------- Index of Articles
NUCLEAR
Muroroa atoll crumbling after nuclear tests
French Try to Prove Chernobyl Caused Ailments
Joint South Korea-Russia Statement
Putin Sees ABM Treaty as Pillar of Security
Immunogenetic background of autoimmune fatigue syndrome
Autoimmune fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia syndrome
Tennessee city to send hundreds of cards in support of crew
Navy officer visits families of submarine victims
Russia, Vietnam expand strategic ties
Sub tragedy exposes wider civilian problems
Russia May Help Persuade North Korea to Give Up Missiles
Sub Commander Apologizes More Directly to Families
Fed Govt urged to condemn ships carrying plutonium fuel
Battling to Dominate Nuclear Waste Disposal
DEPLETED URANIUM:
Powell to face queries about sanctions
Kyushu also hangs back from plutonium burning
Key U.S. Congressman Talks Tough on China and Taiwan
Wrong way on missile defense
Military Satellite Effort Criticized in Report
Special Report Taiwan's Nuclear Power Plant
THE MAIL
Civilians at Sea
Radsafe under influence of Radaition Safety and Health Group
Flats cleanup unlikely before 2008
Cleanup crew polishes water
New Mexico
Engineer at Indian Point 2 Quits Over a Safety Issue
Uranium Plant the plant.
Uranium Plant plant's future.
PERRY POWERS UP
black residents weren't coerced to live near Y-12
Alliance: Carson suit needs closure
Spending cuts could hit Northwest
A presidential speech
MILITARY
Vietnam, Russia Sign Deal
Beijing says sales of arms to Taiwan could hurt trade
Memo Feeds Concern That Exports to U.S. Help Burmese Junta
Colombian rebel chief won't 'beg' U.S.
Maryland Senate committee votes on medical marijuana
Scientists find drugs on site of Shakespeare's home
Annual Drug Report Shows Coca Growth Increase
Drug Runners' Tunnels Test the Agents
COCAINE-DEALING INDICTMENTS
Can't fool customs
Harlan
Press club diplomacy
Navy suspends use of disputed bombing range
China Ratifies Major U.N. Rights Pact
Beijing ratifies pact on human rights
Pentagon unveils new 'non-lethal' weapon
The Transformation of Strategic-Strike Operations
Public access is important
Arizona
OTHER
Second group of elk released
Cumberland Utility issues water quality statement
Whitman Backs Clinton Rules to Cut Diesel Pollution
7 Rare Black Rhinos Killed in Tanzania
Spurned by E.U. on Mad-Cow Aid,
Virus affecting more than livestock
Dark sports calendar in Ireland
FOOT-AND-MOUTH SPREADS
The Ups and Downs of a Climate Debate
American dependence threatens our national security
California
Green after all
Australia bars grapes from California
THE_MAIL
Seed was contaminated with engineered corn
Georgia
Wife of F.B.I. Agent Had No Knowledge of Espionage
Carnie Knowledge(1)
Carnie Knowledge(2)
Hectic Pace for Terrorists Before Embassy Explosion
TERROR CRACKDOWN
Hanssen told KGB a 'friend' might spy
Arafat is accused of ordering attacks
ACTIVISTS
Public Protests Around The World
Globalization is hazardous to Your health
Local Coalition Mobilized to Fight NAFTA
Emergency Appeal for Duro Workers
New free FTAA Newspaper available for distribution!
Anti-AIDS, Anti-Patent Action
Retired Ringling Bros. elephants sent to sanctuary
INDIAN RIGHTS MARCH
-------- NUCLEAR
NZ claims Muroroa atoll crumbling after nuclear tests
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-1mar2001-81.htm
New Zealand is seeking official talks with France over reports that its former nuclear test site on a South Pacific atoll is crumbling.
A report from Paris quotes a senior official for nuclear safety at the French Atomic Energy Commission as saying the tests had contributed to a weakening of the atoll rock on Mururoa.
The Disarmament Minister, Matt Robson, says the report vindicates New Zealand's protests against the tests.
He says information about damage to the atoll and possible plutonium hotspots has been available for some years and he wants to talk to French officials about it.
France conducted 178 atmospheric and underground nuclear tests on Mururoa Atoll and nearby Fangataufa between 1966 and 1996.
-----
French Try to Prove Chernobyl Caused Ailments
March 1, 2001
Excite News
http://news.excite.com/news/r/010301/14/health-chernobyl-ailments
PARIS (Reuters) - A group of French people with thyroid ailments began legal moves on Thursday to try to prove they fell ill because France failed to warn citizens of the radioactive fallout of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
The 53 plaintiffs, backed by two pressure groups, lodged a complaint against persons unknown at the Palace of Justice in Paris on grounds of alleged poisoning and associated counts.
The technical step under French law means a judge must now examine the complaint, though the judge is not bound to order a criminal investigation.
A similar attempt by a sole plaintiff failed last year on grounds that the person could not demonstrate a scientific link between the Chernobyl accident and the illness.
The Chernobyl complex in Ukraine was the site of the world's worst nuclear accident in April 1986, when a reactor exploded and radiation spewed from its burning shell. The plant shut down for good in December.
The plaintiffs allege that French authorities did nothing to alert citizens to the potential dangers from a cloud of radioactivity that drifted west from Chernobyl.
"Too many things have been hidden. We were always told that the cloud had stopped at the border. We want the truth," said one of the plaintiffs, 50-year-old Jean-Claude Foures.
Christian Curtil, the group's lawyer, acknowledged that there was no absolute scientific link between the accident and his clients' illnesses, but said there was sufficient circumstantial evidence to warrant opening an investigation.
---
Washington Downplays Significance of Joint South Korea-Russia Statement
Mar 1, 2001
Russia Today
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=300116
WASHINGTON, Mar 1, 2001 -- (Agence France Presse) A joint statement by Russia and South Korea declaring support for the 1972 anti-ballistic missile treaty does not indicate South Korean opposition to a U.S. national missile defense system, a State Department spokesman said Wednesday.
"The Korean ministry of foreign affairs stated that they had not intended in any way to have their statement imply opposition to missile defense," the spokesman, Richard Boucher, said. "And ... there's no mention of missile defense in the joint statement."
In their joint statement released Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin and South Korean President Kim Dae-Jung said the ABM treaty should be preserved and strengthened.
South Korea and Russia "agreed that the 1972 ABM Treaty is a cornerstone of strategic stability and an important foundation for international efforts on nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation," said the statement.
Russia opposes the proposed U.S. missile defense system, which Moscow says cannot be built without violating the treaty.
The communique did not specifically mention Washington's missile defense plan but was widely interpreted as signaling opposition to the proposed shield by South Korea, a key U.S. ally.
The South Korean foreign ministry later denied that interpretation of the statement, although Seoul is known to be wary of U.S. missile defense plans, as they could undermine the rapprochement launched by a landmark inter-Korean summit last year.
But it has not expressed open opposition to its key ally's missile shield. (Agence France Presse)
---
Putin Sees ABM Treaty as Pillar of Security
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Los Angeles Times
Associated Press
http://www.latimes.com/cgi-bin/print.cgi
SEOUL--Signaling displeasure over U.S. plans for a missile defense system, Russian President Vladimir V. Putin on Wednesday described a 1972 nuclear arms treaty as the "root and trunk" of world security.
Russia has said that a U.S. missile defense program would violate the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, which bans such systems under the belief that a country would not launch a nuclear strike if it were unable to protect itself against retaliation.
"Any attempts to change the treaty will shake the strategic root and trunk of world peace and security," Putin told South Korean legislators in Seoul, the capital.
A Russian general also accused the U.S. on Wednesday of violating the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and threatened retaliatory measures if Washington withdraws from the ABM Treaty. "If we run into facts of unilateral violations of the ABM Treaty, Russia may review other international treaties concerning strategic weapons," Lt. Gen. Vyacheslav Romanov said, according to the Interfax news agency.
---
Immunogenetic background of patients with autoimmune fatigue syndrome
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
Autoimmunity 2000 Oct
Immunogenetic background of patients with autoimmune fatigue syndrome Itoh Y, Igarashi T, Tatsuma N, Imai T, Yoshida J, Tsuchiya M, Murakami M, Fukunaga Y Department of Pediatrics, Nippon Medical School, Tokyo, Japan. [Record supplied by publisher]
We have previously reported that approximately 50% of children with chronic nonspecific complaints were positive for antinuclear antibodies (ANA), and that a novel autoantibody to a 62kD protein (anti-Sa) was found in 40% of these ANA-positive patients.
Therefore, we proposed a distinct disease entity termed autoimmune fatigue syndrome (AIFS). We hypothesized that if autoimmune mechanisms did play an important role in the pathogenesis of AIFS, it is possible that it is immunogenetically regulated as observedin other autoimmune disorders. In order to examine the immunogenetic background of AIFSpatients, HLA-A, -B, -C, and -DR loci were analyzed serologically in 61 AIFS patients.
AIFS was found to be positively associated with the class I antigen HLA-B61 and with the class II antigen HLA-DR9, with odds ratios of 2.77 (p = 0.015, Pcorr = 0.48) and 2.60 (p= 0.012, Pcorr = 0.17), respectively. A negative association was also found between AIFS and HLA-DR2 with odds ratio of 0.25 (p = 0.029, Pcorr = 0.041).
When comparing anti-Sa positive AIFS patients with healthy controls, the odds ratios associated with HLA-B61, DR9, and DR2 were 3.42 (p = 0.021, Pcorr = 0.22), 3.96 (p = 0.0011, Pcorr = 0.015), and 0.16 (p = 0.0022, Porr = 0.031), respectively. Thus, the HLA associations observed in this study suggested that immunogenetic background might play a role in AIFS. PMID: 11092699
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Autoimmune fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia syndrome
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
Nippon Ika Daigaku Zasshi 1999 Aug
Itoh Y, Igarashi T, Tatsuma N, Imai T, Yoshida J, Tsuchiya M, Murakami M, Fukunaga Y Department of Pediatrics, Nippon Medical School, Tokyo, Japan.
We have encounted two patients with fibromyalgia (FM) initially diagnosed as having autoimmune fatigue syndrome (AIFS). To investigate the relationship between AIFS and FM, the distribution of the tender points in patients with AIFS was assessed according to the ACR criteria for FM. It was revealed that AIFS patients had 5.6 tender points on averages. Patients with headaches, digestive problems, or difficulty going to school had more tender points than patients without. Patients with ANA titers <1: 160 had more tender points than patients with ANA> or = 1: 160. Anti-Sa negative patients had more tender points than positive patients. These results suggest a relationship between AIFS and FM in terms of the pathophysiologic mechanisms of the numerous tender points. In other words, ANA-positive FM patients could be oneform of AIFS, as well as ANA-positive chronic fatigue syndrome patients. Thus, autoimmunitycould explain the controversial disease entities of FM and/or CFS. PMID: 10466339
---
Tennessee city to send hundreds of cards in support of USS Greeneville crew
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Oak Ridger
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/030101/stt_0301010050.html
GREENEVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- A Tennessee organization is leading a campaign to send hundreds of cards to those associated with last month's collision of a U.S. submarine with a Japanese fishing boat.
Members of USS Greeneville Inc. -- whose mission is to maintain contact with and support the crew of its submarine namesake -- have collected a large suitcase full of cards, letters and student artwork in hopes of rallying crew morale after the accident.
"The intent of our trip is to be there for our extended family on the submarine and to show our concern and sympathy for the Japanese families on behalf of this community," said organization president Dale Long, who leaves for Hawaii Thursday to hand-deliver the cards.
USS Greeneville Inc. was organized in 1989 to lobby the Navy for a Los Angeles class submarine named for the Greeneville community. The city participated in the new submarine's christening ceremony in 1994, and helped underwrite its commissioning festivities in 1996.
Nine people are presumed dead after the USS Greeneville smashed into the Japanese fishing boat Ehime Maru on Feb. 9, as the submarine was practicing an emergency surfacing maneuver.
The boat -- operated by a high school for aspiring sailors in Uwajima, about 430 miles southwest of Tokyo -- was carrying 35 people at the time of the accident.
---
Navy officer visits families of submarine victims
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2001-03-01-japsub.htm
UWAJIMA, Japan (AP) - The Navy's No. 2 officer completed a round of apologies on behalf of President Bush on Thursday, expressing "profound sorrow" to the families and classmates of four students presumed dead after a U.S. submarine sank their training ship.
The four 17-year-old boys are among nine people lost at sea after the USS Greeneville rammed their ship while surfacing on Feb. 9 off the Hawaiian island of Oahu. The ship, which sank within minutes, is operated by a high school for aspiring sailors in this small fishing village.
"I was sent by President Bush to be his personal representative and to convey his apologies and profound sorrow," Adm. William Fallon said after a closed-door meeting with the families and dozens of students.
The visit by Fallon comes at an emotional moment.
Thursday was graduation day for about 50 of the school's 200 students. Wearing dark blue jackets and huddling under umbrellas, they arrived at school in twos and threes, greeted outside by teachers while about 20 cameramen and reporters looked on. Some of the girls carried flowers.
"When we went to Hawaii (immediately after the accident), I was very unhappy with the way we were treated. But now I feel that the United States is making a sincere effort to address our concerns," said Ryosuke Terata, father of one of the missing students. "I came away feeling certain that the raising of the Ehima Maru will happen."
Shoko Takagi, a relative of missing teacher Jun Nakata, said, "We weren't just reiterating our demands. We were sharing our feelings."
Fallon's sweep through Japan and the ubiquitous apologies recently by American officials have been well received, and appear to be calming anger over the accident and Washington's initial failure to release the information that civilians were at the sub's controls when it occurred.
After their meeting, school principal Ietaka Horita said he thanked Fallon for his "sincere efforts." Horita added he believes the United States is a nation that "cherishes justice, values, human rights and human lives."
"I think it's important that somebody close to the president apologized to the families in person," said Tomomi Mizuno, a 16-year-old freshman. "There's been a lot of misunderstanding on both sides, and I think it's good there was finally some communication."
Over the past two days in Tokyo, Fallon apologized on behalf of Bush to Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and other political leaders and met with some families of the lost nine. He called on the local governor Thursday morning before coming to this village about 430 miles southwest of Tokyo.
The families got the apology they wanted most on Wednesday, when Cmdr. Scott Waddle visited Japan's consulate in Honolulu and hand-delivered his written apologies to them.
Waddle, who according to reports here was born on a military base in Japan, cried as he handed over the letters.
"I think they've apologized enough," said Tokitatsu Miyashita, directing traffic at a construction site near the school.
Families of those presumed dead - the four students, two teachers and three crew members - have repeatedly demanded the boat, the Ehime Maru, be salvaged and the bodies recovered.
Fallon said the possibility of raising the boat was being evaluated.
Washington's concern reflects the crucial importance it attaches to its security alliance with Tokyo.
About 50,000 U.S. troops are stationed here, including the largest contingent of Marines outside the United States. The United States maintains several major Air Force bases in Japan, and the home port of the Navy's Seventh Fleet is just south of Tokyo.
Though strongly supported by both Washington and Tokyo, the troops' presence is often a source of friction, particularly on the small southern island of Okinawa, where roughly half the troops are based.
---
Russia, Vietnam expand strategic ties
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2001-03-01-vietruss.htm
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) - The leaders of Russia and Vietnam signed a deal expanding strategic ties Thursday, a move that reunites Hanoi with its one-time communist benefactor and gives Moscow its strongest ally in Southeast Asia.
Vladimir Putin's visit, the first by a Russian or Soviet leader despite a half-century of diplomatic ties, was widely lauded by Vietnamese leaders and the state-controlled press, but has drawn only muted public interest.
Only a scattering of people were on hand to wave Vietnamese and Russian flags as Putin's motorcade pulled into Hanoi late Wednesday. It provided a sharp contrast to the thousands who spontaneously filled the streets during President Clinton's arrival last November.
Putin received an official red-carpet reception Thursday morning at Hanoi's ornate Presidential Palace before he and Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong moved into closed-door talks.
The two agreed to promote strategic cooperation between the countries, which last year reached an agreement on repaying Vietnam's debt to the former Soviet Union, a long-standing barrier to closer ties. Vietnam agreed to pay $1.7 billion over 23 years.
"It would be a stupid and unforgivable idea to lose the potential and high level of the relationship which existed between our two countries," Putin told reporters.
Luong agreed, saying the two countries were "seeking ways to bring our economic, trade, and technological cooperation to a higher and more effective level, to match our fine political relations."
The leaders also signed agreements on expanding economic and trade ties, particularly in oil and gas, and increasing military cooperation and science and technology exchanges.
Emerging from the private talks, Putin again asserted Moscow's intention to step up strategic and economic cooperation with Hanoi, saying that Russia is ready to help Vietnam with its military needs.
"Vietnam not only needs to maintain its weaponry and military equipment supplied by the Soviet Union, it also needs to modernize its army and also needs new and modern technologies," Putin said.
The strategic accord spells out plans to expand relations in every area from military and technological cooperation to economic and investment ties. It also states Vietnam's support of Russia in holding up the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
However, talks on renewing Russia's lease on a key military base in southern Vietnam's Cam Ranh Bay, set to expire in 2004, were expected to be difficult. The base, once used by U.S. forces, serves as Moscow's strategic foothold in the region. China and the United States are both believed to be interested in gaining access to the massive base.
U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam Pete Peterson said Washington had "no problem" with Putin's visit and understood it was an important event for Vietnam's government.
Coming off a South Korea visit, Vietnam is the second leg of Putin's Asian tour aimed at boosting Russian influence in the region. The Soviet Union was Vietnam's mainstay during the Vietnam War, supplying military and economic assistance to communist North Vietnam, but relations have been strained since the collapse of the Soviet Union a decade ago.
---
Sub tragedy exposes wider civilian problems
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/2001-03-01-nceditf.htm
The USS Greeneville, which sank a Japanese fishing boat Feb. 9, wasn't the only thing that surfaced into view that day. So, too, did the fact that civilians routinely ride along with sailors, soldiers and military pilots while they train - in this case with catastrophic results.
Sixteen civilian guests, some of them involved with a fundraiser for a battleship museum, were on the Greeneville. Although their role in the accident is still unclear, two guests were at the submarine's controls during the collision that killed nine Japanese citizens. One crewman was distracted by the guests and stopped tracking a surface boat, accident investigators have been told.
In response, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld temporarily banned civilian visitors from operating "any item of military equipment" and ordered all services to review their policies on civilian participation in military activities. He says the ban is intended to ensure safety during public visits.
But the problem runs deeper. Citizens' participation in military training exercises generally is rising at a time of constrained military budgets and readiness, with little accountability.
Publicly funded lobbying
The Pentagon sells the civilian junkets as a means of familiarizing the public with the military, an important function. What the military soft-pedals, though, is the extent to which these activities are used to boost support for weapons systems the military wants. In that sense, the public is paying for one part of the government to lobby for more public spending.
Among other problems:
• Individual commanders have great discretion about civilians' activities. Navy guests have handled not only submarine controls but also the wheel of aircraft carriers. Air Force guests have accompanied pilots in two-seater fighter aircraft, placing their hands and feet on the moving controls. Army commanders have let civilians drive tanks and Humvee trucks, and fire M-16s. Yet the services don't track nationally what sorts of dangerous activities are done on visits, or mishaps with civilians. And only the Army's public-affairs rulebook specifies some activities that are "improper" for spectators, such as grenade throwing and bayonet training. The Navy and Air Force say rules exist, but just aren't consolidated.
• There's no national oversight of who is entertained. The services' public-affairs regulations outline at length how to choose guests with the greatest amount of reach in their communities - leading with journalists, business leaders and school officials. But none follows up with national tracking of how many visitors participate in training exercises or who they are. And while the services limit the use of public events as fundraisers, there's inadequate follow up on whether those rules are followed. Despite donations made by some civilians on the Greeneville, the Navy denies the ride was part of a fundraiser.
• Rising costs for entertaining civilians aren't tracked in detail at a time when the services are pleading poverty. All told, the services spend more than $30 million annually on public relations. Yet they don't break out the costs of allowing civilians to ride and operate military equipment.
• There's no high-level analysis of whether the visits detract from training and performance. After a sub performs for visitors a quick-surfacing "emergency ballast blow," as the Greeneville did, it must wait 6-8 hours before resubmerging, to recharge its air tanks.
The Navy denies it performs time-consuming ballast blows especially to thrill civilian guests. But it won't release the logs that would verify that ballast blows are limited to the four times a year typically required for regular training and once annually for maintenance.
An open military
There are good reasons to encourage open interaction between civilians and the services. The military needs to be tied closely to the broader society, and today's all-volunteer military can too easily become isolated.
But when taxpayer dollars are used to lobby for more taxpayer spending, the purpose of the military's public-relations efforts is subverted. In the 1970s, such concerns led lawmakers to require the services to report in detail on their public-affairs activities and expenditures.
Now that the Greeneville accident has cost lives, that sort of accountability, along with strict rules on safe, useful public visits, should be restored.
---
Russia May Help Persuade North Korea to Give Up Missiles
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By PATRICK E. TYLER
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01PUTI.html?pagewanted=all
SEOUL, South Korea, Feb. 28 - As the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, flew off to Vietnam today, South Koreans were left wondering why their government, one of America's staunchest allies in the region, had tilted toward Russia on a crucial issue of international security during his visit here this week. The answer, officials here said, seems to be the fear of another crisis over North Korea's ballistic missile program and Russia's increasingly important role in trying to persuade North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Il, to give it up.
Suddenly, the South Korean president, Kim Dae Jung, needs Mr. Putin. And time is running out as domestic frustration with the North- South peace initiative is rising in South Korea while, in Washington, the Bush administration is already showing signs of impatience and a hardening of tone over North Korea's lack of movement.
The tilt came in the form of a joint communiqué issued on Tuesday by the Russian and South Korean leaders. Its language undercut and indirectly criticized American plans to erect national missile defenses. Such defenses require modifying or withdrawing from the 1972 treaty that forbids them. During a two-day summit meeting, Russia and South Korea said the treaty is inviolable, and if anything should be strengthened.
Seoul's act of independence from Washington caught many analysts off guard.
"Frankly, I was surprised," said Ha Yong Chool, a political scientist at Seoul National University. "Russia seemed to be trying very hard to put Kim Dae Jung on the spot by having him support the Russian position" on missile defense.
"But from the South Korean perspective," he continued, "it was inevitable for Kim to go along with Putin because in return, Putin is working very hard to convince Kim Jong Il to give up this missile program."
Russia may have had its own game to play internationally by enlisting Mr. Kim in the ranks of European and Asia countries who hope America's missile-defense program will be scaled back or deferred as arms-control regimes become more effective and the missile threat subsides.
And Russia hopes to reap a huge financial reward from a successful Korean unification, which could link transport networks from Korea's Pacific ports to Russia and Europe while opening the Korean market for new Russian natural gas fields.
For Mr. Kim, however, stepping out of Washington's shadow to align himself with Mr. Putin had less to do with international politics than with the threat of a new crisis on the Korean peninsula, said Professor Ha and Korean officials who attended the last day of Mr. Putin's summit meeting here.
The South Korean president also needs to demonstrate to Washington, and to his own people, that his diplomacy is working. Siding with Mr. Putin may have been Mr. Kim's way of telling Washington that the North Korean missile threat also can be eliminated through diplomacy and rapprochement between North and South Korea.
But time is short. Kim Dae Jung is under domestic pressure to show tangible results from his so-called sunshine policy of unconditional engagement with North Korea. But the North has done almost nothing toward dismantling the hair-trigger state of readiness for war on the peninsula - despite the hundreds of millions in humanitarian aid that South Korea has sent to the North since Mr. Kim took office in 1998 and the investment by South Korean companies, most of them struggling or losing money.
Beyond this situation, it would be virtually impossible for Seoul to support the Bush administration's missile-defense plans because such a statement would be taken as a sign of belligerence by North Korea at a time when both sides are trying to de-escalate their conflict. So up until this week, Kim Dae Jung's government has been mostly mute about its position, though in private conversations, South Koreans are as skeptical about missile defense as many Europeans.
For the next four months, Mr. Putin and the South Korean leader have made plans, officials say, to work to pursue an intense and coordinated strategy focused on solidifying an agreement, first broached in Pyongyang by Mr. Putin last July, under which North Korea would give up its missile program in return for outside assistance in launching North Korean satellites.
But just as most of the world doubts that North Korea is in the missile business to launch harmless sputniks, many analysts believe that Kim Jong Il will eventually demand hundreds of millions of dollars to replace the hard currency that North Korea earns by selling its missile technology to Syria, Iran and other countries whose missile programs are also regarded with alarm.
After this trip, Mr. Putin will return to Moscow where he will be host to Kim Jong Il in April for what may prove a critical negotiation to explore the price of North Korea's pacification. Then the North Korean leader will make his first trip ever to South Korea, a return visit for the one made to Pyongyang last June by Kim Dae Jung.
"President Kim has told Chairman Kim that he must solve this missile issue with the United States and President Kim believes that he is going to do this," said Park Joon Young, press secretary to the South Korean leader. But the question is when.
Before this sequence unfolds, Kim Dae Jung flies to Washington next week to, among other things, explain to President Bush how crucial the next few months will be and how important Mr. Putin's role will be, officials said.
With political opposition mounting, the South Korean president knows that he is facing a deadline - some say no later than this summer - to persuade Kim Jong Il to make a genuine effort to begin making peace.
---
Sub Commander Apologizes More Directly to Families
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By ELAINE SCIOLINO
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/national/01HAWA.html
HONOLULU, Feb. 28 - The commander of the nuclear submarine Greeneville, which sank a Japanese fishing trawler 19 days ago, has delivered letters of apology to the families of the nine people lost, the trawler's skipper and Japanese officials, Japanese and Navy officials said today.
The commander, Scott D. Waddle, visited the consulate here on Tuesday afternoon to apologize and to deliver the letters, which he wrote himself, the officials said.
In a meeting with Yoshio Mochizuki, a vice minister in the foreign ministry who was visiting from Tokyo, Commander Waddle, who was dressed in a business suit and was alone, made a traditional deep bow and said a few words in Japanese. Commander Waddle explained that he had been born in Misawa, Japan, when his father was an Air Force officer there. It was there that he learned to speak some Japanese, he said.
"When Waddle handed the letters to me tears fell from his eyes," Mr. Mochizuki told Japanese reporters at the airport before his departure for Tokyo today. "He repeated over and over to me his words of apology." He added that Commander Waddle had "used the word apology so I accepted it as an apology."
Commander Waddle also expressed a willingness to travel to Japan to offer a face-to-face apology at the appropriate time, a Japanese official said.
Mr. Mochizuki said he was carrying the letters of apology to Japan.
Commander Waddle's gesture may help allay anger in Japan, where the tradition of making amends with a formal bow and a teary apology is considered extremely important. Apologies from President Bush, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and other senior officials apparently have not been enough.
"I wish he had expressed his feelings to the families sooner," Chihoko Nishida, the wife of a missing crew member, was quoted as saying by Kyodo News agency in Tokyo. "But at least I would like to accept his intention to apologize."
In Tokyo today, Adm. William J. Fallon, vice chief of naval operations, met with the relatives of missing victims.
"I'm here to request in the most humble and sincere manner that you accept the apology of the people of the United States and the U.S. Navy, as a personal representative of President Bush," Admiral Fallon told relatives gathered at the American ambassador's residence in Tokyo.
The skipper of the trawler, the Ehime Maru, and the families of the victims have repeatedly demanded a formal apology from Commander Waddle, and the families have demanded that it be done in person.
But the commander's friends and some Navy officials said his lawyers had at first advised him to say nothing, in an effort to avoid damaging his defense should he be charged with a crime under military law.
Senior Navy officials, however, said that Commander Waddle had been told to do what he thought was right and that he had not been discouraged from apologizing.
Three days ago, Commander Waddle, with the help of his civilian lawyer, Charles Gittins, sent a letter of regret to the Japanese people. But the letter stopped short of an apology.
Besides letters for each of the victims' families and the skipper, Commander Waddle wrote to Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, the governor of the prefecture where the victims lived and the principal of the school that four missing students attended. The contents of the letters were not released.
Efforts to reach Mr. Gittins were unsuccessful. Commander Waddle's military defense lawyer at the Pearl Harbor Naval Base, Cmdr. Jennifer S. Herold, said she had nothing to say about her client.
Commander Waddle has made no public statement since Feb. 9, when his submarine, on a routine training exercise with 16 civilians aboard, tore through the bottom of the Japanese trawler nine miles away from Pearl Harbor, sinking it within minutes. He refused to be interviewed by the National Transportation Safety Board, which is conducting its own investigation. He has been named as one of three parties before a court of inquiry, as the Navy's highest investigatory authority is known, when it convenes here on Monday.
In his apology today, Admiral Fallon pledged that the Navy's court of inquiry would "provide a full and open accounting."
As he stood before three representatives of the families he said, "I humbly request your acceptance of my apology." Then, after a pause, he bowed deeply.
A representative of the families, Ryosuke Terata, the father of a missing 17-year-old, gave the clearest recognition yet of the apologies.
"I felt the envoy was sincere, and it was the most satisfying meeting we have had yet," Mr. Terata told Admiral Fallon. "We thank you for meeting with us."
-------- australia
Fed Govt urged to condemn ships carrying plutonium fuel
Fri, 2 Mar 2001
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-2mar2001-75.htm
The Federal Government has been urged to condemn the passage of two British ships carrying plutonium fuel near Tasmania.
Greenpeace says the two vessels, shipping 230 kilograms of plutonium fuel to Japan, are 200 nautical miles south of Tasmania.
Greenpeace and Greens Senator Bob Brown are concerned about the safety of the fuel in the event of a shipping accident.
Senator Bob Brown says the ships do present a threat, but have met with no opposition from the Government.
"We've got a completely pliant State and Federal Government in this regard," he said.
"Nothing is really being done to give strenuous opposition to the passage of these waste ships plying between France and Japan.
"They present an enormous threat to us, the threat is underscored by the fact that they're not insured.
"The British ships carrying these cargos are armed with machine guns to ward off pirates but they can't get insurance."
-------- business
Battling to Dominate Nuclear Waste Disposal
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Washington Post
By Jerry Knight
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A6060-2001Feb28?language=printer
In the nuclear waste disposal business of Duratek Inc. of Columbia, making use of robots, ultra-high-strength metals, double backup systems and fail-safe technology are standard operating practices.
So when a team of Duratek engineers set out to build a wedge-shaped robot fighting machine, they gave it two sets of tiny tank treads. They wired all the electrical connections with double wires -- both soldered and crimped in place. They armored it with titanium, and carved a killer nose from inconel, a superhard exotic alloy used in nuclear power plants.
Then, for fun, they painted on a mushroom cloud, added a strip of yellow radiation-hazard tape and topped it off with the new corporate logo of the company, which until last month called itself GTS Duratek.
For Duratek, the 325-pound Atomic Wedgie wasn't just a toy. It was the company's entry in Battlebots, the robot wrestling show that has been an instant hit on the Comedy Central cable channel this year. As such, the Wedgie represented a low-budget version of the Nascar racers that companies pay millions of dollars a year to plaster with their labels.
The $10,000 spent sending the Atomic Wedgie team to Las Vegas for a Battlebot championship helped boost employee morale, says Vice President Brad Bowan. It also burnished the company's image in the nuclear industry and helped introduce Duratek's new name. The new logo went up at the company's headquarters only yesterday.
Duratek is raising both its profile and its revenue, which will approach $300 million this year as the result of the acquisition last June of the nuclear-services operations of Waste Management Inc.
The $65 million buyout, financed entirely with debt, is adding about $100 million a year to revenue but much less to earnings per share. Year-end results will be out soon. For the first nine months of last year, revenue grew 34 percent, to $167 million, thanks to one quarter's sales from the Waste Management division. Profit grew to $8.8 million (45 cents a share) from $7.4 million (37 cents), but was held back by the cost of the acquisition, which is projected to add more to earnings in the future.
Assessing the impact of the big acquisition on Duratek's stock is difficult because, as is the case this year with so many technology companies, Duratek's own performance is often overwhelmed by market trends. Its shares are off by about 20 percent over last year, closing yesterday at $6.94 a share, up 6 cents. The stock doesn't trade much -- averaging just under 30,000 shares a day, according to Bloomberg News.
For the last five years, Duratek has been controlled by the Carlyle Group, Washington's biggest private investing firm, which owns preferred stock representing about 39 percent of the company.
By buying Waste Management, Duratek picked up that company's business with the Department of Energy and also became manager of a large nuclear-waste landfill in South Carolina.
Before the acquisition, Bowan said, most of Duratek's revenue came from working on nuclear power plants owned by electric utilities. The company also is one of several contractors working on the government's massive cleanup of leftovers from nuclear-weapons production that are now stored at the federal facility in Hanford, Wash.
Duratek's role in the Hanford cleanup is encapsulating radioactive sludge in molten glass.
That process, called vitrification, is the day job of the team of engineers who built Duratek's battlebot. Engineering manager Charles Payne said he and his co-workers saw Battlebots on TV and decided, hey, we can do that.
Though building battling robots sounds like a sport for teenage tinkerers, at the super-heavyweight championship level, it takes a professional team -- in this case, mechanical engineers Richard Martin and Tom Corrie, electrical engineer Kevin Maze and chemical engineer Robert Everhart.
They built not only a battlebot, but a Web site, www.teamhalflife.com, working nights and weekends with technical support from other nuclear-industry suppliers.
The result was a tracked, titanium-and-aluminum wedge that simply slammed its nose under other radio-controlled warrior robots, flipping them over or shoving them into a corner, permanently disabled.
The Duratek drivers trained for battle by having their robot toss around beer kegs, then tested its durability by driving it full speed into a forklift truck in Duratek's warehouse. The huge machine jumped sideways on impact, Payne said. The robot backed away unscathed.
Atomic Wedgie did not fare as well Tuesday night, when its title bout of a couple of months ago was finally aired. It lost after an inch-thick steel axle gave out. The robot has since been rebuilt and was back at work at a waste-management industry trade show in Tuscon, attracting engineers to Duratek's display booth.
-------- depleted uranium
DEPLETED URANIUM:
SCIENTIFIC & TECHNICAL REFERENCES
INTERNATIONAL NUCLEAR INFORMATION SYSTEM
(INIS) Database of the International Atomic Energy Agency
iaea.org
http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/Focus/DU/DUonINIS.shtml
There are thousands of documents related to depleted uranium and uranium within the IAEA's International Nuclear Information System (INIS). The system produces and maintains the world's most comprehensive bibliographic database in the field of peaceful nuclear applications. Updated continuously, the database contains well over two million bibliographic references covering all fields of atomic energy and applications. These include documents that are commercially not available -- such as theses or proceedings -- that can be ordered from the INIS document services.
A quick search of INIS on depleted uranium -- searching generally for health effects of uranium -- yields nearly 7000 technical and scientific documents. Narrowing down the search -- to cover just depleted uranium and its health hazards or biological and health effects, or the technical uses of depleted uranium --retrieves a far more manageable number of relevant documents.
The INIS search engine is accessible on the Internet (http://www.iaea.org/inis/inisdb.htm) and the entire database is also available on CD-Rom. Access charges may apply, since INIS is an international cooperational effort and some countries have modest fees for the service. INIS is supported by Liaison Officers in 103 countries whom you can ask for help. Further information and assistance can also be obtained from INIS headquarters in Vienna, or by sending email to: inis@iaea.org.
http://www.iaea.org/inis/liaison/liaison.htm
http://www.iaea.org/inis
mailto:inis@iaea.org
A sample search in INIS on health effects of depleted uranium yielded the following results: Full results of this sample search are available for download. (format: pdf, 36 pages, 103KB).
http://www.iaea.org/inis/ws/articles/depl_u_health.pdf
1.Depleted uranium. A post-war disaster for environment and health
2.Potential health impacts from range fires at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland.
3.Study on depleted uranium at the airplane accident in Bijlmermeer, Amsterdam, Netherlands
4.Uranium at the Bijlmer disaster. Effective dosis of inhaled depleted uranium
5.Public health risks of the El Al Boeing disaster. Reconstruction study depleted uranium
6.Draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for alternative strategies for the long-term management and use of depleted uranium hexafluoride.
Volume 2: Appendices
7.Strategiesfor the transmutation of americium
8.Ammunition produced from depleted uranium.
9.ITEP concept of the use of electro-nuclear facilities in the atomic power industry.
10.Ecologicalrisk assessment for radionuclides and metals: A radiological and chemical approach.
11.A screening model for depleted uranium testing using environmental radiation monitoring data.
12.Long-term fate of depleted uranium at Aberdeen and Yuma Proving Grounds: Human health and ecological risk assessments.
13.Particle size distribution of fragments from depleted uranium penetrators fired
14.against armor plate targets.
15.Ecological considerations of depleted uranium munitions.
16.The effect of foodstuffs and related compounds on durability of glazes containing natural thorium, and natural or depleted uranium.
17.Radiological and toxicological assessment of an external heat (burn) test of the 105MM
18.cartridge, APFSDS-T, XM-744.
19.A view from the nuclear fuel reprocessing industry.
20.Packaging configurations and handling requirements for nuclear materials.
21.Uranium compounds in ceramic enamels-radioactivity analysis and use hazards.
22.Perspective for the future. Fast breeders - a controversial necessity.
23.The carcinogenic effect of localized fission fragment irradiation of rat lung.
24.Characterization of airborne uranium from test firing of XM774 ammunition.
25.Radiological safety evaluation report for NUWAX-79 exercise. Simulation of nuclear weapons accident.
26.Dissolution of uranium oxide materials in simulated lung fluid.
27.Potential behavior of depleted uranium penetrators under shipping and bulk
28.Radiological assessment of cartridge 120-mm, APFSDS-T, XM829 ammunition.
29.Risk assessment for transportation of depleted uranium oxide.
30.Environmental monitoring report for Pantex Plant covering 1986.
31.Ambient air quality in uranium production areas.
32.System cost-effectiveness for increasing cask shielding.
33.Safety analysis of the existing 850 Firing Facility.
34.SARP shielding analysis at the Oak Ridge Y-12 plant.
35.Radioactivity in zirconium oxide powders used in industrial applications.
36.Qualitative risk assessment as a remediation management tool.
37.SARP shielding analysis at the Oak Ridge Y-12 plant.
38.Radioactivity in zirconium oxide powders used in industrial applications.
39.Qualitative risk assessment as a remediation management tool.
40.Assaying depleted uranium in bones in-situ using a non-invasive x-ray fluorescence technique.
41.The validity of generic limits on residual uranium-238 radioactivity in soil.
42.Reference computations of public dose and cancer risk from airborne releases of uranium and Class W plutonium.
43.Comparison of models used for ecological risk assessment and human health risk assessment.
44.Evaluation of depleted uranium in the environment at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Maryland and Yuma Proving Grounds, Arizona. Final report.
45.Depleted uranium disposal options evaluation.
46.Calculation of shielding parameters.
47.Depleted uranium human health risk assessment, Jefferson Proving Ground, Indiana.
48.Uranium tipped ammunition.
49.Ecological risk assessment of depleted uranium in the environment at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Annual report, 1991.
Appendix B:
Sample search in INIS on "uses of depleted uranium" Full results of this sample search are available for download. (format: pdf, 26 pages, 77KB). Again, to give an idea of its contents, here is a list of titles:
http://www.iaea.org/inis/ws/articles/depl_u_uses.pdf
Beneficial uses of Depleted Uranium
1.Depleted uranium oxides as spent-nuclear-fuel waste-package invert and backfill materials.
2.Depleted uranium oxides as spent-nuclear-fuel waste-package fill materials.
3.Depleted uranium: valuable energy source or waste for disposal?.
4.Synthesis and evaluation of sup 1 sup 1 C-labeled organic compounds for use in nuclear medicine.
5.Preparation of nuclear and non-nuclear material by the sol-gel method.
6.Applications of a pulsed spallation neutron source.Report of a workshop held at Argonne National Laboratory, April 29--May 4, 1973. ZING.
7.Trends in the use of depleted uranium.
8.Utilization of depleted uranium.
9.Non-nuclear uses of depleted uranium.
10.Yield, utilization, storage and ultimate storage of depleted uranium.
11.Amounts, utilization, intermediate and final storage of depleted uranium.
12.Review of the early AP penetrator work at LASL which led to the selection of
13.Army Air Force MMT production of 0.65 to 0.85 Ti and quad depleted uranium alloys.
14.UH sub 3 cermet.
15.Report of the panel on the use of depleted uranium alloys for large caliber
16.Atomic energy.
17.Nondestructive testing of 105mm depleted uranium penetrators. XM774, XM833.
18.Tungsten versus depleted uranium for armour-piercing penetrators.
19.Production decladding of irradiated fuel assemblies using a YAG laser.
20.Storage and uses alternatives of depleted UF sub 6.
21.Thulium oxide fuel characterization study: Part 1, Materials properties measurements. Tm sub 2 O sub 3 -Yb sub 2 O sub 3; thulium-170.
22.Use of reprocessed uranium and of depleted uranium. Final report.
23.Status of the intense pulsed neutron source.
24.Preliminary investigations for technology assessment of sup 9 sup 9 Mo production from LEU targets.
25.Use of reprocessed uranium and of depleted uranium. Final report.
26.Status of the intense pulsed neutron source.
27.Preliminary investigations for technology assessment of sup 9 sup 9 Mo production from LEU targets.
28.Benefits/impacts of utilizing depleted uranium silicate glass as backfill for spent fuel waste packages.
29.DUSCOBS - a depleted-uranium silicate backfill for transport, storage, and disposal of spent nuclear fuel.
30.NWIS signatures for confirmatory measurements with B33 trainers.
31.Calculated NWIS signatures for enriched uranium metal. Nuclear Weapons Identification Systems.
32.Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride Management Program. The technology assessment report for the long-term management of depleted uranium hexafluoride. Volume 2.
33.Depleted Uranium Hexafluoride Management Program. The technology assessment report for the long-term management of depleted uranium hexafluoride. Volume 1.
34.Structural credit for depleted uranium used in transport casks.
35.Use of reprocessed uranium and of depleted uranium.
-------- india / pakistan
Powell to face queries about sanctions
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
By Ben Barber
http://www.washtimes.com/world/default-200131214834.htm
Secretary of State Colin Powell will face questioning next week on Capitol Hill by House members who are skeptical of his offer to ease sanctions on consumer goods to Iraq to win Arab backing for tighter arms controls on Saddam Hussein.
"The rationale for sanctions is to prevent production of weapons of mass destruction," says one Republican legislative aide. "Is weakening sanctions helping us achieve this goal?"
Rep. Henry J. Hyde, Illinois Republican and new chairman of the House International Relations Committee, has asked Mr. Powell to appear on Wednesday to explain the changes.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohammed Saeed Sahaf quickly rejected the plan to ease consumer sanctions while tightening controls over oil and weapons shipments, and Iraqi officials at the United Nations said U.N. inspectors would not be allowed back into Iraq under any conditions to determine whether Saddam is building weapons of mass destruction. The secretary of state had said before he left for the Middle East that sanctions would not be eased until the inspectors are allowed in again.
A senior State Department official said yesterday the change in policy had been discussed at the highest levels in the White House before Mr. Powell's trip and was approved by President Bush.
"He wasn't making it up as we went along," the State Department official said.
"Since the beginning of the administration, he had a number of discussions on strategy with [Vice President Richard B.] Cheney and [National Security Adviser Condoleezza] Rice. They had a couple of meetings before the trip to agree on the approach.
"The president has not decided on a policy, but the direction on that particular part of the puzzle was set before he left."
Nevertheless, some members of Congress question the decision to ease the sanctions on Iraq so soon after Mr. Powell's confirmation hearing, where he pledged to "reinvigorate" the sanctions.
Mr. Hyde "certainly has questions about the policy," the Republican House aide said. "We need a better sense of where the administration is going with this.
"In his confirmation hearings, Secretary Powell indicated that sanctions against Iraq need to be reinvigorated," he said. "What does this mean in the context of his statements to our allies in the Middle East?"
Mr. Powell made the offer to ease certain sanctions while tightening others during a three-day swing through five Arab capitals and Israel. Representatives of several Arab governments were clearly angry. Mr. Powell told reporters traveling with him that he found wide support in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Kuwait and Syria for preventing Iraq from obtaining weapons of mass destruction.
Proponents of easing sanctions on consumer goods say it is necessary because Iraq is winning the propaganda war in the Middle East by decrying the U.N.-imposed sanctions as killing Iraqi children through hunger and lack of medicine.
"We had lost this one on the propaganda front," said Patrick L. Clawson, an analyst with the Washington Institute on Near East Policy.
"They were yelling in the U.N. and the U.S. and the Arab world about the sanctions' effect on children, so he said, 'OK, we'll change 'em.' He had it totally planned before he left Washington."
Mr. Powell said he won backing from Syria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt for easing restrictions on the sale of food, medicine and other consumer items while tightening controls over access to weapons and oil exports.
However, before he landed in Cairo on Saturday to face Egyptian and other Arab journalists shouting questions about starving Iraqi children, he indicated in public statements that he was ready to adjust the sanctions.
"What the president wanted him to do was to talk about this approach with countries in the region and get their views, and we will need their cooperation in controlling weapons, money and smuggling," the State Department official said.
"It doesn't do any good to adopt a policy in Washington if there is no support in the region. It wouldn't be any better than the previous policy," the official said. "The president will make the final decision whether to go forward."
Mr. Powell yesterday called President Bush to report on his Middle East trip, and "the president was pleased with what he heard," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.
Mr. Powell dispatched his assistant secretary for Near East affairs, Edward "Ned" Walker, to Turkey, Oman and the United Arab Emirates yesterday in an effort to tighten newly focused sanctions around Iraq.
The new focus is on blocking smuggling of oil through Syria, Jordan, Turkey and the Gulf ports to cut off funds Iraq can spend on weapons and to tighten controls over imports along its borders to block weapons materials.
Mr. Powell's visit to the Middle East followed by the bombing earlier last month of five Iraqi radar sites used to target U.S. and British warplanes enforcing a no-fly zone over portions of southern and northern Iraq.
The United States had been unable to persuade the Arab allies in the 1991 Persian Gulf war that Saddam earned enough money from U.N.-monitored oil sales to buy food and medicine to ease the suffering of his people, but used it instead on palaces and weapons.
Mr. Powell argued that it was time to abandon the Clinton administration policy and find a new one before the sanctions regime crumbled entirely.
"He was successful," said Mr. Clawson. "He changed the topic of discussion from starving Iraqi children to weapons of mass destruction.
"That defused the opposition and changed discussions back to making sanctions tougher on some items."
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Monday after meeting with Iraqi officials that the Powell ideas would be presented to the Security Council.
He recalled that Mr. Powell had visited U.N. headquarters just before his Middle East trip and "he did hint at [his new ideas] without going into details, emphasizing the fact that the objective of the sanctions was not to hurt the Iraqi people, that they were not the targets, and one has to find a way of strengthening the disarmament regime and giving relief to the Iraqi people."
Brookings Institution analyst Meghan O'Sullivan published a report Feb. 12 calling for much of the changes Mr. Powell announced during his trip to the Middle East.
"We needed a new Iraq policy because the old one was under pressure since August," she said in an interview yesterday.
"I argued in my report that we needed to regain international support for the measures that have been most critical in containing Saddam - maintaining control over revenues from oil exports and over military and technology imports to Iraq."
-------- japan
Kyushu also hangs back from plutonium burning
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
MagpieNews
Fukushima Governor's unexpected refusal of the MOX program are causing various responses all over Japan, some ideological and others substantial.
Japan's largest daily newspaper, Yomiuri Shimbun, in its editorial yesterday (28 February), accused the Fukushima Governor and claimed that the role ofprovincial heads is to promote the national policy, which in this case is to utilize plutonium.
On the other hand, Director of the Kyushu Electric Power Compnay, which monopolizes the Kyushu region in country's west, told the press that plutonium loading in the Genkai Unit 3 PWR (Saga Prefecture) so far scheduled for "not later than 2004" would be postponed "by a few years". The director says his company needs to wait and see the fate of MOX in Fukushima.
sources: Yomiuri 28 February, Nikkei 1 March
MagpieComment: The right-wing Yomiuri has never concealed its pro-nuclear stand, but are they serious in claiming that local government should rubber stamp central Govt policies even against the wishes of the people of its province?
-------- missile defense
Key U.S. Congressman Talks Tough on China and Taiwan
Mar 1, 2001
Inside China Today
http://www.insidechina.com/news.php3?id=300111
http://www.reuters.com
WASHINGTON, Mar 1, 2001 -- (Reuters) The new head of the House International Relations Committee talked tough on China on Wednesday, reassuring Taiwan on arms sales, while pledging U.S. congressional support for missile defenses that Beijing abhors.
Illinois Republican Representative Henry Hyde told a gathering of Asian diplomats, experts and journalists that Taiwan would likely find the Republican administration of President George W. Bush as well as the new Republican-controlled Congress more amenable than the previous administration on the question of arms sales.
"Congress has become increasingly concerned that arms sales to Taiwan have been inadequate," Hyde said at a breakfast arranged by the Asia Society.
"In the next month or so, the Bush administration will have to make decisions about this year's arms sales to Taiwan ... I have no doubt that the new administration will approve a number of long-delayed requests," he said.
China sees Taiwan as a breakaway province and considers Washington's stance on the self-governing island the most sensitive issue in U.S.-China relations.
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell has reiterated America's long-standing commitment to the principle of "one China," under which Washington recognizes only Beijing, but also underscored U.S. opposition to reunification by force.
Washington also helps provide for Taiwan's defense needs. Bush is expected in April to make a decision deferred by the Clinton administration on whether to sell Taipei four destroyers equipped with the Aegis battle system.
CHINA'S NO "PARTNER," HYDE AGREES
Hyde said that China needed to be "engaged constructively," but agreed with Powell that it was not the "strategic partner" that the Clinton administration made it out to be.
He also made clear that Congress would support Bush's plan to go forward with ballistic missile defense systems in the face of international protests.
"Some in the region -- principally China -- have called this effort destabilizing. But such critics should understand that the development of missile defenses in part has been made necessary by the proliferation of ballistic missiles in China and North Korea...
"And we certainly will look with interest at Taiwan's desire for missile defenses, which after all is a defense requirement that has resulted from deliberate decisions made by the government in Beijing," he said.
Washington says it needs a missile shield primarily to protect itself from what it considers unpredictable states such as North Korea, which in August 1998 test-fired a missile over Japan.
China maintains that a missile defense could trigger a new global arms race by posing a threat to its own nuclear arsenal.
In taking up the chairmanship of the House committee, Hyde becomes one of the most powerful members of Congress on foreign relations, along with North Carolina Republican Jesse Helms, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Hyde started in the position last month after being rotated out of the House Judiciary Committee, where he gained fame for spearheading the House impeachment inquiry of Bill Clinton over the former president's affair with Monica Lewinsky.
---
Wrong way on missile defense
March 1, 2001
Excite News
Harvard Crimson
Harvard U.
http://news.excite.com/news/uw/010301/university-32
(U-WIRE) CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- The Bush administration, which has made a national missile defense an almost obsessive focus of its foreign policy, seemed to score a coup of sorts last week when Russian President Vladimir Putin offered an anti-missile proposal. Putin's plan accepted the possibility of certain types of limited missile defenses. However, on close examination, the proposal looks more like a mere bargaining ploy vastly different from the system Bush would build. This gap between the president's designs and the systems our foreign allies and partners would support shows how much the U.S. stands to lose diplomatically if it continues to move toward a hasty and unworkable missile defense.
Putin's counter-proposal was motivated by Russia's wariness that a missile defense would render its aging nuclear stockpile obsolete. Putin's suggestion of a limited theater system to protect Europe from missile attacks by rogue nations would have been based on already-existing Russian technology and would have been compatible with the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, an agreement that currently prohibits the deployment of large-scale missile defenses. However, Putin's offer would have dealt only with Europe, not the United States. As a result, it should not be seen as an acceptance of the principle of missile defense but rather as an effort to undermine European support for an American plan.
The strength of the foreign opposition to missile defense should give the U.S. pause. Russia is currently the only nation that can substantially threaten the U.S., with China not far behind in its development of long-range nuclear missiles. Better diplomatic and trade ties with both nations will do more to keep the U.S. safe by reducing nuclear proliferation, encouraging political liberalization and decreasing arsenals of long-range missiles.
By heedlessly marching forward with a missile defense, the Bush administration is in danger of sacrificing America's real diplomatic assets to an infeasible defense system. Since the beginning of the Cold War, the threat of nuclear war has been countered by the threat of overwhelming retaliation. This principle -- as well as the nuclear arsenal that the U.S. retains to enforce it -- remains the most effective deterrent to nuclear attack. In contrast, the tests of American anti-missile systems have so far yielded dismal results, with interceptors unable to tell the difference between missiles and simple decoys. No one knows whether it is technologically possible to intercept a significant missile attack.
And the costs of this science-fiction defense plan would be more than diplomatic. Bush called for the development of "effective missile defenses" in his budget speech Tuesday night, and administration officials have suggested that they have in mind a significant increase from the current $2.2 billion per year allotted to the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. Billions of dollars that could have gone to Social Security, education, debt reduction or even tax relief have already been spent on a missile defense system that may never work as its supporters claim.
The Bush administration must make tough decisions about the realistic needs that the U.S. has for protection from terrorists and rogue nations. If a terrorist group wanted to deliver a weapon of mass destruction to the U.S., it would most likely forgo missiles for less risky and more destructive methods. The danger of chemical or biological attack on major cities by terrorist groups is well-documented; in 1995, a nerve gas attack on a Japanese subway left 12 commuters dead and could have threatened many more. Such attacks are warning signs that U.S. policy should concentrate less on the Cold War calculus of missiles and bombs and more on the threat of biological and chemical attacks on American cities.
In light of the failures that have plagued the missile-defense program and the new dangers posed by the reality that Russia is no longer an enemy or a superpower, Bush should scrap costly national missile defense plans for a more limited program -- or, preferably, no program at all.
Harvard Crimson via U-WIRE
---
Military Satellite Effort Criticized in Report
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/national/01NATI.html?printpage=yes
WASHINGTON, Feb. 28 - The Pentagon's program to develop satellites for a missile defense system is in danger of falling behind schedule and going over budget, a Congressional report concluded today.
The report, by the General Accounting Office, dealt with an $11.8 billion Air Force program to build new satellites that will use infrared technology not only to track nuclear missiles but also to differentiate between warheads and decoys.
Pentagon officials say problems with developing the new infrared technology would not hamper use of the limited ground-based system planned by the Clinton administration. But the new satellites would later be needed to shoot down advanced, multiple-warhead missiles that countries like China are thought to be trying to develop.
The accounting office criticized the Air Force for planning to build and launch the first of 30 satellites before flight tests had been completed. The investigators said many satellites would have to be redesigned or rebuilt at great cost if those tests found problems.
The accounting office also found that the satellites' software was not expected to be ready until three years after the first one was launched, in 2006.
-------- taiwan
Special Report Taiwan's Nuclear Power Plant
Asia Source
March 01, 2001
http://www.asiasource.org/news/at_mp_02.cfm?newsid=44751
In October 2000, President Chen Shui-bian followed through on a campaign promise and announced that the government would halt work on Taiwan's fourth nuclear plant for both financial and environmental reasons. The KMT (Kuomintang), which holds a majority in the legislature, was furious that they had not been consulted on the decision and threatened to recall the president from office.
The president has now agreed to resume work on the $5.5 billion power plant, arguing that though the decision is a painful one, it will ensure political and economic stability, which have been threatened by this rift for the past several months. The business community and foreign companies are largely in favor of building the plant, since they fear power shortages and ultimately production losses, while the environmentalists are concerned with Taiwan's management of processing nuclear waste and increasing pollution on the island.
Some feel that the decision will weaken the president and undermine his decisionmaking ability. Other anti-nuclear activists in the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) are angered by the decision. The president has assured the public that building a nuclear-free future for Taiwan is still an important objective in his government.
This Special Report includes articles and commentary on the construction of Taiwan's fourth nuclear power plant, as well as news coverage, and related news sources and links.
Articles and Commentary
No More Cheers (March 2, 2001) http://www.asiaweek.com/asiaweek/magazine/nations/0,8782,100235,00.html
This analysis from AsiaWeek examines the effects of Chen's decision to resume construction on the power plant. Many feel that Chen has neither stood up to Beijing nor his opposition in Taiwan, and worry that he will not be able to push his other policies through in the future. Others argue that his decision has helped to attract more support by proving his ability to maintain stability.
Behind the Darkness (February 22, 2001) http://www.feer.com/_0102_22/p030region.html
This article from the Far Eastern Economic Review discusses the production losses resulting from energy problems in the previous year, as well as the issue of regional power imbalance and the privatization of Taipower, (the state-run Taiwan Power Corporation). Other strategies and solutions are further examined.
Premier swallows his pride (February 15, 2001)
http://www.taipeitimes.com/news/2001/02/15/story/0000073738
This Taipei Times article discusses the government's decision on the nuclear power plant and also analyzes Chen's idea for a referendum law, which would ostensibly allow the public some say in settling policy disputes. Chen also promises to research alternative sources of energy so that eventually all nuclear plants in Taiwan can be shut down.
Taiwanese Reach Compromise on Nuclear Plant (February 14, 2001)
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/20010214/t000013424.html
This LA Times article discusses President Chen Shui-bian's decision to reverse the decision to stop construction of Taiwan's fourth nuclear power plant. The decision breaks Chen's campaign pledge to the environmentalist wing of the DPP, and is described as a defeat to Chen's government.
Taiwan's nuclear fight is all about votes (February 9, 2001)
http://www.csmonitor.com/durable/2001/02/09/p7s2.htm
This article from The Christian Science Monitor discusses the split views between the Taiwanese government and the legislature. The Kuomintang (KMT) argues that Taiwan's economy will collapse without the nuclear plant, while Chen's government feels that Taiwan will be able to survive without it and fears other concerns such as where to bury the nuclear waste.
Taiwan Nuclear Plant Under Fire (September 27, 2000)
http://news.muzi.com/ll/english/92552.shtml
This article from Muzi.com discusses the debate surrounding President Chen Shui-bian and his decision to honor a campaign pledge to stop construction on Taiwan's fourth nuclear power plant. Both sides are discussed, those in favor of the plant who feel that the plant is needed to fuel economic growth, and those opposed to the construction who argue that it will damage the environment and that Taiwan does not have the resources to store the waste.
Crisis shows Taiwan needs new energy policy (September 9, 2001)
http://publish.gio.gov.tw/FCJ/past/00092962.html
This article from the Government Information Office Periodicals focuses on OPEC's price increases, and the effect on the oil-importing industrial economies of East Asia. The article also emphasizes the need for Taiwan to overcome political conflicts and focus on a long-term strategy to "ensure" progress on the island.
News Coverage
Taiwan Leader Confirms Project for Nuclear Plant (February 15, 2001)
http://www.iht.com/articles/10734.html
This article from the International Herald Tribune discusses the Chen government's decision to revive the $5.5 billion nuclear power project, in an effort to regain political and economic stability. Some analysts say that the decision weakened the president.
Pyongyang, Taipei revive bid to transfer nuclear waste (February 15, 2001)
http://asia.scmp.com/ZZZOL3WL2IC.html
This SCMP article focuses on the agreement to transport nuclear waste from Taiwan to North Korea, storing the material in coal mines in return for payment. This decision has generated opposition from Beijing, Seoul, as well as from environmental groups concerned with North Korea's competence in handling the hazardous waste.
Anger at Taiwan government's nuclear move (February 14, 2001)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/asia-pacific/newsid_1169000/1169473.stm
This news report from the BBC discusses the reaction to the Taiwanese government's decision to resume work on the nuclear power station. The article examines the economic impact of the construction, and expresses the views of both the business community and the environmentalists.
High court gives new life to Taiwan nuclear power plant (January 16, 2001)
http://www.edtneurope.com/story/biz/OEG20010116S0025
This EDTN network Europe article examines the outlook for the construction of the fourth power plant after Taiwan's Council of Grand Justices ruled that the original decision to halt construction had "procedural flaws."
Taiwan premier faces political crisis over nuclear plant: analysts (January 16, 2001)
http://tw.orientation.com/en/topstories/11935452.html
This article from AFP analyzes the debate surrounding the construction of Taiwan's fourth power plant.
Grand Justices to rule on nuclear plant (November 9, 2000)
http://www.taipeitimes.com/news/2000/11/09/story/0000060510
This Taipei Times article looks at whether the controversial decision to scrap the plant violated the constitution.
Taiwan Ends Construction of Its 4th Nuclear Plant (October 28, 2000)
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/10/28/world/28TAIW.html
This article from The New York Times analyzes President Chen Shui-bian's decision to halt construction of the plant, which enraged the Nationalist Party members who argue that the project is "critical to Taiwan's economy and reputation among foreign investors."
Taiwan scraps nuclear plant, braces for storm (October 27, 2000)
http://www.enn.com/enn-subsciber-news-archive/2000/10/10272000/reu_tai_39625.asp
This news article from the Environmental News Network discusses the decision in October to scrap plans for the nuclear plant, including the reaction of Taiwan's Nationalist Party.
Taiwan sees heavy loss if nuclear plant scrapped (September 26, 2000)
http://www.climateark.org/articles/2000/3rd/taseeshe.htm
This Reuters article outlines the consequences Taiwan will face if the environmental concerns.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
THE_MAIL
010301
Scientific American
http://www.sciam.com/2001/0301issue/0301letters.html
"How much technological invasion can our lives stand?" asks Steven Ginzburg of Santa Barbara, Calif. (See "As We May Live," by W. Wayt Gibbs; Technology and Business, November 2000.) "Technology is most tolerable when it provides a useful service without our noticing. Using this litmus test, Web-enhanced appliances (such as NCR's e-banking microwave oven) seem rather absurd. A house that unobtrusively monitors the health of elderly inhabitants is more promising, despite the inherent invasion of privacy, as is a Subaru car device that improves handling by monitoring motion and applying momentary brake pressure. I predict that future life will be much like life today, except that everyday gadgets will be safer and more efficient and will interoperate more readily, thanks to computerization. A houseful of hidden cameras and Web-browsing appliances is an improbable and unfortunate stereotype of the home of the future."
For additional comments and opinions about articles from the November 2000 issue--including an intriguing twist in the story of the race to build the A-bomb--please read on.
But for a Bit of Boron ...
William Lanouette ["The Odd Couple and the Bomb"] writes that both German and American scientists recognized that graphite could serve as a moderator for uranium Þssion but that the Germans gave up on it because graphite absorbed too many neutrons. It did so because, unbeknownst to them, their graphite contained a trace amount of boron that had gone undetected by the spectrochemical method they used to analyze it. This fact underlines how crucial Szilard's insistence that Fermi not publish his results on boron-free graphite as a moderator was to the outcome of World War II. Had the Germans learned of it at that point, their project would not have Þzzled as it did.
ARNO ARRAK Dix Hills, N.Y.
Letters to the editors should be sent by e-mail to editors@sciam.com or by post to Scientific American, 415 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10017. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Because of the considerable volume of mail received, we cannot answer all correspondence.
---
Civilians at Sea
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/opinion/L01SUB.html
To the Editor:
Re "New Clues From the Greeneville" (editorial, Feb. 23), and how civilians were permitted to operate crucial controls on that submarine:
I went to sea for a number of years, working my way up to second officer (though not on subs), and from time to time we had civilians aboard the various ships I served on.
We never allowed any civilian to act as helmsman - to take over the steering wheel of the ship - even if qualified personnel stood close by. I can honestly say it never occurred to any ship's officer to allow such a thing.
JOHN SAVAGE Old Greenwich, Conn., Feb. 23, 2001
•
To the Editor:
Re "Submarine Joy Rides" (letter, Feb. 24):
A bigger issue, beyond the safety of allowing civilians aboard a submarine during practice exercises, is the question of why the Navy feels the need to promote itself. This only makes me even more suspicious that maybe we don't really need all these subs.
STEVEN KALOW Glenmont, N.Y., Feb. 25, 2001
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
Radsafe under influence of Radaition Safety and Health Group
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
http://ans.ep.wisc.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-sci-l
I was talking about Joe Alvarez. There is a lobbying pro nuclear group on Radsafe called Radiation Safety and Health. Their listserv archives are below. Alvarez and Seiler work for the nuclear industry's interest for a business group named Auxier and Associates. You must remember John Auxier. The leader of this Radiaiton and Safety Group is Jim Muckerheide, Bernie Cohen, Klaus Becker, etc. and others are founding members of Radiation Safety and Health. This groups lead the charge on Radsafe and attacks anyone who does not have their pro nuclear, non LNT views. I think they are funded by the American Nuclear Society among others.
-------- colorado
Flats cleanup unlikely before 2008
March 1, 2001
Denver Post
By Jim Kirksey
http://www.denverpost.com/news/news0301f.htm
March 1, 2001 - The cleanup of the former nuclear weapons plant at Rocky Flats is two years behind schedule, a delay that could cost the Department of Energy more than $600,000, according to a federal report.
"We have always believed that the 2006 closure goal was aggressive and ambitious," said Karen Letz, Department of Energy spokeswoman at Rocky Flats. "We have made significant progress when you consider that it was originally estimated that the closure would take until 2070."
The two-year delay may cause the cleanup to exceed the anticipated $7.5 billion, according to the General Accounting Office. The delays could cost the Department of Energy as much as $630 million.
The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, concluded that Kaiser-Hill Co., the company contracted to remove plutoniumcontaminated materials at the Rocky Flats facility northwest of Denver, won't meet its target date of December 2006.
"Kaiser-Hill has made significant progress in the cleanup of the site on several fronts," the report said. "However, because of the scope and complexity of the remaining work, and the compressed schedule for completing it, there is little margin for resolving the many obstacles that could delay the completion date."
Kaiser-Hill reported that it has only a 15 percent chance of finishing the project by its 2006 target date, mainly because of difficulties and delays in shipping plutonium to Department of Energy sites in South Carolina and New Mexico.
"We are running behind on our waste shipments right now," Letz said. "We do need to increase those. We're running on a 2007 schedule."
In its written response, Kaiser-Hill noted that many of the delays are due to improvements in worker safety at Rocky Flats, and that a 2008 closure date is a significant improvement from a 1999 GAO report that estimated the company had only a 1 percent chance of finishing by 2010.
Now, 18 months after that report, the estimate is that Kaiser-Hill has a 97 percent chance of having the cleanup done by 2008.
"We have made significant progress," Letz said. "We have a long way to go."
The 6,300-acre Rocky Flats site produced nuclear weapons for almost 40 years during the Cold War.
Denver Post wire services contributed to this report
-------- new jersey
Cleanup crew polishes water
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Bergen Record
By SCOTT FALLON
http://www.bergen.com/region/watersf200103013.htm
-- WAYNE
With its windowpanes ensconced in a metal lattice, the two-story building on Black Oak Ridge Road resembles a large greenhouse from the outside.
Inside, it's anything but a hospitable habitat. Engineers wear protective suits, two layers of gloves, three layers of footwear, a hard hat, and goggles. Anyone leaving this building is swept from head to heel with a Geiger counter.
The precautions are taken seriously. In this building, tens of thousands of gallons of water laced with radioactive particles churn through filters each day to clean it.
Welcome to the water treatment plant at the former W.R. Grace site in Wayne -- home of North Jersey's largest radioactive waste removal effort.
With the cleanup of the 6.5-acre site scheduled to be completed this fall, federal contractors are increasing efforts to have the water treated and removed on time. Beginning this month, the water has been filtered seven days a week.
"We call it polishing water," said Allen Roos, a project manager for the Army Corps of Engineers, which has overseen the excavation of tons of tainted soil from the site for the last three years. There is 7,000 to 8,000 cubic yards of soil laced with thorium and other radioactive particles remaining. The amount of water varies with rainfall.
The water comes into contact with thorium particles left when W. R. Grace processed the element for nuclear fuels, from 1947 to 1971. Thorium breaks down into the radioactive element radon, which has been linked to liver disease and cancer.
The corps had planned to flush the treated water into Sheffield Brook, which runs near a residential neighborhood before emptying into the Passaic River.
But after a community backlash, corps officials decided last fall to continue trucking the water to a South Jersey treatment plant. However, corps officials still consider the brook plan an option and have already received regulatory approval from environmental agencies.
"They should just continue to truck it out of there," said Michelle Volpe, who lives near the site. "Why make matters worse for the people in this neighborhood?"
The contaminated water comes from two sources. One is surface water from rain and snow. The other is water that has seeped into the ground and is pumped up through wells. The process of cleaning the water involves enough chemistry to fill several textbooks.
"It's like a very complex water softener," said Wing Cho, a chemical engineer for Environmental Chemical Corp., the contractor doing the excavation. "It's basically the same concept."
The water reaches the surface and is siphoned into holding tanks where solid radioactive materials such as thorium are separated from it through a series of filters. The water is pre-filtered in three stages: 150 microns, 50 microns -- about the thickness of a human hair -- and finally 10 microns.
The solids, which are in the form of slurry, are pumped into a separate tank.
The water then undergoes a chemical reaction called an ion exchange, a complicated chemical process where liquid radioactive materials such as uranium are extracted.
At a wastewater treatment plant on site, a resin is used to attract negatively charged uranium particles. As the contaminated wastewater is passed through the resin, the uranium exchanges a negatively charged molecule with the resin. As a result, the resin has effectively formed an unbreakable chemical bond with the uranium. It is then removed.
About 50 gallons can be treated each minute, and up to 50,000 gallons can be cleaned in a day's work.
The filtering reduces contaminants by 80 percent to 98 percent. So far, every one of the 8 million gallons that has been processed has been 100 percent compliant with federal safe-drinking water standards.
About 6,000 gallons are pumped into a truck, which delivers the water to the Gloucester County Utilities Authority for further processing. Three to seven trucks leave each day.
Unlike the soil, dealing with water can be unpredictable.
The cold winter has forced delays as surface water freezes.
"It's a battle we fight day in and day out," said Marc Mizrahi, the site project manager for Environmental Chemical Corp. "The weather really affects how we do this job."
The closest thing to a crisis came on Sept. 17, 1999, when Tropical Storm Floyd left 1.2 million gallons of water on the site. Corps and cleanup workers worked around the clock building a makeshift berm to contain the water to the pits that had been carved out when soil was excavated.
"Whatever fell into the pits we contained," Mizrahi said. "We lost about four days of production but considering what had happened, that was pretty good."
After the last of the contaminated soil and water are removed, corps staff will test samples periodically for five years. The site will be cleaned to residential status, meaning homes could conceivably be built there in the near future.
"We want to make sure that our job here is complete," Roos said one recent afternoon before being swept by a Geiger counter. "If we detect anything, we'll be back to clean it up. We hope everything will be taken care of this year."
Staff Writer Scott Fallon's e-mail address is fallon@northjersey.com
-------- new mexico
New Mexico
01/03/01
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/states/all50.htm
Santa Fe - Trucks hauling radioactive material into New Mexico on Interstate 25 will face tougher inspections. State environmental officials in May will replace a small radioactivity monitor at a weigh station in Raton with four monitors mounted on two 6-foot-high towers. All trucks including those hauling shipments to a federal nuclear waste dump near Carlsbad will be monitored by the new system.
-------- new york
Engineer at Indian Point 2 Quits in a Dispute Over a Safety Issue
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By MATTHEW L. WALD
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/nyregion/01NUKE.html?searchpv=nytToday
An engineer working for a contractor at the Indian Point 2 nuclear plant has quit in a dispute over the reliability of the system that triggers automatic shutdowns during equipment failures, according to the company.
The engineer, whom the company would not name, complained that the reactor protection system, which monitors temperatures, pressures, flows and other data around the plant, was wired differently from the way it was designed. The company said it had double-checked the system's operations for safety but would not rebuild it to the original design.
The reactor is already the subject of acute attention, stemming from an accident in February 2000 that allowed radioactive water to escape from the containment building.
A spokesman for the plant, Chris Olert, said, "There are differing professional opinions between Consolidated Edison and the contractor" about the reactor protection system.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is reviewing the dispute, he said.
The plant's safety analysis, completed before licensing, relies on plant diagrams, so discrepancies between the blueprint and the plant itself can mean that the safety systems will not work as designed.
The engineer who quit also spoke to Paul M. Blanch, who was hired by Con Ed to restore the confidence of the public and plant workers. Mr. Blanch, a nuclear engineer, uncovered a safety flaw at a Northeast Utilities reactor in the early 1990's and later quit that company; the Nuclear Regulatory Commission concluded that he had been hounded from his job by the company.
"It's very troublesome when someone resigns because there's a safety problem," Mr. Blanch said. He characterized the safety issue as "a deficiency in the paperwork."
-------- ohio
Uranium Plant
the plant.
Thursday, March 1, 2001
ohio.com
http://www.ohio.com/bj/news/ohio/docs/017057.htm
COLUMBUS: Abraham also announced that Ohio would receive, under President Bush's budget, an additional $1.1 million to help the poor insulate their homes. The state now gets $8.1 million for the program.
The government got out of the uranium enrichment business and spun off its two processing plants in 1998 in a $1.9 billion stock sale.
Both the Ohio and Kentucky plants were built after World War II to enrich uranium to bomb grade, but in recent years have only processed uranium for nuclear power plant fuel.
---
Uranium Plant
plant's future.
Thursday, March 1, 2001
ohio.com
http://www.ohio.com/bj/news/ohio/docs/026853.htm
COLUMBUS, Ohio: The first installment of the $630 million needed to convert the plant was held up after the General Accounting Office questioned the legality of the way the Clinton administration proposed to finance the changes.
The Energy Department said it will use $59 million from its current budget and will take the rest of the $125 million from the department's fiscal 2002 budget. None of the money comes from privatization funds that the Clinton administration wanted to use to help the plant.
---
PERRY POWERS UP
Nuclear plant adds capacity with eye to future Upgrades to take a month
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Akron Beacon Journal.
ohio.com
BY CHRISTINA HANGE KUKUK
http://www.ohio.com/bj/business/docs/019538.htm
As soon as FirstEnergy's Perry Nuclear Power Plant completes its biannual refueling later this month, the company will have added enough production capacity to power 77,000 more homes.
How will the Akron-based utility do it? By tweaking one layer of turbine blades in the plant's generator just 30-thousandths of an inch -- about the same thickness as a human hair.
Widening those spaces will allow enough additional steam through the generator blades to produce about 60 more megawatts of electricity per hour.
Officials at the plant, about 35 miles east of Cleveland, started planning the $10 million upgrade two years ago.
With the growing demand for electricity, expanding Perry's capacity was an economical way to get more megawatts.
``We have enough supply to meet the demands of our customers, but we want to plan for the future,'' spokesman Todd Schneider said. ``We don't want to get caught behind like they did in California.''
The turbine alterations are among the thousands of tasks that must be done during the month the plant is shut down for maintenance.
Workers also are replacing used fuel cells in the reactor core that sits deep in a massive concrete pool of water. Dressed in protective suits resembling yellow flannel pajamas, workers will carefully move the spent uranium fuel assemblies -- 13 feet long and glowing a fluorescent purple -- from the reactor to storage.
Christina Hange Kukuk can be reached at 330-996-3728 or ckukuk@thebeaconjournal.com
-------- tennessee
City's black residents weren't coerced to live near Y-12
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Oak Ridger
Dick Smyser:
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/030101/opE_0301010058.html
The history of the federal government's provision of housing for blacks in Oak Ridge during the city's earliest years is not commendable. Rather, in important ways it's disgraceful.
But as discriminatory and, in current context, almost unbelievably inadequate as were the quarters available for the relatively quite small number of black residents then, there is little in that history to support the allegation that black housing was deliberately located where environmental and health risks might be greatest.
This is the claim being made by many of those who, both in the courts and public forums, are alleging that race is/was a factor in determining who among Oak Ridge's population has been victimized by the alleged risks of residence here: that the Scarboro Village's location just on the other side of a ridge from the Y-12 Plant has made residents there especially vulnerable.
The earliest black residents of Oak Ridge did indeed live in what was called Scarboro Village. But until mid-1949 and early 1950, Scarboro Village was located where the Woodland homes are now, if occupying only the center part of that area. And the housing there -- hutments with dirt floors and segregated not just by race but by sex (married couples could not live together) -- was indeed abominable.
In the city's very earliest planning, however, housing for blacks was to be located in what is now East Village, the area just east of Glenwood Baptist Church. And while the housing there was to be on a lesser scale than the rest of the so-called "cemesto" area to the west, it would have been immensely more desirable than what came to be in the hutment area.
Why the abandonment of the East Village site? Within just weeks of the initial planning, the size and scope of the Manhattan Project mission here grew dramatically and the housing planned for blacks became, in the view of military officials pressured by the urgency of the project, housing needed for non-blacks.
At that time, of course, segregation was not an issue, at least not with the military, the Manhattan Engineer District being under the command of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Military forces were segregated throughout the country and abroad, not just in the South. And relative to civilians, the announced federal policy for all of its projects was one of conformance "with the laws and social customs of the states and communities in which federal installations are located."
The early black presence in Oak Ridge was about 1,500 persons among a total population which at its peak reached 75,000. Thus it was not until the immediate postwar years, when control of the nuclear effort was switched from the military to the newly created civilian U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, that there was even nominal concern about the awful housing in which Oak Ridge blacks were forced to live.
The AEC, once it had made the basic decision that Oak Ridge would continue to exist as a community, almost immediately planned improved housing. The Garden Apartments on the West Turnpike were one of the first big projects. So were Woodland area homes. But since these would be for whites, there was need for new housing for blacks and this would mean also the good riddance of the hutment area.
Those considered leaders of the black community were called together by the AEC and out of these conferences came the choice of the location for the new homes for blacks. It would be in Gamble Valley, the pre-Oak Ridge name for the area where during the war years had been located a large trailer park area for whites.
Built first for blacks were 15 single-family homes which were ready for occupancy in midsummer 1949. Next were seven dormitories completed by early fall. (These later were converted into apartments.) Third phase were 286 duplex units ready for occupancy in late fall. In the interim between the vacating of the hutments and the occupancy of the new housing, blacks were housed in so-called Victory Cottages previously occupied by whites.
The location of the new Scarboro Village, therefore, was significantly determined by what was interpreted then as the consent of those who would live there, although at that time there was little if any concern of health risks from living anywhere in Oak Ridge.
Were the so-called leaders of the black population in 1949 offered alternative sites for their new housing? Records referenced for this column do not show, but surely if someone knows it would add important perspective to current discussions.
In the years that followed there was conflict about the name of the area of the new housing for blacks. Gamble Valley, sometimes shortened to just "The Valley," continued in use by many. There was citywide bus service until the early 1960s and buses on that route said "Gamble Valley" on their front.
In time, however, residents waged a campaign to have Scarboro Village be their neighborhood's designated name and it finally took hold. (Gamble Valley was named originally for the Gambles, a prominent family there. Scarboro was a pre-Oak Ridge community and when the pre-Oak Ridge school there became the school for Oak Ridge blacks, Scarboro was adopted as the name for the black housing area also.)
Discussion of housing for blacks recalls the early months of The Oak Ridger's publication. In mid-April 1949 we published two front page articles which, in very sharp language and supported by pictures, called attention to the deplorable conditions under which blacks were housed. The articles also hit hard at the private landlord hired by the Fed to manage the housing and also to run a "company store" sort of commissary there.
The articles got intense reaction from both the Atomic Energy Commission, which cried foul, and from citizens who praised The Oak Ridger.
In retrospect, I cannot defend the articles as news accounts. They were really harshly worded editorials and might have been equally as effective labeled as such. Also, I would grant that AEC community officials had some cause to charge unfairness: We did not, at first at least, give equal coverage to their plans, already well along, to replace the hutments.
In total, however, our "expose" drew attention to a situation that too many in Oak Ridge had previously ignored. Also, it prompted the AEC to issue within days a statement explaining in much greater detail than previously its concern for improving housing for blacks. The articles also helped convince Oak Ridgers that The Oak Ridger was, indeed, a new and independent voice within the previously largely federally controlled community. -- RDS
Richard D. Smyser is founding editor of The Oak Ridger. You can reach him by e-mail at rdsandmps@aol.com
---
Alliance:
Carson suit needs closure
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Oak Ridger
by Paul Parson
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/030101/new_0301010010.html
Enough is enough.
That's the gist of a letter sent this week to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham by the American Engineering Alliance regarding Joe Carson's "whistleblower" case.
In the letter, Louis Comunelli, chairman of the engineering group, asks Abraham to authorize Department of Energy attorneys to bring the case to an "immediate, equitable and comprehensive resolution."
Carson, a licensed professional engineer, says that while working in a safety oversight role in Oak Ridge for DOE headquarters, his attempts to report safety and security violations at several DOE sites resulted in a lowering of his usual performance rating, his removal from surveillance responsibilities and his reassignment to another site.
In April 1999, the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board ruled that DOE's actions were reprisal for Carson's "whistleblowing." DOE's appeal was rejected by the Merit Systems Protection Board in a February 2000 decision, which ordered Carson restored to his job.
The American Engineering Alliance letter points out that DOE has paid "almost $400,000" in Carson's legal expenses to date.
In addition to its letter, the American Engineering Alliance, a national professional engineering society incorporated in New York, filed a "friend-of-the-court" brief in the Carson case on Feb. 12. The brief allows an organization that is not a party to a legal proceeding but which has a strong interest in the case to voice its opinion on the matter.
"Licensed professional engineers who are employed by a federal agency have an ethical, moral and legal obligation to protect the public, and that obligation requires the freedom of speech required to discharge it," the brief states.
-------- washington
Spending cuts could hit Northwest
The president's plan suggests trims at five agencies with regional ties, but it's too early to assess any impact
Thursday, March 1, 2001
The Oregonian
oregonlive.com
By TOM DETZEL
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/news/oregonian/01/03/wr_52nwbud01.frame
WASHINGTON -- The budget President Bush sent to Congress on Wednesday cuts $3.5 billion in discretionary spending from five federal agencies with important ties to the Northwest environment and economy.
The departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Energy and Interior, plus the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, are among 10 agencies overall that would have lower budgets come October under the president's plan.
Together, the agencies control thousands of acres of federal timber and grazing lands in the Northwest, oversee critical fish and wildlife programs and operate the Columbia River hydropower and flood-control system.
The cuts are outlined in a budget blueprint delivered Wednesday to members of Congress, but what they may mean for specific programs in the region largely remained a mystery.
That's because detailed budgets for the agencies won't be released until early April, and most agency officials were offering few, if any, insights.
Still, the overall reductions cited in the blueprint were enough to raise alarm bells for some Northwest lawmakers.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said the agencies that are being cut "matter most to the quality of life in the Pacific Northwest. . . . If you look at this budget blueprint today, they are in the eye of the storm."
Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., said cuts to the Department of Energy budget were "reason for real concern" because the blueprint doesn't specify proposed spending for cleanup of nuclear and other hazardous waste.
Hastings' district includes the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, the department's most expensive cleanup project. More than $701 million is being spent this year to clean up plutonium and radioactive byproducts.
Hastings said it would take "millions more" in spending at Hanford for the Energy Department to meet its legal obligations under a cleanup agreement with the state.
The department's budget would be cut $700 million, to $19 billion, under Bush's plan. But within that total, the budget would boost spending on weatherization, "clean coal" research and maintaining nuclear weapons.
"I don't see how cleanup avoids taking a hit," Wyden said.
Three other agencies that manage Northwest forests and rangelands and oversee recovery programs for endangered steelhead and salmon also face cuts in discretionary spending. (The figures do not include mandatory spending programs):
• The Agriculture Department, which includes the U.S. Forest Service, would be cut $1.5 million to $17.9 billion.
• The Interior Department, which includes the Bureau of Land Management, national parks and the Fish and Wildlife Service, would be cut $400 million to $9.8 billion. • The Commerce Department, which includes the National Marine Fisheries Service, would be cut $300 million to $4.8 billion.
Officials at each agency said details for forestry and fish and wildlife budgets wouldn't be available until April. The Corps of Engineers, which operates federal dams, would be cut $600 million to $3.9 billion.
Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber met Wednesday with members of Oregon's congressional delegation, in part to pitch his proposal to more than double spending on imperiled salmon and steelhead in the Columbia River basin.
Kitzhaber, a Democrat, wants to boost money for hatchery improvements and habitat conservation by $438 million next year, to $718 million.
Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., said later that the delegation will help the governor get more money, but probably not as much as Kitzhaber wants.
"We need to be in touch with reality around here," Smith said. "He's asking for more than twice as much as we were ever able to get Bill Clinton to approve."
Smith agreed that more money needs to be spent at Hanford, but he said the Energy and other budgets are still works in progress. He applauded Bush's approach on the budget and said it's too early to be alarmed about cuts.
"There's lots of negotiating that will go on between now and when the tax and spending bills are finally concluded," he said. "Again, the president proposes, and the Congress disposes."
You can reach Tom Detzel at 503-294-7604 or by e-mail at tom.detzel@newhouse.com.
-------- us nuc politics
A presidential speech
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/ed-house-20013118124.htm
In his speech before Congress and the nation Tuesday evening, President George W. Bush offered no surprises. He once again left no doubt that the 10-year, $1.6 trillion tax-relief proposal that formed the centerpiece of his successful presidential campaign was the plan he wanted Congress to enact. With post-election projected budget surpluses now reaching $5.6 trillion over the next decade, including more than $3 trillion unrelated to the cumulative Social Security surpluses, the most appropriate word to describe the size of Mr. Bush's proposed tax cut is "modest," a fact that has not prevented Democratic big spenders from relentlessly attacking the plan. Indeed, Mr. Bush proposes to allocate merely half of the non-Social Security surpluses for tax relief at a time when federal taxes now consume as large a share of annual economic output as they did at the height of World War II. Moreover, considering that the 1986 bipartisan tax reform legislation established a maximum income-tax rate of 28 percent, just how radical is Mr. Bush's plan, whose top rate would peak at a relatively hefty 33 percent?
Throughout his address Mr. Bush offered one common sense proposal after another. After four consecutive spending binges that raised discretionary spending by an average of more than 6 percent per year, Mr. Bush proposed to increase overall discretionary spending by 4 percent in fiscal 2002, still above inflation.
On the issue of national security, Mr. Bush was as emphatic Tuesday night as he had been throughout his campaign: "To protect our own people, our allies and our friends, we must develop and we must deploy effective missile defenses."
Under Mr. Bush's plan, federal spending for education would increase by 11.5 percent. However, states would be given greater flexibility allocating education funds where they believe they are most needed. If failing schools failed to improve, parents would be given other options, including the opportunity to attend private schools.
Mr. Bush was surely right when he asserted, "[T]he biggest test of our foresight and courage will be reforming Medicare and Social Security." He announced he would soon be forming a presidential commission to reform Social Security based on the principal that would "offer personal savings accounts to younger workers who want them." He called on Congress to act on the bipartisan framework for Medicare reform developed several years ago by Democratic Sen. John Breaux and Republican Rep. Bill Thomas.
Beyond reducing taxes and reforming entitlements, Mr. Bush's plan would retire $2 trillion of the publicly held national debt during the next 10 years, a feat that would result in "more debt [being] repaid more quickly than has ever been repaid by any nation at any time in history."
If Mr. Bush offered no surprises, neither did Democratic congressional leaders, who delivered their tired party's predictable response to his proposals. Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle audaciously asserted that Mr. Bush's proposed tax cut "will consume nearly all of the available surplus," which totals $5.6 trillion. Even as the Democratic Party parades its "truth deficit," it is the Republican administration that has all the ideas and all the initiative.
-------- MILITARY
Vietnam, Russia Sign Deal
March 1, 2001
Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Vietnam-Putin.html
HANOI, Vietnam (AP) -- The leaders of Russia and Vietnam signed a deal expanding strategic ties Thursday, a move that reunites Hanoi with its one-time communist benefactor and gives Moscow its strongest ally in Southeast Asia.
Vladimir Putin's visit, the first by a Russian or Soviet leader despite a half-century of diplomatic ties, was widely lauded by Vietnamese leaders and the state-controlled press, but has drawn only muted public interest.
Only a scattering of people were on hand to wave Vietnamese and Russian flags as Putin's motorcade pulled into Hanoi late Wednesday. It provided a sharp contrast to the thousands who spontaneously filled the streets during President Clinton's arrival last November.
Putin received an official red-carpet reception Thursday morning at Hanoi's ornate Presidential Palace before he and Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong moved into closed-door talks.
The two agreed to promote strategic cooperation between the countries, which last year reached an agreement on repaying Vietnam's debt to the former Soviet Union, a long-standing barrier to closer ties. Vietnam agreed to pay $1.7 billion over 23 years.
``It would be a stupid and unforgivable idea to lose the potential and high level of the relationship which existed between our two countries,'' Putin told reporters.
Luong agreed, saying the two countries were ``seeking ways to bring our economic, trade, and technological cooperation to a higher and more effective level, to match our fine political relations.''
The leaders also signed agreements on expanding economic and trade ties, particularly in oil and gas, and increasing military cooperation and science and technology exchanges.
Emerging from the private talks, Putin again asserted Moscow's intention to step up strategic and economic cooperation with Hanoi, saying that Russia is ready to help Vietnam with its military needs.
``Vietnam not only needs to maintain its weaponry and military equipment supplied by the Soviet Union, it also needs to modernize its army and also needs new and modern technologies,'' Putin said.
The strategic accord spells out plans to expand relations in every area from military and technological cooperation to economic and investment ties. It also states Vietnam's support of Russia in holding up the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
However, talks on renewing Russia's lease on a key military base in southern Vietnam's Cam Ranh Bay, set to expire in 2004, were expected to be difficult. The base, once used by U.S. forces, serves as Moscow's strategic foothold in the region. China and the United States are both believed to be interested in gaining access to the massive base.
U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam Pete Peterson said Washington had ``no problem'' with Putin's visit and understood it was an important event for Vietnam's government.
Coming off a South Korea visit, Vietnam is the second leg of Putin's Asian tour aimed at boosting Russian influence in the region. The Soviet Union was Vietnam's mainstay during the Vietnam War, supplying military and economic assistance to communist North Vietnam, but relations have been strained since the collapse of the Soviet Union a decade ago.
-------- arms sales
Beijing says sales of arms to Taiwan could hurt trade
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
By Bill Gertz
http://www.washtimes.com/national/default-200131224920.htm
A senior Chinese government official said yesterday that sales of advanced U.S. arms to Taiwan could lead to "explosive" relations between the United States and China and undermine business ties.
Zhou Mingei, Beijing's senior specialist on Taiwan affairs, said during a press conference at the Chinese Embassy that growing business ties between U.S. companies and China had raised the stakes in the debate over arms sales to the island.
Thousands of business and cultural ventures under way between U.S. and Chinese entities make U.S. arms sales different from how they were 10 years ago, Mr. Zhou said.
"Especially with the entering of [World Trade Organization], we are looking forward to have more American business sectors to have long-term investment or long-term corporations in that region, which all requires the peaceful, stable surroundings there," Mr. Zhou said.
Selling arms to Taiwan, "which could be explosive any time," eventually will "hurt bilateral relations and it will hurt U.S. interests," Mr. Zhou said.
U.S. officials said privately that Mr. Zhou's visit, with a delegation of Chinese officials, is part of a major propaganda effort by Beijing to influence the Bush administration's decision on arms sales to Taiwan.
Taiwan's government in January asked to buy four Aegis-equipped guided missile destroyers, along with diesel submarines, surveillance aircraft, anti-radar missiles and other weapons, the official said.
A decision on the arms sales is expected next month.
Pentagon officials said the new administration is more likely to approve sales of advanced weapons, including the warships, based on a more balanced policy toward the region.
The Clinton administration sharply curtailed arms sales to Taiwan as part of its pro-Beijing "engagement" policy.
That policy has led to an arms imbalance across the Taiwan Strait as China's forces have deployed up to 300 new short-range missiles opposite the island in the past several years.
Mr. Zhou's delegation followed other recent visits by Chinese officials who met with administration and congressional leaders to express opposition to Taiwan arms sales.
In contrast, the State Department has blocked a planned visit this month by Taiwan's top admiral, who was expected to seek approval for the sale of the Aegis warships.
Secretary of State Colin Powell said in January the United States would do more to "provide for the defense needs of Taiwan" under U.S. laws regarding arms sales.
"We understand that a strong Taiwan that is secure is a foundation for that prosperous country to continue to prosper, and it is the foundation of stability and security in that part of the world," Mr. Powell said.
China broke off unification talks with Taiwan in 1999 after Taiwan's president made a statement interpreted by Beijing as a step toward formal independence, which China opposes.
Taiwan's new ruling political party, the Democratic Progressive Party, in the past has advocated formal independence. China's government is demanding that Taipei accept Beijing's Communist version of "one China" before discussing reunification.
Mr. Zhou said China would "try in every way" to reach a peaceful settlement, but noted that "you cannot simply talk about peace without talking about reunification. Otherwise, what is the purpose for?
"You cannot talk about having a different system without recognizing one country."
• This article is based in part on wire service reports.
-------- burma/myanmar
Memo Feeds Concern That Exports to U.S. Help Burmese Junta
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01BURM.html
Myanmar, which has been governed by a military junta for more than a dozen years, is rapidly increasing apparel exports to the United States despite American economic sanctions against that country.
A newly declassified State Department cable describes how factories in Myanmar, formerly Burma, have produced garments for leading American designers and retailers, including Kenneth Cole, Nautica, Jordache, Kmart and Wal-Mart.
The cable, written by the American Embassy in Myanmar's capital, Yangoon, also known as Rangoon, to the Secretary of State voices concern that Myanmar's military leaders are benefiting financially from these shipments because most of the factories are joint ventures partly owned by the military government.
"The Burmese garment industry is booming -- growing 45 percent in the last year," said the cable dated last July. "Factories on the northern outskirts of Rangoon are operating non-stop, producing winter clothes for the U.S. market."
In 1999, the cable said, Myanmar exported $168 million worth of garments to the United States, but those shipments more than doubled last year, soaring to $403.7 million. That places Burma's apparel exports to the United States well above France's, at about the same level as Israel's exports to the United States.
Four years ago, President Clinton banned all new American investments in Myanmar, but the government has not banned trade with that country, although it has encouraged companies not to do business there. Mr. Clinton took those actions because of the military junta's repression of the democratic opposition and its leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.
The cable was obtained from Senator Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat who along with Senator Jesse Helms, a North Carolina Republican, and Senator Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, has called for the prohibition of apparel imports from Myanmar.
"Here we have perhaps the most brutally repressive military regime in the world," Senator Harkin said. "And by importing all this apparel from there, we're putting close to half a billion dollars into their coffers every year.
That money is going right to this brutally repressive regime and we're not doing anything about it. You talk about holes in our sanctions in Iraq, that's nothing compared to this."
Most of Myanmar's garment factories, the cable states, have been financed by Korean, Taiwanese and Hong Kong manufacturers that have turned to Myanmar because they are bumping up against quotas imposed by the United States limiting imports from their countries. Myanmar, by contrast, has unfilled import quotas to the United States.
Low pay is a major attraction for foreign manufacturers, the cable suggests. "Workers reportedly receive salaries ranging between 5,000 and 17,000 kyat (or $14 to $47 dollars) per month for a 48-hour work week," the cable said. "The lowest paid workers are trainees who receive 5,000 kyat per month or about U.S. 8 cents an hour."
The cable also noted another reason that garment manufacturers are flocking to Myanmar -- labor unions are prohibited there.
Describing a visit to a factory capable of producing one million shirts per year, the cable states, "The factory owners claimed that the Government of Burma Ministry of Labor adequately protected the workers and that there was no need for unions in Burma."
Earlier this week, the State Department denounced Myanmar in its annual human rights report, finding that the military government deprived the most basic social and political rights.
Last November, the International Labor Organization, a United Nations agency, recommended, in its strongest sanctions ever, that the organization's 175 member states review their business dealings with Myanmar because of the widespread use of forced labor there.
"It's criminal that at the moment the administration is talking about increased repression in Burma, our government is allowing a huge increase in apparel imports from Burma under a very lax quota," said Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the National Labor Committee, a New York-based group that promotes workers rights.
Jessica Moser, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman, said the company's American stores stopped importing apparel from Myanmar three years ago, although she added that Wal-Mart stores in other countries only stopped such imports about a year ago.
Michele Jasukaitis, a Kmart spokeswoman, said, "We do not import directly from Burma, and we double-check our distribution centers for any indirect imports from Burma."
Kenneth Cole officials acknowledged that one of the designer's subcontractors had been importing sweaters from Burma, but the company said it terminated such imports from Myanmar as soon as it learned about them several months ago.
Nautica and Jordache officials did not return telephone calls.
-------- colombia
Colombian rebel chief won't 'beg' U.S.
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene-20013121118.htm
BOGOTA, Colombia - Colombia's rebel leader, responding to President Bush's refusal to participate in peace talks, said yesterday he would not "beg" the United States to join negotiations he is holding with the Colombian government to end the country's 37-year-old war.
Manuel "Sureshot" Marulanda, head of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), made his comments one day after Mr. Bush, at a meeting at the White House, rejected a request by President Andres Pastrana to participate in the 2-year-old dialogue.
"What else can we do? We are not going to beg them."
-------- drug war
Maryland Senate committee votes on medical marijuana
Thu, 01 Mar 2001
Richard Schmitz, MPP legislative analyst
http://www.mpp.org/MD
The Maryland Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee will vote on Senate Bill 705, the medical marijuana bill, tomorrow at 10:00 a.m., just two days after the bill's public hearing.
It is extremely important that you personally call each of the four key committee members before Friday morning's decision making meeting and urge them to vote in favor of S.B. 705.
The four key Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee members are:
NAME (PARTY-DISTRICT) ..................EXTENSION
Richard Colburn (R-District 37) ........ ext. 3590
Timothy Ferguson (R-District 4) ........ ext. 3704
Ralph Hughes (D-District 40) ........... ext. 3656
Clarence Mitchell (D-District 44) ...... ext. 3612
You can call the committee members toll free from anywhere within Maryland by dialing 1-800-492-7122 and using the above extensions.
Please tell each legislator that, "I understand the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee will vote on the medical marijuana bill, Senate Bill 705, tomorrow. I am asking you to vote yes on this bill." [Say 'today' if you call Friday morning.]
If any legislator is not available to take your phone call, leave the above message either with the Senator's assistant or on his or her answering service. Further, if you live in one of the committee member's districts, be sure to tell him or her that you are one of his or her constituents.
Visit the "In The News" section of MPP's Maryland Web site to read about yesterday's Senate committee hearing. The House committee hearing for the medical marijuana bill is today. We do not know when the House Judiciary Committee will vote on this bill, but we will let you know as soon as possible.
Again, it is crucial that the four key Senate committee members hear from you before tomorrow morning's voting session. Please call them today and express your support for the medical marijuana bill.
HOW TO SUPPORT THE MARIJUANA POLICY PROJECT
MPP's state legislative monitoring service is funded entirely by the contributions of MPP allies and members nationwide. In order to launch this service in January 2001, MPP had to raise more than $127,000 from hundreds of donors in 2000.
In order to continue with this service in 2002, MPP needs to raise another $127,000 during this calendar year. If you find MPP's legislative monitoring service helpful, please consider making a donation at: http://www.mpp.org/MoneyForStates
Because MPP devotes 100% of its efforts toward influencing public policy, contributions are not tax-deductible. However, the above link also provides a way to make a tax-deductible donation.
---
Scientists find drugs on site of Shakespeare's home
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2001-03-01-shakespeare.htm
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Several 17th-century clay pipes found on the site of William Shakespeare's home may have been used to smoke marijuana, scientists reported Thursday.
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford-upon-Avon in England allowed South African researchers to analyze 24 pipe fragments in Pretoria.
Though marijuana degrades over time, eight of those pipe fragments showed signs suggestive of marijuana, the scientists said. Two of the pipe samples tested also showed evidence of cocaine.
Others showed traces of tobacco, camphor and a chemical with hallucinogenic properties, the study said.
"We do not claim that any of the pipes belonged to Shakespeare himself. However, we do know that some of the pipes come from the area in which he lived, and they date to the 17th century," said Francis Thackeray of the Transvaal Museum, one of the researchers.
Georgianna Ziegler, head of reference for the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, said scholars had no proof of narcotics use by Shakespeare, who lived from 1564 to 1616.
"I'm not saying that Shakespeare would never have drunk, or eaten, or smoked marijuana, because it was used as a medical remedy at the time. But we have no evidence that he ever used it for pleasure," she said.
John Henry, toxicologist and professor at London's Imperial College of Medicine, who was not affiliated with the study, said it was possible that coca leaves - which contain a small amount of cocaine - "were smoked by people in Britain in the 17th century."
Cocaine itself did not come to Britain until about 1900, but coca leaves, chewed by many Incas in the 1500s, were transported to Europe in the 17th century by Spanish explorers.
The results of the study are published in the South African Journal of Science.
---
Annual Drug Report Shows Coca Growth Increase
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01CND-DRUGS.html
WASHINGTON, March 1 - Six years of intense American-backed anti-narcotics efforts in South America have redrawn drug trafficking patterns, but have failed to stem a yearly increase in the overall amount of coca being grown, the State Department acknowledged today.
Despite dramatic reductions in Peru and Bolivia, the amount of coca under cultivation in Colombia surged by 11 percent last year to cover almost 336,000 acres, the department said in its annual review of anti-narcotics efforts around the world.
Still, the United States certified that Colombia's government, which Washington is providing with $1.3 billion in mostly military aid as it struggles against two guerrilla insurgencies, was cooperating in efforts to fight illegal drug trafficking.
In its review of 24 nations that are either major drug producers or points of transit, the department again denied certification to only two countries - Afghanistan and Burma - and deplored the performance of Cambodia and Haiti, but decided to waive sanctions.
The cultivation of opium poppies in Afghanistan rose by 25 percent last year, leaving lands controlled by that country's Islamic government under the Taliban responsible for 72 percent of the world's supply of the raw material for heroin, the report said.
Congress requires that the administration certify each year whether key nations are cooperating with the United States in efforts to stop the flow of illegal drugs. Nations that are not certified are ineligible for most forms of American aid.
After 15 years, the certification process itself is under fire. The annual rite, which involves the work of 300 people over a four-month period, has become a major irritant for United States allies, who insist that American consumption should be part of any evaluation.
In his confirmation hearing in January, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell criticized the procedure as "hypocritical" and "self-defeating." A senior official said today that the administration was willing to consider other ways to pursue cooperation.
Mexico's President, Vicente Fox, says the process is "a sham." His foreign minister, Jorge G. Castañeda, calls it "irritating, counterproductive, unilateral and unjust."
The report did not stress the point made by President Bush when he visited Mr. Fox in Mexico two weeks ago: The demand by millions of Americans, who spend an estimated $63 billion a year on drugs, is the main reason that tons of them are shipped across the border.
But despite the growing clamor on both sides of the border for an end to the annual ritual, the report also stated for the 15th straight year that Mexico was an ally in the long war on drugs.
The overall increase in Andean coca - the raw material for cocaine - is negligible at less than 2 percent, but it highlights how drug traffickers have fled determined eradication programs in Peru and Bolivia and found haven in Colombia. "With the drug trade now an organic part of the Colombian civil conflict, the question facing the anti-drug coalition will be how to reduce the supply of illegal drugs without exacerbating local conflicts that threaten regional stability," the report said.
Senator Christopher J. Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, has introduced legislation to suspend the drug certification procedure for two years, unless the president chooses to reinstate it.
Mr. Dodd said the suspension, which is also being supported by Senator John McCain of Arizona, would "create an atmosphere of goodwill within which President Bush can discuss with other heads of state - from Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia - ways to improve international cooperation among producing, transit and consuming nations."
---
Drug Runners' Tunnels Test the Agents in a Border Town
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By MICHAEL JANOFSKY
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/national/01TUN.html
NOGALES, Ariz., Feb. 28 - The authorities in this border town today discovered a cache of illegal drugs inside yet another hand-dug tunnel connected to a sewer line that smugglers had used to get drugs out of Mexico and into the United States.
About 350 pounds of marijuana was pulled out of a hole in the concrete floor of a commercial garage less than a mile from the Mexican border. It was a modest discovery by any measure, worth only $300,000 or so on the street, said James A. Woolley, assistant special agent at the Drug Enforcement Administration's offices in Tucson.
But this was the second such tunnel found here in three days - and the seventh in the last six years - evidence that smugglers were still using the hilly landscape of Nogales to their advantage. In each case, the tunnel was connected to a city sewer line that was connected in turn to underground culverts that carry water and debris from Mexico into southern Arizona.
Typically, smugglers walk or crawl the drugs through the culverts and the sewer lines before leaving the contraband for someone else to fish out from the floor of the hand- dug tunnels here and load onto vehicles for transport northward.
Ingenious? Not especially, said Kyle E. Barnette, associate special agent in charge of the Customs Service office in Tucson, whose agents scored big on Monday, intercepting 840 pounds of cocaine at a house to which one 25-foot tunnel led not far from the garage. He said agents believed the cocaine to be 95 percent pure, with a street value well above $6 million.
"If you can imagine it, the smugglers can, too," Agent Barnette said of the various means of drug transport that border agents have encountered over the years. "And just because we catch them doesn't mean they won't try again."
Agent Barnette said some of the tunnel discoveries had led to arrests. But the drug business has become so sophisticated, he said, that most people involved in it perform only one task, like dropping the drugs at the mouth of a culvert, moving them through or pulling them out of the tunnel for delivery to a driver.
"It has become a very specialized operation," said Matthew C. Allen, group supervisor for the Nogales office of the Customs Service. "There's the grower, the marketer, the transporter, and that creates an insulating factor. Most of these people involved don't know each other."
For that reason, he said, American and Mexican authorities often cannot easily identify others involved in the trafficking through arrest of someone who might have dug the tunnel.
In both cases this week, the authorities said, there have been no arrests, and the property owners are still being sought.
Nogales has always been a busy spot for drug running, as well as the smuggling of illegal immigrants, on the Mexican border. Michael Unzueta, the Customs Service's deputy executive director, Operations West, said the town generally ranked among the most active places for drug smuggling and interdiction, along with San Ysidro, Calif., Yuma, Ariz., and El Paso.
Already this year, the Customs Service has recorded 50 arrests, 30 indictments and 18 convictions related to drugs in the Nogales area. The tallies are slightly behind those for the corresponding period last year, but numbers alone rarely measure effectiveness, Agent Barnette said, adding: "Imagine squeezing a water balloon. You increase pressure one place, the water goes somewhere else. Same with smugglers."
The lure of Nogales, a high-desert town of about 22,000 across from a Mexican city of the same name with nearly 20 times the population, has been the rugged terrain. Well below the single-family homes that dot the hills on both sides of the border, underground culverts connect the two countries and open several miles inside Arizona, providing smugglers a cozy means of conveyance. By cutting through the sewer lines to which the culverts connect, the smugglers gain access to drop points at the end of the hand-dug tunnels.
Most of the tunnels, elbowing from horizontal to vertical, have been dug through concrete on the floors of houses, although in 1999 investigators found one connected to Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church, a majestic old building on a bluff about a half-mile from the border.
The commercial garage where the latest tunnel discovery was made today sits across from a busy shopping center and offices of the state's Economic Security Department. Pointing to it, Agent Woolley said: "The novelty of this is that it's an operational business. Nobody would have thought anything of it."
As investigators pulled bundles of marijuana out of the tunnel and gathered other evidence, Agent Woolley turned to Mr. Unzueta, the Customs Service official, who was visiting the area from Washington. "It's been a good week for Nogales," Agent Woolley said. "We ain't winning, but at least we're making dents."
---
COCAINE-DEALING INDICTMENTS
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/nyregion/01MBRF.html
QUEENS: Ten people were indicted yesterday in an elaborate cocaine-dealing scheme in which cocaine was hidden in compact discs and other merchandise at a record store and a variety store, according to Richard A. Brown, left, the district attorney. Among those charged was Jose Reyes, 30, who co-owned and operated Reyes Music and Reyes Variety store, both on Mott Avenue in Far Rockaway. Dealers would hide drugs in merchandise and the record store would sell them to as many as 40 people a day, the authorities said. Mr. Reyes and a store employee, Carlos Durán, 18, are fugitives believed to be living in the Dominican Republic. The indictments were the result of a nine-month investigation. Sarah Kershaw (NYT)
---
Can't fool customs
01/03/01
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nweird/nweird.htm
MIAMI - Customs agents said they selected Joel Calistan for a random search after he stepped off a plane from Haiti. A search of his bags at Miami International Airport turned up nothing, but Calistan appeared nervous and his story about his supposed broken arm didn't sound quite right, agents said. Calistan eventually agreed to let the inspectors examine and drill into the cast, and the inside of the cast tested positive for cocaine. When the cast was removed at a local hospital, agents seized 2.3 pounds of cocaine.
---
Harlan
01/03/01
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/states/all50.htm
- The state medical board temporarily suspended the license of Ali Sawaf, a urologist arrested for illegally prescribing the pain reliever OxyContin. Sawaf's arrest on Feb. 1 came a week before a wave of indictments for alleged trafficking in the prescription drug. Authorities say the drug is being widely abused in eastern Kentucky and nearby states. Sawaf pleaded innocent and remains in custody.
---
Press club diplomacy
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
James Morrison News.
http://www.washtimes.com/world/embassy-200131213419.htm
The National Press Club is at the center of Latin American foreign policy this week.
President Francisco Flores of El Salvador holds a news conference at noon today in the club's Zenger Room, and Foreign Minister Heinz Moeller of Ecuador holds a 9 a.m. news conference tomorrow in the First Amendment Lounge.
Foreign Minister Soledad Alvear of Chile met reporters yesterday.
With all the concentration on this hemisphere, Peter Pennekamp of the Netherlands looks a little out of place. The undersecretary of health, welfare and sports holds a 9 a.m. news conference today in the First Amendment Lounge.
He will discuss the Netherlands' liberal drug policies.
Mr. Pennekamp should have come next week, when Europe will be in the spotlight with representatives of the European Union here to meet with their counterparts in the new Bush administration.
Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, will hold a news conference Tuesday at 3:30 p.m. in the First Amendment Lounge.
She will be accompanied by Chris Patten, the commissioner for external affairs, and Javier Solana, the high representative for foreign and security policy.
To contact James Morrison, call 202/636-3297, fax 202/832-7278 or e-mail morris@twtmail.com
-------- puerto rico
Navy suspends use of disputed bombing range
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washdc/2001-03-01-vieques.htm
WASHINGTON (AP) - In a concession to Puerto Rico, the Navy has canceled plans to use a disputed bombing range on the island of Vieques this month.
The decision was made in light of discussions between the office of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the government of Puerto Rico on a permanent solution to the dispute, said Capt. Mike Brady, a spokesman at U.S. Atlantic Fleet headquarters at Norfolk, Va.
Brady said the decision affects training for the USS Enterprise aircraft carrier battle group and a Marine Corps amphibious ready group led by the USS Kearsarge.
It is not a permanent halt to training on Vieques, although that is what Puerto Rican Gov. Sila Calderon wants.
"The battle group and the amphibious ready group are expected to receive an adequate level of training to deploy" as scheduled in late April, Brady said. They will use the waters off Puerto Rico to do other training, but they will not be able to use Vieques for practice bombing and naval gunfire training.
In seeking to retain the Vieques training range, the Navy has argued that it is the only means of providing the training to ensure that battle groups begin their overseas deployments fully ready for combat.
On Tuesday, Calderon met with Rumsfeld in his Pentagon office. She told reporters later that she asked him to delay Navy training exercises on Vieques until he reviews a study suggesting noise from the bombing has caused heart disease among residents.
Asked about the state of discussions with Calderon, Rumsfeld told reporters Thursday, "The Navy is going to proceed with some aspects of their training but not using the inner range, pending the discussions that are taking place." His term "inner range" refers to the bombing range and other training areas on the island, other officials said.
Rumsfeld would not comment further.
The Navy calls Vieques the "crown jewel" of its Atlantic training sites, saying exercises there are vital to national defense because they uniquely combine air, sea and land maneuvers that cannot be done elsewhere.
The Navy owns two-thirds of Vieques and its bombing range covers 900 acres - under 3% of the island. It used live bombs until two went astray in a 1999 practice and killed a civilian guard on the bombing range.
Bombing was halted and protesters occupied the range for more than a year before the Navy swept them out in May.
Under an agreement reached in January 2000 between then-President Clinton and then-Gov. Pedro Rossello, training with inert bombs instead of live ones resumed and Vieques' 9,400 resident were to decide in a referendum next November whether the Navy should stay or leave.
The agreement, which Calderon considers invalid, says that if islanders vote to expel the Navy, it would have to leave by May 2003.
-------- u.n.
China Ratifies Major U.N. Rights Pact
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01CHIN.html?pagewanted=all
BEIJING, Feb. 28 - The government ratified an important United Nations human rights treaty today, even as its own human rights record has continued to come under international criticism and scrutiny.
The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress approved the International Convention on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights a day after the United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Mary Robinson, visited China.
But the government's brief official announcement suggested that it might hedge on a full commitment to the part of the treaty that is the biggest problem for China, Article 8, which proclaims the right to form and join free labor unions.
``Following the ratification, the lawmaking body issued a statement announcing that the Chinese government will assume the obligations prescribed in Item 1(a) of Article 8 of the convention in line with relevant provisions of China's Constitution, Trade Union Law and Labor Law,'' the New China News Agency reported.
The law recognizes just one union, the state-sanctioned All China Federation of Trade Unions, and prohibits the formation of independent groups. The Chinese Constitution does not recognize the right to strike.
``On the one hand, this is a big step forward,'' Mike Jendrzejczyk of Human Rights Watch in Washington said. ``But it makes it even more urgent, now, that China bring its labor laws into compliance with international labor laws and practices.''
The Chinese clearly hope that the ratification will influence two international votes. On March 19, delegates at a United Nations human rights meeting in Geneva will vote on whether to censure China for its continuing problems. Perhaps more important to China's leaders, in July, the International Olympic Committee will decide whether to give Beijing the 2008 Summer Games, a prize that China believes would affirm its growing international prestige.
Although some human rights groups have opposed Beijing's bid, others have said the prospect of holding the Olympics might serve as an incentive to persuade the Chinese government to liberalize.
A spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry, Zhang Qiyue, said the treaty ``has a profound meaning'' for China. ``We have found the right path suited to China's circumstances in promoting and developing human rights,'' she said, the New China News Agency reported.
A spokesman for the high commissioner's office in Geneva, JosÀe DÀiaz, said it had not received the Chinese official documents and could not comment on it. Mr. DÀiaz said a clarification of the Chinese position could take time, although ``it is in their interest to do it quickly.''
In a news conference here on Tuesday, Ms. Robinson expressed hoped that the Chinese would ratify with few or no reservations. ``A serious reservation on Article 8 would be extremely disappointing and would take away from a real step forward,'' she said.
The convention allows member countries to enter ``reservations'' on treaty clauses, indicating that such parts will not be followed. Based on the information released today, United Nations officials said it was not clear whether China was planning to enter a reservation to the union clause or if it was merely signaling its intention to interpret the clause, officially termed a ``declaration.''
Still, Ms. Robinson said the ratification would be ``enormously important legally and psychologically for China,'' providing a ``real tool and a framework'' for progress in rights, because it mandates periodic United Nations evaluations of China's record, including its labor practices.
The convention diverse goals include safe work places, free compulsory primary education and equal pay for women. Members are subject to periodic United Nations inspections. ``By signing, the Chinese open themselves up to international transparency, which will give them incentive to live up to their obligations,'' Mr. Jendrzejczyk of Human Rights Watch said.
China has jailed dozens of people for independent labor activity, and it has steadfastly refused ``technical assistance'' from the International Labor Organization to improve its labor practices, even though it is a member of the organization.
Even if China does not register a reservation to the union clause, the treaty articles give countries fairly wide discretion in carrying out its provisions.
The article in question states that ``no restrictions'' may be placed on the right to organize, ``other than those prescribed by law and which are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public order or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.''
It is unclear whether the vote in Geneva or the Olympic bid would be greatly affected by the ratification, which had been expected at some point this year.
China may continue to be challenged by human rights issues. This week, it indicated that it was not close to signing what is generally considered in the West to be the more important and more sweeping of the two United Nations human rights conventions. The accord, the Convention on Civil and Political Rights, enshrines rights like universal suffrage, freedom of association and freedom to live where one chooses, and those are anathema to China's rulers.
This week, Foreign Minister Jiaxuan Tang told Ms. Robinson that the Chinese were ``studying the implications'' of the second covenant and that it would probably not be ratified this year.
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Beijing ratifies pact on human rights
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene-20013121118.htm
BEIJING - China ratified a key U.N. human rights treaty yesterday after years of prodding by foreign governments and rights campaigners.
Approval of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights came four years after China signed it and two weeks before a U.N. human rights conference in Geneva where Beijing's human rights record again will come under scrutiny.
The pact and a companion treaty on political rights provide a framework for safeguarding basic civil liberties, which overseas human rights groups say are mostly lacking in China.
The United States signed the pact in 1975 but it still has not ratified it.
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Pentagon unveils new 'non-lethal' weapon
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2001-03-01-weapon.htm
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Pentagon on Thursday unveiled a new "non-lethal" weapon designed to drive off an adversary with an energy beam that inflicts pain without causing lasting harm.
The weapon could be used for riot control and peacekeeping missions when deadly force is not necessary, officials said.
The weapon, called "active denial technology," was developed by Air Force research laboratories in New Mexico and Texas as part of a multi-service program run by the Marine Corps.
"This revolutionary force-protection technology gives U.S. service members an alternative to using deadly force," said Marine Corps Col. George P. Fenton, director of the program at Quantico, Va.
The weapon is designed to stop people by firing millimeter-wave electromagnetic energy in a beam that quickly heats up the surface of the victim's skin. Within seconds the person feels pain that officials said is similar to touching a hot light bulb.
"It's the kind of pain you would feel if you were being burned," said Rich Garcia, a spokesman for the Air Force Research Laboratory at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M. "It's just not intense enough to cause any damage."
The Pentagon has made a strong push to develop "non-lethal" weapons in the aftermath of a humanitarian mission in Somalia in 1992-93 that put soldiers in the line of fire in urban areas where civilians were present.
A prototype of the weapon will be tested on goats and humans at Kirtland in the next few months, Garcia said.
"When it penetrates in, it activates the pain sensors, and you feel a lot of pain," Garcia said. "But there's no damage. It truly is a non-lethal device."
The Marine Corps said $40 million was spent developing the weapon during the past decade.
The Marine Corps plans to mount the microwave weapon on top of Humvees, the Jeep-like vehicles used by both the Marines and the Army. Later it might be used on aircraft and ships, officials said.
The weapon could be fielded by 2009, officials said.
William Arkin, senior military adviser to Human Rights Watch, questioned whether a pain weapon would be safe to use against civilians in combat situations.
"What about children in the crowd? What about pregnant women and the elderly?" he said.
"We have developed a nonlethal weapon which causes pain. What happens when someone continues to walk toward the source of the high-power microwave? What happens when panic ensues in a crowd as a result of high-power microwave? What happens when it's focused on someone's eye?" Arkin said.
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The Transformation of Strategic-Strike Operations
Andrew Krepinevich and Robert Martinage
Published 03/00/2001
Report by CSBA
http://www.csbaonline.org/4Publications/Archive/R.20010300.The_Transformation/R.20010300.The_Transformation.htm#ch2
Executive Summary
The US military is currently investing billions of dollars annually in developing and deploying a broad range of new precision-guided and electronic-strike weapons. These weapons are revolutionizing the way military organizations are thinking about future conflict. Perhaps nowhere are the potential implications of these weapons more significant than in the case of nuclear forces and strategic-strike operations. For the last forty years, the US strategic deterrent has centered on a triad of intercontinental bombers and land- and sea-based ballistic missile forces. A strong case can be made that the United States should take steps to create a new strategic-strike triad, relying on its precision- and electronic-strike capabilities to form two of the three legs, with a smaller residual nuclear force comprising the third leg.
Given the current geopolitical landscape and the US lead in developing and deploying nonnuclear precision- and electronic-strategic-strike weapons, it would appear that the residual nuclear force of the new strategic triad might comprise somewhere between 2,000–3,000 warheads. Indeed, given the considerable opportunity costs of maintaining nuclear forces above this level, the United States should strongly consider reducing its current nuclear forces to these levels for strategic reasons, irrespective of current arms control negotiations.
Periods characterized by dramatic surges in technologies, such as those underwriting the development of precision- and electronic-strike weapons, have often led in the past to equally dramatic changes in the conduct of war. These weapons seem likely to blur what was once a relatively clear distinction between nuclear and conventional weapons. The US military may soon be capable of conducting, against certain types of strategic targets, nonnuclear strategic-strike operations at levels of military effectiveness approaching those of nuclear strikes. As the congressionally appointed National Defense Panel noted in 1997, “Advancing military technologies that merge the capabilities of information systems with precision-guided weaponry and real-time targeting and other new weapons systems may provide a supplement or alternative to the nuclear arsenals of the Cold War.” Thus, although nuclear weapons have dominated discussions of strategic-strike operations since their appearance at the end of World War II, the United States may increasingly be able to rely on both precision-guided munitions (PGMs) and electronic means of attack to effect a significant displacement of nuclear weapons in these operations.
This condition will emerge, in part because, as the world continues its transition away from industrial-based economies and toward information-based ones, there will likely be a corresponding shift in the principal sources of military, economic and political power of states. The character of the strategic target base will necessarily change to reflect these developments. The strategic bombardment depicted in old World War II newsreels showed massive bomber raids on steel plants and fire storms ignited by incendiary bombs. Cold War era films projected horrific images of the aftermath of atomic explosions. Future strategic strikes may instead find militaries, in a growing number of instances, being able to employ well-placed conventional precision and electronic strikes discretely directed against critical elements, or nodes, of an adversary’s center of gravity.
Given the changes in the strategic target base and the emerging precision- and electronic-strike capabilities, it would seem increasingly appropriate for the United States to consider fielding a new type of strategic triad. Residual nuclear forces would be relied upon to address those strategic targets that cannot otherwise be disabled or destroyed by nonnuclear means and to serve as the ultimate guarantor of deterrence by holding an adversary’s society at risk. Assuming that the United States does not want to rely on a pure countervalue targeting strategy, it would appear that residual nuclear forces in the new strategic triad could comprise somewhere between 1,500–3,000 warheads.
Transitioning toward an increased reliance on nonnuclear strategic-strike capabilities could offer several major advantages over today’s high reliance on nuclear weapons. For one, strategic deterrence—including extended deterrence—might be enhanced, since the threat of employing the nonnuclear elements of the new triad would probably be seen as more credible than the threat of employing nuclear weapons. Moreover, while there is unquestionably some deterrence value in not foreswearing the possibility of nuclear retaliation, potential adversaries would be far more likely to believe, and thus be deterred by, a US threat to respond to a nonnuclear provocation with conventional and/or electronic strikes.
There may also be benefits to having a nonnuclear strategic-strike capability in the event that deterrence of nuclear use fails. At that point, the relevant question would then become how best to restore deterrence. The basic requirement for restoring deterrence is straightforward—the United States, together with like-minded countries, would have to demonstrate to the world community that the penalty for nuclear use is exceedingly high. Nuclear retaliation, of course, would serve this purpose rather well, but it would also further undermine the tradition of non-use. That is to say, a nuclear response to nuclear use may in fact work at cross-purposes with the objective of re-establishing nuclear deterrence. In contrast, nonnuclear strategic strikes may, in some instances, be capable of making nuclear renegades pay dearly for their errant behavior without undercutting the presumption of non-use.
Furthermore, by adding a rung on the escalation ladder between conventional theater war and general nuclear war, a nonnuclear strategic-strike capability could provide US political leaders with a very valuable commodity during a period of crisis: flexibility. This rung could also act as a firebreak that might prove helpful in preventing an escalation to nuclear war.
Since a nonnuclear strategic strike would be far more discriminating than a comparable nuclear strike, it would also offer benefits in war termination. The effects of the former are likely to be far more easily reversed than those of the latter, and the prospect of a relatively rapid return to normalcy may substantially strengthen an adversary’s incentives to cease hostilities.
Given the funding shortfalls of the current defense program, maintaining a larger than necessary nuclear force posture incurs substantial opportunity costs that impede efforts to improve US military capabilities in areas where real shortfalls exist (i.e., in creating a different kind of strategic-strike capability). Reducing the current US strategic nuclear forces to Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) II levels (i.e., 3,500 warheads) would save some $6 billion over the next seven years. Moving below START II levels to 2,000 warheads could save as much as an additional $2 billion per year through 2010. Last, but not least, by transforming its strategic-strike forces in a way that devalues nuclear weapons, the United States may encourage other advanced military organizations to do the same.
To be sure, there are several potential disadvantages associated with this new type of strategic triad, which warrant careful study. First of all, conventional precision-strike and electronic-strike weapons will, for the foreseeable future, be incapable of reliably disabling all, or even a majority of, strategic targets. While technologies are currently being developed to enhance conventional bomb damage assessment (BDA), obtaining accurate information about the results of precision strikes will probably continue to be difficult. Generating dependable BDA for electronic strikes is, and will likely remain, even more problematic. In many cases, successful electronic strikes will not generate any directly observable signatures. By contrast, assuming they detonate properly, nuclear weapons leave comparatively little doubt about whether the target has been disabled. Moreover, would-be adversaries can also be expected to explore ways for offsetting nonnuclear, strategic-strike systems (e.g., by constructing deep underground facilities, hardening other targets, etc.).
There is also the danger that the development of an effective nonnuclear strategic-strike capability by the United States—because it would appear to be much more useable than a nuclear-strike capability—could increase the incentives for potential adversaries to acquire at least a small nuclear arsenal for deterrence purposes. Their objective would be to have their homeland, or at least some portion of strategic targets within it, accorded sanctuary status. This may be especially true with less-developed countries, which may view the acquisition of a substantial conventional strategic-strike capability as well beyond their means and view nuclear weapons as a relatively cheap (albeit primitive) counter. Moreover, nuclear weapons will also likely prove irreplaceable to major powers as instruments of assured destruction of the enemy homeland. In fact, nuclear weapons seem likely to exert a strong and enduring influence on warfare, casting a long shadow over humankind even after the emerging military revolution matures in the early decades of this century.
Amassing an inventory of conventional PGMs and, to a lesser degree, electronic-strike systems sufficient for two major regional contingencies, as well as for strategic deterrence and warfighting, could also be a rather expensive undertaking. To a certain extent, these weapons would be developed and produced for other operations, but the additional cost associated with creating a strategic reserve that could supplant part of the existing nuclear arsenal would be substantial. Nuclear weapons are simply more efficient than conventional PGMs, particularly with respect to destroying large area targets such as ports, airfields, storage depots, industrial complexes, and other high-value military installations. As a result, depending on the proportion of such targets in the future strategic target set, it would probably be necessary to procure hundreds of PGMs for every nuclear warhead replaced.
Another possible downside to reduced reliance on nuclear weapons is that it could lower the entry barrier to nuclear superpower status. For instance, it would not be in the US interest to lower its nuclear arsenal unilaterally to the point that relatively minor nuclear powers could easily become de facto nuclear peers. Nor would it be prudent to so outpace Russia in reducing the US nuclear inventory that a disarming nuclear first strike against US strategic forces (both conventional and nuclear) becomes even a remote possibility.
Finally, there is the chance that this type of strategic triad could make both conventional and nuclear conflict more likely by making the consequences of engaging in strategic warfare appear more palatable. It can be argued that the willingness of nuclear-armed states to engage in conventional conflicts with each other has been throttled in the past by the prospect, however slight, that escalatory pressures or misperceptions might trigger a nuclear war. By reducing the perceived risk of nuclear conflict by interposing the option of nonnuclear strategic warfare, it is possible that conventional wars may actually become more frequent. As a result, the risks of inadvertent escalation to nuclear weapon employment might increase.
In the final analysis, this paper raises more questions than it provides answers. But asking the right questions is the key to laying the foundation for a comprehensive strategic assessment of future strategic-strike operations and their implications for US security. Among other things, any strategic-strike net assessment must account for the highly dynamic nature that characterizes military competitions during periods of military revolution, such as we find ourselves at present. For example, we do not know with high confidence those states that will comprise the major competitors in strategic-strike capabilities. Nor do we know what paths these competitors will take in terms of developing the various capabilities comprising the new strategic triad or the policies and doctrines that will govern the use of these capabilities. Yet strategic planners must make decisions today that will determine the character and effectiveness of US strategic-strike forces in a post-transformation regime. In its own way, this represents a challenge as demanding for strategists as that posed by the last major transformation in strategic-strike capabilities a half century ago.
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Public access is important
03/01/2001
USA Today
By Craig R. Quigley
http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/2001-03-01-ncoppf.htm
The ultimate success of our Armed Forces is inextricably linked to the understanding and support of our fellow citizens.
For more than 50 years, the Department of Defense has responsibly managed programs that allow public access to military facilities, equipment and - most importantly - the dedicated men and women who train, deploy and face the challenges that threaten our national security every day.
In an era of ever-declining numbers of veterans, and fewer and fewer Americans who have served in uniform, military-orientation programs are more vital than ever to the democratic process. These programs help ensure that informed voices are heard in the arena of public debate regarding critical national-defense issues.
On any given day, groups of teenagers are escorted through static displays of military planes at bases across the country.
Reporters are given orientation flights in fighter aircraft.
Teachers are invited to training exercises that range from field maneuvers to computer simulations.
Members of Congress visit sailors from their districts aboard an aircraft carrier. Opinion leaders are provided the opportunity to observe night live-fire exercises, while wearing infrared goggles. Local citizens are welcomed to visit our installations to meet the servicemembers assigned there and learn about their missions.
Rarely during the military's many civilian-orientation visits do accidents occur. But when an accident does happen, we must pause, assess and do our best to ensure that it does not happen again.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's recent moratorium on civilians' operating military equipment responsibly directs just that.
We are not stopping - nor should we - the variety of visits that allow the American public proper interaction with its military.
The value of these programs is significant and possibly best summed up by the annual Harris Poll, which since 1989 has reported higher public confidence in the military than any other American institution.
We're proud of that and want the opportunity to continue to show Americans what a fine military they have.
Rear Adm. Craig R. Quigley is deputy assistant secretary of Defense for public affairs.
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Arizona
01/03/01
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/states/all50.htm
Arizona - Some residents are complaining about the noise at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, where officials recently began testing sirens and huge speakers dubbed the Giant Voice. About 100 nearby residents called to object to the noise. Base officials said they're considering less intrusive ways to test the public address system.
Oklahoma
- A University of Oklahoma professor who lied to his students about being a Navy SEAL said the deception started 10 years ago and ended when he was confronted by a real member of the elite military group, The Tulsa World reported. William Whitely, 62, a business professor, apologized for exaggerating his military record. He also resigned as an adviser to ROTC students.
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-------- environment
Second group of elk released into East Tennessee's Cumberland Mountains
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Oak Ridger
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/030101/stt_0301010043.html
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency has released 40 more elk into the Cumberland Mountains as part of a continued reintroduction effort in East Tennessee.
Wednesday's release came just over two months after a herd of 50 elk were released into the woods of Campbell County.
About 200 people turned out for the recent release -- located at a reclaimed strip mine in the Royal Blue Wildlife Management Area -- including Paul Armes of Wartburg, who brought his 12-year-old son and a neighbor.
"I had so much fun the first time, I had to come back," Armes said. "I know several people who live in these mountains who've seen elk from the first release. I think people are real proud of them."
Researchers outfitted each of the animals with radio collars so their movement and survival can be monitored. So far biologists can account for five elk that have died out of the first herd. But TWRA spokesman Allen Ricks says that number isn't unusual.
"We know of five that have died, so that puts us at 10 percent, well within our expected mortality range," Ricks said.
The TWRA plans to release a total of 400 elk over the next few years. Once the population reaches 2,000, the agency plans to open a limited elk-hunting season.
Tennessee's elk restoration zone covers almost 70-thousand acres in Anderson, Scott, Campbell, Claiborne and Morgan counties.
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Cumberland Utility issues water quality statement
Thursday, March 1, 2001
Oak Ridger
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/030101/new_0301010029.html
The Cumberland Utility District exceeded the maximum contaminant level for a disinfection byproduct in its water system during the third and fourth quarters of 2000.
Disinfection byproducts form when disinfectants added to drinking water to kill germs react with naturally occurring organic matter in water, according to information from the Environmental Protection Agency.
A press release from the utility district stated that its use of chlorine, a disinfectant, and an increase in naturally occurring organic matter resulted in high levels of trihalomethanes.
To remedy the situation, the utility district changed its process for adding chlorine to the water, according to Ed Roberts, general manager of the Cumberland Utility District.
Some people who drink water containing trihalomethanes in excess of EPA's standard over many years may experience problems with their liver, kidneys, or central nervous system, and may have an increased risk of getting cancer, according to EPA information.
However, Roberts said the exposure period this past summer wasn't long enough to cause any of the medical conditions.
For more information, call 882-0395.
Cumberland Utility District serves portions of Roane and Morgan counties.
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Whitman Backs Clinton Rules Designed to Cut Diesel Pollution
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/politics/01DIES.html
WASHINGTON, Feb. 28 - The Bush administration has decided to let stand regulations imposed by President Bill Clinton that are intended to reduce substantially the pollution caused by diesel fuel and engines, officials said today.
In a victory for environmentalists, Christie Whitman, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said she would support the regulations, which were drafted by Clinton officials in a last-minute flurry of new rules and then put on hold when President Bush took office in January.
Mrs. Whitman said the new standards would eventually cut pollution from heavy-duty trucks and buses by 95 percent and reduce the sulfur content of highway diesel fuel by 97 percent. The move, she said, would prevent an estimated 8,300 premature deaths and tens of thousands of cases of bronchitis each year.
"The Bush administration determined that this action not be delayed in order to protect public health and the environment," Mrs. Whitman said. "I look forward to working with state and local governments to meet their air quality goals as well as with citizens and businesses to ensure that diesel trucks and buses remain a viable and important part of the nation's economy."
Under the new regulations, diesel producers will be required to virtually eliminate sulfur from the fuel. Sulfur produces soot and clogs up a vehicle's catalytic converter, the device that removes other pollutants. With the removal of sulfur, manufacturers of diesel engines will be required to incorporate the sophisticated pollution-control devices that are standard equipment in cars.
The changes will be phased in. About 80 percent of all diesel fuel must be virtually sulfur-free by 2006, the rest by 2010. Engine manufacturers will have until 2010 to complete their modifications.
Environmentalists and public health advocates praised Mrs. Whitman's decision.
Carl Pope, the executive director of the Sierra Club, said the move would significantly ease respiratory problems for children and adults.
"Because of this decision, children with asthma will be able to spend more time outdoors," Mr. Pope said in a statement. "The elderly and people with respiratory problems will be able to breathe easier."
Frank O'Donnell, the executive director of the nonprofit Clean Air Trust, said the rules affecting everything from delivery vans to 18-wheel tractor-trailers would result in the equivalent of removing 13 million trucks from the road.
But diesel producers, truckers and other industries that depend on that fuel voiced concerns that the regulations would require expensive capital improvements and possibly force small refiners out of business.
"Diesel is the lifeblood of commerce in this nation," said Jay McKeeman, the executive vice president of the California Independent Oil Marketers Association.
Mr. McKeeman warned that the increased costs would be felt throughout the economy.
"When you start tinkering with diesel and its costs," Mr. McKeeman said, "you are going to have an automatic ripple effect in all segments of the economy. The use of diesel is pervasive."
Mrs. Whitman said the phase-in period gave companies sufficient time to upgrade their equipment. The plan will have special provisions offering greater flexibility for small manufacturers, officials said.
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7 Rare Black Rhinos Killed in Tanzania
March 1, 2001
New York Times
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/science/01TANZ.html
ARUSHA, Tanzania, Feb. 28 - United States and African wildlife experts are investigating the mysterious deaths of 7 of the 17 rare black rhinoceroses living in a Tanzanian wildlife sanctuary, an official said today.
The rhinos died in the 3,320-square- mile Ngorongoro Conservation Area in northern Tanzania, five of them in May and two others in January, said Emmanuel Chausi, conservator for the area.
The conservation area, site of the Ngorongoro Crater - the collapsed floor of an extinct volcano that is the rhino's habitat - has also seen several hundred other animals die during a prolonged drought.
Mr. Chausi said the 11-member team from the United States, Tanzania, Kenya and South Africa arrived last week to investigate the cause of death of the rhinos.
"We don't know source of the deaths, but early samples indicate that it is babesiosis," he said.
The total number of black rhinos across southern and eastern Africa was about 65,000 in 1970 but hunting left only about 2,300 alive in the early 1990's. Since then conservation efforts have brought their numbers to around 2,700.
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Spurned by E.U. on Mad-Cow Aid,
France Helps Its Farmers Out
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By SUZANNE DALEY
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01FRAN.html
PARIS, Feb. 28 - With the European Union balking at offering any more aid to cattle farmers hit hard by the mad-cow crisis, France decided to go its own way today, offering its farmers a $200 million emergency aid package.
Farm union officials and lobbyists applauded the aid as desperately needed. But at the same time the package has raised questions about whether the European Union can keep a common agricultural policy in place throughout its 15 member countries.
France first tried to persuade its European partners to do more for cattle farmers, many of whom are reeling from the collapse of beef prices caused by consumer panic over mad-cow disease. Many French farmers say they are now without the cash needed to run their farms, and in recent weeks they have orchestrated a barrage of demonstrations and protests.
But a meeting of European agriculture ministers earlier in the week ended in acrimony. Germany led the opposition to any more spending. France left the meeting in Brussels saying it had at least tacit approval to deal with the problem on its own, the first time any country has won such a concession, industry officials said.
Jean Glavany, France's agriculture minister, today announced a carefully constructed package that he said would abide by the principles of European Union subsidy regulations.
"The aim is to help those businesses that have been worst hit by the crisis and not to adopt a scatter-gun approach," he said in a statement as he announced the measures. "The aid will be targeted, well-defined and limited."
But Mr. Glavany acknowledged that France was acting despite the fact that "several countries voiced their disapproval and spoke of distortions in competition."
France, which has a huge farming sector, has been among the countries hit hardest by concern over the disease. Sales of beef here have dropped about 30 percent since last fall.
At the same time, farmers occupy a special place in the hearts of the French, many of whom tend to hold their rural roots close to sacred. With municipal elections scheduled for later in March, the pressure on Prime Minister Lionel Jospin to offer the additional aid was enormous.
The farmers have proved adept demonstrators. While often succeeding in tying up traffic, they have also branched out in eye-catching ways. When Mr. Jospin tried to conduct his traditional tour of the annual farm show in Paris last week, his entourage was pelted with eggs, forcing him to flee.
Last Sunday, farmers in Brittany, some masked, ransacked a municipal tax office, letting their cows roam the building. Later, they blockaded the police station and set tires and mounds of cow dung on fire.
France may not be the only member of the European Union to offer aid to its cattle farmers; Spain and Belgium could follow, experts said.
"The commission is saying there is no more money," said Dominique Sauchon, a director at COPA, the European farm lobbying group. "But farmers are losing a lot of money and this is a highly political issue in some countries, especially France, and the commission is not finding a community solution.
"We support the aid that France is giving, this is good for the farmers. But there is no doubt that it raises a lot of questions and has the potential of upsetting the balance. It is for the sake of the farmers. But there is a risk."
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Virus affecting more than livestock
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2001-03-01-foot2.htm
LONDON (AP) - It's an animal ailment, but these days, hardly a person living in the British Isles is unaffected by the nationwide outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
In the latest round of cancellations and curtailments meant to stem the spread of the highly contagious livestock virus, organizers on Thursday called off Britain's biggest dog show, beloved by canine fanciers all over the country.
With word that the disease has jumped the Irish Sea, authorities were even thinking about the unthinkable - cancellation of St. Patrick's Day festivities in Dublin.
Such is the sense of crisis that Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey, spiritual leader of the Church of England, is asking for prayers at services this Sunday for the nation's farmers, who are being battered economically by the outbreak. Special prayers are being written for the occasion.
Since foot-and-mouth disease was discovered at a slaughterhouse in southern England on Feb. 19 - Britain's first outbreak in two decades - the list of banned activities has lengthened daily. No fishing in angling streams, no strolls on country paths, no fox-hunting, no unnecessary farm visits, no horse racing.
Government statisticians said Thursday they were making contingency plans in case they have to delay next month's national census. There is even speculation - so far denied by the government - that national elections expected in May will be moved back.
Britain's public forests and bird reserves were closed to the public Thursday, as were all countryside sites run by the National Trust, the privately run conservation and heritage group that oversees some of the country's most scenic and historic properties.
Authorities pleaded for continuing public cooperation with the increasingly restrictive rules - which, this being Britain, hardly anyone is heard to grumble about.
"The measures we have in place are the right ones to control the disease," said Agriculture Minister Nick Brown. "I know they are very harsh."
There were fears the disease would spread to continental Europe - thousands of British-exported animals have been destroyed in France, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, although no cases have yet been found - and human visitors from Britain were beginning to feel a bit unwelcome as well.
On Thursday, Portugal announced anyone arriving from the United Kingdom would have to dip their shoes in disinfectant. In French ports, authorities sprayed the tires of arriving trucks with disinfectant.
The British government reminded people leaving the country on ferries, planes and trains to toss out uneaten sandwiches and cartons of milk - the blanket ban on exporting meat or milk applies to personal travelers as well.
The inexorable march of the disease - which sickens only cloven-hoofed creatures like pigs, cattle and sheep but can be spread by just about anything that moves - continued across Britain, where cases are now reported in more than 30 separate locales. And the first cases have been confirmed in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Foot-and-mouth hasn't made its way across the border into the Republic of Ireland, but cases turned up at a farm along the frontier, prompting fears that it would soon spread south.
Officials were already wringing their hands over the effect on Ireland's farm-heavy economy. The Irish parliament was holding a special debate on the foot-and-mouth crisis.
All weekend sports events were off in Ireland, and a cherished national institution was under threat - the annual St. Patrick's Day parade in Dublin.
The committee that organizes it was reluctantly considering calling it off, although "a cancellation would leave an enormous gap," said spokeswoman Maria Moynihan.
At the border between Northern Ireland and the republic, traffic backed up for miles Thursday as officials stopped cars to ask drivers whether they were carrying meat or milk.
More than 25,000 livestock have been destroyed so far in Britain, where killing herds in infected zones is considered the only means of eradicating the disease.
The country's main agriculture group, the National Farmers' Union, estimated Thursday that if the outbreak is not brought under control within three months, it would cost the industry $1.2 billion. A meatpackers' union said more than 1,000 people have been laid off at processing plants so far, and thousands more could face the same fate.
Consumers were just beginning to feel the effects. One major supermarket chain, Asda, confirmed that one of its large stores, in the north of England, had run out of pork and lamb.
The outbreak may even have inspired thieves to make a daring heist - of meat.
Police said Thursday a haul of beef, pork and lamb worth about $15,000 was stolen from a warehouse in Cambridgeshire, north of London, earlier this week - probably by thieves anticipating they could then sell it at premium prices.
---
Dark sports calendar in Ireland
03/01/2001
USA Today
Associated Press
By Stephen Wilson
http://usatoday.com/sports/horses/stories/2001-03-01-cheltenham.htmil;]
LONDON - All weekend sports events in Ireland were called off and Irish trainers pulled their horses out of the prestigious Cheltenham Festival in England because of the fast spreading outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
The entire three-day Cheltenham meeting, scheduled for March 13-15, is in danger of being scrapped due to the highly contagious livestock disease.
The outbreak had already prompted a one-week suspension of all horse racing in Britain and the cancellation of Saturday's Six Nations rugby match between Wales and Ireland in Cardiff.
On Thursday, Ireland imposed a virtual shutdown of weekend sports, with all soccer, hurling, Gaelic football, rugby and basketball games called off. Horse racing and greyhound racing in Ireland were halted earlier this week.
Football Association of Ireland president Pat Quigley said the decision to cancel the soccer program was taken as a matter of "national importance."
Meanwhile, Irish trainers voted not to send their horses to the Cheltenham meet.
"Under no circumstances should Irish-trained horses be sent to race in the U.K.," the Irish Racehorse Trainers' Association said. "We also urge the racing public to give due credence to the severity of the problem and refrain from traveling to Cheltenham."
About 50 horses and 10,000 fans had been expected to travel from Ireland to Cheltenham, which is the highlight of the British jump racing season and attracts all the top jump horses in Britain and Ireland.
But Irish owners and trainers supported guidelines issued by Ireland's Department of Agriculture to prevent the disease from spreading to the island republic.
"We think the whole thing will be academic anyway," said Willie Mullins, chairman of the trainers association. "From our perspective, Cheltenham will not take place. It is disappointing but there are wider issues which are more important than racing."
The Irish pullout leaves Cheltenham without its star attraction, Istabraq, which was set to chase a record fourth straight victory in the showcase Champion Hurdle race. Also missing will be leading Gold Cup contender Florida Pearl.
"We live in Ireland and we have to comply with the Irish Ministry of Agriculture," said Istabraq's trainer, Aldan O'Brien. "I would love to try to beat the record for the number of Champion Hurdle wins. The horse could not be in better shape. But when you live here you live by the rules."
Cheltenham managing director Edward Gillespie said he still hoped the festival will go ahead.
"At the moment we are trying to get the message across that that's there's no link between holding a race meeting and the physical spreading of this disease," Gillespie said. "We have also got to remember that it is the biggest event of the year for the English horses."
If the meeting is called off, it could be rescheduled for April 17-19, Gillespie said.
Foot-and-mouth affects cloven-hoofed animals, but can be spread by other animals and humans. The virus, which causes weight loss and reduced dairy production, can also be airborne or contracted through contaminated feed.
More than two dozen separate outbreaks of the disease were reported across Britain by Thursday, including the first cases in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Saturday's Wales-Ireland rugby game was called off Tuesday because of fears that Irish fans traveling to and from the game could pick up the disease on their footwear and bring it home.
With the fate of the entire Six Nations championship in doubt, tournament representatives will hold an emergency meeting Friday to discuss the crisis.
Also under scrutiny is the World Cross Country Championships scheduled for March 24-25 in Dublin, Ireland.
"We could postpone it until April but unless we are certain we could hold it then, it would only confuse people," said Chris Wall of Athletics Ireland.
Britain's biggest dog show, Crufts, was postponed Thursday because of the foot-and-mouth outbreak. About 22,000 dogs had been set to compete in next week's event.
So far, soccer in England has been virtually unaffected by the health crisis.
Division one side Burnley's training ground will be closed because the National Trust, which owns the land, set up an exclusion zone around the site to protect neighboring farmland from the possibility of infection.
But no English soccer games have been postponed.
"We are just following the guidance from the Ministry of Agriculture," Football Association spokesman Paul Newman said. "Their advice to us has not changed so that everything is carrying on as normal."
The Union of European Football Associations said European games involving English teams are set to go ahead next week.
Arsenal is scheduled to play host to Spartak Moscow, Leeds travels to Real Madrid, and Manchester United goes to Panathanaikos in Greece in the Champions Cup. Liverpool plays FC Porto in Portugal in the UEFA Cup quarterfinals.
---
FOOT-AND-MOUTH SPREADS
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01BRIE.html?pagewanted=all
BRITAIN: An outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease has worsened despite destruction of thousands of animals, restrictions on the movement of livestock and the quarantining of large parts of the countryside. The number of cases rose to 26 across England and Wales, and there was confirmation that the disease had spread to Northern Ireland. The French agriculture minister, Jean Glavany, announced the slaughter of 30,000 sheep that had come into contact with British sheep. Warren Hoge (NYT)
---
The Ups and Downs of a Climate Debate
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/opinion/L01WAR.html
To the Editor:
Re "A Global Warning to Mr. Bush" (editorial, Feb. 26):
Not only does President Bush not seem to be interested or even aware of the real possibility of international calamities arising from global warming, he also seems inclined to foreclose on learning more about this phenomenon by cutting back on scientific research.
In the midst of talk about trillions of dollars of surpluses, a minuscule increase - in effect a decrease - in financing for the National Science Foundation, one of the major sources of research on global climate change, is tantamount to hiding one's head in the sand.
Stifling research on global warming will not make the phenomenon go away; it will just enable us to prolong our ignorance about it.
PIERRE E. BISCAYE Palisades, N.Y., Feb. 26, 2001 The writer is senior research scientist, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University.
To the Editor:
Re "A Global Warning to Mr. Bush" (editorial, Feb. 26):
Before putting pressure on the White House to act, shouldn't we be asking whether global warming is really happening?
The Kilimanjaro ice cap is not a thermometer. It may well be melting, but this is simply a delayed consequence of a natural climate warming during the early part of the 20th century. Moreover, it will continue to melt as long as the climate doesn't return to the temperatures of the Little Ice Age of past centuries.
The National Academy of Sciences published a report last year that defines the geographic regions of warming and cooling during the last 20 years. Surface measurements of East Africa show no warming trend. Weather satellites show a pronounced cooling trend of the atmosphere there.
S. FRED SINGER President, Science and Environmental Policy Project Arlington, Va., Feb. 26, 2001
---
"American dependence on foreign oil threatens our national security and our freedom"
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/opinion/L01OIL.html
To the Editor:
Trent Lott, the Senate majority leader, is worried that
I look forward to his leadership in reducing oil consumption by taxing sport utility vehicles, which not only overconsume gasoline but coerce other drivers into "upgrading," too; in promoting a boom in bicycling through federal initiatives to educate drivers to respect cyclists' rights; and in sponsoring federal investments to make Amtrak time-competitive with short-haul air travel, and urban transit more attractive than driving.
Each of these measures would have a far greater effect on the oil equation than drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, for considerably less cost.
CHARLES KOMANOFF New York, Feb. 27, 2001
---
California
01/03/01
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/states/all50.htm
California
- In a $7.5 million effort to restore native species in Channel Islands National Park, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposes killing 4,000 feral pigs roaming Santa Cruz Island. The plan includes removing golden eagles that prey on the pigs and threatened island foxes and bringing back native bald eagles.
Washington
- The state Department of Fish and Wildlife is seeking volunteers to find the burrows of endangered pygmy rabbits. The department will survey burrows in Douglas County beginning this spring. It's estimated that fewer than 200 of the smallest North American rabbits live in the state. Most burrow under sagebrush in shrub-steppe habitat.
---
Green after all
March 2, 2001
Washington Times
John McCaslin
http://www.washtimes.com/national/inbeltway.htm
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd Whitman has issued one of her first memos to EPA staff, seeking to allay fears about President Bush's commitment to the environment.
Prior to departing for Trieste, Italy, for the Group of Eight Environmental Ministerial Meeting, Mrs. Whitman shared her thoughts on Mr. Bush's budget request, which calls for $7.3 billion in EPA funding - an increase of $56 million over last year's budget request, yet still below last year's budget.
"Although the request is below last year's enacted budget, that largely reflects the elimination of unrequested earmarks added in last year by Congress," Mrs. Whitman explains.
She says EPA's core operating programs are funded "at the second-highest level in history -$3.7 billion."
To emphasize the administration's pledge to the environment, Mrs. Whitman this week decided to leave in place a March 19, 2001, effective date for the new rule on diesel fuel, to help reduce emissions from large trucks and buses.
As for rumors of EPA layoffs, she says Mr. Bush's new budget "caps" the agency at its current work-force level "and will result in a reduction in our ceiling. But I want to assure you that there will not be any layoffs in EPA staff as a result of this budget."
John McCaslin, a nationally syndicated columnist, can be reached at 202/636-3284 or by e-mail: mccasl@twtmail.com.
---
Australia bars grapes from California
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene-20013121118.htm
CANBERRA, Australia - The government announced yesterday it is barring the import of California table grapes amid fears they may carry a devastating grape virus that could wipe out the local industry.
Agriculture Minister Warren Truss said an application to import the grapes has been rejected by the nation's quarantine watchdog, Biosecurity Australia.
Mr. Truss said Biosecurity fears the California grapes will bring with them the glassy-winged sharp shooter, an insect that carries Pierce's disease, which last year wiped out much of the California grape harvest.
-------- genetics
THE_MAIL
010301
Scientific American
http://www.sciam.com/2001/0301issue/0301letters.html
"How much technological invasion can our lives stand?" asks Steven Ginzburg of Santa Barbara, Calif. (See "As We May Live," by W. Wayt Gibbs; Technology and Business, November 2000.) "Technology is most tolerable when it provides a useful service without our noticing. Using this litmus test, Web-enhanced appliances (such as NCR's e-banking microwave oven) seem rather absurd. A house that unobtrusively monitors the health of elderly inhabitants is more promising, despite the inherent invasion of privacy, as is a Subaru car device that improves handling by monitoring motion and applying momentary brake pressure. I predict that future life will be much like life today, except that everyday gadgets will be safer and more efficient and will interoperate more readily, thanks to computerization. A houseful of hidden cameras and Web-browsing appliances is an improbable and unfortunate stereotype of the home of the future."
For additional comments and opinions about articles from the November 2000 issue--including an intriguing twist in the story of the race to build the A-bomb--please read on.
Cloning and Its Discontents
The problem posed by Robert P. Lanza, Betsy L. Dresser and Philip Damiani ["Cloning Noah's Ark"]--"how to get cells from two different species to yield the clone of one"--is not completely solved in the manner they suggest. The gaur they anticipate, Noah, is a hybrid; he contains DNA not only from different individuals but from different species, because the cow egg used to generate Noah contained mitochondrial DNA. Noah will contribute to the management of gaurs only if he is subsequently mated with a gaur female or if his nuclear DNA is incorporated into an enucleated gaur ovum. Resulting offspring would then contain only gaur DNA. This complication limits the potential contribution of somatic-cell nuclear transfer, at least as practiced in this case, to the management of species that are in danger of extinction.
MICHAEL R. MURPHY Department of Animal Sciences and Division of Nutritional Sciences University of Illinois
Damiani replies:
Nature will help us out with this problem. The sperm mitochondrial DNA is inactivated when it reacts with the egg cytoplasm; thus Noah's bovine mitochrondrial DNA (which is sperm-derived) will not be transmitted to his offspring. The female gaur's mitochondrial DNA will be transmitted, and the resulting offspring will be 100 percent gaur--in both mitochrondrial and nuclear DNA. [Editors' note: Noah was born on January 8 but died of a common bacterial infection within 48 hours. The scientists do not think the cloning process was a factor in his death.]
If habitat is continually being destroyed, where will these new genetic creations live? For example, in the case of the bucardo--"wiped out by poaching, habitat destruction and landslides"--what would prevent the same cycle from reoccurring? Cloning should be seen not as a replacement for wildlife preservation or a solution for ecosystem depletion but as a tool to aid in wildlife conservation. If funds are siphoned away from preservation to cloning, the practice ought to be reconsidered--an ecosystem is not merely fauna.
JONATHAN SUTER Kanata, Ontario
Letters to the editors should be sent by e-mail to editors@sciam.com or by post to Scientific American, 415 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10017. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Because of the considerable volume of mail received, we cannot answer all correspondence.
---
Seed was contaminated with engineered corn
03/01/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2001-03-01-corn.htm
WASHINGTON (AP) - Some corn seed headed for sale to farmers has been contaminated by small amounts of a genetically engineered variety of the grain that prompted mass recalls of food last year, an industry official said Thursday.
Seed companies detected the genetically engineered grain while testing their stocks, said Bruce Knight, vice president of public policy for the National Corn Growers Association.
Representatives of the seed industry and farmers were to Thursday to discuss the finding, which was first reported in The Washington Post.
Seed companies "have got a responsibility to not take this to the marketplace," said Knight, adding that the contamination did not appear extensive enough to cause a shortage of seed this spring.
Agriculture Department spokesman Kevin Herglotz said there "may be low levels" of StarLink contamination in seed corn. "Once we learn more details, if there's any appropriate steps to be taken from there, we'll further evaluate it," he said.
The engineered corn, known as StarLink, has been approved only for animal consumption because of concerns about its safety for humans.
None of the contaminated corn seed has been planted, but farmers and grain exporters fear the discovery could alarm European and Asian companies that have said they will not buy any corn suspected of being tainted by StarLink.
Seed companies and food processors have been testing corn for StarLink under guidelines recommended by the government. The National Corn Growers Association has also advised farmers to take steps to avoid contaminating this year's corn crop with stray StarLink plants that will sprout from grain left in their fields last fall.
The creator of StarLink, Aventis CropScience, maintains the corn is safe for people and has asked the Environmental Protection Agency to approve it retroactively for humans. The EPA has chosen not to do so, because a protein in StarLink, Cry9c breaks down slowly, raising fears that it could cause allergic reactions.
-------- police
Georgia
01/03/01
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/states/all50.htm
Georgia
- Mayor Jack Ellis says a three-day suspension isn't adequate punishment for a police officer found at fault in an accident that left a young woman partially paralyzed. Officer David Henning was driving 60-to-65 mph in a 45-mph zone when his cruiser struck the car in which Erica Howard, 20, was a passenger, investigators said. Howard, who was in a coma for two months after the May 20 accident, said Henning should be fired.
Kentucky
- Under a bill approved by the House and now a Kentucky Senate committee, police participating in gun buyback programs would have to ensure that the gun had not been stolen or used in a crime before destroying it.
Mississippi
- Police Chief Bracy Coleman will no longer be driving a 2001 Chevy Tahoe after the Jackson City Council criticized it as an unnecessary expense. The luxury sports utility vehicle will instead be used by the police department's special operations units. Coleman will use the Ford Crown Victoria he drove last year. The Tahoe at $31,000 is estimated to cost $8,000 more than the Crown Victoria.
-------- spying
Wife of F.B.I. Agent Accused of Spying Had No Knowledge of Espionage
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By PHILIP SHENON and JAMES RISEN
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/national/01SPY.html?pagewanted=all
WASHINGTON, Feb. 28 - The wife of a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent accused of spying for Moscow had no suspicion that her husband might be involved in espionage and knew nothing about hundreds of thousands of dollars that he was purported to have received as spy payments, her lawyer said today.
The wife, Bonnie Hanssen, has been in seclusion since the arrest of her husband, Robert Philip Hanssen, a veteran counterintelligence specialist of the F.B.I. who is accused of turning over volumes of highly classified documents to Moscow since 1985.
In the bureau's voluminous court filings in the case against Mr. Hanssen, there has been no suggestion that his wife or the couple's six children knew of any spying.
The documents suggest instead that Mr. Hanssen may have wanted to shield his family from knowledge of his activities, and that he established Swiss bank accounts to hide part of the $600,000 in cash he is reported to have been paid by Moscow. A senior federal law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Mrs. Hanssen was not the focus of any investigation.
Her lawyer, Janine Brookner, said in telephone interviews that Mrs. Hanssen had convinced government investigators that she and her children had no knowledge of the activities that prosecutors are branding as espionage.
"My understanding is that they know she wasn't involved," Ms. Brookner said. "I don't think the government is blaming the family at all."
On Capitol Hill today, the F.B.I. director, Louis J. Freeh, and Attorney General John Ashcroft appeared before a closed hearing of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence to answer questions about the Hanssen case and to explain how a mole could have operated within the bureau for 15 years without detection.
The committee has begun its own investigation of the case, and how the F.B.I. managed the inquiry.
After the hearing, the panel's chairman, Senator Richard C. Shelby, Republican of Alabama, expressed confidence in Mr. Freeh but said: "We're not satisfied with anything at this point. From what we've learned, this is a very, very grave, serious case."
Mr. Shelby also said the leaders of the intelligence community were working with Congress "in stopping this as much as we can." But, he added: "You know, there will probably be other spies. Don't be surprised."
As the government continued to assess the damage that may have been done by Mr. Hanssen to the F.B.I.'s counterintelligence efforts, officials said the Bush administration was expected shortly to name a senior F.B.I. official, David Szady, as the first governmentwide director of counterintelligence policy.
The appointment would fill a post created by an executive order signed by President Bill Clinton in his final days in office. In the post, Mr. Szady, a counterintelligence specialist, is expected to coordinate the counterespionage activities of the F.B.I., the C.I.A. and other agencies.
The world of espionage and counterespionage is not a new one to Ms. Brookner, who was a covert agent in the Central Intelligence Agency and who was paid $410,000 by the agency in 1994 to settle a lawsuit in which she said she had been smeared by fellow C.I.A. officers.
Ms. Brookner, who does not practice criminal law, said Mrs. Hanssen had decided to retain a lawyer because "she just didn't know where to go," not because she feared any criminal charges. She said, without elaboration, that Mrs. Hanssen was in "shock" as result of the accusations against her husband.
A decision to publicly lift any suspicion from Mrs. Hanssen and her children would leave the F.B.I. and federal prosecutors with one fewer bargaining chip in trying to persuade Mr. Hanssen to plead guilty to espionage.
In recent espionage cases, the government has pressured suspects into guilty pleas by threatening to bring serious criminal charges against family members who might have known about the spying.
In 1994, prosecutors obtained a confession from Aldrich H. Ames, a C.I.A. covert agent who spied for Moscow, after threatening to indict his wife on espionage charges that could have kept her in prison for decades. She was instead sentenced to slightly more than five years in prison.
The bureau has released copies of letters it said were written by Mr. Hanssen to his Soviet handlers in which he seemed to suggest that he was shielding his wife and children from knowledge of his activities.
In a letter last November, "Ramon," an alias that Mr. Hanssen is said to have used, wrote that he did not want to meet his handlers abroad because foreign travel requires that `'I must answer too many questions from family, friends."
Mr. Hanssen and his family lived in a modest suburban home near Washington and went without obvious luxuries that would have tended to raise suspicion about their income. Property records in northern Virginia, where they lived, showed that they had used their home as collateral on loans and lines of credit.
Mrs. Hanssen had worked for several years as a part-time religion teacher at a Roman Catholic girls school in suburban Virginia attended by her daughters. Although school officials did not return telephone calls for comment, friends of the Hanssen family said her teaching post meant that the family was not required to pay full tuition.
---
Carnie Knowledge
Thu, 01 Mar 2001
Slate Magazine
Attention, federal budget cutters.* A WP spy scandal fronter is headlined "HANSSEN CARRIED SECRETS BETWEEN FBI, STATE DEPT," and is about the extraordinary access to intelligence he had in his five years as a liaison between the two agencies. But the real news of the story is positively buried way after the jump. Way down there, one former State Department intel type spills the real top secrets of the FBI when he tells the paper a key reason Hanssen was apparently able to use the assignment to nose around so much: "What he was supposed to be doing would take maybe an hour and a half" per day.
-------- terrorism
Carnie Knowledge
Thu, 01 Mar 2001
Slate Magazine
The WP off-leads reports from unnamed Israeli security sources that in reaction to the continued violence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the Israelis are discussing possibly militarily retaking territory currently controlled by the Palestinian Authority. The thinking in this direction has especially strengthened, says the paper, since Ariel Sharon's election as the next prime minister. The story adds that yesterday the Israeli military chief of staff said the Palestinian Authority is becoming a "terrorist entity."
USAT intrigues with a well-reported piece about the difficulties involved in a U.S. attempt to capture Osama bin Laden, who's been indicted for 200-plus murders. The government has been planning a "snatch-and-grab" of him since 1996, reports the paper, but the chances of success seem to be diminishing over time. For one thing, bin Laden seems to be constantly on the move--he prepares several different possible sleeping locations every night, and decides which one only at the last minute, often only informing one or two aides. And he's stopped talking on satellite phones, which had been a reliable way to track him--preferring now to communicate in hand-written code. Plus, he is protected by dozens of armed-to-the-teeth fanatical guards including some from the Taliban, the militia that controls most of Afghanistan. So extracting him would mean quite a firefight--and the risk of a lot of American losses. So how did the AP--whose 1998 head-and-shoulders shot of the man himself accompanies the story--find him?
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Hectic Pace for Terrorists Before Embassy Explosion
March 1, 2001
New York Times
By ALAN FEUER
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01TERR.html
Room 107A in the Hilltop Hotel in Nairobi was a hectic place in the days before the American Embassy in Kenya was bombed.
Men left the room at night and did not return until morning. Their emotions ran high, a federal agent testified. One man, he said yesterday, veered from "extremely worried" to "very happy" in the course of a couple of days.
The agent, John M. Anticev, said that one man staying at the Hilltop was Mohammed Saddiq Odeh, a defendant in the embassy bombings trial. During a 12-day interview after the embassy was destroyed, Mr. Odeh described for Agent Anticev the frantic week that preceded the blast and told him that although he felt morally responsible for the attack, he was never directly involved in its planning or execution.
Mr. Odeh's statement to the agent, which was introduced yesterday at the bombings trial in Federal District Court in Manhattan, provided remarkable details about the crucial days that preceded the Nairobi blast. It painted a picture of furious activity in the Hilltop Hotel that alternated with some moments of quiet.
The statement says that three days before the Nairobi attack, Mr. Odeh sat in his hotel room as two colleagues went to a house in town where Mr. Odeh said he thought that the embassy bomb was built. Mr. Odeh flipped through a magazine article about wanted Egyptian terrorists, wondering if another colleague would be mentioned.
The statement also revealed for the first time that on the eve of the bombing, "people" in Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden, who is accused of masterminding the attack, was based, had already hunkered down in anticipation of an American military strike. In Kandahar, Afghanistan, Mr. Odeh's statement says, these people, who were never identified, believed there was a "possibility of the U.S. Navy sending in warplanes or missiles to retaliate."
Mr. Odeh, who turns 36 today, is on trial with three other men. They are accused of participating with Mr. bin Laden in a plot that led to the bombings of the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania on Aug. 7, 1998. His lawyers have denied his involvement, calling him a deeply moral man who joined Mr. bin Laden's group, Al Qaeda, with no intention of killing Americans.
It was Aug. 1, 1998, the statement says, when Mr. Odeh got an urgent order from Al Qaeda: He had to get out of Kenya fast. He had been running a tiny fishing business on the Kenyan coast, but now there was "an emergency," the statement says.
In the next few days, Mr. Odeh put his personal affairs in order and bought an airplane ticket to Karachi, Pakistan. He took an all-night bus to Nairobi, the statement says, arriving early on Aug. 4.
In Nairobi, he checked into a room at the Hilltop with a false passport and napped until noon. When he arose, he ran into two men he described as Al Qaeda members, who were on their way out to "do a small job," the statement says.
In the next two days, the statement says, Mr. Odeh watched as the two men, joined by a third, came and went from Room 107A, sometimes staying out all night. He recognized the third man as an expert in explosives.
On Aug. 6, his final day in Africa, Mr. Odeh went shopping, the statement said. He bought a jacket and a towel had his shoes shined. He ate dinner at a restaurant and then caught a flight at 10 p.m.
When Mr. Odeh landed in Pakistan, he was arrested. Within 10 days, he was back in Kenya, where he submitted to the 12-day interview with Agent Anticev.
During that interview, he revealed Al Qaeda's secret codes: "potatoes" meant hand grenades and "soap" meant TNT, he said. He added that, "hypothetically speaking," explosives could be smuggled into Kenya in boxes containing lobsters.
He also said that he believed that the Nairobi bomb had been built by a man named Haroun Fazil, whom he had seen at the Hilltop. Mr. Fazil has been indicted in the case, but whose whereabouts remain unknown.
Before the interview began, Mr. Odeh had been advised of his right to silence, Agent Anticev said. But the suspect decided to talk, the agent added, "Because the people he was with were pushing him and pushing him and pushing him and they were all gone, and he was left here facing big problems."
It was Mr. Odeh's lawyer, Anthony L. Ricco, and not the prosecutors, who introduced that statement as evidence. On cross-examination, Mr. Ricco tried to use the statement in his client's defense. He got Agent Anticev to admit that Mr. Odeh had said that even within days of the bombing, he did not know what was happening at the hotel. The agent also conceded that Mr. Odeh had denied all involvement in the attack.
---
TERROR CRACKDOWN
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01BRIE.html?pagewanted=all
BRITAIN: The government named 21 groups that can no longer be active or raise money in Britain, under a new law aimed at ending international complaints that Britain is a haven for groups plotting violence abroad. Among those on the terror list were: the Greek November 17 organization; the Basque separatist E.T.A.; Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers; Al Qaeda, led by Osama bin Laden; Hezbollah; the People's Mujahedeen of Iran; and Algerian, Egyptian, Palestinian, Kashmiri and Turkish groups. Warren Hoge (NYT)
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Hanssen told KGB a 'friend' might spy
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
By Bill Gertz
http://www.washtimes.com/national/default-200131224018.htm
The FBI has identified a retired Army officer as the "old friend" whom suspected Russian spy Robert P. Hanssen suggested the KGB recruit as a spy, The Washington Times has learned.
Twice in an affidavit made public by authorities at the time of Mr. Hanssen's arrest, the anonymous "old friend" is mentioned as a recruitment target in a 1991 communication that federal investigators say was exchanged between the FBI special agent and his Russian handlers.
The FBI interviewed retired Army Lt. Col. Jack Hoschouer as part of its investigation after the arrest of Mr. Hanssen, a 27-year FBI veteran, on espionage charges, said law enforcement officials close to the case.
The FBI believes the KGB tried to recruit Col. Hoschouer, who was with Mr. Hanssen shortly before his arrest Feb. 18, as a spy in the early 1990s, the officials told The Times.
The officials said Col. Hoschouer spurned the recruitment offer and told Army authorities about it at the time.
Col. Hoschouer contacted the FBI last week, shortly after Mr. Hanssen was arrested, the officials said.
"We interviewed him after he came to us because of his concerns," said one official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "We don't think he had anything to do with this."
Reached yesterday at his home in Germany by telephone, Col. Hoschouer acknowledged that he was questioned by the FBI but disputed that he had reported the Russian contact in the early 1990s as a KGB recruitment attempt. He suggested the contact was benign.
"If they pitched me, I was too dumb to know it," he said. Col. Hoschouer declined to comment further.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard C. Shelby told reporters yesterday that "there's an ongoing criminal investigation" stemming from Mr. Hanssen's arrest.
"Will it lead to others, or will it not? We're not sure," Mr. Shelby, Alabama Republican, said after a closed-door meeting with senior law enforcement and intelligence officials.
The senator said the matter is "a very, very grave, serious case."
Attorney General John Ashcroft spoke to reporters after the hearing. He described the hearing as "extensive."
"The committee is focused on the case appropriately with a view toward, I believe, helping us minimize the risks of these kinds of problems in the future," Mr. Ashcroft said.
"And I want to do everything I can to cooperate with the committee, along with doing what is possible to make sure that we avoid this kind of breach of national security in the future," he said.
The FBI is still investigating Col. Hoschouer, although he is not considered a target of the probe, the officials said. However, the officials added, "It's not over yet."
The probe of Col. Hoschouer is part of an expanding counterintelligence investigation aimed at identifying whether other Americans may have been recruited to spy for Moscow as a result of what some are calling the worst compromise of counterintelligence data in the FBI's history.
Several other people also are being questioned by the FBI as part of the probe that was launched after Mr. Hanssen's arrest.
Mr. Hanssen was a senior FBI counterspy who is charged with providing large amounts of intelligence documents to Moscow since 1985, including documents that identified recruited Russian agents working for the United States, who were later executed as a result. He received some $1.4 million worth of cash and diamonds in exchange for the documents, according to the FBI.
The FBI affidavit reveals correspondence between Mr. Hanssen, writing under the code name "B" and other code names, and the KGB and its successor spy agency, the SVR, the Russian acronym for Foreign Intelligence Service.
The affidavit states that the KGB asked "B" to identify officials with access to secrets who might be open to working for Moscow.
During a secret drop-off on Oct. 7, 1991, a computer diskette provided to the KGB contained a note from "B" with the name of "a particular 'old friend' whom he suggested the KGB try to recruit," the affidavit states.
"He explained that the man was a military officer who had recently been told he would not be promoted," it said.
"Hanssen had been friends with this individual since Hanssen was a teen-ager," the affidavit states.
The officials said the KGB proposition to Col. Hoschouer took place some time after the communication in late 1991 or early 1992.
Col. Hoschouer also reported the contact with a Russian official to the U.S. Army at the time, the officials said.
It could not be learned whether Col. Hoschouer was aware of Mr. Hanssen's espionage activities.
The Senate Intelligence Committee heard testimony on the spy case from FBI Director Louis J. Freeh, CIA Director George J. Tenet, and Mr. Ashcroft. The three officials were questioned by the oversight committee for several hours on why the spy case was not detected sooner.
Asked whether he was satisfied with the answers provided by the officials, Mr. Shelby said: "We're not satisfied with anything at this point, because at this point in time, there's an ongoing criminal investigation."
"You know, there will probably be other spies. . . . Don't be surprised," Mr. Shelby said.
FBI court documents made public late Tuesday revealed that Mr. Hanssen left a package of documents for the Russians that included a message that he believed he had come under suspicion.
The message also stated that Mr. Hanssen had detected short-duration radio transmissions from his car, which he presumed was an electronic surveillance device.
"Since communicating last, and one wonders because of it, I have been promoted to a higher do-nothing senior executive job outside of regular access to information within the counterintelligence program," he stated. "It is as if I am being isolated."
The package contained classified FBI documents from October to December 2000, which included printouts of ongoing FBI counterspy cases involving Russians. It was recovered from under a footbridge at Foxstone Park in Northern Virginia.
---
Arafat is accused of ordering attacks
March 1, 2001
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene-20013121118.htm
JERUSALEM - The commander of Israel's armed forces charged yesterday that Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority is ordering attacks against Israel.
"The authority is being converted into a terrorist entity," said Lt. Gen. Shaul Mofaz, the military chief of staff, charging that "senior security officials" are directing attacks against Israel by militias that are "operational arms" of the Palestinian Authority.
Israeli officials in the past have complained that Mr. Arafat has encouraged, or at least not stopped, armed attacks by Palestinians during five months of violence, but this was the first time Israel charged that his quasi-government has adopted terrorism as a policy.
-------- activists
Public Protests Around The World
globalissues.org
http://www.globalissues.org/TradeRelated/FreeTrade/Protests.asp
Mass protests, throughout history have come at a time when enough of the population are affected by policies of the rulers and elite. They have often been met with brutal, efficient crackdown by the guardians of the elite, be they local police, militias, national militaries, or even another nation's military forces.
The protests against the current forms of globalization and the marginalization it is causing, and the increasing disparities between the rich and the poor that it has predictably led to already, has motivated people all over the world to protest. Seattle in 1999 and Washington D.C. in 2000 were just the more mainstream and reported ones because they were in the home nation of the current superpower, the United States. These protests, directed at the World Trade Organization (WTO) and at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank respectively, were all protests at the effects of the current forms neoliberal/free trade (or more of a mercantilist/imperialist policy of wealth appropriation that is a continuation of such policies throughout history.)
The WTO protest of Seattle were about the trade policies that are being drawn up in undemocratic ways but affecting all people around the world. Here too, the elite's front guard were mobilized to protect the image of the multinational corporations and institutions that support their "rights". The police crackdown was often violent and unprovoked. The IMF and World Bank protests in D.C. were about the policies of the IMF and World Bank towards developing countries. Their methods of "assistance" are criticized for increasing dependencies on the richer nations and promoting a form of development whereby developing nations continue to provide cheap resources and labor to the richer nations, to continue to remain in servitude for the west. These policies are a precursor and basic framework to allow trade policies discussed at the WTO to be effective; they go hand in hand.
It is ironic then, that in many countries, leaders, elected through processes of democracy (themselves often painful, trying and hard-won) have been turning against protestors, via pressure from the aristocracy of that nation and from western financial institutions that are the target of the protests and criticisms.
Mainstream Media Portrayal
The mainstream media portrayal by many western nations, notably the US, has been very biased. Being corporate-owned, and due to the fact that the protestors are voicing concerns over the current form of globalization, which is seen as overly corporate-friendly without appropriate considerations for people, this bias can be seen as quite obvious. However, most people get their views and news from mainstream media, from what are regarded as "respectable" news sources and hence it makes it difficult for additional views and perspectives to be heard, thereby contributing to the on-going process.
Protests Have Occurred All Over The World
"[T]his 'new movement', portrayed by the media as students and anarchists from the rich and prosperous global north, is just the tip of the iceberg. In the global south, a far deeper and wide-ranging movement has been developing for years, largely ignored by the media." -- Jessica Woodroffe and Mark Ellis-Jones, States of unrest: Resistance to IMF policies in poor countries, World Development Movement.
http://www.oneworld.org/wdm/cambriefs/DEBT/unrest.htm
Some mainstream media representation may leave the impression that the recent public protests in D.C., Seattle, Prague and other western cities are recent issues, or that these are the only protests, and that only a few are protesting. In fact, Seattle and D.C. protests were international protests in their composition. The mainstream avoided in-depth issues of developing nations in Seattle, for example, while they concentrated on sensationalism.
Both before (long before in many cases) and since Seattle, around the world thousands upon thousands of people have turned up in waves of protests at various IMF, World Bank, WTO meetings or policies in various nations. Repression has been equally brutal and sometimes worse. For example there have been protests in:
Argentina up to 80,000 protested against the IMF, in May 2000.
Over 7.2 million workers support a 24 hour general strike in defiance of the new IMF-prescribed labour laws, June 2000. Australia (even during the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, there have been various protests to do with globalization issues).
Bolivia (protests in April 2000 led to some bizarre media coverage.)
Brazil As reported by the World Development Movement (WDM), "[a] referendum asking whether Brazil should discontinue IMF reforms is backed by more than a million people. Organised by the National Council of Bishops and Jubilee 2000, the 'unofficial' referendum is a marked success."
The WDM report continues, that on "7 September [2000], to mark the end of six days of voting and Brazil's Independence Day, a demonstration draws thousands of protesters under the banner of Cry of the Excluded. All the main cities in Brazil are "crammed", say reports, with more than 100,000 people in Sao Paulo. The Government had previously called the [above-mentioned] referendum "stupid" and an isolated project undertaken by "minorities"." (emphasis added) To coincide with the annual World Economic Forum meetings in Davos, Switzerland, where multinational corporations get to meet, and have access to world political leaders, Porto Alegre in Brazil, at the end of January 2001 saw a World Social Forum meeting attended by over 10,000 people. The goal was to discuss alternatives to the current forms of globalization.
Colombia saw 15,000 workers go on protest and strike regarding IMF's loan conditions requiring further opening up of the economy and cutting back on social provisions and jobs. Costa Rica in March 2000, 10,000 people protested at IMF-prescribed policies of privatization, and faced police brutality in the process. Czech Republic (World Bank and IMF meetings in Prague, end of September, 2000) Estimates vary from 20,000 protestors to 50,000
As with other places, heavy security response and police brutality was in effect, as predicted.
Protests in other regions of the world coincided with this -- for example, in the U.S. in all 50 states, there were protests -- not that the mainstream media would have described it in much detail. The Prague protests disrupted the IMF and World Bank meetings enough to end the meetings a day early. The IndyMedia Center Prague has much more detail.
Ecuador Marches at the beginning of 2000, see over 40,000 indigenous people protesting US and IMF-prescribed reforms (resulting in 35,000 military personnel and police being deployed). 10,000 protested, also in January, at the fear of dollarization of their economy (which became reality in September, 2000) There was even a coup attempt that month. Numerous strikes and protests occur throughout the first half of 2000 due to IMF reforms. Numbers are in the tens of thousands. (On one occassion, 30,000 doctors were part of a protest). The dollarization and other US/IMF-prescribed policies have left many problems in their wake and protests etc are sure to continue. The above-mentioned WDM report provides more detail.
Germany Honduras, where numerous IMF-prescribed cut backs and privatizations policies are being protested. In August 2000, thousands of civil servants went on strike for 24 hours disrupting education, transport and health services. The strikers were opposing plans by the administration of President Carlos Flores to privatize the electricity, telecommunications and social security sectors as required by the International Monetary Fund. India (In some instances there were forced and violent attempts to stop protestors gathering or forming.)
Indonesia Kenya has seen many protests on IMF conditionalities. Malawi too has seen protests on IMF conditions, where protestors were dispersed by tear gas. Mexico has seen protests that at first sound local but have a more global aspect to it. That is, the struggle is Chiapas of the Zapatistas. While fighting for their indigenous rights (against military crackdowns which human rights groups have heavily criticized), they have seen the effects of the current form of globalization on them very sharply, as this translation from the leader of the Zapatista National Liberation Army shows. Nigera has seen many protests on the IMF austerity measures, and violent crackdown as well.
Paraguay has seen protests that have also been met with police violence. IMF reforms are heavily criticized there. Peru South Africa has seen numerous protests as well. The above-mentioned WDM report also mentions that "[o]ne of the protesters, Trevor Ngwane, a city councillor from the Soweto township, says, "Many of those debts were used to buy weapons and suppress the people during apartheid. So we are paying twice for it - once with our lives, and now with an inability to fund critical social services. Instead of building health clinics the Government is selling off zoos and libraries to stay in the good graces of the IMF."
South Korea. October 2000 has seen over 20,000 protest about globalization at an Asia Europe meeting.
Switzerland
Taiwan Thailand Turkey has seen protests, the latest being September 2000, where the IMF is pressing for higher energy prices, wage "control" (i.e. reductions) and tax reform. Venezuela. On 27 February 1989, structural changes imposed by the IMF were followed by a popular uprising (the caracazo), but was put down with 4,000 dead.
Zambia
Recent G8 Summits
The June 18 campaign in 1999 was another highly publicized event, with biased media reporting. This was another international protest, where many major cities in the world on the same day saw large protests. In fact, as this report shows, the June 18 protests occurred all over the world, including:
Argentina Australia Belarus Canada Czech Republic. Germany Italy Netherlands Nigeria Pakistan Spain Switzerland United Kingdom United States Uruguay Zimbabwe
Note that in many of these countries, the protests were in numerous cities.
These are just a small number of examples. (It is not even a complete list.) And protests are likely going to continue around the globe if policies continue along the way they are. (And supressions or crackdowns are equally likely -- ironically by the policing forces that are meant to uphold people's rights, who instead are and will be upholding and protecting the rights of the elite and power holders. The mainstream media too is likely to continue its negative portrayal, as it affects them directly as well.)
In fact, just a few months after writing the previous paragraph, amongst other places, we have seen police crackdowns in Davos, Switzerland, at the beginning of 2001 at the annual World Economic Forum and we see that the next WTO meeting will be held in Qatar so that protestors cannot have a chance of voicing their concerns (because Qatar has oppressive laws about such things). Unforunately this pattern is likely to continue.
Protestors Are Labeled as Anti-Trade and Anti-International
The (corporate-owned) mainstream media have often criticized the protestors for being anti-trade or against international cooperation and hence anti people, or against giving a chance for the poor to have a decent chance for a standard living. In fact, it couldn't be further from the truth! Most protestors are for international trade. However, the corporate-owned media assume that the current form of globalization (i.e. corporate-led) is the only way (and this is more anti-people than protestors have ever been). It is already shown that this is increasing disparities (which has been predicted by many over a number of years). Protestors are therefore voicing their concerns to these issues.
However, there is one aspect the media have concentrated on disproportionately although not realized that it is a concern with the protests. That is, in the US especially, elements of the Right Wing have been also opposing globalization and the progressive protestors risk forming a dangerous alliance with them. The Right Wing have a more isolationist agenda that the media attributes to all the protestors. While that is a concern and something most would oppose, the vast majority of protestors in Seattle and D.C. for example, have been progressive people concerned at the social welfare and basic human (i.e economic and social as well as civil and political) rights for those affected.
In the industrialized countries, there is the additional concern for one's own job moving overseas which has also led to more people voicing their concerns. As globalization in its current form continues, and IMF/World Bank policies continue to open up developing countries and force their wages and resources to become cheaper and cheaper, this puts a downward pressure on wages in the western countries as well (because corporations move to those cheaper areas, where they can take advantage of the exploitation that can be done). Hence while many in developed nations may have additional reasons to join in the protests, the voices of protestors from developed and developing countries are at the same concern -- the effects of overly corporate-led forms of globalization.
To developing countries, the effects are much worse as standards are systematically reduced. The chance of improvement for most people around the world, for an equitable share and chance are all becoming less likely as the dependency and influence of outside force take control over their lives, directly or indirectly. In developing countries especially, many are aware of the geopolitical processes at play, as many have lived through struggles against imperialism and colonialism. However, as the effects of western policies are now also affecting a large number of citizens in their own countries, protests are getting louder. While there may be elements of nationalism and anti-internationalism involved, by far the largest factor is fairness, equity, social justice, environmental, basic rights etc. in international trade as international policies affects domestic policies.
Police Brutality and Other Civil Rights Violations Ignored
"A million dollar bail for walking down the street with a cell phone during a demonstration. Passports taken and political activity forbidden because of a misdemeanor act of civil disobedience. The big boys don't like to be messed with, whether they are bombing the s[#$!] out of a Third World country or meeting in luxury hotels and convention centers to keep the reins of the world economy in their little paws. There's growing, worldwide opposition to corporate global pillage. The response, typical of autocratic regimes, is the criminalization of dissent." -- The Criminalization of Dissent, FreeSpeech.org
The media has also ignored the often brutal police and law enforcement crackdowns. Tactics have included:
torture
physical and sexual violence detaining suspects without proof not providing food or water or access to lawyers absurd bails and so on.
And this isn't just in countries where civil rights are not as prominent. These are some of the same problems that have occurred in the United States.
http://www.zmag.org/CrisesCurEvts/Globalism/assessing_a16.htm
Another tactic used has been to get the police to infiltrate as "anarchists" as happened in Prague and Seattle.
http://prague.indymedia.org/display.php3?article_id=1976
In some places, including the US, where there are an expected large turnout in public protests, the local police have often had to quickly increase their numbers that are present. This itself has sometimes not helped as often the rushed increase leads to more untrained police in comfrontational situations, who are more armed than citizens protesting.
For more information
For additional detailed discussions on this perspective, look at this web site's sections that provide links to many more articles and analysis by other people and organization on these issues:
The IMF and World Bank Protests.
The WTO Protests in Seattle.
"States of unrest: Resistance to IMF policies in poor countries", by the World Development Movement provide details of protests in various developing nations in recent months.
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Globalization is hazardous to Your health -
FTAA teach-in this SATURDAY
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
WHAT: GLOBALIZATION, HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH!
WHEN: SATURDAY, MARCH 3, 2001 @ 1:00 PM
WHERE: AMERICAN UNIVERSITY'S WARD BUILDING, WARD 2
Thousands are beginning to organize against the next target of the anti-globalization movement: the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) agreement which will be negotiated at the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City on April 20-22. The secretive FTAA, like the NAFTA and other free trade agreements demanded by global capitalism, promises more deregulation and privatization-policies which have led to the further exploitation of workers and destruction of the environment-in the Western Hemisphere. The FTAA will make it more difficult for the 35 million people with AIDS to get access to affordable, generic AIDS drugs which would allow them to live longer, healthier lives. This effects thousands right here in the capital of the richest country in the world where the leading killer of young black men is AIDS. Moreover, in a city where life expectancies and infant mortality rates are comparable to the poorest countries in the world, the city's overseers want to privatize the city's only public hospital, DC General, out of existence. This will not only cut off access to health care for the majority of the city's poor and uninsured but will also lead to the laying off of over 1,300 health care workers. Join organizers of the anti-capitalist convergence in Quebec and local activists discuss how we can STOP THE FTAA & LOCALIZE THE MOVEMENT FOR GLOBAL JUSTICE
SPEAKERS:
Globalization, the FTAA and their Impact on Women - Helene Vallieres, CASA
Stopping the Privatization of DC General Hospital - Vanessa Dixon, Health Care Now Coalition
The FTAA & the Aids Crisis in the Global South - Jim Straub, ACT-UP! Philadelphia
Organizing Against the FTAA in Quebec City - Ian Renaud-Lauze , CASA
For more information:
Tel/Fax: 202 777 2642 x7894 Email: leftturn-dc@onebox.com <mailto:leftturn-dc@onebox.com>
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Local Coalition Mobilized to Fight NAFTA Expansion Throughout Southern Hemisphere Washington Area Groups Kick Off Organizing Campaign
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
Adam Eidinger or Lauri Apple
WASHINGTON, DC - Throughout the hemisphere, environmental, labor and human rights activists are launching campaigns and preparing for protests against the next target of the anti-corporate globalization movement: the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). Heads of governments will be meeting in Quebec City from April 20-22 to formally launch an FTAA agreement intended for completion in 2003 at the earliest. Organizers from Quebec City and Washington will meet for a forum, "Globalization: Hazardous to Your Health," on Saturday, March 3 at 1:00 PM at the American University in the Ward Building, room #2. Members of the media are invited.
WHO: Ian Renaud-Lauze, Summit of the Americas Welcoming Committee (CASA - Quebec City)
Vanessa Dixon, Health Care Now Coalition and Union Organizer
Jim Straub, ACT-UP! Philadelphia
Helene Valliers, Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC - Quebec City)
WHAT: Public Forum - "Globalization: Hazardous to Your Health"
WHEN: Saturday, March 3, 2001 at 1:00 PM
WHERE: American University's Ward Building, room #2
Many economists and the activists expecting to converge in Quebec City and along the US-Canadian border in April argue that the FTAA is essentially an expansion of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). A look at NAFTA's legacy shows that over 400,000 U.S. jobs have been lost, with workers new jobs paying, on average, only 77 percent of the wages of their earlier employment. They also see increased industrial pollution along the U.S.-Mexico border as a direct result of NAFTA.
Since 1994, FTAA negotiations have been conducted in secret, although corporate representatives have advised US negotiators and helped write proposed rules. Meanwhile the United Nations, citizen groups and Unions have not been able to incorporate their concerns or suggestions into the talks. In the view of local community activists working to protect public healthcare, this approach is jarringly similar to how the federally appointed DC Financial Control Board has directed privatization of health services at Dc General Hospital to the benefit of profit driven HMOs.
More information about the FTAA protest is available at www.A20.org or www.stopftaa.org.
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Emergency Appeal for Duro Workers (Rio Bravo, Mexico)
Thu, 01 Mar 2001
oneworld@igc.org
Ravi Khanna
<oneworld@igc.org>
IN THIS MESSAGE:
1) Letter of Presentation, by OWC Continuations Committee
2) What You Can Do Immediately to Support the Duro Workers
3) Fact Sheet: History of the Struggle of the Duro Workers
--
1) Letter of Presentation,
by OWC Continuations Committee
Dear Supporters of labor and human rights:
We are writing to ask for your urgent support for the Duro workers in Rio Bravo, Tamaulipas, Mexico. We are reprinting below the Emergency ppeal packet published by the Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras (CJM). Please send your letters of protest today (Thursday, March 1st) to the email addresses indicated below -- as the union elections in Rio Bravo are tomorrow, Friday March 2nd.
The OWC Continuations Committee fully supports this effort by the Duro workers to form an independent union. On Friday, February 28, OWC Continuations Committee member Alan Benjamin joined Maria Robinson (a member of the executive board of CJM) and Craig Adair (of the Mexico desk of Global Exchange) in a delegation to the Mexican Consulate in San Francisco in which we delivered to the Acting Consul General, Mr. Arturo Balderas, a statement calling for a union election process free of intimidation and repression for the Duro workers in Rio Bravo.
Mr. Balderas said he would transmit our message immediately to the proper authorities in Mexico City and acknowledged that it is impossible for there to be fair union elections if these are not conducted by secret ballot.
Again, thank you in advance for your support for the Duro workers.
- OWC Continuations Committee
--
Contact: Martha Ojeda, Executive Director 210-240-1084
Judy Ancel, member of the Board 816-835-4745
Will the New Fox Government Protect Maquiladora Workers Rights or Bow to Foreign Corporations and their Mexican Subsidiaries and Unions?
The Test Will Be in Rio Bravo Tamaulipas This Friday, March 2nd.
Last night in Rio Bravo, a group of about twenty women workers - members of a new independent union at the Duro Bag Company - and a handful of allies from organizations in Mexico City, Valle Hermoso, and the U.S. - members of theCoalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras faced their worst nightmare. They were surrounded in the Hotel La Mansion and menaced by forty to fifty thugs brought in by Duro Bag from Mexico City "unions", the CROC and CTM all trying to block a democratic election scheduled for Friday at the company. The police lounged outside, refusing to intervene.
Word got out by phone to CJM members in three countries who tried to mobilize a response, but Rio Bravo is remote, and the local authorities had earlier that day refused to take complaints by the workers when they were beaten and almost run over by the thugs. In desperation a U.S. board member of CJM called the U.S. consul in Matamoros to appeal for intervention on behalf of the of Americans in the group.
Then, as if by providence, a group from a Catholic lay organization arrived from Matamoros, led by a priest and a young politician. The priest proceeded to talk to the workers in front of the thugs telling them to be brave and that the church was behind them. The thugs began to back off. Calls were made by the politician to federal officials. Then the police arrived calling out the name of the non-Hispanic American, and forcing the thugs to withdraw. Thus the Mexican government provided the crucial police protection not to its own citizens but to avoid an international incident.
Just another day of routine organizing among Mexico's impoverished and abused maquiladora workforce, or an incident that shows the opposing forces mounting in the pressure cooker of the U.S. Mexican border? After a determined campaign by the Duro Bag workers for over a year and support for them by CJM and its member organizations in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada, the Fox administration finally scheduled the recuento or union representation election, which the workers had petitioned for six months ago. The election will be held on Friday March 2nd at 9:30 A.M. at the Duro plant, located on the outskirts of Rio Bravo.
However, the Mexican labor board rejected the independent union's request for a secret ballot election on neutral ground, despite an agreement reached between the U.S. and Mexican government to promote secret ballot elections. Thus, workers must declare out loud before a panel of bosses and union representatives which union they will vote for. Since the election is to be held inside the company, it will control access. The atmosphere of repression and violence has escalated in Rio Bravo with many recent firings of independent union supporters, daily threats by Duro that anyone voting for the independent union will be fired; that if the independent union wins, they will close the plant; and the thugs, who block the workers' efforts to leaflet and do house calls and attack them in the street.
Meanwhile, pressure builds as independent unions in Mexico call on the Fox Administration to bring this rogue corporation and the traditional impunity of gangster unions under control. On Monday in the U.S., religious leaders, unions, and students rallied at Duro's headquarters in Ludlow Kentucky as company executives sneaked out the back door, rather than face the two women workers from Rio Bravo who came from Mexico to tell their stories and the extensive media that came to cover it. Demonstrations against Hallmark, Duro's largest customer and Mexican consulates are continuing this week. (There were 20 demonstrations against Hallmark around Valentines Day.)
On Friday, election observers from Mexico, the U.S. and Canada will monitor the election, but it's clear that despite the strong and defiant support by the workers for the new union, the deck may be completely stacked against them. Without dramatic action by the Fox government, it will be evident that nothing has changed for Mexican workers.
Duro is a Kentucky-based maker of gift bags for Hallmark, Neiman Marcus and others. Rio Bravo is near Reynosa, which is just across the border from McAllen, Texas. The Duro workers are receiving support from a variety of U.S., Mexican, and Canadian organizations allied in the Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras, which is based in San Antonio, Texas.
--
2) WHAT YOU CAN DO IMMEDIATELY
Send Letters Demanding a Free, SECRET-BALLOT Election to Company and Government.
Our demands to government officials are:
§ Provide for a democratic union election at a neutral public place
§ Insure a secret ballot
§ Protect workers from intimidation and threats by police, company, and CTM and CROC thugs
Send letters to:
President Vicente Fox, Email him from his web page either by going to <http//www.vicentefox.org.mx/> then select Tablero de Mensajes, type your message and choose "Enviar" or by going directly to http//www.melodysoft.com/cgi-bin/gbook.cgi?ID=fox2000&do=sign With copies to:
Virgilio Mena Becerra, President, Federal Conciliation & Arbitration Board: Fax: 01152 (5) 645-2345, Email: apiccini@stps.gob.mx
Governor Tomas Yarrington, State of Tamaulipas: Email from web page http://www.tamaulipas.gob.mx/gobernador/contacto.htm or Email tamps@infosel.net.mx. Fax: 01152 (1) 318 8701
Our demands to Duro and Hallmark are:
§ Duro should stop interfering with the workers' right to choose their own representative. They should stop all support of the CTM, CROC and Emancipation and stay out of it. They should get rid of their hired thugs.
§ Duro must not only stop threatening workers that they will shut down the plant, stop lying about the independent union, and promise to keep the plant open no matter which union wins.
Send letters to:
Charles Shor, Duro Bag Company: Fax 859-581-8327, email cshor@durobag.com and/or info@durobag.com
Irv Hockaday, CEO, Hallmark: Fax (816) 274-7555, info@hallmark.com (Tell Hallmark to insist that Duro do the above things)
Send copies of all letters to CJM at cjm@igc.org or fax 210-732-8324
4. Make a financial contribution to the campaign. We are desperate for funds for organizing expenses, van rental for transportation to vote, travel for Mexican organizers and for Duro workers to speak in Cincinatti. Make checks to "Emergency Support Fund" and mail to The Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras, 530 Bandera Road, San Antonio, TX 78228.
--
3) Fact Sheet on Duro Bag Workers' Struggle (February 26, 2001
History of the Duro Struggle)
The Duro plant is a maquiladora located in the city of Rio Bravo, Tamaulipas, near Reynosa and McAllen Texas,. Duro-Rio Bravo assembles gift bags for corporations such as Hallmark and Neiman Marcus. The company is large, privately held, family-owned and is based in Ludlow, Kentucky.
Duro workers put up their strike banners on June 12 in order to establish an independent union and to force the reinstatement of their elected leaders who had been illegally fired in April for refusing to agree to a sweetheart contract negotiated with the company by the National Paperworkers Union (CTM). They have been occupying an encampment in Rio Bravo's town plaza since that day. When they struck, they were attacked and beaten by police armed with machine guns, arrested on trumped up charges (subsequently dismissed), and later blacklisted with all maquilas in town.
The workers demand the right to be represented by a union willing to negotiate better working conditions such as: medical attention inside the plant, bathroom breaks, basic safety equipment (there are no guards on cutting machinery, and workers have lost fingers) and sanitary conditions in the bathrooms and cafeteria (the workers complained of mouse feces in the food). They also want an end to constant harassment (including sexual) and threats from management. The state government has acknowledged that Duro has some of the worst working conditions of any of the maquiladoras in the area.
After a summer of organizing and mobilization nationally and internationally, they succeeded in winning the first legal registration of an independent union in the history of the state of Tamaulipas. The Duro Workers Union then filed for a recuento or representation election to win the right to negotiate the contract away from the national CTM union. They filed for this election in late September with over 400 workers' signatures. The plant then had 700 workers. It now has 1200.
Since then, they have been subject to hearing after hearing all seemingly aimed at never scheduling an election date. There have been two so-called phantom unions (with no base in Rio Bravo let alone the plant) introduced by Duro and certified by the Conciliation & Arbitration Board to be on the ballot (a stalling tactic). The intimidation and violence have continued. On October 31st the shack of their leader was firebombed. He is convinced Duro was behind it, but the authorities concluded that the fire was caused by the wind which made the nails in the corrugated tin roof scrape against the metal and cause a spark (!)
The Current Situation
Knowing that the independent union's support is growing, the CTM union secretary general spent several days at the plant in late January shutting down line-by-line and holding captive audience meetings to tell the workers to vote against the independent union which he claims is controlled by foreigners who want their jobs back. Then on Friday, January 26, the entire second shift was threatened with firing if they voted for the Duro Workers Union, and 20 workers were fired for giving information to the union and organizing. On February 5 an additional ten workers were fired for organizing.
Finally, after numerous demonstrations targeting Duro's customer Hallmark and a letter from 43 members of the US Congress to Mexican President Fox between February 10-15, The Federal Conciliation & Arbitration Board, at a hearing on February 19, scheduled the union election for March 2. However, the election was to be on company premises (not a neutral place as requested) and without a secret ballot, also requested by the independent union. There was an immediate increase in threats and intimidation from the company as well as an increase in the number of goons belonging to the CTM and CROC and police threatening the workers.
What's at Stake Here
The workers had hoped that the new Fox administration would improve the administration of Federal Labor Law and respect the right to Freedom of Association guaranteed under it. However, the new Secretary of Labor is a former head of COPARMEX, the association of industrial employers, and COPARMEX has taken over legal representation of Duro at labor board hearings. The Board has continued the same illegal actions as the previous administration and in scheduling the election without a secret ballot, has reneged on promises made by the Zedillo administration to the U.S. and Canada during talks over several NAFTA Labor Side Accord cases.
If the Duro workers succeed in getting an election, and if the election is democratic enough for them to win, then a real union, committed to negotiating improvements in wages and working conditions in the maquiladoras will have been born. This would be a tremendous breakthrough. Of course, that's why COPARMEX, Duro and political leaders from Fox to Governor Yarrington of the State of Tamaulipas, to the local Labor Board are all working hard to make sure this doesn't happen. The authorities blame everything on outside agitators - Americans who come to take their jobs back and on Mexicans intent on economic destabilization.
The more the company and government fire, threaten and harass the Duro workers, however, the more determined they seem to be. So far they have weathered nine months of hunger and repression, and they see their movement growing both inside the plant and among an increasing number of allies in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada.
The support campaign is being coordinated by the San Antonio Texas-based Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras, a tri-national coalition of border groups, unions, faith-based organizations, fair trade, and environmental groups. Key support has come from the FAT (Authentic Workers Front) and the UNT (National Union of Workers) in Mexico, from PACE (Paper, Allied Industrial, Chemical, and Energy Workers) in the U.S. and Campaign for Labor Rights, the CEP (Communications, Energy, and Paper Union) and the Canadian Labour Congress in Canada and numerous other organizations in all three countries. These groups are providing organizers, legal support, political pressure on the Mexican government and pressure on Duro and customers like Hallmark as well as crucial financial support for the workers and the campaign. The stakes are getting higher every day.
When they began their struggle, none of the largely young and female workers thought about the possibility of making real progress against a global economy which offers them only deadly working conditions, starvation wages and daily assaults on their dignity, but this struggle could win real gains. The forces are arrayed on both sides, and the Duro workers' determination and support in across the continent offer a real opportunity for a big step forward.
For more information, contact, The Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras (210) 732-8957 - cjm@igc.org
Read more on the struggle of the workers at the Duro plant, and other news on Mexico by visiting http://www.1worldcommunication.org (follow the link to the Mexico page.)
Ravi Khanna, Director 1world communication P. O. Box 2476 Amherst, MA 01004 Phone: 413-323-7629 Cell: 413-530-9640 Fax: 413-323-9348 E-mail: oneworld@igc.org Web-site: http://www.1worldcommunication.org Signup to join 1world list. Get updates and participate in discussions. Send a blank e-mail to: 1worldcommunication-subscribe@topica.com
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New free FTAA Newspaper available for distribution!
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
cestpodge@aol.com
Announcing a free multicolor Newspaper on the FTAA and the destructive effects of global corporate rule and the actions that are happening in Buffalo, NY April 20th - 22nd to stop the FTAA.
This newspaper is 4 pages long and is available for free to activists everywhere. It is a great organizing tool and resource that can be given to folks and left in book stores, record stores, schools, bars, etc.
We have printed 30,000 copies of this newspaper and want to get it out to folks all across the U.S. and Canada. You can order as few as 1 or 2 copies and as many as one thousand.
Orders for the newspaper can be sent to: cestpodge@aol.com
Be sure to include in your order: Name Organization Name Shipping Address Phone # Email Address Quantity Desired Whether or not you provide a donation to cover the printing and postage costs? If so how much?
It is costing us approximately two thousand dollars to print and distribute the newspaper. Any donations are appreciated. Tax Deductable donations to cover the printing and distribution costs of this publication can be made payable to "Riverside Salem UCC - Economic Justice" and can be sent to:
the Buffalo Activist Network attn: FTAA Newspaper 114 Anderson Pl. #10 Buffalo, NY 14222
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Anti-AIDS, Anti-Patent Action
Thu, 1 Mar 2001
"Robert Naiman" <naiman@cepr.net>
Anti-AIDS, Anti-Patent Action Monday 3/5 at Bristol Myers Squibb; meet at 14th & E NW 1:30 pm
The first in a series of actions in DC leading up to the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City on April 20-22.
Please join us in support of the demand that pharmaceutical companies stop using patent claims to block access to lifesaving treatments.
WASHINGTON, DC
MARCH & RALLY: MARCH 5, 1:30 pm
PROTEST U.S. TRADE POLICIES AND COMPANIES BLOCKING ACCESS TO MEDICINE
Meet at Freedom Plaza at 14th and E NW. March to Bristol Myers Squibb offices and Bush Administration location
For more information: katie@critpath.org, 215-731-1844 For more information on events worldwide, see: http://www.tac.org.za/
GLOBAL DAY OF ACTION ON THE AIDS CRISIS: Affordable AIDS Drug for All!
MONDAY, MARCH 5
The events below are in response to the call to action and solidarity from AIDS activists in South Africa against multinational pharmaceutical companies.
Groups around the world are responding to the call by organizing a Day of Action targeting drug company profiteering on March 5, 2001.
On this day, the court action by more than 40 multinational drug companies against the South African government will be heard in the Pretoria High Court. The drug companies are suing the South African government in order to block affordable, generic AIDS drugs and importation of less expensive drugs from other nations.
Called by the Treatment Action Campaign of South Africa, folks of all backgrounds will rally in defense of South Africa's attempt to bring drugs to its poorest citizens and Brazil's famously successful AIDS program.
Both now stand threatened by the big drug monopolies and US trade actions. This time, it truly is a matter of people before profits, and above all, human life.
On March 5, we will say NO to murder by patent, to death by profit!
We will say YES to hope and to affordable medicines!
WASHINGTON, DC
MARCH & RALLY: MARCH 5, 1:30 pm
PROTEST U.S. TRADE POLICIES AND COMPANIES BLOCKING ACCESS TO MEDICINE
Meet at Freedom Plaza at 14th and E NW. March to Bristol Myers Squibb offices and Bush Administration location
For more information: katie@critpath.org, 215-731-1844
To download outreach flyers or get more information on the campaign go to: http://www.globaltreatmentaccess.org/nyc.html Global Treatment Access Campaign/ (GTAC) NEW YORK Phone: 212-674-9598 E-mail: GTACny@hotmail.com
DETAILED SUMMARY
In South Africa, subsidiaries of US and European mega-drug companies have taken the South African government to court over its commitment to purchase cheaper generic and/or brand name medicines for millions living with HIV/AIDS. Originally filed in 1998 and supported by Clinton-Gore threats of trade sanctions until late 1999, the law suit is scheduled for trial in Pretoria March 5-12.
In late 2000, the world largest and most profitable pharmaceutical company threatened a lawsuit against an Indian generic manufacturer, CIPLA, which was supplying cheaper medicines in Ghana. On Feb. 8 this year, pharmaceutical representatives said they would protect their patent rights against CIPLA's new plan to sell generic AIDS anti-virals to poor governments at a huge discount.
This February, the U.S. lodged a complaint against Brazil at the World Trade Organization over its production of generic AIDS drugs. In what the New York Times calls a model solution to the AIDS crisis, Brazil has provided free AIDS drugs to over 60,000 citizens, and cut its death toll by over half since 1996. Now Brazil's program is endangered by the strong-armed tactics of big Pharma acting through their proxy, the US government.
The AIDS epidemic is the modern plague, and its impact will lay waste to the continent of Africa, wiping out a whole generation of working men and women, and leaving millions of orphans. However, this pandemic is treatable. The same medicines that have kept tens of thousands alive in this country, is out of reach for the world's poor, now making up over 95% of total AIDS cases.
Because of their monopoly patents, drug companies make mega-profits selling AIDS medicines at huge mark-ups - as much as 4500%. For example, the Indian manufacturer CIPLA has just offered anti-viral triple therapy costing $10,000 per year in the U.S. for $600 to poor African countries and for $350 to Medecins Sans Frontier.
The pharmaceutical giants, however, are working hard to keep their monopoly grip on the market by preventing generic competitors and desperate countries from providing cheaper alternatives. Sometimes, the industry acts directly on its own behalf by filing lawsuits and/or threatening court action.
Other times, it works behind the scene at the White House, in the Congress, with the U.S. Trade Representative, or at international agencies including the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, the World Health Organization, and UNAIDS. Activists around the world are protesting drug profiteering and death by monopoly pricing.
Even in our rich country, seniors fight back at price gouging by taking buses to Canada where drug prices are far cheaper. Joining them is a growing chorus of journalists, economists, students, religious figures, care givers, international charities, and nobel prize winning doctors, who cannot deny the simple truth - people are dying of AIDS because of corporate greed.
On March 5, a global day of action, timed to coincide with the South African court case and in support of the Brazilian AIDS program, will be held marking a new stage in the growing international solidarity movement. Called by the Treatment Action Campaign in South Africa, solidarity demonstrations and rallies will be held around the world. In the US, we have a special responsibility to fight the pharmaceutical companies on their home ground, and reaffirm our moral commitment to human values. In this case, it truly is a matter of people before profits.
Drop the Pharma lawsuit against affordable medicines in South Africa.
Drop threats against CIPLA's low-price AIDS medicines offer.
Drop the U.S. WTO action against the model Brazilian AIDS program.
Fund access to medicines now.
Stop the genocide by corporate greed.
###### Julie Davids ######
###### ACT UP Philadelphia ######
###### jdavids@critpath.org ######
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Retired Ringling Bros. elephants sent to sanctuary
03/01/2001
USA Today
Bryan Bacon, AP
http://usatoday.com/news/nphoto.htm
GALT, Calif. (AP) - Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey has settled a lawsuit brought by an animal rights group by agreeing to turn over some retired circus elephants to the organization and pay for their care.
In its lawsuit, the Performing Animal Welfare Society had accused Ringling Bros. of spying on PAWS in order to discredit it. The nonprofit group has criticized the circus - billed as The Greatest Show on Earth - for its treatment of elephants and other animals.
The settlement was reached Monday. The number of animals and the amount of money provided for their care were not disclosed.
"It never crossed our minds that the lawsuit would work out this way, but this resolution makes us very happy because it will give some old elephants a good retirement," PAWS founder Pat Derby said.
PAWS operates several animal sanctuaries.
Ringling spokeswoman Catherine Ort-Mabry refused to comment on the mistreatment allegations but said: "The important thing is we have found amicable agreement with an organization that does not share our philosophy about performing animals, but shares our goal of caring for these animals when they retire."
Ringling owns more than 65 Asian elephants, with 25 of them touring the United States.
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INDIAN RIGHTS MARCH
March 1, 2001
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/01/world/01BRIE.html?pagewanted=all
MEXICO: A bus carrying Subcommander Marcos, left, and 23 other Zapatistas arrived in the city of Tlaxcala on the fifth day of a march for Indian rights. The Zapatistas plan to arrive in Mexico City on March 11 to lobby for an Indian rights bill. (AP)
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