime, Mr. Quaranta said the controversy swirling about the Cape Wind and Jones Beach proposals has prompted him to consider locations much farther off the Jersey Shore than his current proposals, and he is following developments in deep-water turbine technology. "We know there's a problem that people aren't happy about seeing these turbines," said Mr. Quaranta, known in the industry as a "wind prospector," a 55-year-old former restaurant owner whose experience applying for a federal fish-farm permit led to his interest in developing offshore wind power. "The permitting is basically the same as a fish farm." To face inland from the boardwalk at Asbury Park is, for all the talk of redevelopment, to look upon a bleak panorama of decaying amusements, crumbling hotels and unfinished apartments. But turn around to face the ocean, and the view is as rich and pristine as in Deal or Loch Arbor, Asbury Park's wealthy neighbors to the north. Even so, the prospect of dozens of wind turbines on the distant horizon was welcomed by Harold Rohrs, who was on the boardwalk recently, braving the December chill for a midday stroll from his home in neighboring Ocean Grove. Mr. Rohrs, a 65-year-old retired biology professor who has traveled widely and seen windmills in Europe and Australia, said that they "certainly were not ugly." "I didn't find them at all disruptive to the environment, to the aesthetics of the environment," he said. "I guess, in truth, I was thinking how marvelous it was that they were using the wind as a renewable source of energy, without adding to the C02 in the environment." The professor is not alone. The wind panel's interim report cites a survey taken in Vermont, which found that people's aesthetic judgment of windmills seemed to be influenced by their attitude toward renewable energy. Essentially, the more people like wind power, the better-looking windmills are to them. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," Mr. Quaranta said of wind turbines. "People are going to look at them and say they're beautiful. Other people are going to look at them as say, 'Ugh, it's commercializing the ocean.' " -------- ACTIVISTS China jails democracy activist Thousands demonstrated against Japan in April Sunday 25 December 2005, 15:04 Makka Time, 12:04 GMT Reuters http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/E8A47016-9895-45FE-BC21-11F146A2F3C2.htm China has sentenced a democracy activist to 12 years in prison for allegedly organising protests that were part of a wave of anti-Japanese demonstrations this year. Xu Wanping, 44, was convicted of "incitement to subvert state power" and sentenced on Friday in a closed-door hearing by a court in southwest China's Chongqing municipality, where he lives, Chen Xianying, his wife said. Chen said she did not find out about the court's decision until later. "He's innocent," she said. "They should release him immediately." Xu was among about eight political dissidents who were known to have been arrested in May, a month after large anti-Japanese demonstrations occurred in several large Chinese cities. The detentions of the dissidents reflect China's unease with anti-Japanese sentiments and fear that dissidents critical of the government could take advantage of the protests to influence ordinary people to protest against other issues, such as corruption and lack of freedoms. Xu is believed to be the first of the group of dissidents to be sentenced. During three weekends in April, tens of thousands of demonstrators across several Chinese cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, threw stones, eggs and bottles at the Japanese embassy, shops and restaurants. Protesters opposed Japan's recent approval of history textbooks that China and other Asian countries say gloss over its wartime atrocities, and Japan's attempt to secure a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.