NUCLEAR
Radiation Syndromes
Assurances given over plutonium transport
Search for missing Japanese mariners suspended
China Lobbies to Block An Arms Sale to Taiwan
last call
A part of STOA Workshop
North Korea threatens to scrap missile and nuclear accord
Flexibility Urged on N. Korea
Top official says Russia could beat missile shield
Russia Marks 1961 Anti-missile Test, Slams U.S.
Missile shield won't work, so don't build one
New times require new strategies
Russian officials blast defense plan
Polluted site will be tested in spring

MILITARY
Rebels kill 12 soldiers in northeast India
SCOTIA, N.Y.

OTHER
Recycling urban waste Incinerators a public health risk
The Fastest Way to Steal Money
Focus shifts in battle for forests
LAPD still struggles a decade after King beating
Mexican road hazards include menacing cops
Navy Investigating Theft of Guidance Data From Computer

ACTIVISTS
Tues. 3/6 Meeting of Labor Task Force For Public Power
Homeless camp iced
Sect members sentenced
Atrocities in Cancun at the WEF


-------- NUCLEAR

Radiation Syndromes

March 3, 2001
Readers Digest
National Organization for Rare Disorders, Inc.
http://www.readersdigesthealth.com/kbase/nord/nord264.htm

Important

It is possible that the main title of the report Radiation Syndromes is not the name you expected. Please check the synonyms listing to find the alternate name(s) and disorder subdivision(s) covered by this report.

Synonyms

Radiation Disease Radiation Effects Radiation Illness Radiation Injuries Radiation Reaction Radiation Sickness

Disorder Subdivisions

None

General Discussion

Radiation syndromes describe the harmful effects--acute, delayed, or chronic--produced by exposure to ionizing radiations. Tissues vary in response to immediate radiation injury according to the following descending order of sensitivity: (1) lymph cells (2) reproductive organs (3) proliferating cells of the bone marrow (4) epithelial cells of the bowel (5) top layer (epidermis) of the skin (6) liver cells (7) epithelium of the little lung sacs (alveoli) and bile passages (8) kidney epithelial cells (9) endothelial cells of the membranes around the lungs, lining the chest cavity (pleura) and the abdominal cavity (peritoneum) (10) nerve cells (11) bone cells (12) muscle and connective tissue. Generally, the more rapid the turnover of the cell, the greater the radiation sensitivity.

Resources

American Cancer Society, Inc. 1599 Clifton Road NE Atlanta, GA 30329 Tel: (404) 320-3333 Tel: (800) 227-2345 Internet: http://www.cancer.org

Leukemia Society of America, Inc. 600 Third Avenue 4th Floor New York, NY 10016 Tel: (212) 573-8484 Tel: (800) 955-4572 Fax: (212) 856-9686 Email: infocenter@leukemia.org Internet: http://www.leukemia.org

National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements 7910 Woodmont Avenue Suite 800 Bethesda, MD 20814-3095 Tel: (301) 657-2652 Fax: (301) 907-8768 Email: ncrp@ncrp.com Internet: http://www.ncrp.com

National Association of Radiation Survivors P.O. Box 2815 Weaverville, CA 96093-2815 Tel: (800) 798-5102

This is an abstract of a report from the National Organization of Rare Disorders, Inc. (r) (NORD). A copy of the complete report can be used for a small fee by visiting the NORD website. The complete report contains additional information including symptoms, causes, affected population, related disorders, standard and investigational treatments (if available), and references from medical literature. For a full-text version of this topic, see http://www.stepstn.com/nord/db/dbsearch/search.htm

The information provided in this report is not intended for diagnostic purposes. It is provided for information purposes only. This information is presented for further understanding that could lead to the prevention, treatment, and/or cure of rare disorders. NORD recommends that affected individuals seek the advice or counsel of his or her own personal physician(s).

It is possible that the title of this topic is not the name you selected. Please check the Synonyms listing to find the alternate name(s) and Disorder Subdivision(s) covered by this report.

This disease entry is based upon medical information available through the date at the end of the topic. Since NORD's resources are limited, it is not possible to keep every entry in the Rare Disease Database completely current and accurate. Please check with the agencies listed in the Resources section for the most current information about this disorder.

Updated: 1998-02-02

-------- australia

Assurances given over plutonium transport

Sat, 3 Mar 2001
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-3mar2001-28.htm

The Federal Government has been given assurances about the safety of a shipment of plutonium fuel expected to enter the Tasman Sea today.

The two British ships are expected to be met and shadowed by a Greenpeace led flotilla.

Greenpeace claims the plutonium fuel on board the ships is enough to make 20 nuclear weapons and has urged the Federal Government to oppose the shipment.

However, the Department of Foreign Affairs says the Government will not be joining New Zealand and Pacific Island countries in their protests because the ships are abiding by international laws granting freedom of navigation on the high seas.

The department says nuclear material has been transported safely around the world since the 1960s and assurances have been received that the shipment conforms with international standards of safety and physical security, and that liability arrangements have been made.

The Government has also been told the nuclear companies involved have emergency response plans in place.

---

Search for missing Japanese mariners suspended

03/03/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2001-03-03-sub.htm

HONOLULU (AP) - The Coast Guard has suspended its search for nine people lost at sea when their Japanese fishing vessel was rammed and sunk by a surfacing Navy submarine. The Navy is scheduled to open its hearings into the accident Monday at Pearl Harbor. Four commercial fishing students, two teachers and three crewmen of the Ehime Maru have been missing since Feb. 9 and presumed dead. Coast Guard Lt. Christina De Leon said Friday night that no more ships would be sent out to look for them, pending further developments.

The students' school, Uwajima Fisheries High School, and local government officials in Japan said they had no comment on the Coast Guard's decision.

The Japanese trawler sank minutes after it was hit by the USS Greeneville when the sub conducted a rapid-ascent drill nine miles off Honolulu. Twenty-six people from the trawler were rescued.

The trawler was located Feb. 16 at a depth of 2,000 feet.

The Navy hearings will focus on the actions of the Greeneville's officers.

Navy lawyers were reviewing a request from attorneys for the Greenville's captain, Cmdr. Scott Waddle, seeking "testimonial immunity" for Waddle during the hearings.

Such immunity would prevent military lawyers from prosecuting Waddle based upon anything he says during the investigative hearing, according to military legal expert Eugene Fidell, president of the National Institute of Military Justice in Washington. However, Waddle still could face prosecution based upon the testimony of others.

Immunity would allow Waddle to testify "without waiving his rights later to present a full and vigorous defense in the event charges are referred to court-martial," his civilian lawyer, Charles Gittins, said Saturday.

"Cmdr. Waddle is intent that the court of inquiry be thorough, fair and transparent," Gittins said.

The National Transportation Safety Board, which also is investigating, released information Friday showing the surface and subsurface movements of the two vessels.

The submerged Greeneville raced past the slow-moving Ehime Maru before a course reversal that ended in their deadly collision, according to the information, which was based on a preliminary tape provided by the Navy of the Greeneville's sonar and navigation data.

Navy submarines have been involved in at least five other collisions with surface vessels since 1992, according to Navy data. Two involved the USS La Jolla, a nuclear attack submarine in the same Pacific Fleet squadron as the Greeneville.

-------- china

China Lobbies to Block An Arms Sale to Taiwan

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Washington Post
By John Pomfret
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A14948-2001Mar2?language=printer

BEIJING, March 2 -- China has launched a diplomatic offensive to head off the sale of a high-tech weapons system to Taiwan, dispatching two diplomatic delegations to Washington and preparing to send a third just six weeks after the Bush administration took office.

The Beijing government is trying to prevent Taiwan from acquiring the advanced Aegis air defense and battle management system, part of a large arms package the Bush administration is considering selling the island. A decision on the sale is scheduled to be made in April. Despite what appears to be a lukewarm response to the diplomacy in Washington -- after calling the heads of more than 20 countries, President Bush has yet to call President Jiang Zemin -- some Chinese analysts think Beijing is succeeding.

The diplomatic offensive reflects China's concern about the Bush administration's position on the Aegis, and more broadly about how it will pursue its relationship with China and Taiwan. During his campaign, Bush referred to China as a "strategic competitor," which raised concerns in Beijing. Some members of Bush's administration have called for a more aggressive China policy and more substantial arms sales to Taiwan.

The contacts underway represent a more carefully calibrated diplomacy from Beijing, which has blustered for years about U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. Instead of blasting all U.S. attempts to sell weapons to the island of 23 million people, Chinese diplomats are now lobbying against specific systems, such as the Aegis and submarines, and are keeping relatively quiet about others, such as a proposed $600 million deal for four former U.S. Navy Kidd-class guided missile destroyers.

In Beijing, the Bush administration's decision on the Aegis has been imbued with extraordinary consequence as a verdict on the general course of U.S.-China relations. If the sale goes through, officials will see it as a signal that the United States is prepared to insert itself into any conflict between Taiwan and China. And an Aegis sale would be seen here as a sign the United States is willing to sacrifice the progress it has made in slowing China's proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

"The political significance is very, very rich," said Yan Xuetong, executive director of the Institute of International Studies at Beijing's Qinghua University. "A sale would show us the Bush administration does not care about a strategic relationship between China and the United States."

The Aegis system is mounted aboard Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. Taiwan wants to buy four of them at almost $800 million each. The system's radar allows ships, planes and missiles to be coordinated over a wide area and could help defend Taiwan against a Chinese missile attack. The Aegis thus would mark an important step in countering China's trump card with Taiwan: short- and medium-range missiles. There are hundreds deployed in southern China, just across the 100-mile wide Taiwan Strait.

The Chinese fear the sale would also send a signal to Taiwan that the United States is moving closer to the idea of including Taiwan in a missile defense network that it hopes to design for Asia. That raises concerns in Beijing of the de facto resuscitation of a military alliance between Washington and Taipei.

As things stand now, the United States is committed to helping Taiwan maintain its defenses, but without a specific pledge of intervening if China should attack. Beijing, which considers the island part of China, has warned it could attack if Taiwan formally declares independence.

Beijing's response to an Aegis sale would be an immediate increase in the number of missiles deployed in southern China, predicted Chu Shulong of the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations, who is close to the military.

"It's easy and it can be done within the current military budget," he said. "We could increase it by hundreds within a year."

In addition, he predicted the People's Liberation Army would plan major military exercises in the spring or early summer, raising the specter of missile tests such as those in 1996 that prompted the Clinton administration to dispatch two aircraft carrier battle groups to the region. Finally, he said, China would not cooperate with the United States on nonproliferation, including in Iraq and Iran.

The first Chinese delegation, three former ambassadors to the United States and Canada, went to Washington in mid-February. The second, led by Zhou Mingwei, deputy director of the Taiwan Affairs Office of China's State Council, was in Washington this week. Vice Premier Qian Qichen, the dean of China's foreign policy establishment, will cap the offensive with a trip to Washington late this month.

Zhou said in a meeting with Washington Post editors and reporters that an Aegis sale "would show [that] the U.S. government is supporting this particular [Taiwanese] government, which is independence-oriented. It would send the wrong signal."

U.S. officials said all three delegations in effect invited themselves, something one Western diplomat said was "unusual and very welcome from the Chinese."

Chu and other analysts and diplomats said China's tag-team delegations represented a significant change in the country's diplomatic behavior. "In the past China would always wait for something, for a U.S. official to come to China," Chu said. "In the past China used to be quite passive. Now they are worrying so they are sending people to America."

In recent interviews, Chinese analysts and diplomats expressed optimism that the diplomatic offensive against the Aegis was paying off, despite the absence of any clear indication from Washington about it. One possible reason for the confidence involves Chinese beliefs about using the old boy network of former U.S. officials who remain close to Bush's father, who was U.S. envoy to China in the mid-1970s. The three ambassadors' first stop was Houston for a visit with the elder Bush.

Liu Huaqiu, a high-ranking Communist Party official involved in foreign affairs, during a meeting in January with senior American security experts, named former secretary of state Henry A. Kissinger and former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft as people China could count on to keep the new president from harming U.S.-China ties. He said he has received personal assurances that American "friends of China" that surrounded President Bush's father would step in to "teach Bush" if relations hit a crisis.

But China's diplomats so far have not exactly been warmly received. The first group of ambassadors was met by a mid-level State Department official.

-------- depleted uranium

last call

Sat, 3 Mar 2001
tycho
<earth2tycho@earthlink.net>

Amigos,

This is another report from the West Bank. i am wrapping things up because i need to leave on tuesday, so you can breathe easily that this is the last one of these diatribes from me you'll have to read, unless something extreme happens in the next couple days:-) i've appreciated everyone's support and feedback and have tried my best to create a good slide show for you. Have also collected various implements of war - will they make it across the border with me? Ah well, even if i lose the apache missile the message inherent in my trying to take it out will have been worth it.

The use of depleted uranium remains an open question. i've spoken with a few PA officials and they all claim they can't get any information about whether the israelis are using DU. It's unclear why they don't believe they can test for it by themselves, or investigate isreal's weapons stock for verification. A number of civilians have asked me about it, i get the sense that it's a non-understood threat and that people are genuinely concerned. The isreali peace movement is in much too much disarray to take this issue on in any meaningful way right now (imho, of course). What has happened that is quite severe is the use of nerve gas in the Gaza strip; about 35 people were hospitalized for convulsions, bleeding, etc. Yet another gross irony within the morass that surrounds Palestine (or into which it is sinking?).

Yesterday i went to Ramallah for the friday showdown out at the checkpoint. When we were walking back up the hill after it ended, i turned around and realized that i had been on a movie set. Even so, it got pretty violent - mostly rubber bullets but i saw approx 20 people get taken away in ambulances. The medics are super well organized and get people out very very fast. At least half of them are young women. The main thing these demonstrations appear to accomplish is the wounding of more palestinian youth. Yet the youth are the ones triggering the confrontations, and they definitely are into it. My friend Dominic Ryan, an australian making a documentary about violence/nonviolence, put me in front of the camera with my art & rev t-shirt and i got to blab on about how these guys are on the front lines of a struggle that is happening all over the world, they are getting more press than most, etc etc. That was something of a wild and crazy moment, more than a little gonzo. Of course someone had to ask if i worked for the CIA, which i thought was a nice touch to the whole interaction.

Today i was in Hebron, spending some time with the Christian Peacemaker Team. They are terrific folks and provide a huge number of services and outlets for people in the community. One of them took me around the city, detailing the outlay of the land. The situation in Hebron is totally insane. Many of you have probably heard about Areas A, B & C, a division of control zones between PA and IDF. In Hebron, they are called H1 & H2, the line drawn to separate the israeli settlements, which go right threw the center of the old city. This area is very much like Jerusalem's old city, with lots of vaulted rooves and everything crammed into tiny little spaces. Squeezed inside, evicting as needed, are about 400 jews and an army of some proportion to protect them. The IDF actually has tanks there, used to shell the houses on the hillside. Since today was saturday, the jewish sabbath, lots of settlers were out and about, and many of them carry guns. It is just bizarre - out for an afternoon walk and don't forget the M16s. The most disturbing thing that i witnessed involved two 7 yr old jewish boys who threw a stick in the face of a palestinian man who had stopped to talk with us, he's been a tour guide for 40 years and was talking about the history of the Ibrahim mosque, which also has a line drawn literally down the middle of it: one half mosque, the other synagogue. Suddenly the boys threw this branch in his face and they just looked so mean and hateful, and the soldiers there said absolutely nothing to the kids, whereas if the ethnic roles had been reversed, everyone assured me the palestinian kid would have been shot. Such is life under military occupation, i guess. As far as i can see, this kind of behavior pattern does not bode well for israeli society, whether they leave the West Bank or not.

i wanted to let those of you who made financial donations for this trip know that i managed to bring a load of medicine into Gaza a couple weeks ago, when the isrealis were prohibiting aid shipments. i thank the Elvis Wand of Power for helping me get through that crossing, it was a bit scary for me going into Gaza, irrespective of the smuggling. What was interesting is that when we got out of the car in the Jabaliya camp, i smelled a very familiar smell and realized it was Egypt. There are obvious reasons that this makes sense, but it sort of colored my perspective on the terrible overcrowding, the dust and the poverty. i thank the good people at Al-MEZAN, a human rights group there, for welcoming me warmly and directing us to Al-Awda hospital in northern Gaza, where we delivered the goods. The hospital has 35 beds, and uses their seminar room for 15 more when the army is attacking, since the intifada began. They serve about 200,000 people, the only facility north of Gaza City. The director is a very nice man, they served us lunch and we ate with a group of doctors.

As an aside, the young dutch guy i brought to help me with this was just deported by the israelis for doing something they didn't like in the northern West Bank. His girlfriend, a swede, had the honor of joining him. This is somewhat unusual but not totally unique. Haven't yet been able to find out exactly what they did.

It's been a kick putting stories up on indymedia, and if you are desperate for a website to surf you can see other reports there. Next time i will need to bring a laptop, but otherwise my relatively low-tech toys have worked well. Cameras are a very powerful tool here, that's clear - thanks again, Cory and Peter! Apologies to those of you for whom some of this was redundant. Feel free to forward blah blah you're all in my thoughts and continued gratitude

more love less rage tycho Jerusalem * 3 March 2001

-------- europe

A part of STOA Workshop,
5 February 1998

Sat, 03 Mar 2001
du-list@yahoogroups.com

Survey and evaluation of criticism of basic safety standards for the protection of workers and the public against ionising radiation (European Parliament - STOA,1998)

This document is a working Document for the STOA Panel. It is not an official publication of STOA. This document does not necessarily represent the views of the European Parliament.

page 14

4. Criticism of current radiation standards

With the effective dose as the primary tool for setting radiation protection standards, the ICRP has recommended, and Directive '96 has adopted, an upper limit of 50 mSv per year for workers, with the provision that within a 5 year period the cumulative dose should not exceed 100 mSv (in practice an average of 20 mSv per year). For the general public, the corresponding upper limit is 1 mSv pr year (exceptionally more than 1 mSv may occur as long as the average over 5 years remains less than 1 mSv per year). These upper limits, which are to be transformed into national legislation by the Member States of the European Union before 13 March 2000, have drawn considerable criticism from certain scientists and concerned groups. The implication of the criticism is that, even at these levels, the health risk from radiation exposure remains unacceptable.

Any criticism of radiation standards may be seen ultimately as a contestation of the shape and/or the calibration of the dose response curve in Fig. 1, which, through the procedure schematically depicted in Fig. 2, gives rise to such standards. In this light, the criticism expressed may fall into three broad categories, which pertain to:

- The data on which the shape of the dose response curve in the high dose region depends (Fig. 1, solid line). Such data usually come from follow up studies of accidentally irradiated populations or from experiments with animals.

- The extrapolation of the dose response curve into the low dose region (curves A, B, C and D in Figs. 1 and 2).

- The calibration of the ordinate in Figs. 1 and 2, i.e. the accurate determination of the detriment for a given dose.

It is of course recognised that these three categories are not entirely independent. The critical scrutiny of current radiation standards, as discussed in the STOA Workshop of 5 February 1998, is presented in this Chapter.

4.1 Database criticism

Few large-scale epidemiological studies are available for directly evaluating the excess risk of cancer after exposure to low doses of radiation. Extrapolation from high-dose studies is therefore an alternative method to assess the low-dose risk. Results of this approach are, however, highly dependent on the factors that affect the dose-response behaviour used by the extrapolation model.

Following the 1950 census of Japan there was an attempt to obtain, from all the survivors who were still living in Hiroshima or Nagasaki, information under six headings: exposure position, shielding, flash burns, epilation, purpura and oropharyngeal lesions. The data relating to exposure positions and shielding were needed for dose estimates and the injury data were needed for the identification of survivors with tissue destructive or non-stochastic effects of radiation. This was the beginning of the Life Span Studies (LSS) based on the cohort of A-bomb survivors.

In her invited paper contributed to the Workshop, Alice Stewart [Stewart 1998] questions the risk estimated for cancer effects of radiation which are based on the Life Span Study cohort of the a-bomb survivors. According to Stewart both from the Oxford Survey of childhood cancers, and from recent surveys of nuclear workers at Handford and Oak Ridge, have come risk estimates for radiation induced cancers that are much higher than the ones based on the LSS cohort of A-bomb survivors. Therefore, there is a need to clarify whether the LSS cohort is a homogeneous population, or, alternatively, whether the persons who had survived acute effects of the bombing constitute a special radiosensitive subgroup of this study cohort.

The main results of the statistical analysis of the LSS data by Professor Stewart provide evidence that:

- Cancer was not the only late effect of the A-bomb radiation; some of the high dose survivors had remained at high risk of dying from non-stochastic effects, such as irreversible damage to the immune system.

- Exposure before 10 and after 55 years of age carried an exceptionally high cancer risk.

- Differences between survivors with and without acute injuries were largely the result of persons who (by virtue of their age in 1945) were at high risk of dying before the LSS cohort of five years survivors was assembled. As a result of the early deaths there was no question of the study cohort being a normal unselected population.

Focusing attention on survivors who either denied all injuries or claimed at least two injuries, Dr. Stewart maintains that her analysis minimised the effects of faulty reporting and made possible to see that persons who survived non-stochastic effects of the radiation constituted a special subgroup of the LSS cohort. Analysing new LSS data, it was possible to recognise that levels of radio-sensitivity were much higher at the beginning and end of the life span than during the intervening period, and that it was only among survivors who claimed several injuries that leukaemia deaths were exceptionally common.

Given an association between leukaemia and tissue destructive effects of ionising radiation, it was possible that the different findings for leukaemia in A-bomb data stemmed from early effects of all high dose exposures. The loss of immunological competence would explain why the extra radiogenic leukaemias had short latent periods and lymphocytopenia would explain the absence of lymphatic leukaemias among these cases.

How to test the above hypothesis is not immediately obvious, but it would explain why, in A-bomb data, the association between radiation and leukaemia is so selective.

Dr. Stewart remarked that the A-bomb survivors are not representative of the people who died since the levels of radio-sensitivity are controlled by the immune system, which also controls infections. The radio-sensitive people were removed from the population from the destructive effects of the bomb. That is why we are currently working on a basis which only provides for extremely resistant people. If the population was composed of young men, this condition would represent extreme-radio-resistance, which is in fact exactly what happened in the A-bomb survivor study.

Having said that, the A-bomb survivor data are not a good data basis, and are particularly misleading with regard to age. However, Dr. Stewart remarked that they can be used to discover the factors that influence the radio-sensitivity of people.

Commenting on the usefulness of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki data during the ensuing discussion, Klaus Becker, in agreement with Alice Stewart, added that these data are characterised by very high dose rates, large uncertainties on the dose estimates, complicated by dominating heat and pressure injuries, emotional stress, breakdown of social and medical services and a totally destroyed city. These factors amount to a situation, which is hardly comparable to the normal situation in which we live and work. So the linear extrapolation of data from Hiroshima and Nagasaki maybe as dangerous, as the radon situation, where there has been a linear extrapolation down to zero in homes.

4.2 Endpoint considerations

For many years (into the 1950s), the genetic effects of radiation were considered to pose the greatest danger for human populations exposed to low levels of radiation. Today, the major concern is cancer. This of course does not mean that other non fatal consequences of exposure to radiation should be excluded from consideration or that should be neglected in the estimate of detriment. In the early 1950s, when it was generally recognised that using the erythema dose, the dose which produced reddening of the skin, was not adequate as a guide to radiation protection, many different biological endpoints were proposed as guides to regulatory standards: reproductive problems, tumours, congenital malformations, cataracts, blood disorders. Other possible biological endpoints were added later: obesity, hormonal disruptions, auto-immune diseases, developmental disorders, mental and physical retardation. In a paper presented at the Workshop, Rosalie Bertell [Bertell 1998] criticises the ICRP for neglecting such endpoints - dismissing them as transient, not consequential, not damaging to the gene pool, or not fatal - and focusing primarily on fatal cancers and the biological mechanism of direct damage to DNA.

Dr. Bertell quotes many examples, drawing primarily from results of her own research, in order to substantiate the importance of several biological endpoints that should be included in the determination of the total detriment incurred from exposure to ionising radiation. She gives an extensive account of studies of the health effects of nuclear fallout on the inhabitants of the Rongelap Atoll, following the testing of a 15 Megaton hydrogen bomb in 1954 at Bikini Atoll. According to her own studies, conducted in 1988, an excess of serious chronic illness was found among Rongelapese born prior to the 1954 hydrogen bomb detonation. She also observed serious congenital disease or malformation in living children and measurable adverse health effects in three generations of Rongelapese, i.e. those exposed to the 1954 fallout, their offspring and the third generation. Illnesses investigated included thyroid related problems, tumours and cysts, hearth problems, mental and neurological abnormalities, reproductive problems experienced by women and adult diabetes. However, these studies do not offer an estimate of the doses received by the Rongelap People, which would enable the quantitative correlation between dose and the various endpoints under consideration.

According to the author of this paper, similar adverse health effects are observed in the population exposed to high background radiation (between 3 and 30 mSv per year) in Kerala, India. Although this population was identified and proposed for study as early as 1957, actual studies dod not start before 1988, with quantitative analysis of the data still incomplete.

The main conclusion of Dr. Bertell's paper is that, before definitive radiation standards are set, substantial research is needed for the quantification of dose response relationships between radiation exposure and several non-cancer endpoints and the inclusion of such endpoints in the evaluation of detriment. These endpoints include the occurrence of cysts, blood abnormalities, auto-immune diseases, hormonal disruptions, reduced fertility, congenital malformations and diseases, skin cancer (including non-melanoma), and the so-called 'transient' effects of exposures which disrupt homeostasis.

4.3 Effective dose criticism

The introduction of the quantity of 'Effective Dose' by the ICRP in 1990 nd its usage for setting radiation protection standards has been criticised both as a concept and with regard to the values assigned to the weighting coefficients wT in eqn (3).

In paper contributed to the Workshop, David Sumner [Sumner 1998] argues that the introduction of the concept of effective dose, which replaces the quantity effective dose equivalent, is a further step away from pure science. The role of the weighting coefficients wT, which are intended to quantify the relative contribution of organ or tissue T to the total 'detriment', in addition to risk of fatal cancer and serious hereditary effects, is now expanded to encompass two additional factors:

- A factor to take account of years of life lost, and

- a factor to take account of morbidity of non-fatal cancers.

According to Dr.Sumner this new definition contains an inordinate amount of value judgement and thus the effective dose and the sievert cease to be a scientific quantity and unit, respectively.

However, the paper does not propose any alternative means for quantifying 'detriment' or suggest new ways for setting quantitative radiation protection limits.

From a different point of view, H. Kuni, in an invited paper presented at the Workshop [Kuni 1998], has criticised the values assigned by the ICRP to the weighting factors wR and wT in eqns (2) and (3) and the consequent radiation protection limits. The criticism of Professor Kuni is on the following grounds:

1. Revision of the value of wR for X-rays. It is argued that the usage of a single value for wR, independent of X-ray energy, underestimates the relative biological effectiveness (RBE) of soft X-rays. He thus proposes an increase of the value of wR by a factor of 4. According to this argument, if X-rays were the only source of irradiation, dose limits should be reduced by the same factor.

2. Linearity of Dose Response Curve and revision of the Dose and Dose Rate Effectiveness Factor (DDREF). It is argued that a linear extrapolation of the dose response curve should be used (as indeed it is [Valentin 1998] and that the DDREF value of 2 should be revised. The author concludes that this will lead to the lowering of limits by a factor of 2.

3. Underreporting of radiation induced cancer mortality. The reduction of radiation limits by a factor of 1.4 is proposed due to underreporting of cancer mortality, which, according to the author, leads to aa 40% increase of the gradient of the dose response relationship. However, a detailed calculation of this factor is not given in the paper.

4. Improvement of conventional working conditions. the author maintains that improved working conditions have lowered the incidence of mortality in industrial accidents with a continuous trend of 3% per year. Based on this fact, the author proposes a four-fold decrease of the radiation limits.

5. Demographic influence. Due to the higher life expectancy in Europe, the probability of cancer incidence is 20% higher than in Japan. Based on this fact, the author recommends a reduction of radiation limits by a factor of 1.4. Again, a detailed calculation of this factor is not given in the paper. 6. Densely ionising radiation. Quoting results from his own work [refs. 10 and 11 in Kuni 1998], the author suggests that wR values for neutrons should be multiplied by a factor between 16 and 25. The reasoning is not very clear, although this may be attributed to a language problem.

In his conclusions the author assumes that the above corrections contribute in a multiplicative manner and thus proposes an overall reduction of radiation exposure limits by a factor of (4 x 2 x 1.4 x 4 x 1.4 =) 63 for X-rays. The proposed limits are thus 1 mSv y-1 for workers and 20 uSv y-1 for the general population.

The premises put forth in this paper suffer both from lack of mathematical rigour and lack of solid experimental evidence. First of all, it is observed that some of the points criticised pertain to the value of a particular coefficient in the double sum of eqn (3). Even if the proposed revision of this value is accepted, the effect would be not on the limits set but on the value of the estimated dose - which would now may or may not be above the allowed limit. However, the overall effect on the effective dose would not be multiplicative; in certain cases it might even be negligible. Furthermore, the evidence behind the reasoning for reducing radiation limits is mostly presented in a sketchy, offhand, fashion or is based on unpublished, hard-to-locate reports.

4.4 The Linear No Threshold (LNT) controversy

major issue in radiation risk assessment, as it emerged from the Workshop, is the extrapolation of the dose response curve to low doses and low dose rates, particularly for low Linear Energy Transfer (LET) radiation (e.g. electromagnetic radiation). As already mentioned, and illustrated schematically in Fig. 2, the simple linear extrapolation of the dose response curve down to zero dose is the simplest and, among the three alternatives shown in Fig. 2, the most conservative with regard to setting radiation protection standards. This is in fact the most recent recommendation of the ICRP [Valentin 1998]. However, this has not always been the case.

For many years, based primarily on laboratory studies of cells, plants and animals, a quadratic behaviour of the dose response curve for acute doses up to 2.5 - 4 Gy was predicted [see e.g. NCRP 1980], i.e. a response of the form

eqn. (5) E(D) = alphaD + betaD2

in which alpha and beta are constants with values depending on the biological effect under study, the type of radiation, the dose rate and other factors. This relationship leads to a curve similar to curve B in Figs. 1 and 2 and is usually referred to as 'linear-quadratic' (a mathematical misnomer).

The theoretical justification of the linear-quadratic dose response is based on a model developed by Kellerer and Rossi [Kellerer 1972] on concepts originally put forth by Lea [Lea 1962]. According to this model, known s 'dual radiation action', events leading to 'lesions' (i.e. permanent changes) in cellular DNA require the formation of interacting pairs of 'sub-lesions'. The interacting pairs can be produced by a single traversing particle, or track, or by two tracks, giving rise, respectively, to the linear and quadratic term in eqn (5). According to this theory, a sub-lesion my be repaired before it can interact to form a lesion, the probability of such repair increasing with time. Consequently, as the dose rate is reduced, the formation of lesions from sub-lesions caused by separate tracks become less important and the contribution of the second term in eqn (5) decreases. Hence the model predicts that at sufficiently low doses or doses rates the response should be linear [EPA 1994].

Results of animal tumourigenesis studies are, in general, qualitatively consistent with the theory indicating that low-LET radiation seems to have reduced effectiveness per unit dose at low dose rates [NCRP 1980]. However, it is usually not possible from the data to verify [EPA 1994] that the dose response curve has the linear-quadratic form of eqn (5).

Apart from the manipulation with regard to extrapolation into the low dose region, the dose response curve is usually further corrected to take into account low versus high dose rates. According to the dual action model (or other theories), the dose response should be linear at low doses or low dose rates and, in either limit, should have the same slope. at higher doses and dose rates, multiple track events become important and the dose response slope should increase. As a result, it is argued [EPA 1994], the response per unit dose at low doses and low dose rates will be overestimated if one extrapolates linearly from observations made at high doses, acutely delivered. The degree of overestimation is commonly expressed in terms of the Dose and Dose Rate Effectiveness Factor (DDREF). For instance, a DDREF of 3 means that the risk per unit dose observed at high acute doses should be divided by 3 before being applied to low dose and/or dose rate conditions.

The current theoretical explanation for the need of DDREF involves DNA repair. The linearity of dose response at low doses suggests that DNA repair is maximal and independent of dose rate for doses below about 0.2 Gy. Repair of radiation-induced DNA damage is found to be largely complete within a few hours of an acute exposure. Consequently, protracting the dose beyond this time span should have little or no effect on the risk of cancer induction. It is expected, therefore, that repair will be maximal so long as no doses above 0.2 Gy are delivered within a few hours [EPA 1994].

Some general conclusions concerning the value of DDREF that should be utilised when setting radiation protection standards can be drawn from the Atomic Bomb Survivor Study (ABSS) and laboratory animal data. However, the results contain significant uncertainties due both to dosimetry errors in the ABSS, estimated today at 30 - 40%, and to the manner of transfer of animal laboratory data to humans. Taken together, current scientific data indicate that the value of DDREF is site specific and that in general it should be in the range of 1 to 3 for human cancer induction. However, there are indications that a higher DDREF may apply to lung [EPA 1994].

The utilisation of a DDREF value above unity has been criticised by Professor Kuni in the paper presented at the Workshop [Kuni 1998]. As mentioned earlier, according to the author, the revision of the DDREF value recommended by the ICRP from 2 to 1 leads to a decrease of radiation limits by a factor of two.

Severe criticism of the use of the currently accepted dose response relationship for low dose and low dose rates was voiced during the Workshop by several participants on the grounds that it underestimates - or, by some critics, that it has been deliberately made to underestimate - actual health risks to workers and the general population. In a contributed paper, Heiko Ziggel [Ziggel 1998] presented data from studies conducted in Germany on the incidence of leukaemia on children and young adults living in the vicinity of nuclear plants and nuclear facilities. The results of Dr. Ziggel's epidemiological findings are discussed in further detail in paragraph 5.2.

Criticism of current radiation standards has been also expressed by a group of scientists with the opposite point of view, arguing that the dose response relationship used for low doses and low dose rates are too conservative, leading to unnecessarily stringent - and, therefore, costly - radiation protection practices. In a paper presented at the Workshop by J. Jovanovich [Jovanovich 1998], the author criticises the exposure limit set by the Atomic Energy Control Board (AECB) of Canada for the disposal of nuclear waste. The author maintains that the recommended limit of 0.050 mSv y-1, which, according to the LNT response curve, corresponds to a radiological risk of 10-6 fatal cancers and serious genetic effects per year, is inordinately stringent. He compares this limit with other common (and uncommon) risks, which he estimates as about 10-3 per year for deaths due to home fires and 10-6 to 10-5 for a comet or a planetesimal with a diameter larger than four kilometers hitting the earth during a human lifetime. He further argues that the limit of 0.050 mSv y-1 is within the range of variation of cosmic radiation with elevation which roughly corresponds to five floors of a typical multi-storey building.

Along the same lines, in a paper contributed to the Workshop [Cohen 1998] and presented mainly during the Discussion periods, B. Cohen summarised the results of his study in the United States pertaining to geographic correlation of radon inhalation. According to the author, purely statistical analysis of a large body of data, covering about 90% of the total US population, in measurements of average radon levels show a correlation with carcinogenesis leading to a dose response relationship akin to curve D in Figs. 1 and 2, showing signs of negative health detriment (i.e. health benefit) for low doses and low dose rates [Cohen 1995]. The author concludes that the only explanation he can give for these results is that the LNT theory fails, grossly overestimating the cancer risk in the low dose, low dose rate region. However, he offers no theoretical explanation of the effect (see also paragraph 5.4).

A very interesting point pertaining to the LNT dose response relationship is raised by C. Busby [Busby 1998] in an invited paper presented at the Workshop. The author of this paper maintains that the dose response for external exposure to radiation should be differentiated with respect to dose response from internal irradiation, i.e. due to decay products of ingested or inhaled radionuclides. Dr. Busby in fact claims that "...the internal exposure people suffer [from internal irradiation] is more than 500 times more mutagenic, or cancer producing, than the equivalent dose of external radiation, from an X-ray machine or an atomic bomb" [Busby 1998] and advocates a dose response relationship of the form contained in Fig. 3. The author bases his arguments both on theoretical considerations, in particular on his "Second Event" theory (see paragraph 5.3), and on experimental results (see Fig. 3) which are unfortunately drawn from unpublished work [Burlakova 1996] that could not be easily located during the time available for the writing of this report.

Selected Bibliography:

Bertell, R. Limitations of the ICRP Recommendations for Worker and Public Protection from Ionising Radiation. In STOA 1998

Burlakova E.B. et al. Mechanism of biological action of low dose irradiation. In E.B. Burlakova (ed.). Consequences of the Chernobyl Catastrophe for Human Health. Moscow, Centre for Russian Environmental Policy, 1996.

Busby, C. Averaging errors in the prception of health risks from internal radioisotopes with specific emphasis on mutagenic enhancement due to 2-nd Event effects caused by sequentially decaying maan-maade fission-product bet-emitters. In STOA 1998.

Cheng, K.C. and Loeb, L.A. Genomic Stability and Instability: a working Paradigm, in Genetic Instability and Tumourigenesis, M.B. Kasten, Springer (ed.), Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, 1997.

Kellerer, A.M. and Rossi, H.M. The theory of dual radiation action. Curr. Topics Rad. Res. Quart. 8:85-158; 1972

Lea, D.F. Actions of Radiation on Living Cells. Cambridge University Press, 1962.

Luning, K.G.; Frolen, H.; Nelson, A.; Roennbaeck, C. Genetic effects of strontium-90 injected into male mice. Nature 197:304-305; 1963.

Morgan, W. F.; Day, J.P.; Kaplan, M.I.; McGee, E.M.; Limoli, C.L. Review of genomic instability induced by ionising radiation, Radiat. Res., 146:247-258; 1996.

Mothersill C. and Seymour C.B. Lethal mutations and genomic instability. (Review) Int. J. Radiat. Biol. 71: 751-758; 1997.

Mothersill C. and Seymour C.B. Genomic instability after low dose irradiation; implications for protection. In STOA 1998.

Stewart A. A-bomb Survivors: Reassessment of the Radiation Hazard. In STOA 1998.

Ziggel, H. Evidences of the impact on health by normal operation of nuclear facilities. In STOA 1998.

-------- korea

North Korea threatens to scrap missile and nuclear accord with Washington

01/03/03
Evansville Courier & Press
Associated Press
http://www.courierpress.com/cgi-bin/view.cgi?200103/03+nkorea030301_latestnews.html+20010303

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea reiterated a warning Saturday that it might scrap a moratorium on long-range missile tests and revive a nuclear program that Washington fears was being used to develop nuclear weapons.

A spokesman for the reclusive communist state's Foreign Ministry accused the United States of failing to maintain its end of a 1994 framework in which North Korea agreed to freeze its nuclear facilities in return for two Western-designed reactors.

The reactor project has been plagued by delays, upsetting the North's Stalinist regime.

"Under this situation it is self-evident that it is difficult for the Democratic People's Republic of (North) Korea to unilaterally and indefinitely keep in force such measures as a moratorium on the launch of satellites and missiles," the spokesman said in remarks carried in English by the North's official foreign news outlet, KCNA. As usual, the spokesman was not identified.

North Korea issued a similar warning Feb. 21 in angry reaction to comments by senior Bush administration officials that they would review policies regarding the North _ remarks interpreted by both Koreas as a sign that Washington might take a tougher stance toward the communist North.

Condoleezza Rice, President Bush's national security adviser, responded to the threat in February by saying that development of missile technology in countries such as North Korea was one of the reasons the United States is considering a missile defense system.

North Korea said, however, that "it is none other than the DPRK which is exposed to threat owing to the conservative hard-line stand expressed by the U.S. administration. We have neither intention nor capacity to browbeat anyone." DPRK refers to North Korea.

Under the 1994 agreement with Washington, a U.S.-led consortium is building the two new reactors in the North at a cost of $4.6 billion. As part of the deal, Pyongyang suspended its own nuclear program, which Washington feared was being used to develop nuclear weapons.

But North Korea has been unhappy with the slow progress of construction. The reactors, originally to be completed by 2003, are several years behind schedule. The North has blamed part of its acute electricity shortage on the delays and has demanded compensation.

North Korea also agreed to suspend missile tests in September 1999 as long as talks continued with Washington on resolving concerns over Pyongyang's missile program. In turn, the United States eased some sanctions.

Washington says the United States will keep its promises under the agreed framework and expects North Korea to do likewise.

Some South Korean officials worry privately that a rekindled standoff between the United States and North Korea could jeopardize Seoul's efforts to engage the North.

---

Flexibility Urged on N. Korea

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Washington Post
By Steven Mufson
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A16194-2001Mar2?language=printer

Three leading House members have urged President Bush not to commit himself to a 1994 agreement that pledged U.S. support for the construction of nuclear power plants in North Korea.

Aiming to preempt a pitch South Korean President Kim Dae Jung is expected to make during a visit to Washington next week, the three lawmakers want Bush to keep the flexibility to renegotiate the agreement and to provide conventional power plants instead of nuclear facilities.

Kim has supported the Agreed Framework as part of his effort to open up the isolated North and defuse tensions on the peninsula.

House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), House Republican Policy Committee Chairman Christopher Cox (R-Calif.) and Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) said in a letter to Bush: "We urge you to avoid making any commitments to foreign governments that would prejudice your ability to refine U.S. policy toward North Korea."

The letter revives a debate that raged during the Clinton administration about the Agreed Framework. Many Republicans held up the agreement as an example of the Clinton administration appeasing a country allegedly bent on blackmail of the United States. But Bush administration officials have said they would honor the agreement.

"We will abide and agree to the commitments made under the Agreed Framework, provided that North Korea does the same," Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said in his confirmation hearing in January.

Under the framework, negotiated in 1994 by the Clinton administration, North Korea promised to stop work on a five-megawatt nuclear reactor that the United States suspected was devoted to developing a nuclear weapon. North Korea also agreed to let American and international inspectors monitor the disposal of spent fuel from that reactor.

In return, the Clinton administration agreed to work toward normalization of relations with North Korea, supply aid in the form of fuel oil and take part in an international consortium that would build two light-water nuclear power plants at a cost of about $5 billion.

Critics of the agreement said the nuclear power plants were impractical for North Korea because it would be impossible to guarantee their safety and because they would be difficult to connect to the country's power grid. They argued that conventional oil or coal plants would be safer and more practical.

"Questions have emerged about safety, liability, licensing, the condition of North Korea's electric power grid and the suitability of alternate sources of electric power, to say nothing of the need to ensure that North Korea fulfills its obligations under the Agreed Framework and other pertinent international agreements," said the Hyde-Cox-Markey letter.

The letter suggested obliquely that South Korean corporate stakes in construction of the nuclear power plants might be a factor in Kim's support for the deal. "We can think of no worse reason than financial gain for proceeding with nuclear power plant construction in North Korea," the three House members said.

-------- missile defense

Top official says Russia could beat proposed U.S. missile shield
RUSSIA Ballistic missile-defense systems can be penetrated, top official says

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Salt Lake Tribune
http://www.sltrib.com/03032001/nation_w/76303.htm

MOSCOW -- Russia's Deputy Prime Minister said on Friday that his nation can penetrate missile-defense systems such as the one the United States is proposing to build.

The Kremlin vehemently opposes the proposed U.S. missile defense, arguing it would violate the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty and threaten to touch off a new arms race. The ABM treaty bans wide missile defenses.

Proponents of the U.S. system counter that it would be aimed at blocking attacks by small nations, and would not be effective against Russia's vast nuclear arsenal.

Russia has the technical know-how "to overcome any ABM system," Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov said.

"It is theoretically possible to get through any ABM system, and the United States knows this," the Interfax news agency quoted him saying.

Also on Friday, a former chief of Russia's Federal Security Service, Nikolai Kovalyov, warned that if the United States builds such a system, it would intensify anti-American sentiments in Europe.

-------

Russia Marks 1961 Anti-missile Test, Slams U.S.

Mar 3, 2001
Russia Today
NMD
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=301547

MOSCOW, Mar 3, 2001 -- (Reuters) Veterans of what Russia says was the world's first successful test of an anti-missile defense system 40 years ago celebrated its anniversary on Friday and officials said Moscow was ready for any new U.S. missile shield.

http://www.reuters.com

Russia and the United States are at loggerheads over Washington's plan for a new national anti-missile defense.

Russia says the U.S. system will be aimed against its own nuclear arsenal, while the Washington says it is directed against so-called rogue states such as Iran and Iraq.

At a Moscow exhibition hall of the Russian Agency for Guidance Systems, veterans watched film of an anti-missile test carried out on March 4, 1961, by the former Soviet Union, shook hands and drank vodka.

"Today, you saw that 40 years ago, a rocket hit the nose of a ballistic missile. The Americans haven't done that, even now," said Vladimir Simonov, the agency head.

Surrounded by veterans with chests bedecked with medals and colleagues who had not seen each other for years kissing each other noisily on the cheeks, Simonov said Russia was ready to face any U.S. challenge on missiles.

"We hope for a political solution, but the option of an adequate response at a lower cost is ready. This has been reported to the Security Council," he said, speaking of the Kremlin body which advises President Vladimir Putin.

Russia is hoping European worries about the U.S. plans, which will involve amendments to the key 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty, will make Washington rethink its plans to build a National Missile Defense (NMD).

Russia has proposed what it says is a cheaper, more localized option to the U.S. project which involves putting missiles close to countries causing concern in the United states.

Russia has opposed any amendments to ABM, saying the treaty is the cornerstone of Cold War arms pacts. It says the United States will start a new arms race if quits ABM.

The new U.S. administration has also been strong in its rhetoric. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has accused Russia of being part of the problem by selling missile technology to countries Washington says might be a threat in the future.

"Russia has the technical possibilities to penetrate any anti-missile shield," Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov told reporters at the event, adding that the dispute with Washington should be settled via negotiations.

Russia has never specified what could be Moscow's match for NMD. But Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev said last month Russia could dust off technologies designed to match a similar U.S. "Star Wars" plan designed in the 1980s, but never carried out.

-------

Missile shield won't work, so don't build one

March 3, 2001
Milwaukee Journal
By Richard Foster
http://www.jsonline.com/news/editorials/mar01/foster04030301.asp

At first, it seems like a no-brainer. Russia, though no longer a Cold War threat, still has thousands of nuclear missiles capable of hitting the United States, and control over these nukes - like just about everything else in Russia - is unreliable.

President Vladimir V. Putin won't mash the red button, but a mob headed by a crazed Russian general or scientist could hijack one of these missiles. It's also possible that one could be launched by accident.

Or what about Osama bin Laden or some other terrorist? Or a rogue country? In July 1998, a commission headed by Donald H. Rumsfeld, now the U.S. secretary of defense, warned that the ballistic missile threat to our country is "broader, more mature and evolving more rapidly than has been reported" by U.S. intelligence agencies. Countries like Iran, Iraq or North Korea might be able to develop a missile capable of hitting the United States within as little as five years of a decision to do so, the commission warned.

A few weeks later, as if to ratify this warning, North Korea test-fired a missile that flew over Japan before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean.

In spite of this documented and demonstrated danger, and even though our country possesses some of the best scientific brains in the world, we still don't have a defense against a ballistic missile attack. Isn't it just a matter of common sense to build one? Don't we owe this protection to our children, if not to ourselves?

Along with many others, President Bush has given an emphatic "yes" to both these questions, and he and Rumsfeld have vowed to build such an umbrella.

But there are very solid, very compelling reasons why a defense against a rogue missile attack is not possible, or even necessary.

The first reason is that a reliable, effective defense will not work, at least not for very long. The United States has been trying to build a missile shield, on and off, since at least the 1960s. By one estimate, $100 billion has been spent in the effort, most of it since 1983, when President Reagan began his now-famous (but later abandoned) "Star Wars" program.

There is very little to show for this time, money and effort except perhaps a lot of data that suggest that, in a scientific sense, a missile shield is in a class with a perpetual-motion machine. There are just some things that are not technologically possible, at least with our present capabilities, and a missile shield may be one of them.

Wait a minute, you say. Landing a man on the moon once seemed impossible, too. People thought the Wright brothers were crazy. Let's assume a breakthrough. Let's assume that a defense can be built. Let's even assume it would work perfectly.

But that would not solve the problem. The invention of body armor did not make swords impotent and obsolete; it just encouraged people to make them bigger and sharper. Likewise, the tank begat the bazooka. Similarly, a missile shield would inspire countermeasures. What's worse, scientists seem agreed that it is easier, cheaper and simpler to overcome a defense shield than it is to build it in the first place.

Thus, any protection it might confer - again, assuming it could be built - would be only temporary. Is it worth spending more billions of dollars to produce, at best, an only temporary remedy?

And what about this ballistic missile threat, anyhow? How genuine is it?

The Rumsfeld Commission did warn that countries like Iran, Iraq and North Korea might be able to build long-range missiles quite rapidly. But it attached important qualifiers to its warning.

One of the commission's members, scientist Richard L. Garwin, points out that the panel cautioned that rogue nations could build only a few missiles, that they would be inaccurate and unreliable, that an "urgent, well-financed" program would be needed to develop them, and that the job couldn't be done without foreign technical help.

Neither did the commission assess the likelihood that Iraq's Saddam Hussein, say, would actually attempt to attack us. It only said he and others might have the technical ability to do so. Neither did the commission appraise the likelihood that the United States could be attacked by other weapons - nuclear bombs planted at airports, say - that a shield could not defend against.

Although the Rumsfeld Commission provided the chief intellectual rationale for missile defenses, the commission itself did not support this remedy. Instead, it made only a brief and general recommendation that "U.S. analyses, practices and policies that depend on expectations of extended warning of deployment be reviewed and, as appropriate, revised to reflect the reality of an environment in which there may be little or no warning."

Finally, the commission's warning itself has been authoritatively challenged. In 1998, Gen. Henry Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he believed it "unlikely" that a rogue nation could acquire a ballistic missile capability quickly and without being detected. as the commission said.

Even if this country is or will be threatened by ballistic missiles, there are other, better ways to deal with the threat. Russian leaders have every reason to make sure that they alone (not dissident generals or scientists) retain control of their weapons. If this control is eroding, why not help the Russians restore it, through better command and control systems?

Terrorists like Osama bin Laden are not likely to attack us with ballistic missiles. Terrorists are more apt to do what they have done: use truck bombs or perhaps chemical or biological weapons. A ballistic missile shield is useless against such threats.

Neither is Saddam Hussein likely to launch a missile against us. He and the leaders of Iran and North Korea know very well that doing so would provoke a massive and devastating reprisal. Hussein may be ruthless and powerful, but he is not likely to commit national and personal suicide, and neither are his military chiefs.

What missile defense would do is divide this country not only from Russia and China, but also from our allies, almost all of whom oppose the idea. It would also weaken the rule of international law, since it would violate (or require the revision) of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

There are many things you can do with the billions of dollars that ballistic missile defense would require. You can buy military hardware that really does work, like ships and planes. And you can buy schools and hospitals and roads.

Or you can save it. The worst thing you can do is waste it.

Richard Foster is a Journal Sentinel editorial writer and columnist. His e-mail address is rfoster@onwis.com

Appeared in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on March 4, 2001

---

New times require new strategies

March 3, 2001
Milwaukee Journal
By BAKER SPRING
http://www.jsonline.com/news/editorials/mar01/spring04030301.asp

It's as if Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has hung out a sign at the Pentagon: From now on, U.S. missile-defense policy will be made in accordance with how things are, not with how they used to be.

That's the upshot, anyway, of what the secretary has noted recently, pointing out that the national security environment that produced the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which we signed with the Soviets, no longer exists. Neither, for that matter, does the Soviet Union. In view of this, he said, it's time for the United States to get to work building a global missile-defense shield.

Reasonable people can disagree over whether it was the correct strategy at the time. But why do arms-control advocates still cling to the ABM treaty as "the cornerstone of strategic stability," a phrase heard often on both sides of the Atlantic? The primary threat to the U.S. comes no longer from a calculated strategic nuclear attack by the Soviet Union but from accidental or unauthorized missile attacks by established powers or from calculated strikes by rogue states such as Iran, Iraq and North Korea.

The Russians charge that an American missile defense will spark a new arms race. They claim to have weapons capable of penetrating such a defense.

President Bush could quiet Russian protests - and sever Russian interests from those of the Chinese, who also vehemently protest a U.S. missile defense - by offering to let the Russians join us behind any missile shield. And the Chinese can't reasonably expect to dissuade America from constructing such a defense while they sell weapons to the very states that pose the most significant threats to American security.

Those who think we should retain the ABM treaty assume the same agreement that stabilized relations with the old Soviet regime somehow will protect us from the fundamentally different dangers now facing the United States. In a recent issue of "Inside Missile Defense," Spurgeon Keeny, president of the Washington-based Arms Control Association, wrote that to walk away from the treaty would represent an abandonment of the security approach "that has been painstakingly fashioned on a bipartisan basis over the past three decades."

This is fantasy. We're essentially being asked to believe that - by a magical coincidence - a Cold War instrument is perfectly suited to addressing current threats. Bush and Rumsfeld simply have recognized the pointlessness of using the old approach to solve new problems.

This recognition has taken hold even among those who helped craft the treaty, such as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. He told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in May 1999 that it is strategically and morally necessary to build a missile defense, given current security threats. The U.S. needs to "find a way to end the restrictions the ABM Treaty imposes on the research, development, testing and deployment of missile defense systems as soon as possible," he said.

Kissinger probably put it best. "I cannot imagine what an American president would say to the American public if there should be an attack and if he would have to explain that he did nothing to prevent or defeat the resulting catastrophe," he told the Senate committee. "The legitimacy of government would be threatened if such a condition existed."

It apparently won't - now that we've signaled our willingness to shed the ABM straitjacket.

Baker Spring is a research fellow in the Davis Institute for International Studies at The Heritage Foundation.

---

Russian officials blast defense plan

Published: Saturday, March 3, 2001
Pioneer Planet
http://www.pioneerplanet.com/seven-days/sat/news/docs/034600.htm

MOSCOW Russia's deputy prime minister said Friday that his nation can penetrate missile-defense systems such as the one the United States is proposing to build. The Kremlin opposes the proposed U.S. missile defense, arguing it would violate the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty and threaten to touch off a new arms race. The ABM treaty bans wide missile defenses. Proponents of the U.S. system counter that it would be aimed at blocking attacks by small nations, and would not be effective against Russia's vast nuclear arsenal. Russia has argued that the system, once deployed, could be expanded. Nonetheless, Russia has the technical know-how ``to overcome any ABM system,'' Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov said. Also on Friday, a former chief of Russia's Federal Security Service, Nikolai Kovalyov, warned that if the United States builds such a system, it would intensify anti-American sentiments in Europe.

-------- u.s. nuc facilities

-------- pennsylvania

Polluted site will be tested in spring

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Philadelphia Inquirer
By Marc Levy
http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/03/03/city/JMCGUIRE03.htm

NEW HANOVER TOWNSHIP - This spring, the Air Force will begin mapping a plume of liquid chemical degreaser that has moved through groundwater below McGuire Air Force Base and into a neighboring wildlife refuge.

The mapping is expected to last two years and is to include an ecological analysis to determine the extent, if any, of damage to the Colliers Mills Wildlife Management Area in Ocean County, according to Air Force officials speaking to a civilian oversight board meeting Thursday night in Cookstown.

Officials said they hoped to have awarded a contract for the study by the end of April.

Environmental engineers at the base say the plume of trichloroethylene, or TCE - which is known to damage the liver, kidneys and nervous system, and impair immune-system function and fetal development in pregnant women - is not endangering wells that draw from the water table.

Of the 23 possible environmental hazards the Air Force has found on the base in the last 20 years, only the plume of TCE has spread off base. Eleven of the hazards have been cleaned up at a cost of $20 million, and the Air Force expects to spend an additional $9.7 million to clean up the remaining 12 sites over the next six years.

Still to be cleaned up are a jet-fuel discharge pit and a nitric-acid pit, among other sites. There is also a 41-year-old plutonium spill to clean; removing 8,500 cubic meters of soil at that site could cost $6 million.

Cleaning the TCE plume could cost about $750,000. It would involve punching 2-inch pipes up to 100 feet deep to test water and map the plume, which has spread several thousand feet east of the 220-acre Bomarc missile site that the Air Force leases from Fort Dix, engineers said. Bomarc refers to the Boeing Michigan Aeronautical Research Center, where the missile was designed.

After the studies, officials say, the Air Force should have a better idea of how to clean up the plume.

The plume is believed to be about 4,000 feet at its longest point, 1,400 feet at its widest point, and at least 50 feet deep. Tests show the water table has as many as 400 parts per billion of TCE, engineers said. TCE is not a naturally occurring substance and has no acceptable level in the environment, engineers said.

TCE is a nonflammable, colorless liquid used mainly as a solvent to remove grease from metal parts, but is also found in adhesives, paint removers, typewriter correction fluid and spot removers.

A McGuire spokesman said last year that mechanics had used TCE to clean parts on the Bomarc missiles, although Air Force environmental engineers King Mak and John Pohl say it was unclear why TCE was used at the site.

The chemical's path has been traced to a storm drain on the Bomarc site, where 52 antiaircraft missiles were based in steel-and-cement bunkers until 1972.

The site, which sits along Route 539 on the eastern edge of Fort Dix, is shuttered.

The Air Force has been tracking the movement of the TCE plume since the chemical was inadvertently discovered in the groundwater in the mid-1980s. The plume has moved steadily to the east, reaching tributaries of the Toms River.

However, the rapidly moving waters of the tributaries are pushing the chemical to the waters' surface, where it evaporates, Pohl said.

The tributaries are possibly providing a natural barrier to the chemical's eastward spread, although it is possible the TCE is moving underneath the streams, he said.

In addition, organisms such as trees and plants in the white cedar swamps of Collier Mills are absorbing the TCE, sucking it out of the groundwater, Pohl said.

The natural cleansing of the chemical from the ground is crucial to the cleanup. Removing the chemical from the groundwater would involve using heavy equipment, which would irreversibly damage the wildlife refuge, Pohl said.

Marc Levy's e-mail address is mlevy@phillynews.com.

-------- MILITARY

-------- iraq

Rebels kill 12 soldiers in northeast India

03/03/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2001-03-03-india.htm

GAUHATI, India (AP) - Suspected guerrillas attacked a convoy of paramilitary forces in India's remote northeast on Saturday, killing at least 12 soldiers in a gun battle, police said.

The state government blamed the banned National Liberation Front of Tripura for the ambush of the Central Reserve Police Force in southern Tripura.

The rebels, who are fighting for a separate tribal homeland, attacked the convoy at the village of Ampi, said D. Gautam, the superintendent of police.

At least five rebels were killed on Friday night in a territorial battle between the NLFT and its rival separatist group, the All Trapper Tiger Force, in Sidhai, a village in western Tripura, Gautam said.

More than a dozen guerrilla groups are fighting separatist wars in India's seven northeastern states. They complain of alienation, neglect by the federal government and threats to their indigenous cultures.

More than 25,000 people have been killed since they began fighting Indian security forces in 1948.

Also Saturday, Islamic militant groups based in Pakistan claimed responsibility for ambushing two police vehicles and killing 17 policemen in Indian-controlled Kashmir.

Abu Osama, a spokesman for the Lashkar-e-Tayabba guerrilla group, said the attack on Friday was jointly carried out by four groups who have been fighting for independence from India since 1989.

The groups are Lashkar-e-Tayabba, Hezb-ul Mujahedeen, Jaish-e-Mohammed and Hezb-e-Islami, he said. The Jaish-e-Mohammed also confirmed it was a joint operation.

The militants fired rockets and heavy weapons at policemen on Friday near Manjakot, a village 150 miles northwest of Jammu, the winter capital of Indian-controlled Jammu-Kashmir state.

The policemen, riding in a jeep and a minibus, were returning from Manjakot after investigating the killing of two civilians on Thursday by suspected militants, a police officer said.

It was the first major strike by the guerrillas since Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee last week extended a unilateral cease-fire against them for three months. The rebel groups have rejected the truce and intensified attacks against Indian security forces.

On Friday, Indian policemen returned fire, and a gunbattle with the rebels lasted for nearly two hours, police said.

Security forces later found the bullet-riddled corpses of 12 policemen. Five other policemen injured in the attack died in a hospital in Jammu, police said.

Kashmir is a predominantly Muslim region in Hindu-majority India. Separatists want to wrest it from India's control, and some want to unite it with Muslim-dominated Pakistan.

-------- u.s.

SCOTIA, N.Y.

March 3, 2001
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A16747-2001Mar2?language=printer

A Navy missile technician accused of sabotaging cables on a Trident nuclear submarine was on LSD, cocaine and methamphetamine at the time, prosecutors said. Petty Officer 2nd Class Ernesto G. Cimmino, 23, of Scotia, was arrested Nov. 26 as the USS Alaska sat at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard near Seattle. He faces 23 counts for allegedly cutting 106 cables.

-------- OTHER

-------- environment

Recycling urban waste Incinerators a public health risk

01/03/03
The Independent
http://independent-bangladesh.com/news/mar/02/02032001re.htm#4

Asia's fast-growing big cities must use less expensive and safer methods of urban waste disposal than burial and incineration, says international environment watchdog greenpeace. Along with a coalition of regional green groups, Greenpeace has urged civic authorities in the Thai capital to switch to recycling urban waste that will also generate jobs for many.

According to a new study commissioned by Greenpeace, Bangkok and other big cities in South-East and East Asia, need to shift from the traditional "dump, bury or burn" methods of getting rid of city waste. The green activists are especially worried about the use of expensive incinerators to burn garbage in these cities. Incinerators are not only costly to build, run and maintain, they are known to create serious public health risks, say environmentalists.

"Incinerators have been pinpointed as the major, if not largest, sources of toxic emissions into the environment, including heavy metals and the ultra toxic dioxins and furans, which are known carcinogens," said a greenpeace press note issued to mark the mid-February release of the study. The study, titled, 'Incinerator Critique and Scenario for Recycling and Economic Development in Bangkok,' was carried out by the US-based Institute for Local Self-Reliance. A copy was presented to Bangkok Governor Samak Sundaravej.

Samak pleased green groups early February by announcing that city authorities would scrap a seven billion-baht (about 160 million US dollar) incinerator project, which was largely funded by the Japan Bank for International Co- operation. The incinerator would have burned about 1,200 of the estimated 12,100 tonnes of garbage produced daily in the Thai capital. Greenpeace South-East Asia Toxics Campaigner Tara Buakamsri says this would have been much smaller in size than incinerators in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore. Taiwan has more than 20, South Korea, five and Singapore, three incinerators. It costs between 60 to 90 dollars to incinerate one tonne of waste, says Tara. Since incineration also releases toxic substances into the atmosphere "communities living around and downwind of incinerators in countries like Japan and France have higher rates of cancer, birth defects and infant mortality, compared to incineration-free areas," he points out.

According to Tara, there are more waste incinerators in Japan than in all other countries in the world. Greenpeace quotes a 1999 UN Environment Programme report, which says that Japan's incinerators produce nearly 40 per cent of the world's emissions of dioxin and furan.

Geenpeace launched its campaign against incineration of urban waste last year, with an alliance of 12 Asian environmental groups, known as 'waste not Asia'. There are groups from the Philippines, Taiwan, India, Korea and Thailand involved in the alliance. The alliance launched its campaign in Bangkok by urging city governor Samak to scrap the incinerator project. Waste not Asia activists say that incinerator manufacturers in industrialised nations are eyeing these cities because public health concerns have driven them out of the North American and West European market. "Incineration is an example of toxic trade. We are here to let the world know we no longer intend to become the dumping ground for their discarded technologies," Junilyn Sylvestre, a waste not Asia activist from the Philippine clean air coalition, was quoted as saying. The Philippines has enacted legislation banning incineration of urban waste.

The green activists, instead, advise Asia's big cities to strive for a "zero waste society," where most of the urban waste is reused. This would require minimizing waste production, recycling non-biodegradable waste and converting the rest into compost. The Greenpeace study notes that these methods also have the advantage of generating work for thousands of poor people. At present, the Thai capital recycles less than one-tenth of its urban waste. The Greenpeace report estimates that more than half the city's waste can be recycled. "The metropolis spends millions of dollars annually on waste disposal and the potential savings from composting and recycling could also mean increased resources for other government priorities like health and education," says greenpeace. The success of these methods, however; depends not only on funds and planing, but also on political commitment, says Tara.

Greenpeace has lobbied with members of Thailand's parliament and the government to persuade them to oppose incineration of urban waste. It has also tried to educate industry and business in Bangkok by organising discussions on cheaper and safer ways of waste disposal. IPS Feature

---

The Fastest Way to Steal Money

Sat., Mar. 3, 2001
SLATE NEWS:

The NYT and WP front the border tightening throughout Europe in response to the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Britain. The disease, which does not affect people and rarely kills animals but can have disastrous economic consequences (because infected animals stop eating and giving milk), has been discovered at roughly 40 farms so far. It is extremely contagious, and so far Britain has ordered the slaughter and burning of about 30,000 animals. Ireland placed 1,000 extra police officers on its Northern border to prevent the movement of animals South. European airports are requiring British passengers to disinfect by wading in shallow pools or wiping their feet on special mats. France, with no documented cases of foot-and-mouth, also ordered the slaughter of thousands of animals. The European Commission banned all livestock imports from Britain until next Friday. The British government has promised to compensate suffering farmers, but it has not released details.

-------

Focus shifts in battle for forests
Once it was spotted owl; now global warming threatens

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
By JEFF BARNARD
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/local/enviro02.shtml

EUGENE, Ore. -- Ten years ago when Andy Kerr was getting together with other environmentalists to stop logging in the Northwest's ancient forests, efforts focused on protecting habitat for the northern spotted owl.

With the owl battle largely won, his focus has shifted to global warming, but it's still about saving forests.

At a panel discussion at the Public Interest Environmental Law Conference yesterday, Kerr described the benefits of leaving trees standing as a way to draw excess carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, where most scientists say it contributes to the greenhouse effect.

"Sometimes the way to solve problems is by going bigger, not smaller," Kerr said while relaxing between panel discussions in a student lounge at the Knight Law Center at the University of Oregon.

"The problems of global warming, unsustainable farming and forest destruction can become solvable if you put them all together."

The principle has been discussed for years. Trees breath carbon dioxide from the air the way animals breath oxygen.

As the trees grow, they store more and more carbon drawn from the air, helping to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels -- coal, oil and natural gas.

Not everyone on the global warming panel agreed with Kerr's argument that using forests to store carbon -- a concept known as sequestration -- should become part of the mix of tactics to reduce greenhouse gases.

Last November, talks in The Netherlands on implementing the 1997 Kyoto Accords on reducing worldwide greenhouse gas emissions broke down over whether countries should be able to count the carbon dioxide absorbed by forests and farmlands towards their emissions reduction targets.

Panama Bartholomy, a student at Humboldt State University who attended the negotiations, argued that using forests to store carbon will just allow industrial countries to continue burning the fossil fuels that are creating the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Kerr said to achieve the 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions some scientists say is needed over the next 20 years to stabilize global warming, promoting forests as carbon sinks will ultimately become part of the mix.

"The problem is that it does a lot of good for the biosphere and little for the atmosphere if you keep pumping more carbon out of the ground," he said.

Kerr said global warming creates much wider incentives to protect forests than the spotted owl ever did.

Using forests to store carbon makes it attractive to protect the tropical rainforests of the Amazon as well as the temperate rainforests of the Northwest.

"The last time I checked, money still talks," Kerr said in an interview. "Why are forests cut down? People want the money."

"When we get serious about global warming, and there is a real market for carbon sequestration, I think it will be able to outcompete the market for timber."

-------- police

LAPD still struggles a decade after King beating

03/03/2001
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2001-03-03-lapd.htm

LOS ANGELES (AP) - It was 10 years ago Saturday that Rodney King was beaten in what became an enduring symbol of police brutality and a flashpoint for racial tensions. It also proved to be the first in a series of blows that have shattered the reputation of the Los Angeles Police Department.

Mere mention of the 1991 beating causes those in power to cringe as they recall the morning the city awoke to a chilling video of the black motorist being clubbed and kicked over and over by four white police officers as he writhed in agony on the ground.

The video, made by an onlooker, shocked the public and led Police Chief Daryl Gates to condemn the officers' actions.

But that was just the beginning. There would be three trials - one of them ending in the conviction of two officers - and the worst race riot Los Angeles had ever seen. When the smoke cleared on May 2, 1992, 55 people were dead and 2,383 were injured. Damage was put at $1 billion.

Gates was driven from the LAPD. Commissions were empaneled and made wide-ranging recommendations for reform.

Yet in the years to come, reform efforts would be overshadowed by events that would further damage the police force whose reputation for integrity and excellence was burnished by TV shows like Dragnet and Adam-12.

The King beating was followed by criticism of how police handled the 1992 riots and later the O.J. Simpson case. And now, the department is struggling with a corruption scandal in its Rampart division that has led to more than 100 convictions being overturned.

"Rodney King was about police abuse, O.J. was about police incompetence, and Rampart is about police corruption. That's a pretty grim picture for the LAPD," said Laurie Levenson, a Loyola University Law School professor. "What Rodney King taught us is you can't ignore the problems and hope they will go away."

District Attorney Steve Cooley, who was elected in November and whose office is prosecuting the Rampart corruption cases, said morale on the LAPD has been devastated.

"People who worked all their lives for this department are leaving," he said. "Right now they're in the hurt locker. Healing takes a long time. Law enforcement needs esprit de corps and pride. Something will have to happen to make them proud again. Maybe it will be some effective reforms."

After the King beating, a commission headed by former Secretary of State Warren Christopher was assembled to come up with reforms. Some were implemented, some were not.

Christopher said recently that the report had significant results in strengthening the city's civilian police commission, limiting the police chief's term and creating the office of inspector general.

But he said there is still a need for better training, regular psychological testing of officers and a system of tracking citizen complaints.

In any case, the Simpson murder trial in 1995 would bring new disrepute on the department. The LAPD was accused of mishandling scientific evidence and was criticized over Detective Mark Fuhrman, who eventually admitted committing perjury in denying he used racial slurs. In an embarrassment for the police force and the district attorney's office, the case ended in the former football star's acquittal.

Then, last year, the LAPD was hit with another scandal when officers in the department's Rampart division, a gang-infested neighborhood, were accused of planting evidence, lying under oath, even shooting unarmed suspects.

Five officers have been charged. One was acquitted, the convictions of three were overturned, and the fifth is awaiting trial on attempted murder charges.

"The King incident was a spontaneous reaction to a middle-of-the-night situation. I think Rampart is worse," said Lou Cannon, author of the book "Official Negligence: How Rodney King and the Riots Changed Los Angeles and the LAPD." "What went on in Rampart was a lot more cold-blooded. There was an element of malevolence, of premeditation and planning."

Recently the city agreed to federal oversight of the LAPD to try to end racial profiling and brutality. The new district attorney has also reinstated a program in which a prosecutor and investigator rush to the scene of any officer-involved shooting to see if charges are warranted.

Gates, who resigned as chief after the Christopher Commission report detailed brutality, racism and poor management in the LAPD, blamed the panel and later reform efforts by outsiders for the department's current low morale.

"People should stop meddling in the department's affairs and allow it to rebuild itself," Gates said. "You have police officers doing a great job out there day in and day out. They come home at night and read they have to reform the department. They need to feel good about themselves, and they just don't."

-------

Mexican road hazards include menacing cops

Saturday 3 March 2001
Monreal Gazette
LYNN MOORE
http://www.montrealgazette.com/travel/pages/010303/5031730.html

We rolled into Mexico with a solid game plan: we'd always travel in a caravan with other recreational vehicles; we'd never be on the road after dark and we'd only stay in accredited RV parks. In other words, we were going to play it safe.

The problem - as best I can discern it a year after our 10,000-kilometre trek - is that ''safe'' doesn't play well in Mexico if you have any sense of adventure. Which explains, in part, how we came to find ourselves at the centre of an ugly situation involving armed men with police badges and larcenous intent.

As every cautionary tale needs a beginning, we'll begin in the border town of Laredo, Tex., where we went looking to join an RV convoy. In the municipal campground, we found Roger, a Canadian who escorts RV caravans from Texas to Mexico's Pacific coast. He charges $500 an RV for the two-day trip, less than the fees charged by American RV "guides."

Roger was the first of several Mexico veterans who tutored us on the finer points of RV travel in Mexico. He had plenty of good advice

"The army checkpoints are usually at (the 31) state borders but can be anywhere,'' he said. ''Two or three soldiers will want to enter your rig. Don't freak out. They're generally just kids - kids with automatic weapons, but still kids - and mostly curious about RVs. Just stay inside with them as they look around."

We would soon navigate the army checkpoints without breaking into a sweat, but we never learned to relax on the highways. If a road has shoulders, truckers treat it as though it has three lanes and drive right up the middle; whoever gets there first has right-of-way. On mountain curves - peppered with small roadside crosses to mark the spots where people were killed - transport trucks and buses passed one another, their mirrors almost touching. We came across three accident scenes where the carcasses of trucks were still burning.

One transport-truck driver summed it all up in a slogan painted on the front window of his cab: "It's only God and Good Luck."

After an uneventful three-day trip, our happy little convoy reached the coastal village of San Patricio Melaque. And we found the closest thing we could to an accredited trailer park. We lasted two days, until the woman next to us unleashed her Whipper Snipper at 7 a.m. on a patch of lawn apparently transplanted from suburban Iowa.

That was one of our better moves because about 27 kilometres north of Melaque we found a stretch of beach where we could park on the sand, turn on the solar panels and just be. There were two trailer parks within the sound of our alarm system, so we felt secure and liberated at the same time.

A week later, the day before Christmas, we found ourselves at Teotihuacan - an archeological site just 50 kilometres north of Mexico City. By this time, it seemed sensible to bypass the one pitiful trailer park in the region and search for higher ground. Literally and figuratively.

Teotihuacan - which means "where men become gods" - features a host of impressive structures, notably a Pyramid of the Moon and a Pyramid of the Sun, which is the world's third-largest pyramid.

The site is on a plateau 7,482 feet above sea level and dotted with huge mountains that mimic the shape of the pyramids or vice-versa. We wanted to spend Christmas overlooking the majestically mysterious monuments.

After some searching through the countryside on the motorcycle, we found a cobblestone road that snaked up the mountain, Cerro Gardo, which forms a backdrop to the Pyramid of the Moon. The road is evidently used by the workers who tend the microwave towers atop the mountain.

The rig took about two hours to creep up the mountain and into the darkening sky. We had to stop twice to let the engine cool down. But when we pulled into a field of barley - or was it gold? - just below the summit, it felt like we were on top of the world.

Later, when the villages sprinkled below us, set off reams of fireworks to mark their faith in the birth of Jesus Christ, the dawning of the Age of Aquarius seemed truly possible.

So what happened three days later in Tula pulled us back to Earth with a thud. After a pleasant tour of the archeological site just outside the city, we went to find a telephone to call Canada.

By the time we'd parked the RV, a municipal police cruiser was glued to our bumper and two police officers with down-turned mouths awaited us. One of the cops tried repeatedly "to show" me to the international phone service some streets away while the shorter, more menacing one scrutinized our travel permits and licenses.

Veterans had warned us about municipal cops who find tourists in violation of some infraction or other. Expect to pay "a fine" - preferably in American dollars - on the spot, they said.

We were prepared to pay but the two cops insisted that they do us "the favour" of leading us through the maze of one-way streets and onto the open highway. Once outside of town, our problem would be settled, they said.

It was, by then, dark. The cops had been joined by a third man who sat in the back of the cruiser. I was afraid. The last thing we wanted to do was drive into open countryside, away from witnesses, with armed, menacing men.

We were alone, and virtually untraceable, in a country where life can be brutal. This was Mexico, where, in late 1997, 15 children, 21 women and nine men were massacred in Chiapas by fellow peasants and police because they didn't support Mexico's ruling party.

We weren't far from Mexico City, where, as I later found out, rogue police sometimes force tourists to ingest alcohol after they've been robbed and forced to disclose the passwords for their bank cards. The tourists would then be dumped. These antics claimed the life of one American college student a year before our visit.

We conferred in the rig. My partner would try to defuse the situation and offer, one last time, a slew of greenbacks to the cops. Me, well, I'd pray.

Then there was a knock on the door. A girl, maybe 12 years old, stood there with her father. What could they do to help? she asked. I don't know what seemed more incredible to me then - that she spoke English in a region where few do - or that she and her family would insert themselves into such a situation for strangers.

We were all afraid the cops, who had vanished, might be waiting for us outside town, so our new guardians led us gingerly along back roads out of Tula. It seemed an eternity before we spotted a 24-hour Pemex gas station where we spent the night hidden between two parked tankers.

Little is known about our Good Samaritans. We last saw them as we huddled near the Pemex. The father refused our offer to pay for his gas. The girl accepted a package of Christmas candles, a quick hug and a sobbed "Thank you."

- Lynn Moore can be reached by phone at (514) 987-2587 or by E-mail at moorel@thegazette.southam.ca

-------- spying

Navy Investigating Theft of Guidance Data From Computer

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Associated Press
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A16751-2001Mar2?language=printer

Naval officials are investigating how hackers broke into a computer at a Navy research facility in Washington and stole the source codes to a missile guidance program, officials said yesterday.

The Navy has been working with the FBI and police forces in Germany and other unspecified countries since Dec. 24, when officials believe the break-in occurred. An FBI spokesman said the stolen software was unclassified.

"We are trying to see who's responsible," said Paul O'Donnell of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. "This has led us to several foreign countries."

FBI spokesman Chris Murray confirmed that the guidance system's source codes -- the building blocks of a computer program -- had been stolen from a computer at the Naval Research Laboratory.

Representatives of Exigent Software Technology, based in Melbourne, Fla., said their company built the stolen program, called OS/COMET, which also can be used to guide satellites and spacecraft.

Murray said the software was secret when it was first used in the 1980s but is now sold commercially. He said the intruder got about two-thirds of the source codes.

"It is not the intelligence disaster along the lines of Robert Hanssen," Murray said, referring to the FBI counterintelligence agent charged with spying for Russia.

In a statement, Exigent confirmed that only a portion of the program was taken and that it was an older version of the software.

A spokesman for the German federal office for criminal affairs said an investigation is underway there, in the hands of the state prosecutor's office in Kaiserslautern. The city is the home of several U.S. military installations, including Ramstein Air Base.

The Swedish newspaper Expressen, which first reported news of the break-in, said the perpetrator is believed to have used a computer at Kaiserslautern University, as well as an account with Carbonide, a Swedish Internet service provider.

Carbonide Chief Executive Erik Wickbom said the Stockholm-based company has cooperated with authorities.

-------- activists

Tues. 3/6 Meeting of Labor Task Force For Public Power

Fri, 3 Mar 2001
GGLP NEWS & INFORMATION
by the Golden Gate chapter of the Labor Party,
P.O. Box 40637, San Francisco, CA 94140
Phone: (650) 355-5329 or (415) 626-1175; Fax: (415) 626-1217.

You are invited to participate in the first regular meeting of the Bay Area Labor Task Force For Public Power. The meeting will be held next Tuesday, March 6th at 6 p.m. at the hall of ILWU Local 6 in San Francisco (255 Ninth St., between Howard and Folsom).

This Labor Task Force For Public Power has been initiated by the Golden Gate chapter of the Labor Party. Its goal is to build the broadest possible labor-community coalition for public power.

As you know, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted February 12 to place an initiative on the ballot in November which would, if approved by a majority of the voters, create a Municipal Utility District (MUD) in San Francisco. Similar proposals and initiatives are being discussed in other Bay Area communities.

We are appending below the Statement of Purpose of the Labor Task Force For Public Power. We are convinced that a movement for public power with organized labor at its center would create the momentum that would draw in community activists, retirees and small business people. We believe such a coalition could win the battle for public power.

We urge all unionists and activists (you don't have to be a union member) interested in building the Labor Task Force For Public Power to attend the Tuesday night meeting.

Please fill out the coupon below if you plan to attend the meeting next Tuesday night. If you cannot attend the Tuesday meeting, but wish to get involved in the work of the Labor Task Force For Public Power, please check the appropriate box in the coupon. Please return the filled-out coupon as soon as possible to GGLP, c/o <alan@energy-net.org>.

In Solidarity,

David Walters, chair, GGLP Alan Benjamin, vice chair, GGLP

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE OF THE LABOR TASK FORCE FOR PUBLIC POWER

1. The Labor Task Force For Public Power believes that electricity and gas are essential social resources, not commodities - and that a democratically controlled public power authority is the best way to supply these resources in the cheapest, most reliable, environmentally friendly way possible. Not beholden to stockholders and the bottom line, such an authority would be free to develop renewable energy sources, develop conservation programs and balance generation needs against environmental concerns.

2. The Labor Task Force For Public Power believes that public power is dependant on the skills and dedication of the men and women now working in the industry. Any transfer to public power must include maintaining and improving union contracts and conditions. Minimum staffing levels must be maintained at least at current levels to ensure reliability and safety for both workers and the community. Any worker displaced must be fully compensated.

3. The Labor Task Force For Public Power believes that only a movement based on those who have an interest in public power can win the fight for it. Since ratepayers and taxpayers are overwhelmingly working people, we are committed to help build a movement for public power within the organizations of working people, the trade union movement. Although environmental and consumer activists have made a wonderful start, we believe that only the labor movement can add the political weight and power necessary to counteract the energy industry's bottomless pockets and endless stable of lobbyists. A movement with organized labor at its center would create the momentum that would draw in community activists, retirees and small business people. We believe such a coalition could win the battle for public power.

------

Homeless camp iced
City, army freeze event support

Saturday 3 March 2001
Montreal Gazette
CATHERINE SOLYOM
http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/pages/010303/5033462.html

What would it take for you to camp out downtown this weekend in minus-20C weather?

Annie Roy and Pierre Allard are doing it at the corner of Ste. Catherine and Clark Sts. to draw the city's attention to what they say is the growing number of homeless people who live on the street all winter.

For two years in a row, the artists - founders of Action Terroriste Socialement Acceptable - have organized a much bigger winter "refugee camp," known as State of Emergency, to break the isolation of homeless people.

With the help of the Canadian Forces, they provided $40,000 of warm clothing, 500 meals a day and cots for 100 people in heated tents, creating a little human warmth and understanding between the homeless and non-homeless alike.

But this year, Roy and Allard are the abandoned ones. The army will no longer lend them a hand, saying it's not within its mandate. Montreal's executive committee, meanwhile, refuses to allow them the public space - people are not allowed to sleep in parks, the two were told.

Roy thinks the city is just trying to hide the problem of homelessness.

"It's not by being ashamed of our poor that the problem will go away. When we hide it, it is only exacerbated. And the city's shame gives it a bad image," said the dancer and choreographer. "But when we face the homeless and confront our prejudices, it brings out the best in us, and the city itself would show good mental health. That's a city I could respect."

The week-long camps, which have included art installations, street theatre and improvised comedy, also make the homeless more real, said Allard, himself a visual artist.

"When we see them coming down the street we'll do anything to avoid eye contact. But here we see them as they really are - people just like you and me. And we don't avoid them, because we don't know which ones are homeless and which ones aren't."

Of course, Allard knows which ones are homeless. Looking at photos of 64 of last year's participants superimposed on a street map of Montreal and exhibited outside this weekend, he knows them all.

"He's a narcoleptic," Allard said, pointing to a smiling 30-something man. "Nice man. But what kind of a job can you get when you can just fall asleep any time, anywhere?"

"And he's a great musician," he said, pointing to another. "Last year, he sang us songs all night long. But he has a pretty bad drug problem." Then he pointed out another. "He died last year. Four of them have died since these pictures were taken."

For some of the people huddled around bonfires yesterday, a refuge from the bitter cold was another reason the city should support the camp.

"The city says it's inciting people to stay in the street," said land surveyor Marcel Bernard. "But imagine at minus-25 degrees, you're kicked out of one mission and it's too late to go to the other. This can save your life."

Roy and Allard are hoping that their protest this weekend will change the city and the army's mind about their camp, unique in the world for giving the most disadvantaged people a forum, they say.

They have written to both federal Defence Minister Art Eggleton and Mayor Pierre Bourque, saying there is no reason to think the politically neutral event would cause any trouble. Previous events - the first at Place des Arts and the second in the SNC Lavalin parking lot off Bleury St. - actually saw a drop in the area's crime.

As for the bylaw against sleeping in a park, Roy said the city breaks its own rules for festivals all the time, and it's not likely to create a precedent. "Take away the heated tent and no one in his right mind would sleep out there in minus-20-degree weather."

Except perhaps Roy and Allard themselves.

---

Sect members sentenced

Saturday, March 3, 2001
Pioneer Planet
http://www.pioneerplanet.com/seven-days/sat/news/docs/034600.htm

BEIJING China has sentenced 37 members of the banned Falun Gong sect to prison terms for distributing information about the group, state media said on Friday. The sentences ranged from 3 to 10 years. Most of the defendants were convicted of ``using a cult to obstruct the law.'' Some had distributed material downloaded from Falun Gong web sites and others had attempted to hand out fliers proclaiming the group's virtues. The government and the sect have been engaged in an intense propaganda war.

-----

Atrocities in Cancun at the WEF

Sat, 03 Mar 2001
http://chiapas.indymedia.org/
http://chiapas.indymedia.org/display.php3?article_id=372

While the world follows Britain's cattle disaster, and the American press remains virtually silent on the meetings between the Zapatistas and Fox's government, Fox's riot police savagely brutalize peaceful demonstrators in Cancun at the World Economic Forum, in an all-out attack on departing protestors. From Chiapas Indymedia.

A Little Atrocity In the Cancun Afternoon. by Ramor Ryan 4:35pm Thu Mar 1 '01 ramorx@hotmail.com

Front-line report of the mobilisation against the World Economic Forum in Cancun, February 26 and 27th.

NEO-LIBERAL PARADISE FOUND Theres a bus that leaves the indigenous town of Altamirano, Chiapas, near the zapatista headquarters at Morelia, that sets out for Cancun full with temporary construction workers. The workers, tseltal and tojolabal campesinos, work 6 or 7 days a week for 12 hours a day, for the paltry sum of 40 pesos a day, about $4. They labour to construct the ever expanding hotel industry of the monsterous elite tourist playground. There are over 50,000 rooms in Cancun and the average price is around $100 a night to stay.

20 years ago Cancun was a sleepy Mexican village looking out over the beautiful caribbean. Today it is more like a US colony modeled after Disneyland or a Hollymovie set in Los Angeles. The graceful shoreline is now choc-a block with astonishingly ostentatious hotels of enormous proportions. Some are post-modern representations in the style of ancient Mayan pyramids, others, are more reminiscient of gangster run Havana casino's in bygone era's; all cater for the rich, the vaste majority of clients foreigners from the US and Europe. The sweeping avenue down the peninsula is a veritable wet-dream for American shopping mall fanatics, with every brand store and logo commodity represented in abundance.

Jose Alfredo, a young zapatista from a village near Altamirano returned a few months ago from his first stint of work at Cancun. "I thought i had left Mexico!" he commented, I thought I was in another country." And he is right in one sense; Cancun is a model of a new kind of Global space. It is an embodiment of global village as the neo-liberals would have it. A sanctuary for the wealthy where poverty does not exist. A utopia without poverty, hunger, illiteracy, any of the everyday realities of life for the majority, not because they have come up with some fine neo-liberal solution, but because they are excluded. Cancun is a world of illusion where everything is shiney and happy, nothing can desturb the idea of this fanciful paradise; and just in case anybody foolish or crazy enough to disagree or raise their voice in dissent, there is a huge security aparatus, both private and public, to deal with that.

It is quite apt, and quite ironic that the World Economic Forum chose this location fopr their latest reunion to discuss the liberalisation of Latin American Markets and the consolidation of the Neo-liberal economic strategy for this region.

ENTER THE CLOWNS..... Globofobics are everywhere. Everywhere the globalizers have gone since the breakdown of the Seattle round in november of 1999, they have been persued and harried by a plethoria of protesters at every location they have chosen. This meeting in Cancun continues with this successful stategy on behalf of the anti-globalization movement. A diversity of people have come to this absurd resort to organise and demonstrate, and possibly blockade and disrupt the proceedings. By their very presence alone, the globofobics have affected the meeting, as various mouth-pieces for the Economic Forum dispatch their press releases in defence of their doctrine, and try desperately to disarm the dissenting voice by engaging them in vacuous dialogue.

Today in Cancun, February 26, the numbers are low, only a few hundred protesters, but the numbers climb steadily as the day unfolds. This disappoinmtment is no doubt to do with location, Cancun situated at the far end of the Yucatan peninsula, more than a 1500km from Mexico City. The costs of arriving here are huge. As for the local community,the indigenous population of the town is small, as the workforce is in the most part, in classic neo-liberal fashion, temporary, migatory and ununionised. And finally, most Mexican activists are organising the mobilistaion in support of the Zapatista Caravan to DF which unforuanately coincides with this event. Nevertheless the 500 or so who made the journey are aware they represent the millions nationally and globally who are not present....

A FESTIVAL OF RESISTENCE, OR THE GARDEN OF GHETSEMENE...The first march on Monday the 26th is celebratory and peaceful in its manifestation. The protesters are grouped around four main organisations, F-26, Civil Disobedience, the student CGH, El Barzon and the radical Black-block and Maoist contingents making up the numbers. They are predominantly young and radical, dressed in punky and counterculture attire, peppered by the obligatory Zapatista balaclavas and paliacates. Boisterous and colorful, they march as far as the fortified police cordon at the entrance to the Tourist Zone, where they taunt security forces, a few cheekily exhibiting their backsides to the sullen lines of riot cops before heading back to the centre of commercial Cancun. Avenues around the city are lined by loitering police forces and riot police, some with their gas masks at the ready, and a helicopter hovers menancingly overhead. Migration watch out for foreigner participation. Agent provocateurs mingle with the marchers, and every inch and every face is monitored and filmed.

Back at the Palapas, a quiet little grass park littered with old mangled trees that functions as base camp for the globefobicos, the protesters assemble. Around campfires and gaggles of tents, they meet and organise all evening for the big day tommorow.The mood is industrious but a little pessimistic. The numbers are dangerously low to attempt the professed aim of the mobilisation- to blockade and disrupt the meeting. Rumours abound of the arrival of hundreds more Barzon activists the next day, but this never materialises. Stupendiously outnumbered- there are several thousand security elements in Cancun- still the 500 continue with their plans. Rubber inner-tubes are inflated and tied together to make mobile barricade defences. The Civil Disobedience people are to attempt to break through the Police cordon like the Ya Basta group at Prague, wearing white jumpsuits and fortifying their shoulders and arms with cushion and padding to protect from beatings, and taping on a variety of colourful helmets.

Others plan to enter the Convention Hotel from the beach, masquerading as tourists, as the main body of the march battles with the police on the main road. Militant Maoists hold there own breakaway meeting, closed to outsiders. They have their own plans, disrupting the unity of the other groups. 'Comrades!' screams an older masked man, to the assembled gaggle of about 30 youths, 'We are not afraid of the police or jail! Remember the glorious martyres and prisoners!' as the group break into another round of ultra-militant chanting about death to this or that. A corrosive assembly the previous night had revealed a serious division between these radicals hell bent on destructive ideas, and the majority who preferred the tactic of non-violent direct action for the protests. Despite the industriousness of the prepararions, the cheerful hum of the labours, there is an unmistakable mood of foreboding and fear.

The local newspapers had contributed to fueling the tensions with their sensational reporting. They Enter The Ring! screams one front-page accompanied with a photo of masked up, fist-clenched militants. Others present the protesters as dangerous terrorists - 'One version (of the police searches of the arriving buses) indicate that explosives were found, but this cant be confirmed...'. Complete nonesense, of course and they forget to inform their readers that the police also stole money and cameras from the buses. 'They are going to fuck us up tomorrow!' said one 20 year old philosophy student as he tried on his full-face motorcycle helmut. Even with the helmut, all the padding and his white jump-suit, he still looked terribly small and fragile. (The helmut would be seen the next day lying on the side of the road smashed in half by a police baton, and the youth in jail.) Others spoke confidently of Fox needing to keep his international image clean hence the police would be on better behaviour than usual. Wishful thinking, as the local governor spoke of not tolerating any disorder in the streets oF Cancun. In the shadows of the trees on this warm tropical night, completely surrounded by patrolling cop pick-up trucks and undercover agents idling on every corner, they bravely prepare all night for battle, or better, for their suicide mission. Rebel dignity, pride and courage are the attributes of this raggle-taggle band of Mexican youth.

OF A FEROCITY AND ULTRA-VIOLENCE UNLEASHED... The 500 marched tentatively with much noise through the town. They arrived at a wide boulevard with a picturesque park between the two roads in and out of the Tourist Colony. An army of fortified police lines faced them behind two rows of solid metal fencing. This meant the Civil Disobedience plan of pushing through the police lines armed with their rubber tyres was twarted, as those metal fences were not for moving. In the moments hesitation, the Maoists took the initiative, charging to the front and calling for a storming of the barricades nevertheless.

This tactic is fearfully doomed, and the main body of the demonstration re-grouped to re-consider strategy, sppealling for non-violence. But already the forces are devided. The Maoists rush up the the police lines full of thunder and fury while the cops laughed. Their 'assault' on the barricades falters a couple of meters short and a stand-off for an hour resumes as both sides exchanged insults and an occasional stick flies or a baton is swung. The Press horde crowded around with enthusiasm. Tourists stopped to watch. A group of nude protesters dissolved the minor tension with their antics in front of the police, and the protesters decide to stage a sit-down protest to block both sides of the road. After an hour or so, the traffic is held up for miles and why the police didnt simply divert the traffic from the start is a mystery. Instead all the tourists are left waiting and infuriated. Meanwhile, a group of 30 had infiltrated the beach as far as the Hotel where the forum is held. There they are violently apprehended by a large contingent of riot cops and bundled off to jail.

It was when the Civil Disobedience group began to leave, and the majority of people were now sitting around the park tired from the hot sun and dyhydration, when the mood had become almost festive as a few hundred tourists and the press core waited around for the next spectacle, that the barricades opened up suddenly. With an unbridled ferocity, the riot squads came storming out at full sprint. Hundreds of them flooded out. They swung wildly and indiscrimatory at everyone in their path. First to be pummelled was the isolated group left sitting on the road. The still afternoon air became filled traumatically with screams of panic and pain, and a horrific battle-cry of the maurading cop gangs as they beat their shields...People fled hopelessly in every direction as the maddened thugs pursued them relentlessy. There was no resistance because there was none prepared. There was only running in absolute terror. It was simple savage punishment. Scenes of utter vomit-inducing brutality ensued. A tall cop beat a helpless youth on the ground with a 3-meter pole while his buddies delivered carefully aimed blows to the victims head with their batons and boots. A silent couple clutched each other uselessly as a gang of thugs did a Rodney King on them. People with videos and cameras were singled out too for beatings. Of all the blows, most seemed to be aimed at the peoples heads.

The Civil Disobedience group, encumbered with their absurd rubber tyres, were single out for special punishment, while the Maoist contingent abandoned their militant posturing to flee frantically. A few valient ones went in defence of their bloodied companeros, and were beaten heavily for their impudence. Some paltry stones flew and then the menancing sound of gas cannisters being shot off was heard. The air filled with the poisoneous fumes. The people fled in utter pandemonium. Heavily injured people were carried through the gas clouds. The picturesqe grass park resembled a furious medieval battle-field. And the beatings went on and on, the cops frantically seeking fresh victims, or else any vanquished body languishing on the ground would do. The blare of ambulances interupted the din of violence. The rout was complete. The Neo-liberals had triumphed heroically, their mercenery soldiers delighted with their crusading victory, their little slaughter of the Globefobicos on this sunny afternoon outside the Tourist Colony.

THE RESURGENCE OF THE STRUGGLE....The attempted blockade was defeated but the media coverage was a victory. Images of the unprovolked ultra-violence flashed across the television networks. Newspapers the next day were filled with powerful photos of police violence under headlines of Brutality! Police Riot! and Cowards And Savages. The resignation of the Police chief was demanded. Trolleys filled with food arrived at the protesters encampement as they bandaged up their wounds and searched to locate the 65 prisoners and the 15 hospitalised about whom the police would release no details. Locals rallied in support and warned protesters of new police movements. A solidarity demonstration was organised in the Capital. Even with small defeats, the movement grows. The next day popular pressure helped ensure the prisoners release, and condemnation of the police came from every quarter, even, opportunistically, from PAN deputies and local representatives. A demonstration was called in front of the Town Hall. Not one uniformed cop appeared. They were withdrawn in disgrace. The authorities faltered under an avalanche of criticism and the journalists organised their own protest against the police brutality. Fox remained silent, his image tainted. The World Economic Forum finished up without a peep and the Neo-Liberals hurried away from Cancun without releasing their usual celebratory communiques. But, no doubt, business continued as usual. The protesters mockingly charged the undefended Town-Hall, as if to say - Look! Here we are... still! The message was clear; even if they batter them off the streets, the protesters wont go away. Cancun is a watershed for the movement. New strategies and tactics will emerge, and the Neo-liberal project continues to retreat under pressure.

------- Onelist (submissions from subscribers)