------- Index of Articles

NUCLEAR
'Suitcase bomb' allegedly sought
West warned of lasting threat from bin Laden
Britain OKs Nuclear Fuel Plant
The nuclear threat
Russia and Iran Sign Arms Deal; Nuclear Reactors on the Way
House Panel OKs Nuke Security Bill
Nuclear plants on guard
Yucca comment period extended till Oct. 19th
Guinn, Del Papa rip Yucca process

MILITARY
Bush and Blair Warn Taliban of Retaliation
Taliban leaders plan mutiny
Anti-Taliban Forces Await Arrival of U.S. Aid Package
U.S. to Boost Aid to Afghanistan
Russia, Iran Reach Deal On Conventional Arms Sale
Weapons Makers Asked to Be Discreet
Colombian Rebels Use Refuge To Expand Their Power Base
Cash flow for Taliban eyed as reason for opium surge
Eternal city of eternal conflicts
NATO claims mutual defense, backs U.S.
NATO reassesses Russia relationship
Putin Eases Stance On NATO Expansion
Pakistan invites ex-king to form government
U.S. targets terrorist camps

ENERGY AND OTHER
Papal warning on rift between Vatican hawks and doves
Energy Giant Shell Prepares for End of Oil Era

POLICE / PRISONERS
House Panel Calls for 'Cultural Revolution' in F.B.I. and C.I.A.
U.S. Was Foiled Multiple Times
Sudan's Offer to Arrest Militant Fell Through After Saudis Said No
Companies Responding to Potential Threat

ACTIVISTS
Short declarations by experts needed for leukemia lawsuit
Judge Acquits Five Protesters Arrested at GOP Convention
In Dire Need of a Patriotism of Dissent
40,000 people sign CND petition opposing military retaliation
Imported oil



-------- NUCLEAR

'Suitcase bomb' allegedly sought

The Seattle Times
Nation & World :
Wednesday, October 03, 2001
By Bob Port and Greg B. Smith
New York Daily News
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/display?slug=ternuke03&date=20011003

NEW YORK - In a 10th-floor high-security jail cell a few blocks from the ruins of the World Trade Center sits a man Osama bin Laden was counting on in his quest to buy a nuclear bomb.

Mamdouh Mahmud Salim is the only member of bin Laden's inner circle in custody, and in many ways, he's one of the most frightening figures in bin Laden's terrorist confederacy, al Qaeda.

Last November, Salim briefly made headlines when he allegedly stabbed a Metropolitan Correctional Center guard in the eye with a carefully sharpened plastic comb.

But the most disturbing allegations concern Salim's participation in bin Laden's long and serious effort to acquire a nuclear device.

Experts agree that bin Laden probably has not yet acquired the ability to set off a nuclear bomb in his effort to drive America and Israel from what he views as Muslim holy land.

But law-enforcement sources and experts on nuclear weapons agree that bin Laden has certainly made a sustained effort to buy the enriched uranium that is the essential ingredient of any nuclear effort.

Could bin Laden make an A-bomb?

"It's much harder than hijacking an airplane with a knife," said Leonard Spector, of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies. "(But) it's probably true that with enough time and effort, one could make a bomb. It is a big challenge, though. People have debated this for a long time."

There have also been reports - none confirmed - that the terrorist leader was seeking to buy a small nuclear device.

Details of bin Laden's nuclear efforts first came to light after Sept. 14, 1998, when German authorities apprehended Salim, a 41-year-old Iraqi-trained engineer.

Days after the Aug. 8, 1998, bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa, Salim traveled from Khartoum, Sudan, to Istanbul to Majorca, Spain, to Stuttgart, Germany. A friend then took him by car to Munich, where German police detained him.

He was held there for days while first German and then U.S. law-enforcement officials grilled him. Since then, evidence gathered by the FBI makes clear that Salim was an elite member of bin Laden's organization.

He allegedly controlled bank accounts for al Qaeda and ran one of bin Laden's construction companies. In extradition papers filed in Germany, Manhattan Assistant U.S. Attorney Kenneth Karas listed Salim as a member of bin Laden's majlis al shura, a council that advises terrorist groups from Egypt, Iran, Sudan, Algeria and elsewhere affiliated with al Qaeda.

One of Salim's most frightening missions involved a joint operating agreement between al Qaeda and the Islamic governments of Iran and Sudan. The three agreed to produce weapons in Sudan, including "an effort to develop chemical weapons," Karas alleged.

Salim - who says he trained as an electrical engineer at the University of Baghdad - has been linked to the pharmaceutical plant in Khartoum that was bombed by U.S. forces on Aug. 20, 1998.

The bombing took place shortly after the Aug. 8 attacks on the two U.S. embassies in East Africa. The Clinton administration said the plant was manufacturing chemical weapons - an allegation plant management denied.

But a chemical attack was only part of the plan.

As long ago as 1993, bin Laden's network began trying to make or acquire nuclear weapons, according to FBI informers and U.S. intelligence reports.

By 1998, bin Laden acknowledged his effort openly.

In May that year, he issued a statement titled "The Nuclear Bomb of Islam," translated by the U.S. State Department as declaring "it is the duty of Muslims to prepare as much force as possible to terrorize the enemies of God."

In testimony during the embassy-bombing trial last year, informant Jamal Ahmed Mohamed Al-Fadl vividly recalled Salim's involvement in bin Laden's 1993 effort to buy a nuclear device.

Al-Fadl - who left al Qaeda in 1996 after he was caught embezzling money - claimed he met with a former high Sudanese official to discuss buying enriched uranium.

He described meeting with intermediaries who demanded $1.5 million, then driving in a jeep to an anonymous address in a Khartoum neighborhood called Bait al Mal.

There, inside a house, a bag was brought out and opened. Inside, Al-Fadl said, was a 2- to 3-foot-long metal cylinder with South African markings.

He said he was instructed to go to Salim with a document spelling out this transaction, and that Salim reviewed the document and approved it.

Though Al-Fadl never saw money change hands, he got $10,000 and praise for arranging an inspection of the uranium before it was shipped to Cyprus for quality testing. Al-Fadl said he later learned, secondhand, that the uranium was good and the deal was consummated.

It's unclear what became of the uranium.

To make an atomic bomb, at least 7 pounds of an extra-radioactive form of uranium that exists as a small fraction of mined uranium is needed. This highly purified U-235 is enriched, or weapons-grade, uranium.

Enriched uranium, which is hard to make, is placed in a container that implodes, compressing the uranium to a critical mass and triggering an atomic chain reaction that releases a blast equal to thousands of tons of dynamite.

A crude device might likely resemble Little Boy, the bomb crafted by America's secret Manhattan Project during World War II and dropped on Hiroshima. Little Boy was 10 feet long and weighed nearly 10,000 pounds.

Since the 1993 effort to buy uranium, bin Laden has focused on acquiring a bomb from the former Soviet Union's arsenal, according to an October 1998 article in the Arabic magazine Al Watan Al Arabi.

The magazine claimed that at a meeting between bin Laden followers and Chechen mobsters, $30 million cash and 2 tons of opium were exchanged for about 20 nuclear warheads. It quoted sources as saying bin Laden planned for his scientists to convert the warheads to small "suitcase nukes."

A month earlier, Israeli intelligence sources told Time magazine that bin Laden paid $2 million in British pounds to a man in Kazakstan who promised to deliver a suitcase bomb within two years.

Ever since, a spate of alarming, unconfirmed and exaggerated news reports have played off those original news items, which remain unconfirmed.

The mere mention of "suitcase bomb" caused speculation bin Laden might acquire one of some 80 1-kiloton tactical nuclear weapons allegedly made by Russia in the 1970s, as claimed in a 1997 "60 Minutes" interview with former Russian Security Council Secretary Alexander Lebed.

"My impression was that this issue was checked out pretty thoroughly," said Spector, of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies. "Nobody inside the U.S. government became alarmed once they did some investigating. ... This did not lead to an enormous amount of anxiety. Nobody was losing sleep over it."

For years, the United States has been buying Russia's stock of weapons-grade uranium to remove it from the market, but the purchases are a fraction of what exists.

"The threat is taken very seriously because the quantities of uranium in Russia are enormous. ... We've been worried for some time that security there is a problem," said one defense source. "Nobody wants to talk about it."

--------

West warned of lasting threat from bin Laden

Irish Times
Wednesday, October 3, 2001
From Nikla Gibson, in Paris
Reuters
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/2001/1003/wor10.htm

FRANCE: People in the West will have to learn to live under permanent threat from Osama bin Laden's agents, who could strike with "dirty" nuclear bombs as well as chemical or biological weapons, a French terrorism expert has said.

Mr Roland Jacquard, an adviser to the United Nations Security Council and author of a book about Washington's prime suspect for suicide air attacks on US cities three weeks ago, believes his supporters are ready to attack again.

But they could also lie low for months or even years, waiting for governments to drop their guard.

"It is the nature of bin Laden's organisation to plan attacks in advance, to choose . . . the commandos that will carry them out and give them the ability, technology and financing so they can act without needing orders or having to return to the bases in Afghanistan," he said.

Mr Jacquard, who heads France's International Terrorism Observatory, said bin Laden had the capability to launch a chemical attack and had obtained enough radioactive material to create a "dirty" nuclear bomb using conventional explosives.

"He certainly doesn't have the technology to make a nuclear bomb . . . but he has been able to get suitcases of radioactive material from mafia in former Eastern Bloc countries," he said.

Mixed with conventional explosives, this could spread radiation over a wide area.

Despite the best efforts of US and European secret services to crack the Saudi-born millionaire's network, Mr Jacquard said agents might well remain "dormant" for years, like many of the hijackers who carried out the attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York and the |Pentagon in Washington on September 11th.

"The more that is done to destroy bin Laden's organisation, the more they will try to carry out the plans they have already," he said.

Mr Jacquard said that in this climate, with a long fight ahead to eradicate an enemy that is almost impossible to identify, Americans and people living in countries on friendly terms with the United States would have to get used to living under siege.

"Since the attacks on the World Trade Centre, nothing will be the same as before. People in the mass-market consumer societies of the United States and Europe will have to live like people in countries such as Israel, under permanent threat."

The United States, France and many other countries have stepped up security in public places, deploying soldiers at airports and train stations and sealing rubbish bins.

hought of the simplest plan of all - to attack a nuclear power station or chemical site, thereby unleashing huge and devastating damage with little effort.

-------- britain

Britain OKs Nuclear Fuel Plant

October 3, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Britain-Nuclear-Fuel.html

LONDON (AP) -- The government Wednesday approved the start of operations at a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant that has drawn strong criticism both at home and in Ireland.

Environment Secretary Margaret Beckett and Health Secretary Alan Milburn said work could begin on the manufacture of mixed oxide (MOX) fuel in the reprocessing plant at the Sellafield nuclear site on the coast of the Irish sea in northwest England.

Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace immediately attacked the decision, saying the transport of plutonium to the plant, dangerous at any time, was especially worrisome in the days after the Sept. 11 terror attacks in the United States.

The Irish government, which has routinely voiced concerns about the operation of the Sellafield complex which is only 150 miles from the Irish coast, said the British decision ``defied logic in the current climate of international terrorist threats.''

The new operation is intended to make mixed oxide fuel from plutonium and uranium separated from spent fuel derived from the thermal oxide reprocessing facility already operating at Sellafield.

The MOX facility was completed in 1996, but the commercial go-ahead was held up for financial reasons and after the operators of a MOX demonstration plant at the site admitted to falsifying records.

A report last year by the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate also found management incompetence, complacency and a ``lack of safety culture'' at Sellafield.

-------- india / pakistan

The nuclear threat:
Could Pakistan's arsenal fall into the hands of Islamic extremists?

The Seattle Times
Wednesday, October 03, 2001
By Los Angeles Times and Reuters
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/display?slug=pakinuke03&date=20011003

Pakistan's nuclear arsenal has become a source of concern to U.S. officials as they consider launching a military campaign in Afghanistan that could send political shock waves through its troubled southern neighbor.

Although Pakistan's small nuclear arsenal is now believed to be under firm control of the army, some officials fear its security might be imperiled if a regional war involving an unpopular American force further polarizes a sharply divided country.

A war could set off new civil upheaval that could allow dissidents to seize weapons, or it could usher in a new fundamentalist government, hostile to the United States, that might pass on nuclear know-how to Osama bin Laden or other U.S. enemies.

One official said that while the United States is confident in the status of the weapons now, "This is the kind of thing you've got to think about."

Last month's U.S. decision to lift sanctions on India and Pakistan effectively recognizes the two foes as members of the nuclear club and was driven by self-interest, Indian newspapers said last week.

President Bush said the sanctions, imposed on the two neighbors after they conducted tit-for-tat nuclear tests in 1998, were no longer in the U.S. national-security interest as a result of the terrorist attacks in New York and near Washington, D.C. The sanctions were lifted after India and Pakistan pledged to cooperate in Bush's war against terrorism.

The U.S. move to lift sanctions on India had been in the cards amid increasingly warm ties between the two countries, which often were on opposite sides during the Cold War.

But Washington had given no such signals to Pakistan, which it had cold-shouldered, especially since the military coup that brought President Pervez Musharraf to power in 1999.

"I think the Indian and Pakistani governments are as responsible as governments of Western nuclear powers, and I don't see anyone rushing for the nuclear button in South Asia," said Chris Smith, deputy director of the International Policy Institute at King's College, London.

In addition, defense experts believe there is nothing in South Asia comparable to the warheads mounted on U.S. and Russian missiles.

The bombs are generally thought to be stored away rather than loaded on planes or missiles, acting as a deterrent of last resort rather than a first line of attack.

A former head of the Pakistan armed forces, Mirza Aslam Beg, has described the country's approach to nuclear devices as a "bomb-in-the-basement policy."

"And then it is many miles away from the delivery system, that is, the missiles and the aircraft," Beg, who now heads an independent think tank, said in an interview in June.

Pakistan is believed to have as many as 30 nuclear devices, according to a range of estimates from defense experts, while India may have 40 to 100.

"They are difficult and expensive to create, so there are not going to be hundreds," said Andrew Brookes at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London.

Worries about militant groups grabbing a bomb, stuffing it in a suitcase and blowing up a city are also far-fetched.

Weighing up to a ton, these are sophisticated bombs.

"It's a heavy piece of engineering we are talking about," said Brookes. "They are not suitcase-type things.

"Similarly with a missile - there are lots of safety brakes, so one lunatic cannot come and fire it off," he added. "No one man or woman can launch these things."

Defense experts say the bigger concern is that Pakistan and India do not have extensive mechanisms to talk to each other in a crisis and head off nuclear confrontation.

Experts believe Pakistan may be ahead of India in "weaponization" - marrying a warhead to a delivery system like a missile - thanks to its close ties with China.

"China could have give them tips on the guidance systems for such (nuclear) weapons," said Kanti Bajpai, strategic-affairs analyst at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.

Pakistan's nuclear-capable Ghauri missile, with a range of 1,250 miles, can reach almost any city in India.

New Delhi is also fast developing delivery systems, and is pushing ahead with production of the intermediate-range Agni (Fire) ballistic missile, which it says has been fully tested. The Agni II, also with a 1,250-mile range, is due to become part of New Delhi's military arsenal by early 2002. India has also developed the nuclear-capable short-range ballistic missile, Prithvi (Earth), which experts say is a "Pakistan-specific" weapon.

But while Pakistan's nuclear program has been conducted to protect the country from a perceived nuclear threat from India, some groups in the region view its nuclear arsenal as the "Islamic bomb" that could be used to defend the broader interests of the Muslim world.

The threat of a U.S. military assault on Afghanistan has thrust the weak regime of Musharraf into an anguished situation.

While the Pakistani government would like the financial and other benefits that a better relationship with the United States could bring, many Pakistanis are violently opposed to the idea of support for a U.S. invasion of Afghanistan.

An American military presence in the country could be the most controversial step, and would be considered intolerable by many of the country's 25 million residents.

Ivo Daalder, a former National Security Council aide, said the weapons offer a "nightmare scenario" that "deserves to be very high on the radar screen" of U.S. policymakers.

He said the issue of nuclear security is worrisome all over the world but is especially so "in a country that's as crisis-prone as this one."

The Pakistani army is seen as generally pro-Western in its outlook, said Stephen Cohen, a scholar at Brookings Institution who has written a book on the Pakistani army. At the same time, many of Pakistan's military leaders are not pro-American, believing that the United States has "let Pakistan down time and again, and is in bed with the Indians," Cohen said.

In the event of a civil crisis, the army could be sharply divided, he said. And the nuclear weapons certainly would be "an object of great desire."

Bruce Blair, president of the Center for Defense Information, a think tank that advocates arms control, said he is convinced that senior Bush administration policymakers must have already thought through what action they might take if the weapons fell into the wrong hands. He said he believes they have already ordered increased intelligence-gathering on the nuclear arsenal, and may have assigned special-forces teams to try to seize or disarm them if a civil upheaval put them at risk.

But one U.S. official, who asked to remain unidentified, said the Pakistani army is "huge" and would not permit such an intervention.

This official said that although the Pakistani nuclear weapons do raise serious issues, the risks should not be exaggerated.

-------- russia

Russia and Iran Sign Arms Deal; Nuclear Reactors on the Way

New York Times
October 3, 2001
By MICHAEL WINES
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/03/international/middleeast/03RUSS.html?searchpv=nytToday

MOSCOW, Oct. 2 - Six years after it stopped major arms sales to Iran under pressure from the United States, Russia signed a new military accord with Iran today that the Kremlin said could lead to $300 million in annual sales of jets, missiles and other weapons.

Russia's atomic energy ministry also announced that it plans to deliver next month the first of two nuclear reactors for a 1,000-megawatt power station being built largely by Russian technicians at Bushire, an Iranian port on the Persian Gulf.

The actions, announced as the Iranian and Russian defense ministers met in Moscow, had been in the works for close to a year and were not unexpected. But they took on new meaning in light of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, which not only prompted Russia to join an American-led antiterrorism coalition, but also led Iran to issue its own condemnation of the attacks and an unusual expression of sympathy for the United States.

Washington, which still regards Iran as a leading sponsor of terrorism, strongly opposed the moves announced today. It now finds itself condemning a weapons deal whose seller, Russia, has become a crucial ally, and whose buyer, Iran, is a potentially crucial recruit to the antiterrorist front.

The Iranian defense minister, Adm. Ali Shamkhani, and Russia's defense minister, Sergei Ivanov, discussed the two nations' roles in an antiterrorism campaign today, the second day of Mr. Shamkhani's five- day visit, but offered no details of their conversation.

Both Russia and Iran are enemies of the Taliban government in Afghanistan and of Osama bin Laden.

Mr. Ivanov said last week that the two countries could find common ground in battling international terrorism. The United States sees Russia, a supporter of Western military action against the Taliban, as a potentially valuable go-between in persuading Iran to support its military actions there, or at least to refrain from attacking them.

Mr. Shamkhani said this afternoon that Iran would support military strikes against Afghanistan, but only if they were authorized by the international community acting through the United Nations.

Terrorism, he said, could not be defeated in a society "under the influence of superpowers."

One expert on Middle East policy, Daniel Brumberg of Georgetown University, said today that Iran was threading the loopholes in American policy, hoping to reap the benefits of a Western defeat of the Taliban without having to support it explicitly.

"There's still a plausible case from an American standpoint that Iran hasn't given up" targeting civilians to achieve its goals, he said.

Sergei Yastrzhembsky, President Vladimir V. Putin's spokesman, disagreed with that. "I have not seen any proof so far," he said today. "At least no one has given us this proof."

The military accord reached today sets out only an agenda for cooperation. But tonight Russia's NTV television network reported that the total value of arms deals between Russia and Iran could reach $1.5 billion, making Iran Russia's third-largest arms customer, behind India and China.

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

House Panel OKs Nuke Security Bill

October 3, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Attacks-Nuclear.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The House advanced legislation directing the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to establish new security requirements for power reactors, taking into account potential suicide attacks and threats from aircraft.

The bill, passed by a voice vote Wednesday by the Energy and Commerce Committee, also would give guards at the nation's 103 nuclear reactors broader authority to carry weapons, make arrests and use deadly force.

In the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the NRC commissioners unanimously agreed to review its ``design-threat'' security regulations. These rules set out what kinds of threats a plant operator must be prepared to guard against as part of a plant license.

Currently, power plant operators are required to prepare for commando-like attacks, internal sabotage or attack by truck or car bombs.

Under the legislation, which now goes before the full House, the NRC would have to issue new rules within a year to consider a wide range of additional threats -- including coordinated attacks from different groups of 20 people at the same time, suicide attacks and threats from aircraft.

``We cannot afford to sit until the terrorists target one of these facilities before we take action,'' said Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., who offered the amendment changing the NRC security requirements.

Consideration of a proposal calling on the president to establish no-fly zones over nuclear power plants during an emergency was postponed.

Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., the committee's chairman, said the actions outlined in the legislation ``represent quick and necessary first steps as we examine and seek ways to address the terrorist threat.''

Tauzin said other provisions in the legislation had been requested by the NRC, including:

--Federal authorization for guards at nuclear power plants to carry arms, make arrests and use deadly force. Such authority currently exists in some states, but is not uniform nationwide.

--NRC regulation of what weapons may be brought into a nuclear facility.

--Stronger laws against sabotage at other nuclear facilities, such as nuclear material processing plants, waste treatment plants and fuel fabrication facilities.

-------- new jersey

Nuclear plants on guard

By LAWRENCE HAJNA
Courier-Post Staff
LOWER ALLOWAYS CREEK
Thursday, October 4, 2001
http://www.southjerseynews.com/issues/october/m100401a.htm

The thick concrete domes surrounding the Salem and Hope Creek nuclear reactors here are built to resist hurricanes and tornadoes and other natural disasters. But questions surround whether they could withstand the type of jetliner crashes that toppled the World Trade Center.

"They really were not designed to withstand acts of war," federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman Neil Sheehan said this week.

The NRC has promised a thorough review of steps needed to protect nuclear plants across the nation from attacks like those on the Twin Towers and Pentagon.

But what are the risks that an attack on the Salem/Hope Creek complex, the nation's second-largest nuclear facility, could produce a reactor meltdown or a widespread release of radiation?

And would such an attack have to be carried out by suicide hijackers, or could individual terrorists inflict serious harm from the ground?

These are questions the NRC and PSEG Nuclear, the primary owner and operator of the Salem County complex, face in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Meltdown risk low

Scientists say the risk of a core meltdown from a jet crash into a reactor is low. But opponents of nuclear power argue that if a meltdown did occur, casualties would be higher here than in many other places in the nation because the plants are near well-populated areas, including Wilmington, Del.

A 1982 study by the Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico estimated that 102,000 people within 20 miles of the complex, an area extending into southern Gloucester County, would die initially as the result of a core meltdown at one of the Salem County reactors.

Another 41,500 within that same radius would eventually die of cancer. More than 75,000 within a 55-mile radius - an area encompassing much of South Jersey, Delaware and and southeastern Pennsylvania - would suffer radiation-related injuries, such as temporary sterility, vomiting, cataracts and thyroid nodules.

Although this study has never been updated, casualties would be much higher today because of growth that has occurred since 1982, said Norm Cohen, coordinator of the Linwood-based UNPLUG Salem Campaign. Even if a core meltdown or radiation release did not occur, any attack on the facility would create widespread panic, Cohen said.

"It would cause massive fleeing from the area," he said.

Changes since attacks

Since the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks, the Federal Aviation Administration has told airline pilots to avoid flying over nuclear plants, conventional power plants, refineries and other industrial facilities "to the extent practicable." Air Force fighters and Coast Guard cutters have been on alert to help protect such facilities.

The NRC this week sent letters to governors, including acting Gov. Donald DiFrancesco, asking states to consider additional steps to help protect nuclear power plants. A A spokeswoman for DiFrancesco could not be reached for comment.

The Washington-based Nuclear Control Institute wants National Guard troops and anti-aircraft missiles deployed at the plants. Local activists oppose such measures as potentially creating more dangers.

"If you shoot down an errant plane, you'd have no guarantee where it would crash," said Cohen, who argues nuclear power should be phased out in favor of renewable energy sources.

New Jersey, however, relies on nuclear power for about 50 percent of its electricity needs. It's one of the nation's highest nuclear-dependency rates.

PSEG Nuclear won't discuss all its security measures implemented since Sept. 11 but calls the plants secure. Still, officials concede they cannot predict what could happen to the reactors in every terrorism scenario.

"I really can't answer every `what-if,'" PSEG Nuclear spokesman Skip Sindoni said.

The most visible security measure is a new vehicle checkpoint on the only road leading to the complex. It is attended by PSEG security and local police.

Built on a manmade peninsula that juts into the Delaware River, the complex is surrounded by vast marshlands interlaced with serpentine tidal creeks that some say could provide ways for terrorist attackers to get close to the plant.

Pakistani detained

The FBI recently detained Raza Nasir Khan, a 29-year-old Pakistani whose visa had expired, on a weapons charge. State game officials contacted the FBI after Khan asked for maps of hunting land near the plants. The request came Sept. 19, eight days after the attacks.

The FBI subsequently found four long guns, a handgun and a global positioning system device in Khan's Wilmington apartment. An FBI spokesman would not comment on the case, adding the bureau has been following thousands of leads on potential terrorist activities since the attacks.

Sheehan would not comment on the arrest either, but said the NRC has been working with the FBI on numerous tips of threats to nuclear plants. "None of the threats have proven credible," he said.

PSEG Nuclear security manager Garland Gibson said he was informed the Pakistani man was a hunter and never posed a threat to the plants.

Gibson would not discuss security measures being taken to protect the plants from attacks from the marshes or from the river.

"There are things that we do that we don't talk about," he said.

Gibson, however, said utility security successfully thwarted a mock commando raid of the plant in 1998. "We smoked them," he said.

This does little to reassure Lower Alloways Creek resident Doris Tice. She is more concerned about saboteurs infiltrating the plant than she is about an airplane being crashed into a containment dome.

"The biggest problem would be if someone would be able to get through security," she said.

The plants employ more than 1,800 people directly and use hundreds of contractors. PSEG is using the same system of background checks in place before the attacks, but is limiting access to the most sensitive areas of the plants, Sindoni said.

More barriers

Since the attacks, additional concrete barriers have been erected around the plants' security entrance, where every visitor and worker must pass through metal and bomb detectors.

The utility placed boulders and other concrete barriers around the chain-link fence surrounding the complex as a protection against vehicle bombs after a security breach at the Three Mile Island complex near Harrisburg, Pa., several years ago.

The Salem 1 and 2 and Hope Creek reactors are encased within huge domes of steel-lined concrete up to four feet thick. Although the domes are very tough, no one ever considered making them impregnable to jet crashes, Sheehan said.

A federal study done when the plants were designed in the 1970s concluded such precautions were unnecessary because the complex is not along the flight path of commercial air traffic. Even those reactors that are on flight paths, such as Three Mile Island, were built to withstand accidental crashes from jets much smaller than the Boeing 767s that slammed into the World Trade Center.

"Times have changed, planes have gotten bigger," Sheehan said.

David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer for the Union of Concerned Scientists, says reactor domes at Salem and Hope Creek may or may not withstand jetliner crashes. But he believes a reactor meltdown would be unlikely if a dome were breached.

The airplane would have to pierce an additional barrier - a tough carbon-steel reactor vessel inside the dome - or knock out all of a reactor's cooling water pumps for a meltdown to occur, Lochbaum said.

Spent fuel a concern

Lochbaum is more concerned about spent fuel stored in large pools in less-protected buildings adjacent to the reactors. Designed only as temporary holding areas, these pools hold decades worth of lethally radioactive uranium fuel pellets.

Environmentalists have opposed the federal Department of Energy's attempts to build a permanent repository in the Nevada desert, forcing the utility to keep old fuel-rod rod assemblies.

The buildings surrounding these pools could be ruptured by even a small aircraft weighing about 1,500 pounds or by a well-placed shoulder-mounted missile, Lochbaum said.

Any damage to the building would in itself not be a threat, but radiation could be released if the pools were ruptured or if circulation pumps that prevent water in the pools from boiling away were taken out of service, Lochbaum said.

Water within these deep pools provides the primary barrier between the spent fuel and the environment.

Because of incredible costs involved, Lochbaum doesn't foresee plant operators building stronger containment domes or even bolstering the spent-fuel buildings. Operators, however, could install more fire suppression equipment to douse jet-fuel fires within containment domes and backup systems to maintain water in fuel-rod pools if they become damaged, Lochbaum said.

"To the NRC's credit, they were looking at these types of things (before Sept. 11), but it wasn't a top priority," he said. "I suspect that has changed."

-------- nevada

Yucca comment period extended till Oct. 19th

Tuesday, October 02, 2001
Las Vegas Review-Journal
http://12.9.217.6/plweb-cgi/fastweb?state_id=1002049029&view=view2&numhitsfound=1&query=yucca&query_rule=%28%28$query%29%29%20AND%20%28%28$query1%29%29%3ADATE&query1=20011002&docid=20161&docdb=2001&dbname=2001&numresults=10&operator=AND&TemplateName=predoc.tmpl&setCookie=1

WASHINGTON - The Energy Department announced Monday it has extended until Oct. 19 the period for Nevadans and others to submit comments on the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste project.

The public comment period originally was scheduled to close on Sept. 20, but Secretary Spencer Abraham last month extended it to Oct. 5.

The deadline was pushed back again after hearings were added between Oct. 3-12 in Nevada's rural counties.

"This two-week extension of the comment period provides Nevada citizens significant additional time and opportunity to express their views," Abraham said in a statement.

The department is collecting comments on the proposal to establish a repository at Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, for storage of radioactive spent fuel from commercial power plants.

---

Guinn, Del Papa rip Yucca process

By Cy Ryan <cy@lasvegassun.com>
SUN CAPITAL BUREAU,
October 03, 2001
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/lv-other/2001/oct/03/512437447.html

CARSON CITY -- Gov. Kenny Guinn and Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa are complaining that the public has been given neither adequate information nor sufficient time to comment during the latest round of public hearings on the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain.

The Energy Department agreed to schedule 29 additional public hearings. The first meetings were scheduled today in Carson City and Virginia City.

The governor said the state has received from the DOE only a preliminary report, which contains "questionable findings regarding the safety and suitability of Yucca Mountain."

He said he was pleased the DOE scheduled additional hearings, but Guinn and Del Papa said that a final environmental impact statement has not been released, nor have final siting guidelines that provide evidence the location is suitable to bury 77,000 tons of the nation's nuclear waste.

Without these documents, a proper evaluation cannot be made, the two said in separate news releases.

Guinn also said the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has not established its licensing requirements for the proposed project. In addition, the governor said the state is challenging in federal court radiation standards issued by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Del Papa said the public notice for the new hearings did not appear in the Federal Register until Monday.

The hearings are scheduled to run today through Oct. 12.

"Once again, DOE will be conducting public hearings prematurely and without sufficient advance notice to the public to afford an adequate opportunity for people to attend the hearings and provide comment," Del Papa said.

"Under the guise of seeking public input, DOE is making a mockery of the public participation process and denying the public an opportunity for meaningful input," Del Papa said.

Guinn said he was "concerned and disappointed that the DOE has scheduled these hearings when the country is grieving and working through the many challenges resulting from the horrific events of Sept. 11."

Hearings in Reno and Gardnerville are scheduled Thursday.


-------- MILITARY

Bush and Blair Warn Taliban of Retaliation
U.S. Shares Bin Laden Evidence With Allies

By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61184-2001Oct2.html

President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair yesterday bluntly threatened Afghanistan's rulers with retaliation if they do not hand over Osama bin Laden, as the United States stepped up efforts to enlist international support against bin Laden by presenting classified evidence linking him to last month's suicide attacks on Washington and New York.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld also joined in the effort to strengthen the U.S.-led coalition, flying to the Middle East last night. Before leaving, he ordered the unprecedented deployment of U.S. troops to the former Soviet republics of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, bringing the total U.S. force amassed overseas for the war on terrorism to more than 30,000 uniformed personnel, defense officials said.

Bush, appearing at the White House with congressional leaders, said there "will be a consequence" if the Taliban does not hand over bin Laden and destroy his training network. The president repeated his warning last night at a Washington restaurant, where he dined with D.C. Mayor Anthony A. Williams to celebrate the reopening of Ronald Reagan National Airport. "There will be no negotiations," Bush said. "They need to rout al Qaeda out of their country and bring them to justice. . . . They need to know I'm serious about that."

Blair, speaking at a Labor Party conference in Brighton, England, was more specific about the consequences for the Taliban leadership, vowing to unseat the regime if it does not cooperate. "Surrender the terrorists or surrender power; that is your choice," Blair said.

The escalating rhetoric from Bush and Blair was part of an increasingly aggressive posture for the coalition, which since the terrorist attacks Sept. 11 had focused on exchanges of intelligence. Blair, one of Bush's founding partners in the coalition, declared that the attacks "marked a turning point in history" and said the victims must be avenged not simply by the punishment of the guilty but with the "destruction of the machinery of terrorism wherever it is found."

In Brussels, NATO for the first time formally invoked a mutual defense clause obliging all 18 of its other members to aid the United States just as if they had been attacked themselves. The vote was taken after ministers were briefed on what a State Department spokesman called "a great body of evidence" implicating bin Laden's network, al Qaeda, in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Several NATO countries had been pressing for information proving bin Laden's culpability, and the administration launched an intensive effort to build an extensive case. The evidence was contained in cables that the State Department sent to its ambassadors around the world Monday night, and it was to be shared in varying degrees -- depending on the U.S. relationship with the host country -- yesterday and today.

After a briefing yesterday by a U.S. diplomat, NATO Secretary General George Robertson said the report made it clear that "all roads lead to al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden" as having perpetrated the attacks.

Rumsfeld left Andrews Air Force Base last night for visits with defense ministers and other leaders in Saudi Arabia, Oman, Egypt and Uzbekistan. Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said the administration had been talking for several days about the importance of having a senior administration official head to the region "so we make the decisions as quickly and as effectively as we can."

Administration officials said Secretary of State Colin L. Powell had also been considered for the trip, but Bush's selection of the Pentagon chief signaled the readiness of the United States to use force. Asked why he is going to Uzbekistan, a possible staging area for U.S. troops that borders Afghanistan, Rumsfeld said, "It seemed to me that given their geography and their situation, that having a first face-to-face meeting with the leadership there would be a useful thing."

As part of a war communications strategy coordinated from the White House, administration officials have begun referring to "coalitions," to draw attention to Bush's insistence that different groups of nations will help in different ways at different times -- some by allowing the United States to build military bases on their soil and others by providing intelligence covertly.

Rumsfeld said he believes that "the kind of information that will turn the day will be scraps of information that people from all across the globe will give, sometimes people from inside countries that are harboring terrorists, sometimes conceivably people from inside organizations that would like terrorists to leave their country."

The administration has begun expressing increasing confidence that the pieces of the coalition are falling into place, but officials refuse to discuss the timing of a military strike. "Element of surprise is one of the things we want," Clarke said.

The 1,000 troops from the Army's 10th Mountain Division headed for Uzbekistan and Tajikistan represent the first major deployment of a regular Army unit -- as opposed to the small, elite Special Forces troops -- in the campaign against terrorism. The Navy has also committed a fourth aircraft carrier to the effort; the USS Kitty Hawk left Japan and headed for the Arabian Sea.

Bush has warned frequently about sacrifices to come, but Blair was more specific about the possible costs of military engagement. "We will do all we humanly can to avoid civilian casualties, but understand what we are dealing with," Blair said. "If they could have murdered not 7,000 but 70,000, does anyone doubt they would have done so and rejoiced in it? So there is no compromise possible with such people."

U.S. officials did not go as far as the British prime minister in promising to oust the Taliban if they do not cooperate. White House officials said Bush and Blair were sending the same message in different words. Asked repeatedly if the White House shares Britain's goal for the Taliban, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said only that Bush had promised to "act decisively to protect the United States and our friends from all terrorist attacks that are affiliated with or responsible for those nations that harbor terrorists."

But last night, as he dined with Williams, Bush said that Blair "was echoing exactly what I said to the U.S. Congress."

A National Security Council policy memo on Afghanistan says, "We do not want to choose who rules Afghanistan, but we will assist those who seek a peaceful, economically developing Afghanistan free of terrorism." An administration official said that refers partly to covert support for political opponents.

In Washington, U.S. officials continued diplomatic efforts to line up support for the coalition. Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou said after meeting with national security adviser Condoleezza Rice yesterday that his country is cooperating with the coalition "very closely on issues such as intelligence-sharing, money-laundering and of course tracking these terrorist suspects."

Before leaving, Rumsfeld met with India's defense and foreign minister, Jaswant Singh, who said his country stands "shoulder to shoulder with the United States of America."

-------- afghanistan

Taliban leaders plan mutiny

Washington Times
October 3, 2001
By Alex Spillius
LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20011003-17072128.htm

PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Taliban military commanders in key border provinces of Afghanistan are plotting to mutiny against the regime, former allies from the guerrilla war against the Soviet Union said yesterday.

Anti-Taliban leaders based in neighboring Pakistan say they are in touch with the commanders, who are their tribal cousins or former brothers-in-arms in the struggle against the Soviet occupation.

The commanders are reported to be holding regular meetings in their villages and camps and are ready to move against the Taliban at any time.

The threat of American military action and the Taliban's refusal to give up Osama bin Laden means the commanders are no longer willing to operate under Taliban command as they have for five years.

Former unit leaders based in Peshawar are also said to be preparing to come out of retirement and cross the border to combat the Taliban in a belt of eastern provinces bordering Pakistan.

"These provinces are very vulnerable. They are in walking distance from the border, and we can easily get our weapons in. They are the gateway to Kabul, and once we start, the Taliban will easily fall apart," said Qazi Amin Waqar, a former mujahideen leader and minister in the government ousted by the Taliban in 1996.

He and other exiled opposition leaders communicate regularly with associates inside Afghanistan by satellite telephone or via messengers traveling up to 12 hours by foot across the mountainous frontier. "It is just a matter of timing; they are ready for the word to go," Mr. Qazi Amin said.

The uprising would probably begin in and around Jalalabad, his home city and capital of Nangarhar province, and spread west into Kabul and south into Paktia and Paktika provinces, where the Taliban has already agreed to devolve authority to tribal elders to try to hold on to power.

The provinces are dominated by the same Pashtun ethnic group as the southern-based Taliban, but have an independent tribal tradition that has never more than tolerated the militia's control.

The Taliban's adversaries realize that fear of American military attacks has created an incomparable opportunity to topple the puritanical regime.

Pakistani newspapers have reported efforts by Ismail Khan, another former anti-Soviet leader now exiled in Iran, to attack Kandahar, the headquarters of the Taliban in the south. Western powers are said to have encouraged him to use old contacts to exploit divisions within the Taliban.

Afghans based in Peshawar have been told in telephone calls from friends in Kandahar that most Taliban officials have fled to the hills and that Mullah Mohammed Omar has left the city in fear of his life and never spends two nights in one place.

The Americans have made it clear they do not want to be seen as the sponsor of any one particular force, especially the Northern Alliance.

Though it has provided the only active resistance to the Taliban for the past five years, the alliance, thanks to its support from the hated Russians, has scant credibility in areas beyond its control.

"Once we have got rid of the Taliban the other problem, Osama bin Laden, will be taken care of. We will not tolerate foreign terrorists on Afghan soil," Mr. Qazi Amin said.

Sayed Ishaq Gilani, an Afghan patrician and major supporter of efforts to bring back former King Mohammed Zahir Shah to lead a government of national unity, said: "People are mobilizing, the commanders are meeting day and night, they are planning attacks on the Taliban.

"They have the guns and ammunition. They have contacted me and asked for political and financial support. I have passed this message on to representatives of Western countries here.

"We don't need much. For the price of two to three cruise missiles we could take care of this. It would be so much cheaper for the U.S. and better for our country than if they invade. There is a danger any new government would be seen as a new puppet, and we don't want any more puppets in Afghanistan."

Mohammed Nadir, 75, a village head from Paktia, arrived in Peshawar by road over the weekend to consult Mr. Sayed. He said: "Everyone opposes the Taliban."

--------

Anti-Taliban Forces Await Arrival of U.S. Aid Package
Military, Technical Assistance Expected Soon, Official Says

By Susan B. Glasser
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A23

TASHKENT, Uzbekistan, Oct. 2 -- Opposition forces inside Afghanistan expect to receive military and technical assistance from the United States within the next month even as significant additional shipments of supplies from Russia are being airlifted into the country, according to officials of the Northern Alliance based here.

The Northern Alliance is one of a range of groups the Bush administration is attempting to enlist as part of its anti-terrorism efforts in Afghanistan, whose Taliban rulers continue to harbor chief terrorist suspect Osama bin Laden.

"We expect this new assistance from the American side very quickly, before winter falls in Afghanistan," Mohammad Hasham Saad, the top Northern Alliance official here in neighboring Uzbekistan, said in an interview. The new U.S. aid will include ammunition and military equipment, according to Saad, as well as humanitarian assistance to help the Northern Alliance deal with the tens of thousands of refugees who have fled Taliban-controlled areas and are now seeking shelter in the part of Afghanistan the Alliance controls.

Saad said he had been consulting with U.S. officials "almost every day" since the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington on Sept. 11, and he confirmed that the United States, despite previous denials, has been cooperating "in a significant way" with the Northern Alliance for several years.

"We had relations with America long, long before these attacks," he said, dating cooperation with Washington to 1997 and referring to a meeting that took place that year between U.S. representatives and opposition fighters inside Afghanistan. He refused, however, to provide details about previous U.S. aid.

U.S. officials here declined to discuss Saad's assertions.

Before the attacks, the United States never openly acknowledged working with the Northern Alliance. But the Bush administration has made clear in recent days that the Northern Alliance is now an important member of its anti-terrorist coalition on the ground.

Russia, which along with India and Iran has long given public backing and covert military assistance to the Northern Alliance, has also vowed to increase military aid to the anti-Taliban forces, pledging to resupply them with spare parts and Soviet-made weapons airlifted in from bases in neighboring Tajikistan.

Since President Vladimir Putin made that commitment in a speech last Monday, aid has "increased fourfold," according to Ali Akhmad, consul at the Northern Alliance mission here. "Every day planes are flying from Moscow to Tajikistan and then from Tajikistan to Afghanistan."

But in addition to receiving U.S. and Russian help, the Northern Alliance is eager for the new U.S.-led coalition to move more aggressively to cut off the Taliban's supply routes. Officials said supplies are still reaching the Taliban through the border with Turkmenistan in the north and Pakistan to the south. "Pakistan is still supplying the Taliban with fuel and ammunition," Saad said. "Just last week we have reliable information that more than 100 trucks carrying fuel and equipment crossed the Pakistan border to the Taliban side."

Cutting off those supply lines, he said, "would accomplish 50 percent of our work."

Members of some of Pakistan's extremist Islamic groups said their organizations are sending weapons, food, medical supplies and recruits to Afghanistan to assist the Taliban. An official with the Lashkar-i-Taiba -- whose charitable wing, Al Rashid Trust, was among the 27 organizations identified as supporting international terrorism by President Bush -- said that "in addition to the support of our trained jihadis, we are also sending food and medical supplies to the Taliban base in Kandahar."

Pakistani officials said that in recent days tribal groups in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province have sent hundreds of small and medium-size weapons to fellow tribespeople on the Afghan side of the border.

The government of Pakistan has said it is complying with U.S. requests to attempt to halt the flow of weapons and supplies to the Taliban, but it notes that it shares a porous, 1,500-mile border with Afghanistan that is impossible to patrol adequately. Pakistan remains the only government to officially recognize the Taliban as Afghanistan's legitimate rulers.

Unlike other Central Asian nations, Turkmenistan has remained ambivalent about assisting the United States in retaliatory strikes against Afghanistan, saying only that its airspace might be used for humanitarian flights.

But here in Uzbekistan, which shares a border with Afghanistan, Washington has received much more substantial promises of support. Uzbekistan has three former Soviet air bases that could be used to launch strikes against Afghanistan, and official sources and independent analysts said President Islam Karimov has already agreed to allow the Americans to use them.

On Monday, Uzbekistan's security council met to discuss its involvement in the U.S. operation, and state-controlled television reported that support would include allowing use of Uzbek airspace for military as well as humanitarian flights. While Uzbekistan has yet to publicly admit the deal it has cut for use of the air bases as well, a senior government official, offering the most concrete confirmation of the U.S.-Uzbek arrangement, said in an interview today it was clear that would happen.

"Our government won't openly say we allow the use of air bases as well," said the official. "But even though we don't say so openly, when we say the use of our airspace is allowed, that also means the use of our air bases. It's just less sensational to say airspace, rather than air bases, but it is included."

At Tuzel, the former Soviet military base just outside Tashkent, there were no signs of the U.S. military. A genial commander, who declined to give his name, stepped outside the base on Monday long enough to insist, "No one's here, nothing's happening." There are no U.S. planes, he said, no American troops hidden from sight. "As for the operation," he said, "we can't say anything. But we are here. We are ready."

Witnesses, however, have told local journalists that they saw several American transport planes landing at Tuzel last week. At Khanabad, another base located less than 100 miles from Afghanistan, a Russian television crew filmed an American Hercules transport plane landing on Saturday; another Russian crew filmed it leaving on Sunday.

Special correspondent Kamran Khan in Karachi, Pakistan, contributed to this report.

--------

U.S. to Boost Aid to Afghanistan

October 3, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Attacks-Diplomacy.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Secretary of State Colin Powell said Wednesday a prospective military strike in Afghanistan against the al-Qaida terrorism network would be only the first step in the U.S. campaign against terrorism. At the same time, the Bush administration was preparing to substantially boost its humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.

President Bush was preparing to announce expanded humanitarian aid to Afghanistan in a visit to the State Department on Thursday, two administration officials said. The new money will approach $100 million, one aide said.

Over the weekend, Bush dipped into an emergency fund and authorized an additional $25 million in relief aid to Afghan refugees. This brought U.S. assistance to more than $205 million, including $32.8 million in assistance over the last few weeks.

Powell received unqualified support Wednesday from Qatar, a Persian Gulf emirate. ``This is the first phase of this operation,'' Powell said. ``I obviously cannot comment on what might happen in the future.''

As Powell left open the possibility of taking the U.S. fight beyond Afghanistan, he offered assurances that ``we are not looking for conflict with other nations.''

On the diplomatic front, meanwhile, Richard Haass, director of policy planning for the State Department, made plans to meet in Rome Thursday with Afghanistan's deposed former king, Mohammad Zaher Shah.

It was the highest-level U.S. contact with the ex-monarch. ``We support the idea of a broad-based government in Afghanistan,'' department spokesman Richard Boucher said. ``We are certainly interested in his ideas.''

Haass is on a weeklong trip to Europe for talks with European government policy makers in France, Belgium, Rome and London.

Powell, addressing Arab worries and even demands that the Bush administration promise not to strike Arab countries, said this is not the beginning of a conflict with them. Almost all Afghans are Muslims, but they are not Arabs.

With the Qatari emir at his side, Powell added at a news conference that while focusing at the outset on Osama bin Laden's network in Afghanistan, the U.S. campaign ``also takes note of those nations that provide haven, provide succor, provide support to terrorist organizations.''

In the three weeks since the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, Powell has condemned Iraq frequently as a supporter of terrorism. Some senior officials in the Bush administration are known to support a strike against Baghdad as well as Afghanistan.

There also are Arab governments disturbed by the possibility that the United States might go that far in pursuing the al-Qaida network.

Powell's remarks did not appear to rule out an attack on Iraq.

While bin Laden has his headquarters in Afghanistan, Powell said, ``He has elements of his network around the world.''

``We are using all the tools available to us -- financial tools, law enforcement, intelligence and the prospect of military operations as well -- to go after this network.''

Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, the Qatari emir, pledged his country's unqualified backing to the U.S. effort.

``There is no doubt that the unique relationship between Qatar and the United States dictates that we have to stand by the United States, especially in the efforts to combat terror,'' the emir said in Arabic.

Powell sought again to dismiss reports that Saudi Arabia is balking at cooperating with the United States if an attack should be mounted.

``The requests that we have put to the Saudis have been responded to,'' he said. ``We are very satisfied with the support that the Arabian government has provided to us.''

Powell had lunch with members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Department spokesman Boucher said the meeting did not involve an effort by the administration to get Congressional approval for military action in Afghanistan.

The chairman, Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., said afterward there was ``absolutely unanimous agreement on part of all members for what the president and the secretary are doing.''

``Most of us believe the president has time,'' Biden said. ``The American people understand the importance of making sure this gets done right.'

-------- arms sales

Russia, Iran Reach Deal On Conventional Arms Sale

By Sharon LaFraniere
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A28
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60747-2001Oct2.html

MOSCOW, Oct. 2 -- Russia signed an agreement today that paves the way for up to $300 million a year in conventional arms sales to Iran, dismissing U.S. fears that more weapons in Iran's hands could further destabilize the Middle East.

Declaring Iran a historical partner, Russia agreed to intensify military and technical cooperation with Tehran. Analysts said the pact was only a framework for future sales, and did not specify what weapons Russia might supply. Iran is reportedly seeking enough arms to make it Russia's third-biggest military hardware customer, after China and India.

U.S. officials have repeatedly condemned Russia's technological and military exports to Iran, which the United States lists as a sponsor of terrorism. But the Bush administration's response to this latest pact may be constrained by its desire for both Russia's and Iran's support of its campaign against Osama bin Laden and his network of terrorists based in Afghanistan.

The new agreement shows that for all Moscow's pro-Western tilt in recent weeks, it is not abandoning its traditional ties. Sergei Yastrzhembsky, a Kremlin spokesman, said that despite U.S. claims that Iran has long backed anti-Israel militant groups, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, there is no concrete proof that it harbors terrorists.

"Iran is much closer to us than to the U.S., and we are not going to act to the detriment of our own national interests and our national security interests," he said.

Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said Russia will sell only defensive weapons and will not violate any international laws or norms. Ali Shamkhani, his Iranian counterpart, said the agreement "is not aimed against any country" -- a clear reference to Israel.

There have been no major Russian arms sales to Iran since 1995, when then-president Boris Yeltsin, under pressure from Washington, agreed to a ban. But President Vladimir Putin decided in December 2000 to resume the arms deals, and the current agreement began to take shape shortly after that.

Since Russia can no longer afford many military purchases, its defense industry depends heavily on exports. Russia's total arms exports were estimated to be worth about $3.7 billion last year, only about one-fifth the figure of Soviet times but still a major source of hard currency.

Analysts said today that Iran seems most interested in Russia's mid-range air defense systems, most likely the S-300 missile that has been compared to the U.S. Patriot missile used in the Persian Gulf War. Iran is also said to be seeking Sukhoi and MiG-29 fighter jets, and anti-ship missiles, among other items.

Besides agreeing to sell arms, Russia is helping Iran build a 1,000-megawatt nuclear power station in the port city of Bushehr. Today, Russian officials announced that it will deliver the first reactor to the station next month.

-------- business

Weapons Makers Asked to Be Discreet

October 3, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Attacks-Weapon-Makers.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- On the premise that loose lips sink ships, the Pentagon is asking major defense contractors to be careful about what they say about the weapons they make.

The warning is the latest from officials hoping to limit what they say is sensitive information in the fight against terrorism.

In a letter faxed to the heads of 11 defense companies, E.C. ``Pete'' Aldridge Jr., undersecretary of defense for acquisition, asked businesses to use ``discretion in all public statements, press releases and communications made by your respective companies and by your major suppliers.''

``Even seemingly innocuous industrial information can reveal much about military activities and intentions to the trained intelligence collector,'' the letter said.

Noting that the country is ``shifting to a war footing,'' Aldridge wrote, ``Statistical, production, contracting and delivery information can convey a tremendous amount of information that hostile intelligence organizations might find relevant.''

The letter echoes a theme repeated countless times a day at the Pentagon since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington. Citing security worries, public affairs officials have declined to give any details on troops, where they are going, how the war on terrorism will be fought and so on.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has told journalists that anyone giving such information to the press is breaking the law and could be charged with violating national security laws.

Lockheed Martin Corp. spokesman Jim Fetig said the manufacturer had already tightened information about its military products immediately after the terrorist attacks.

``We didn't think press releases were particularly appropriate. We pulled all of our product advertising and got condolence ads'' published in military newspapers, he said. ``Lives of our armed forces and citizens ... are far more important than product publicity.''

Boeing Co. similarly moved on its own to limit information, said spokesman Rick Fuller.

But the spokesman of another manufacturer who spoke on condition of anonymity questioned the point of letter, given that so much information about weapons is widely available in magazines, on the Internet and from other public sources.

The Air Force Web site gives details about its jets and spy planes, including how many they have; how high, how fast and how far they can fly; what they're designed to do; and what they cost.

Another industry official who declined to be identified agreed with Aldridge's admonition, giving the example that adversaries planning to shoot down U.S. missiles would like to know such things as how many the country has and what the maximum rate is for producing more.

``It's not a threat, not a gag order,'' Cheryl Irwin, a spokeswoman for Aldredge, said of the letter, also adding that no contractor had done anything to prompt the letter.

``It is a call for the exercising of discretion,'' Irwin said. ``And who can argue against that?''

-------- colombia

Colombian Rebels Use Refuge To Expand Their Power Base
FARC Pushes Boundaries of Government-Backed Safe Haven

By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A25
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60875-2001Oct2.html

SOLITA, Colombia -- This dusty town on the banks of the Caqueta River is a rough half-day ride -- 80 miles over potted dirt lanes -- from a huge swath of jungle and pasture ceded by the government to Colombia's largest leftist guerrilla army. But in many ways, the rebels have extended their reach all the way to Solita.

Main street is sandbagged to prevent an easy guerrilla assault. Plywood houses rimming the town have been abandoned, padlocked shut and plastered with cardboard "For Sale" signs. Despite a heavy army presence, many residents say the real government is administered at gunpoint by guerrillas, who set curfews and kill those who help the army do its job.

Almost three years ago, President Andres Pastrana withdrew security forces from the 16,000-square-mile zone northeast of here to encourage peace talks with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. Envisioned as a way to end Colombia's nearly four-decade civil war, the FARC's safe haven instead has become the guerrillas' single biggest military advantage in the widening conflict, according to senior army officers and defense analysts in Colombia.

Military officers and town officials here and in a string of nearby villages say the guerrillas have pushed the zone's border out at least another 100 miles, broadening their de facto rule. They have done so by using the zone to stage strikes against police barracks and army units with more fighters than would be available elsewhere, to quickly supply patrols with arms and troops and to kill political opponents with impunity by using the safe haven for retreat.

Around Solita, which means "all alone" in Spanish, more than 2,000 FARC troops patrol an area where three years ago there were fewer than half that number, according to army officers based here. To protect the flow of supplies to nearby Tres Esquinas, a key military staging area for the U.S.-backed, anti-drug strategy known as Plan Colombia, the over-stretched army has had to match FARC strength.

"This is our Afghanistan," said an army officer here, referring to the safe haven, which is actually about the size of Switzerland. "The president made an enormous mistake handing it over without any rules. It seems to us that the international community views these guerrillas as some kind of Robin Hood. They are killers."

Pastrana is under fresh pressure from hard-line elements within the military, the government and a private, anti-guerrilla paramilitary group to end such protection. Last week, senior military commanders here said the head of the armed forces, Gen. Fernando Tapias, gave orders to pursue guerrillas into the zone if attacked, contradicting Pastrana's wishes.

Pastrana is scheduled to decide Monday whether to extend the zone, perhaps through the end of his presidency next August, or send in security forces and effectively end a three-year experiment in peace negotiations. The U.S. State Department, preoccupied with other matters since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, has remained largely silent on Pastrana's pending decision.

During a trip to Colombia before the attacks, Marc Grossman, undersecretary of state for political affairs, said the FARC was "abusing" Colombians by using the zone to build military strength, hide kidnap victims and perhaps manufacture bombs with the help of international terrorist groups. But Grossman said the United States supports Pastrana's peace efforts while opposing the zone, arguing that "it is possible to hold those two thoughts in your head at the same time."

Maintaining the demilitarized zone has become an increasingly difficult proposition after almost three years of fruitless peace talks and mounting violence, including the FARC's killing Sunday of the beloved former minister of culture, Consuelo Araujo. Pastrana's critics suggest that his failure to end the zone in the face of evidence that the FARC is using it for initiatives other than peace is a form of harboring terrorists.

FARC leaders have brushed off accusations that they are misusing the safe haven, arguing that because the government agreed to talk in the midst of war, guerrilla military actions would continue. A leading FARC commander, Raul Reyes, warned Pastrana yesterday against imposing new rules on the safe haven and advised the increasingly hard-line field of presidential candidates running to replace him next year not to advocate an end to peace talks.

"Those business and political leaders who are now calling for all-out war should carefully analyze what this would mean for Colombia's future," Reyes said.

Following a recent cease-fire proposal submitted by a civilian commission advising the peace talks, the head of the anti-guerrilla paramilitary force, Carlos Castano, wrote an open letter to Pastrana. If there is no cease-fire, Castano wrote, "the country and the [paramilitary force] will not respect the Afghanistan of [the demilitarized zone] and its protectors." The paramilitary force, which fights the FARC on the same side as the Colombian military, appears on the State Department's terrorist list, as does the FARC.

"At least they are doing something about the guerrillas," said a leading businessman in Florencia, the provincial capital of Caqueta, where the zone has been carved out, referring to Castano's forces. "Right now we are all kidnapped in our own city. We can't leave by car and we are kidnapped on our own streets."

While what has taken place inside the safe haven has raised the most concern here and abroad, the FARC's push to expand its frontier militarily has been crippling to the people of Caqueta province. Last week, 15 of the province's 16 mayors met in Florencia to consider resignation to protest the government's inability to protect them from the FARC's expanding reach.

The 16th mayor, Jose Lizardo Rojas of Puerto Rico, the first town outside the zone's western border, was shot seven times by alleged members of the FARC on Aug. 30. He died and has not been replaced.

Puerto Rico is the first in a string of towns running west from the safe haven that have been ravaged by the FARC in the past three years. Solita, 285 miles south of the capital, Bogota, is the last stop before the river frontier with Putumayo province.

In many of these places, the FARC has been a daily presence for more than 20 years. But villagers, town officials and military officers agree that the guerrillas have greatly increased their numbers and the severity of their attacks in ways that draw directly from the protected strength provided by their safe haven.

In El Doncello, just south of Puerto Rico, the FARC lobbed bombs made from spent propane canisters into the city three times last month. These were the first canister attacks on the town, directed at the construction site of a new police station. But the bombs, launched from outside town, miss more frequently than they hit their intended targets and have demolished a family home and a clothing store.

As the sky darkened on Sept. 23, a taxi pulled up in front of Alexis Viafara's farm just outside El Doncello. Several men got out, rang the doorbell, and shot Viafara when he answered. Viafara was president of the local ranchers committee, whose members have become frequent FARC targets across Colombia because of their presumed support for Castano's paramilitary army, the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC).

"This whole region is a theater of war, and in the middle of it they have a place to hide, a place to gather men and make their attack," said Maj. Wilson Barrios, the police commander in El Doncello. "It is a huge advantage that we just don't have."

Despite Castano's implied threat to enter the demilitarized zone, the paramilitary presence in the area is still too small to challenge the FARC here. In La Montanita, a collection of concrete-block houses between the safe haven and Florencia, the AUC has recently become the group in charge. Two motorcycles buzz around the streets, two young men on each with cell phones and handguns on a constant patrol for strangers.

But that is as far as the paramilitary army has advanced toward the safe haven, which the AUC is trying to surround in numbers to prevent further expansion. Before dawn Saturday, the FARC attacked La Montanita, bombing the town hall and the home of Didier Restrepo, who townspeople said is a paramilitary member. The homemade mortar burned to death his wife and three children, age 23 months to 7 years.

"The bombs lit the house on fire," said Restrepo, his black hair singed orange and his body covered with iodine splotches over severe burns. "My whole family is dead."

-------- drug war

Cash flow for Taliban eyed as reason for opium surge

October 3, 2001
By Jerry Seper
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20011003-88178856.htm

Drug shipments out of Afghanistan have increased by 400 percent since the attacks last month on America in what the head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration believes is an effort by the ruling Taliban to raise cash or to empty warehouses glutted with opium.

"The outflow of opium has continued since the Sept. 11 attacks, and seizures have multiplied fourfold," said DEA Administrator Asa Hutchinson. "They may simply be generating cash or trying to empty out their warehouses for other reasons."

Over the past five years under the Taliban regime, Afghanistan has accounted for more than 70 percent of the global supply of opium, the source crop for heroin. About 90 percent of the heroin sold in Europe is processed, mainly in Turkey, from opium produced in Afghanistan.

Terrorists operating out of Afghanistan, many of whom have direct ties to the opium trade, have been named as the prime suspects in the Sept. 11 suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that killed almost 6,000 people. The Taliban regime controls 95 percent of Afghanistan, including the country's major opium-producing areas.

"Terrorism and drug trafficking are entwined," Mr. Hutchinson said. "One generates money, the other needs money, and both involve the extraordinary use of violence. They feed on each other."

Mr. Hutchinson said opium sales by the Taliban generate between $10 million and $40 million annually, and that federal law enforcement authorities and others believe that some of the cash has been diverted to terrorists operating in that country, including accused mastermind Osama bin Laden and the terrorist network he founded known as al Qaeda.

Last week, the Taliban - anticipating military action by U.S. forces in the wake of the New York and Washington attacks - publicly threatened to lift a ban on the cultivation of opium and encourage new plantings of the crop. But federal law enforcement authorities said heroin trafficking out of Afghanistan continued unabated and the ban, announced last year, had never been more than a public relations ploy.

"Despite the Taliban's public relations commitment, there has not been any reduction of heroin trafficking or in the amount of heroin coming out of Afghanistan," Mr. Hutchinson said in an interview last week, adding that federal authorities believed the ban was aimed at guaranteeing continuing profits from drug sales and to stabilize the price of opium.

He said 60 percent of the country's crop of opium had been stockpiled in recent years in an effort to drive up prices.

Saying the production of opium was "un-Islamic," the Taliban in July 2000 imposed a ban on the cultivation of the crop. The order, according to a State Department advisory released last week, reduced that country's opium production by 95 percent, accounting for a global supply decline of nearly two-thirds.

But, the department said, the U.S. government remained concerned "over other aspects of the drug trade, including heroin production, trading and trafficking." It said large seizures of opium originating in Afghanistan continued to be made in Pakistan and other neighboring countries, meaning that despite the ban, Afghan drug smugglers had been able to draw on stockpiles of opium produced over the past several years.

"The Taliban has derived revenue from the drug trade in the past, and we have no evidence indicating that this has stopped," the advisory said.

An April report by the United Nations accused the Taliban of selling opium and heroin to finance its war against northern rebels and to train terrorists.

The report said the Taliban ban on poppy cultivation allowed the government to stockpile opium to keep the price of the product from plummeting. During the ban, the cost of a kilogram of opium went from about $30 to $500, authorities said, with the Taliban collecting a 10 percent tax on each kilogram sold.

The U.N. report also said it was essential to examine Afghanistan's illicit heroin trade because drug money was being used to buy weapons and "finance the training of terrorists and support the operations of extremists in neighboring countries and beyond."

With the planting season in Afghanistan beginning in two weeks, authorities believe any order by the Taliban to begin cultivation would spur huge crop increases in several regions of the country.

-------- israel

Eternal city of eternal conflicts

October 3, 2001
By Greg Myre
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20011003-87031976.htm

JERUSALEM - Beneath the golden Dome of the Rock, one of Islam's holiest shrines, an odd scene unfolded: Young Israeli soldiers padded about in their socks, looking out of place but scarcely drawing a glance from the bearded Arab men seated on the floor, reading the Koran.

As part of army training, the Jewish soldiers were getting a lesson in Islamic history, politely leaving guns and boots outside to enter the 1,300-year-old mosque with its tiles of lemon and sky blue.

The military field trip in the middle of last year seemed a fitting gesture of cultural sensitivity while Israelis and Palestinians were trying to negotiate an end to a century of conflict.

But on Sept. 29, 2000, Israeli security forces were once again at the compound sacred to Muslims and Jews, this time facing thousands of Muslim protesters, seething over a visit a day earlier by Ariel Sharon, then Israel's opposition leader and now prime minister.

Israeli troops fatally shot six Palestinians and wounded about 200 in the clashes. Jerusalem, the eternal city of seemingly eternal conflict, was once again at the center of a Mideast conflagration.

Israel says the visit was used as a pretext for a planned assault aimed at winning more than was offered at the negotiating table. Palestinians say Israel's harsh repression of protests triggered a spontaneous uprising. A year later, a tenuous truce has been forged under American pressure, spurred by the massive terrorist attacks in New York and on the Pentagon on Sept. 11.

But Israelis and Palestinians remain sharply divided on the future of Jerusalem. Mr. Sharon claims the whole city as Israel's undivided capital, while the Palestinians want the traditionally Arab eastern sector for their future capital. And tourism, the lifeblood of the city's economy, has run dry.

"When there are no tourists, there is no work," said Palestinian Mohammed Kilani, 58, a hotel worker whose job has been scaled back to one day a week. "When there's no work, there's no money. And when there's no money, life here is very hard."

On a recent Friday, Mr. Kilani was among 5,000 worshippers who ascended the steps of the mosque compound Muslims call the Haram as-Sharif and Jews call the Temple Mount - down from a typical 25,000 before the Palestinian uprising began.

On a stone wall, a faded poster offers tribute to Adnan Jaddeh, 23, killed on the first day of the riots. Beneath it, Mr. Jaddeh's brother Osama Jaddeh, 26, explained how that day changed his life.

At the time, Osama Jaddeh worked in an Israeli print shop, earning $1,200 a month. After his brother's death, he felt he could no longer work with Israelis.

The Israelis at the shop said they were sorry about his brother's death, but Mr. Jaddeh still quit. He now earns less than half his old salary delivering bottled water for a Palestinian company.

"I don't want to work with Israelis. I'm not ready to shake hands. I don't even like to see them," he said.

Outside the Old City, a few noisy blocks into Jewish West Jerusalem, stands the Sbarro pizzeria, where a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up Aug. 9 at the peak of the lunchtime crush, killing 15 persons.

In the days after, Israelis placed flowers and candles next to the blown-out windows, while workmen renovated the charred interior. A month later, Sbarro reopened.

"It's wonderful to see how quickly it's been rebuilt," said Sarah Journo, 19, a secretary who rushed to the scene when the bomb went off. She ate at the restaurant two days before the bombing and had no fear of returning.

Following the bombing, many restaurants placed security guards at their doors. Business at restaurants, bars and shops is down throughout the city, particularly in the crowded center.

A few blocks from Sbarro is a major police compound where officers are seated before telephones that seem to never stop ringing and radios that never stop squawking.

Every day, they receive some 400 calls from Jerusalem residents who believe they have seen a bomb or a suspicious person. That's up from about 150 a year ago, but each report is still checked by officers who often clear the area and neutralize bombs.

Often the panic is caused by someone who absentmindedly left behind a bag. Still, the police take no chances. They routinely close streets and set off a controlled explosion - only to discover that they have blown up someone's lunch.

"The workload has doubled, but the number of police haven't," said Avi Sabag, the officer in charge of the center.

"47 Dead in Jerusalem Riot; Attacks by Arabs Spread." The headline is from the Aug. 29, 1929, edition of The New York Times, and the gray clipping hangs in the hallway of the American Colony Hotel in east Jerusalem.

That tempest began at precisely the same spot as the current upheaval, the mosque compound that is bordered on one side by the Western, or Wailing Wall. With a few minor changes, the story from 72 years ago could stand today:

"Centering on the ancient remnants of Solomon's Temple, known as the Wailing Wall, sacred shrine to Jews all over the world, trouble started at noon yesterday," the story begins.

"Rioting spread and soon got beyond control. Hospitals were crowded with the injured. The authorities, who proclaimed martial law, barred the populace from the streets after 6 o'clock tonight. Twelve were killed and 110 injured in the first phase of the fighting. ..."

From the gracious old hotel, it's again just a short walk to Elia Photo Service, a small shop in the Christian quarter where black-and-white photos of Jerusalem in the 1930s hang in the window.

Kevork Kahvedjian, an Armenian immigrant, began taking pictures in the city in the 1920s and kept shooting for the next four decades.

His grandson Ruben has taken over the shop, and business was thriving last year after Pope John Paul II visited the city's holy sites, boosting tourism to record levels until the violence erupted.

"We never had it so good as the period from 1997 to 2000," Mr. Kahvedjian said. Now tourists have been scared off, and business is down more than 50 percent.

Mr. Kahvedjian opens a glass case and points to his grandfather's pictures from the 1930s. That also was a time of tension, but the photographer captured moments of cooperation. In one photo, a Jewish shoe repairman works on a pile of old shoes while an Arab customer waits patiently.

"These people were poor, and things weren't perfect, but people were living together," said Mr. Kahvedjian, who is retracing his grandfather's steps to take pictures at many of the same sites. "I don't see these kind of scenes today."

At the Western Wall plaza - beneath the mosque compound - volunteers from Cardio-Start, a British-based organization that has sent a team to perform two dozen open-heart operations on Palestinians, are visiting the famed sites of Jerusalem.

Dr. Aubyn Marath, a British surgeon, has diagnosed a diseased spirit in the holy city.

"This is the epicenter of three major religions - this should be the most beautiful place on earth. But it's the opposite," he said. "I don't see any peace, or even anyone espousing peace. I see lots of angry, aggressive, hostile looks. Lots of glares. It's filled with violence and hate."

-------- nato

NATO claims mutual defense, backs U.S.

October 3, 2001
By David R. Sands
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20011003-97878181.htm

NATO yesterday declared that the Sept. 11 strikes in New York and Washington constituted an assault on the entire 19-nation alliance, as British Prime Minister Tony Blair warned Afghanistan's ruling Taliban regime it faced certain destruction if it did not hand over the terrorists behind the attacks.

For the first time in its 52-year history, NATO's executive council formally invoked the founding charter's mutual-defense clause, which essentially holds that an attack on any member constitutes an attack against all.

The decision followed a presentation in Brussels by Ambassador-at-Large Francis X. Taylor, President Bush's coordinator for counterterrorism activities, detailing financial and logistical support by Osama bin Laden's international network for the suicide hijackers who killed nearly 6,000 people last month.

The classified briefing also dealt with bin Laden's links to the ruling Taliban regime in Afghanistan, which is sheltering his al Qaeda organization and faces a major U.S. military buildup on its borders.

Said NATO Secretary-General George Robertson after yesterday's decision: "It is clear that all roads lead to al Qaeda and pinpoint Osama bin Laden as having been involved in it."

Mr. Blair, addressing his ruling Labor Party's annual conference in Brighton, England, yesterday, said the message for the Taliban was: "Surrender the terrorists or surrender power - this is your choice."

The British prime minister, who has been outspoken in his support of a military counterstrike following last month's attacks, said there could be "no moral ambiguity" in the fight against international terrorism.

While saying the response should be targeted and minimize civilian casualties, Mr. Blair added: "This is a battle with only one outcome - our victory not theirs. ... Whatever the dangers of the action we take, the dangers of inaction are far, far greater."

NATO's mutual-defense clause does not compel individual members to participate in a U.S.-led military strike against the terrorists, and Mr. Robertson said yesterday U.S. officials did not seek any specific coordinated NATO action.

Regardless of the role NATO ultimately plays, the vote gives a green light from America's closest allies to a U.S. retaliatory strike.

The vote could also strengthen Mr. Bush's case that the United States has compelling evidence that bin Laden and his terrorist network are behind the attacks last month on the Pentagon and World Trade Center.

Many Arab- and Muslim-majority nations have been pressing Washington for proof of bin Laden's involvement before any military response is undertaken.

Two days after the attacks, NATO ministers meeting in Brussels said they were prepared to invoke the mutual defense pact - embodied in Article 5 of the NATO charter - if it could be proved the attackers came from outside the United States.

Yesterday's vote indicates that America's 18 NATO allies are now convinced that was the case.

The Article 5 clause had never been invoked, even during the tense confrontations of the Cold War, the 1991 Persian Gulf war and the 1999 air war against Yugoslavia.

Mr. Robertson yesterday refused to give reporters details of the closed briefing, citing the need to protect intelligence sources and the fear that disclosing details could help bin Laden and his associates prepare for counterstrikes.

The United States received a strong message of support from a powerful NATO nonmember whose leader was in Brussels yesterday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, on a visit to meet with European Union leaders in the Belgian capital, said he was convinced bin Laden's network was behind the Sept. 11 strikes.

"Russia's special services need no proof of the guilt of bin Laden in the attacks. For us, it is already clear," Mr. Putin said after meeting with Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt. "The only thing we do not know is the exact role he played."

Mr. Putin has been pressing the case that bin Laden's network has extensive ties to the Islamic rebels fighting Russian forces in the breakaway republic of Chechnya.

---------

NATO reassesses Russia relationship

Washington Times
October 3, 2001
http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/nobyline-2001103125326.htm

BRUSSELS, Belgium, Oct. 3 (UPI) -- NATO is reassessing its relationship with Russia following President Vladimir Putin's offer to work more closely with NATO allies and his reaffirmation of opposition to allowing former Soviet Union countries membership.

NATO Secretary-General George Robertson said Wednesday he and Putin have identified new areas for collaboration.

"Today we have identified a number of new areas where Russia and NATO could work together, only some of them arising out of the need to combat terrorism," Robertson said as he stood beside Putin on the steps of the Palais D'Egmont in Brussels.

Putin said Russia is working closely with the United States on the fight against terrorism, and while questions and issue related to terrorism were at the center of talks with Robertson, "the discussions went far beyond that."

"Secretary-general did not mention it but I don't think I am revealing any secrets (about) setting up a body to examine the qualitative relationship between NATO and Russia," Putin said. "I find this proposal very good and business like and we support it."

NATO officials said Putin had called for a closer relationship with the defense organization and that Russia regards NATO's role as having shifted to a more political one because of its peacekeeping roles in Kosovo and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

The officials said Germany's Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder suggested a reappraisal of Russia's role in Chechnya in the light of the attacks on New York and near Washington and the international fight against terrorism.

They said it has put Chechnya in the same frame as other terrorist situations around the world and Russia's support of the U.S.-led fight on terrorism has dramatically changed the outlook of NATO allies.

Tuesday NATO declared the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States should be taken as an attack on all the NATO allies.

Robertson said he and Putin had developed a frank speaking approach. "What the people of the world now expect is decisive leadership from the leaders of the democratic world when their safety had become overshadowed by the acts of terrorism in the United States," he said.

For some 40 years, Russia and NATO glowered at each other and then tiptoed around each other. That they now have established a considerable area of cooperation would have seemed unimaginable just several years ago.

Commenting on NATO enlargement Putin said: "The position of Russia is known and there is no change in its position. ... I think we should abandon this."

--------

Putin Eases Stance On NATO Expansion
Moscow Seeks Closer Security Ties With West

By William Drozdiak
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, October 4, 2001; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2330-2001Oct3.html

BRUSSELS, Oct. 3 -- President Vladimir Putin declared today that Russia is prepared to reconsider its opposition to NATO expansion into states of the former Soviet Union as part of a transformation in its security relationship with Europe.

Asserting that global politics has experienced a tectonic shift in the wake of the devastating terrorist attacks in the United States, and that fighting international terrorism must be a top priority, Putin insisted that his country wants to bolster security cooperation with the West. He renewed Russia's previous demands that NATO assume a broader political identity and said Moscow could be drawn into that process.

The statement came as the latest in a series of significant shifts by Putin toward the West in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks. Earlier, Putin approved U.S. military activity in Central Asian states that were once Soviet republics and offered to cooperate with the United States to fight terrorism.

After NATO expanded in 1999 to include Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic, Russia insisted that the alliance not encroach onto territory that was formerly part of the Soviet Union, including the three Baltic states. Putin's comments today marked a potentially important concession to the United States, which has advocated further expansion of the alliance.

Concluding a two-day visit here to meet European Union leaders and NATO Secretary General George Robertson, Putin said, "It's high time to come up with practical solutions" to address changing priorities that have placed terrorism at the top of the global agenda. Russia, he said, would start holding monthly consultations with EU authorities on how to thwart terrorist financing, share intelligence on criminal suspects, track false documents and monitor movements of chemical, nuclear and biological materials.

Since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon three weeks ago, Putin has won praise in Western capitals for his strong endorsement of an international campaign against terrorism and gained greater sympathy for Russia's brutal conflict with Muslim separatists in the southern region of Chechnya.

Putin, who asserted again today that Osama bin Laden's network was also aiding the Chechen rebels, said that deadly bombings of Russian apartment buildings two years ago "bore the same signature" of bin Laden, the Saudi dissident who is suspected of masterminding the suicide airliner attacks in New York and Washington.

Belgium's prime minister, Guy Verhofstadt, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, called the pledge to combat terrorism "a gigantic step forward" toward a new strategic partnership between Russia and the EU. He said the monthly consultations would serve as "an important political pillar of cooperation" in the rapidly warming relationship between Russia and Europe.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard A. Boucher said Putin's remarks "mark a fundamental change in the way we all see security. . . . What this shows is that indeed we're all in this together and we can only help ourselves by helping each other."

In Moscow, Putin's avid courtship of the EU and NATO was seen as a decisive bid to plant Russia firmly within the Western camp. "This is a new level of relations between Russia and the West," said Sergei Chugrov, a senior researcher with the Institute of World Economy and International Relations. "Russia's main goal is to find its place, not on the margins of world policy, but as part of the civilized world together with the U.S. and Europe."

Dmitri Trenin, deputy director of the Carnegie Moscow Center, a research organization, said the terror attacks offer "a tremendous new opportunity" for Russia to integrate with the West. "Instead of dangling between the major powers of the world, Russia could at least find its identity as a European country," he said. "It's just too weak to act as a first-rate pole between China and Europe."

The EU has already agreed to a long-term "energy dialogue" designed to increase imports of Russian oil and natural gas and reduce Europe's dependence on energy supplies from the Middle East. European companies have rushed to sign contracts to start tapping into Russia's vast oil and gas reserves in Siberia.

As Russia's main trading partner, the 15-nation EU promised to accelerate efforts to help Moscow join the World Trade Organization -- a campaign Russia has waged in vain for the past eight years.

EU officials said they would assist Russia in devising and implementing the necessary economic reforms that would allow it to follow China into the WTO. Putin complained that unfair demands had been placed on his country, but he said Russia was willing to recognize intellectual property rights, drop tariff barriers, reduce farm subsidies and adjust foreign trade laws to meet WTO requirements.

Putin also emphasized his desire to see Russia abandon its longtime adversarial stance toward NATO. He outlined plans for a more cooperative approach in his hour-long conversation here with Robertson and promised to elaborate in discussions with President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Putin said he expected Blair to visit Moscow in the coming days.

The Russian leader said the challenge posed by global terrorism was forcing his country to take "an entirely new look" at NATO's enlargement plans. At a summit scheduled for next year, NATO's 19 member states will consider the next wave of expansion that could include the Baltic states, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

"If NATO takes on a different shade and is becoming a political organization, of course we would reconsider our position with regard to such expansion, if we are to feel involved in such processes," Putin said. "They keep saying that NATO is becoming more political than military. We are looking at this and watching this process. If this is to be so, it would change things considerably."

The United States has not previously set a timetable for NATO expansion, but the issue had been an irritant in U.S.-Russia relations for some time. Russia strongly opposed the previous expansion but acceded to it at the last minute. The Baltics have been considered the leading contenders for the next wave of expansion, which could eventually also include other former Soviet republics, now independent nations.

Earlier efforts to improve relations between Russia and the alliance have been fraught with difficulty. After the earlier expansion agreement, Russia and NATO formed a permanent joint council for regular consultations, but it languished. Russia also irritated the alliance with its vocal opposition to the 1999 NATO attack on Yugoslavia.

While cautious about the notion that Russia one day could become a member of the Western military alliance, Robertson said he was delighted with the tone and substance of his talks with Putin. "These discussions mark a major milestone in the NATO-Russia relationship," he said. "We have identified a number of new areas where NATO and Russia can work together."

Correspondent Sharon LaFraniere in Moscow and staff writer Alan Sipress in Washington contributed to this report.

-------- pakistan

Pakistan invites ex-king to form government

Washington Post
October 3, 2001
http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/nobyline-20011039589.htm

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 3 (UPI) -- President Pervez Musharraf asked former Afghan King Mohammed Zahir Shah to send an emissary to Islamabad as soon as possible to discuss a post-Taliban government, Italy's minister of state for foreign affairs said Wednesday.

United Press International reported Sunday that Pakistan planned to press the ex-king to relocate from Rome and invite various Afghan factions for talks in Pakistani tribal areas.

Margherita Boniver told reporters in Islamabad after meeting Musharraf for 40 minutes that the Pakistani leader believed the former king had a role to play in forming a unified government in Afghanistan should the Taliban regime fall.

"The Pakistanis are now realizing that the old king can be a direct person with whom to engage in a peace process," Boniver said. "President Musharraf has asked me to convey to the king the fact that Pakistan wants an emissary -- a person close to the king -- to come to Islamabad as quickly as possible."

Former Pakistani President Farooq Khan Leghari told UPI Editor at Large Arnaud de Borchagrave, on Sunday that he has urged Musharraf to invite the ex-king to Pakistan and provide him with a base in Waziristan, a northwestern tribal region.

Close to the Afghan border and the home of several Pashtun tribes who live on both sides of the border, Waziristan is a suitable place for calling a loi jirga or traditional assembly of Afghan leaders and tribal elders, Leghari said.

Pashtun is the dominant ethnic group in Afghanistan and also is the second largest ethnic group in Pakistan. The king is a Pashtun and Leghari's mother is a Pashtun. He is also related to Afghanistan's Gilani family which is strongly linked to the Afghan royal family.

Reports in the Pakistani media suggest that Shah may appoint Pir Syed Ahmed Gilani, the leader of a royalist party called the National Islamic Front of Afghanistan, the prime minister of an interim government to replace the Taliban regime.

The former Pakistani president told United Press International that Musharraf "enthusiastically endorsed his idea" and said he was going to discuss it with the United States and other allies trying to replace the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

The United States is already negotiating with the former king who on Tuesday formed an alliance with the opposition Northern Alliance which is fighting to topple the Taliban. The United States also has agreed to support the Northern Alliance.

Leghari, who had another meeting with Musharraf on Monday evening, may fly to Rome to meet the former Afghan king, a Pakistani newspaper, The News, reported.

Pakistan is trying to establish direct contacts with Shah to prevent the Northern Alliance from dominating the future Afghan government. The Alliance has close relations with Pakistan's rival India and Russia.

However, it is not yet clear how would the former king react to such overtures from Pakistan. He did not have good relations with Pakistan while in power from 1933 to 1973 and his new allies in the Northern Alliance do not hesitate in expressing their dislike for Pakistan.

Hamid Karzai, a Pakistan-based chief of a major Pashtun tribe in the Taliban-dominated Kandahar region, told The News that he did not know whether Leghari would visit the king.

However, he said he was flying to Rome on Thursday for a meeting with Shah. Karzai and other Pashtun supporters of the former king want him to land directly in Afghanistan instead of taking up residence in a neighboring country. They argue that fiercely independent Afghans may not approve if he takes up residence in another country, even if temporarily.

Meanwhile, a Pakistani Pashtun leader Mehmud Khan Achakzai, who also has some influence in Kandahar as his tribe lives on both sides of the border, said Waziristan would be a suitable place for convening the tribal assembly.

"Nadir Khan, the father of Zahir Shah, also entered Afghanistan from the same route in 1930," he said.

Nadir Khan was a commander of the late Afghan king Amanullah Khan's army in early 1920s. But he never felt comfortable with the haste, his king wanted Afghanistan to get modernized. And, preferred to live a life of exile in Paris.

Amannullah Khan also had close links with Russian communists and admired Turkish leader Mustafa Kamal Pasha. His links with Turkey and Russia annoyed the British who played a key role in stirring up a religious revolt against him.

He was replaced by an ethnic Tajik fundamentalist ruler, Bacha Saqqao. But Afghanistan's Pashtun tribe rejected the non-Pashtun rulers and finally the British helped Nadir Khan, who was a cousin of Amannullah Khan, in entering Afghanistan through Waziristan.

He soon became the king in 1930 but was murdered in 1993 and was replaced by his son, Zahir Shah. Shah was deposed in 1973 and has been living near Rome since then.

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

U.S. targets terrorist camps

October 3, 2001
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20011003-37269.htm

U.S. intelligence agencies have identified 23 terrorist training camps in Afghanistan that have been targeted for military action, according to U.S. officials.

They also told The Washington Times that China has placed its military forces in the western part of the country on heightened alert and is moving troops to the border region near Afghanistan in anticipation of U.S. military strikes.

The officials said the 23 camps have been targeted by U.S. military forces assembling in the region. The forces include up to four aircraft carrier battle groups with cruise-missile-equipped warships and submarines, several hundred warplanes and special-operations ground troops.

Other targets in Afghanistan include some of the Taliban military forces, including a small number of MiG-21 aircraft, some tanks and armored vehicles and air-defense missile sites, defense officials said.

The Taliban militia reportedly has about 1,000 Russian-made T-54, T-55 and T-62 tanks, up to 30 surface-to-surface missiles, including Scuds and Frog-7s. Its air force is made up of some 30 MiG-23s and additional older aircraft along with 80 MiG-21s. Its surface-to-air missile forces include SA-2 and SA-3 batteries and SAM-7 and SAM-14.

The Taliban also is believed to have some U.S.-made Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, but defense officials said the batteries may have run down. The missiles were sent to the Afghan rebel groups fighting Soviet forces during the 1980s.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told a group of visiting former U.S. government officials last week that the military has selected numerous "high-value" targets inside Afghanistan, according to a participant in the meeting. The defense secretary also said that military action is likely to cause collateral damage.

The training camps are located in areas stretching from northeastern Afghanistan, below the territory controlled by the Northern Alliance, and stretching south and east throughout the country. They include camps near the cities of Kabul, Jalalabad and Khost and in the province of Uruzgan.

The officials did not provide further details of the locations of the bases.

Russia's government, however, has identified 55 facilities used by Saudi-born Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda network, Reuters news agency reported.

The network includes terrorists from Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan, Philippines, Bangladesh, Kashmir and "nationals from Arab countries," according to the Russians.

At one of the camps near the town of Mess-e-Aynak, they said, terrorists are being trained by a staff of 130 men from Egypt, Sudan, Yemen, Iraq, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria.

Regarding the Chinese military movements, U.S. intelligence officials said the western group of forces for the People's Liberation Army was placed on heightened alert status last week.

Chinese troops have been detected moving from bases in Xinjiang toward areas near the border with Pakistan, Afghanistan and Tajikistan, the U.S. officials said.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman stated on Sept. 25 that "security measures" were being taken to secure the country's western border.

"In order to safeguard the peace and stability of China's border areas, we are fully entitled to implement security measures along our border," Zhu Bangzao told reporters in Beijing. He did not elaborate.

According to accounts from the far-western Chinese city of Kashgar, convoys of Chinese troops were seen heading down the Karakoram highway toward the mountainous areas around the Pakistani and Afghan borders, Agence France-Presse reported from Beijing.

China has been using military forces to keep order in Xinjiang province, where Muslim Uighur separatists have been fighting for independence.

The Frontier Post, an English-language newspaper published in Peshawar, Pakistan, reported Monday that Chinese military forces had begun exercises near the Afghan border.

The exercises were under way near Tashkurgan, a western outpost along the Afghan border. Chinese forces based at a nearby garrison have more than doubled in size over the past two weeks.

An estimated 4,000 Chinese troops are currently in the region, the report said.

Other military convoys were spotted moving from the provincial capital of Urumqi, where hotels reportedly are filled with Chinese military officers and schools are being used to house ground troops.

Beijing is opposing unilateral military action in Afghanistan and wants the United Nations to authorize any attacks.


-------- OTHER

Papal warning on rift between Vatican hawks and doves

Wednesday, October 3 12:04 AM SGT
Agence France-Presse
http://english.hk.dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/world/afp/article.html?s=hke/headlines/011003/world/afp/Papal_warning_on_rift_between_Vatican_hawks_and_doves.html

VATICAN CITY, A unprecedented public split between Vatican hawks and doves over the appropriate reaction to the anti-US terror attacks prompted a reminder in the Vatican's official newspaper Tuesday that the Pope's word is final - and that he is a dove in this context.

Catholic doctrine is relatively flexible when dealing with matters of war and peace.

It states that Catholics should seek peace but have a right of self-defence.

Hawks in the Vatican have been emphasizing the self-defence part of the doctrine to such an extent that the pope's newspaper Osservatore Romano felt there was a risk that there would be an impression that Pope John Paul II had given his approval for US strikes against Afghanistan.

In fact in his main speech on the issue, made on September 22 on his arrival for a visit to Kazakhstan, the pope said: "Difficult questions should be resolved not by the recourse to arms but through peaceful means of negotiation and dialogue.

"I fully support the use of this method of engagement which meets the fundamental principles of charity and peace which humans aspire to."

But the chairman of the Italian bishop's conference and John Paul's vicar for Rome, Cardinal Camillo Ruini, said two days later, "We must not put in doubt the right, I say even the necessity and the right - to combat and neutralise where ever possible, international terrorism and all those, who at whatever level, are its promoters and defenders."

Ruini at the same time warned against indiscriminate reprisals.

The official spokesman for the Vatican, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, has also been quoted as saying that a US strike against Afghanistan would not be an attack but "...a preventive action against a menace which has already shown itself in the horror of recent weeks and which could be repeated."

Because of the tense international situation, the pope decided in an unusual step to leave the official number two in the Vatican hierarchy, Cardinal Secretary of State Angelo Sodano, in Rome when he went to Kazakhstan and Armenia last month, to coordinate the Vatican's response to developments.

In the event Sodano made hardly any official pronouncements on the subject, leading to speculation that the war between the hawks and doves was part of the struggle to decide who would succeed John Paul II.

-------- alternative energy

Energy Giant Shell Prepares for End of Oil Era

October 3, 2001
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/business/business-energy-shell.html?searchpv=reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Big Oil must prepare itself for the end of the hydrocarbon age as alternative energies win over consumers in coming decades, chairman of world No. 2 energy firm Royal Dutch/Shell (RD.AS) (SHEL.L) said on Wednesday. Oil giants from the last century will have to look to their laurels if they are not to be unseated as motorists move toward hydrogen-powered vehicles, and renewable energies, such as wind or solar power, emerge, Shell chairman Phil Watts told reporters.

``One thing I am convinced of is that the next 50 years is not going to be more of the same. An energy company had better make sure it has the necessary expertise and knowledge,'' Watts said at the launch of Shell's 'Long Term Energy Scenarios'.

Shell has moved firmly into the same camp as fellow oil supermajor BP(BP.L), which has made vigorous efforts to carve out an environmentally friendly public image.

The world's No. 1 oil firm, Exxon, has by contrast concentrated firmly on its oil and gas interests, and had little truck with the environmental lobby.

Shell has pledged to spend between $500 million and $1 billion in the next five years to develop new energy businesses, concentrating primarily on solar and wind energy.

``There will be different sources of energy by the middle of the century. It challenges what our portfolio will be,'' Watts said. ``I don't know if Shell will be transmogrified by it, but I wouldn't like the opportunity to pass by default.''

OIL ON TOP

Oil currently sucks up around 40 percent of primary energy use. While that will fall to barely 25 percent by 2050, oil will still be the top dog, above gas at 20 percent, according to Shell figures.

``We are going to have oil and gas for many, many years,'' Watts said. ``The internal combustion engine is not going to go away. It's going to fight for its life. Under pressure the internal combustion engine is going to develop.''

Automakers such as Toyota (news/quote ) (7203.T)(TM.N) and Honda (7267.T)(HMC.N) are already selling hybrid cars which combine traditional engines with battery powered motors.

The vast markets of China and India are key examples of how nations and energy firms alike will need to balance rapidly growing energy needs with rising import dependence and environmental effects, Watts said.

Natural gas will initially pick up much of the slack as oil's preeminence slowly wanes, Watts said. After that, the outlook is far less certain as new technologies fight to establish themselves.

``We could see an evolutionary progression, the so-called carbon shift, from coal to gas, to renewables, or possibly even to nuclear,'' said Watts.

``A second scenario explores something rather more revolutionary; the potential for a truly hydrogen economy, growing out of new and exciting developments in fuel cells and advanced hydrocarbon technologies,'' he added.

According to one Shell scenario, rapid growth in fuel cells from 2025 -- which produce electricity from hydrogen and cut harmful emissions -- could shift the energy business dramatically away from oil long before oil becomes scarce.

Radical changes possible in the energy business means the old order which dominated the last century such as Exxon, BP and Shell itself cannot afford to assume they will dominate for the next 100 years.

``That would be a very complacent view. Longevity in corporations is not the norm,'' said Watts.

Oil companies will have to be more sensitive to environmental concern, he added. ``Companies are not charities but they do have values,'' he said.

-------- police / prisoners

INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES
House Panel Calls for 'Cultural Revolution' in F.B.I. and C.I.A.

New York Times
October 3, 2001
By ALISON MITCHELL
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/03/national/03INTE.html

WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 - The House committee that oversees the nation's intelligence agencies has called for far-reaching changes in intelligence operations and for an independent investigation into why government did not foresee or prevent the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.

Reflecting the mood since Sept. 11, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, in a report accompanying a classified intelligence bill expected to be taken up by the House this week, says it is a matter of urgency, "like no other time in our nation's history," to address the "many critical problems" facing the intelligence agencies.

The bill, approved by the committee late last week, would create an independent 10-member commission to study the "preparedness and performance" of several federal agencies during and after the Sept. 11 strikes. It would also increase the roughly $30 billion intelligence budget, but the exact dollar sums the bill contains are classified.

The committee calls for a "cultural revolution" inside agencies like the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation and a thorough review of the nation's national security structures.

The committee's bill would rescind the 1995 restrictions on the C.I.A.'s use of unsavory covert agents and instruct the current director of the agency, George J. Tenet, to write new guidelines. It speaks of a "culture of risk aversion" and says the 1995 guidelines "have had a negative impact on the recruitment of sources against terrorist organizations."

So far the criticism of the C.I.A. has been muted since Sept. 11, with only Senator Richard C. Shelby of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, calling for Mr. Tenet's resignation. The Bush administration has rallied behind Mr. Tenet, and many lawmakers say it is not the time to remove him or to run an investigation that could distract or demoralize agencies that should be focused on preventing further attacks.

The House committee chose its words carefully. In the report accompanying its bill, the committee says it "does not in any way lay blame to the dedicated men and women of the U.S. intelligence community for the success of these attacks. If blame must be assigned, the blame lies with a government, as a whole, that did not fully understand nor wanted to appreciate the significance of the new threats to our national security despite the warnings offered by the intelligence community."

Representative Porter J. Goss, Republican of Florida, who heads the intelligence committee and is himself a onetime C.I.A. case officer, emphasized in an interview that he was a strong supporter of Mr. Tenet's and that he leaned against establishing an independent commission at this time.

But Mr. Goss added, "The debate has already started" over what needs to be changed.

Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said, "The point is not to point blame or point fingers. The point is to see where the weaknesses are in our system."

The commission would be appointed by the president and Congressional leaders, and would examine the performance of several federal agencies responsible for public safety, law enforcement, national security and intelligence gathering. It would have subpoena powers and would report back in six months of its formation.

President Bush has already ordered internal reviews of intelligence gathering. But the committee said: "If history serves, however, no substantive changes will occur after these reviews are complete. The committee believes that major changes are necessary."

The Senate passed its own intelligence measure before Sept. 11 and it was not clear where it would stand on creating such a study commission. Senior lawmakers on the Senate Intelligence Committee have also called for a new look at the nation's intelligence apparatus.

While the intelligence bill is not expected to be controversial, some amendments could prove to be as Congress contends with how much it wants to rethink the limits on covert operations.

Representative Bob Barr, Republican of Georgia, was weighing whether to offer an amendment to lift the 25-year ban on using covert agents to assassinate foreign leaders. The ban is in effect through an executive order of the president.

The House committee focused in its report on the shortage of intelligence analysts and case officers with foreign language skills. "At the N.S.A. and C.I.A., thousands of pieces of data are never analyzed or are analyzed `after the fact', " it said, "because there are too few analysts, even fewer with the necessary language skills. Written materials can sit for months and sometimes years before a linguist with proper security clearances and skills can begin a translation."

The committee recommended that intelligence agencies offer bonuses for language proficiency and that they consider creating their own language school.

The committee also said that the nation needed to increase its front- line field officers, clandestine case officers and defense attaches. It said a "fresh look" should be taken at restructuring the C.I.A. and other intelligence agencies to create a separate clandestine service.

-------- spying

U.S. Was Foiled Multiple Times in Efforts To Capture Bin Laden or Have Him Killed

CIA Trained Pakistanis to Nab Terrorist but Military Coup Put an End to 1999 Plot

By Bob Woodward and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61219-2001Oct2.html

In 1999, the CIA secretly trained and equipped approximately 60 commandos from the Pakistani intelligence agency to enter Afghanistan for the purpose of capturing or killing Osama bin Laden, according to people familiar with the operation.

The operation was arranged by then-Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his chief of intelligence with the Clinton administration, which in turn promised to lift sanctions on Pakistan and provide an economic aid package. The plan was aborted later that year when Sharif was ousted in a military coup.

The plan was set in motion less than 12 months after U.S. cruise missile strikes against bin Laden's training camps in Afghanistan that Clinton administration officials believe narrowly missed hitting the exiled Saudi militant. The clandestine operation was part of a more robust effort by the United States to get bin Laden than has been previously reported, including consideration of broader military action, such as massive bombing raids and Special Forces assaults.

It is a record of missed opportunities that has provided President Bush and his administration with some valuable lessons as well as a framework for action as they draw up plans for their own war against bin Laden and his al Qaeda network in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington.

The Pakistani commando team was up and running and ready to strike by October 1999, a former official said. "It was an enterprise," the official said. "It was proceeding." Still stung by their failure to get bin Laden the previous year, Clinton officials were delighted at the operation, which they believed provided a real opportunity to eliminate bin Laden. "It was like Christmas," a source said.

The operation was aborted on Oct. 12, 1999, however, when Sharif was overthrown in a military coup led by Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who refused to continue the operation despite substantial efforts by the Clinton administration to revive it.

Musharraf, now Pakistan's president, has emerged as a key ally in the Bush administration's efforts to track down bin Laden and destroy his terrorist network. The record of the CIA's aborted relationship with Pakistan two years ago illustrates the value -- and the pitfalls -- of such an alliance in targeting bin Laden.

Pakistan and its intelligence service have valuable information about what is occurring inside Afghanistan, a country that remains closed to most of the world. But a former U.S. official said joint operations with the Pakistani service are always dicey, because the Taliban militia that rules most of Afghanistan has penetrated Pakistani intelligence.

"You never know who you're dealing with," the former senior official said. "You're always dealing with shadows." 'We Were at War'

In addition to the Pakistan operation, President Bill Clinton the year before had approved additional covert action for the CIA to work with groups inside Afghanistan and with other foreign intelligence services to capture or kill bin Laden.

The most dramatic attempt to kill bin Laden occurred in August 1998, when Clinton ordered a Tomahawk cruise missile attack on bin Laden's suspected training camps in Afghanistan in response to the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.

At the time, the Pentagon informed the president that far more ambitious and riskier military actions could be undertaken, according to officials involved in the decision. The options included a clandestine helicopter-borne night assault with small U.S. special operations units; a massive bombing raid on the southeastern Afghan city of Kandahar, the spiritual home of the Taliban and a place frequently visited by bin Laden and his followers; and a larger air- and sea-launched missile and bombing raid on the bin Laden camps in eastern Afghanistan.

Clinton approved the cruise missile attack recommended by his advisers, and on Aug. 20, 1998, 66 cruise missiles rained down on the training camps. An additional 13 missiles were fired at a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan that the Clinton administration believed was a chemical weapons factory associated with bin Laden.

Clinton's decision to attack with unmanned Tomahawk cruise missiles meant that no American lives were put in jeopardy. The decision was supported by his top national security team, which included Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen and national security adviser Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger, officials said.

In the aftermath of last month's attacks on the United States, which the Bush administration has tied to bin Laden, Clinton officials said their decision not to take stronger and riskier action has taken on added relevance. "I wish we'd recognized it then," that the United States was at war with bin Laden, said a senior Defense official, "and started the campaign then that we've started now. That's my main regret. In hindsight, we were at war."

Outside experts are even more pointed. "I think that raid really helped elevate bin Laden's reputation in a big way, building him up in the Muslim world," said Harlan Ullman, a defense analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank. "My sense is that because the attack was so limited and incompetent, we turned this guy into a folk hero."

Senior officials involved in the decision to limit the attack to unmanned cruise missiles cite four concerns that in many ways are similar to those the Bush administration is confronting now.

One was worry that the intelligence on bin Laden's whereabouts was sketchy. Reports at the time said he was supposed to be at a gathering of terrorists, perhaps 100 or more, but it was not clear how reliable that information was. "There was little doubt there was going to be a conference," a source said. "It was not certain that bin Laden would be there, but it was thought to be the case." The source added, "It was all driven by intelligence. . . . The intelligence turned out to be off."

A second concern was about killing innocent people, especially in Kandahar, a city already devastated by the Soviet Union's 1979 invasion of Afghanistan. Large loss of civilian life, the thinking went, could have cost the United States the moral high ground in its efforts against terrorism, especially in the Muslim world.

The risks of conducting a long-range helicopter assault, which would require aerial refueling at night, were another factor. The helicopters might have had to fly 900 miles, an official said. Administration officials especially wanted to avoid a repeat of the disastrous 1980 Desert One operation to rescue American hostages in Iran. During that operation, ordered by President Jimmy Carter, a refueling aircraft collided with a helicopter in the Iranian desert, killing eight soldiers.

A final element was the lack of permission for bombers to cross the airspace of an adjoining nation, such as Pakistan, or for helicopters to land at a staging ground on foreign soil. Since Sept. 11, Pakistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan have offered the United States use of bases and airspace for any new strike against bin Laden.

Bin Laden, 44, a member of an extended wealthy Saudi family, was expelled from Saudi Arabia in 1991 and stripped of his citizenship three years later. In early 1996, the CIA set up a special bin Laden unit, largely because of evidence linking him to the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. At the time, he was living in Sudan, but he was expelled from that country in May 1996 after the CIA failed to persuade the Saudis to accept a Sudanese offer to turn him over.

After his subsequent move to Afghanistan, bin Laden became a major focus of U.S. military and intelligence efforts in February 1998, when he issued a fatwa, or religious order, calling for the killing of Americans. "That really got us spun up," recalled retired Marine Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, who was then the chief of the Central Command, which oversees U.S. military operations in the Middle East and Central Asia.

When two truck bombs killed more than 200 people at the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August of that year, and the U.S. government developed evidence that bin Laden was behind both attacks, the question was not whether the United States should counterattack, but how and when. And when depended on information about his whereabouts. Two weeks later, intelligence arrived in Washington indicating that bin Laden would be attending a meeting in eastern Afghanistan. Much turned on the quality of the intelligence provided by CIA Director George J. Tenet, recalled a senior official who had firsthand knowledge of the administration's debate on how to respond.

"Some days George was good," the official said, "but some days he was not so good. One day he would be categorical and say this is the best we will get . . . and then two days later or a week later, he would say he was not so sure." 'It Was a Sustained Effort'

The quality of the intelligence behooved restraint in planning the raid. Hitting bin Laden with a cruise missile "was a long shot, very iffy," recalled Zinni, the former Central Command chief. "The intelligence wasn't that solid."

At the same time, new information surfaced suggesting that bin Laden might be planning another major attack. Top Clinton officials felt it was essential to act. At best, they calculated, bin Laden would be killed. And at a minimum, he might be knocked off balance and forced to devote more of his energy to hiding from U.S. forces.

"He felt he was safe in Afghanistan, in the mountains, inside landlocked airspace," Zinni said. "So at least we could send the message that we could reach him."

In all, 66 cruise missiles were launched from Navy ships in the Arabian Sea off the coast of Pakistan into the camps in Afghanistan. Pakistan had not been warned in advance, but Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, then the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, met with Pakistani officials at the precise time of the launch to tell them of the operation. He also assured them that Pakistan was not under surprise attack from India, a potential misapprehension that could have led to war.

At least one missile lost power and crashed in Pakistan, but the rest flew into Afghanistan and slammed into suspected terrorist training camps outside Khost, a small town near the Afghan-Pakistani border. Most of the cruise missiles were carrying loads of anti-personnel cluster bomblets, with the intention of killing as many people as possible. Reports from the scene were inconclusive. Most said that the raid killed about 30 people, but not bin Laden.

Intelligence that reached top Clinton administration officials after the raid said that bin Laden had left the camp two or three hours before the missiles struck. Other reports said he might have left as many as 10 or 12 hours before they landed.

Sources in the U.S. military said the launch time was adjusted some to coordinate it with the Sudan attack and to launch after sundown to minimize detection of the missiles. This had the effect of delaying the launch time by several hours. An earlier launch might have caught bin Laden, two sources said.

Cohen came to suspect that bin Laden escaped because he was tipped off that the strike was coming. Four days before the operation, the State Department issued a public warning about a "very serious threat" and ordered hundreds of nonessential U.S. personnel and dependents out of Pakistan. Some U.S. officials believe word could have been passed to bin Laden by the Taliban on a tip from Pakistani intelligence services.

Several other former officials disputed the notion of a security breach, saying bin Laden had plenty of notice that the United States intended to retaliate.

There also is dispute about the follow-up to the 1998 raid, specifically about whether the Clinton administration, having tried and failed to kill bin Laden, stopped paying attention.

There were attempts. Special Forces troops and helicopter gunships were kept on alert in the region, ready to launch a raid if solid intelligence pinpointed bin Laden's whereabouts. Also, twice in 1999, information arrived indicating that bin Laden might possibly be in a certain village in Afghanistan at a certain time, officials recalled. There was discussion of destroying the village, but the intelligence was not deemed credible enough to warrant the potential slaughter of civilians.

In addition, the CIA that year launched its clandestine operation with Pakistani intelligence to train Pakistani commandos for operations against bin Laden.

"It was a sustained effort," Cohen said recently. "There was not a week that went by when the issue wasn't seriously addressed by the national security team."

Berger said, "Al Qaeda and bin Laden were the number one security threat to America after 1998. It was the highest priority, and a range of appropriate actions were taken."

But never again did definitive information arrive that might have permitted another attempt to get bin Laden, officials said.

"I can't tell you how many times we got a call saying, 'We have information, and we have to hold a secret meeting about whether to launch a military action,' " said Walter Slocombe, the former undersecretary of defense for policy. "Maybe we were too cautious. I don't think so."

Researcher Jeff Himmelman contributed to this report.

--------

Sudan's Offer to Arrest Militant Fell Through After Saudis Said No

By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 3, 2001; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61251-2001Oct2.html

The government of Sudan, employing a back channel direct from its president to the Central Intelligence Agency, offered in the early spring of 1996 to arrest Osama bin Laden and place him in Saudi custody, according to officials and former officials in all three countries.

The Clinton administration struggled to find a way to accept the offer in secret contacts that stretched from a meeting at a Rosslyn hotel on March 3, 1996, to a fax that closed the door on the effort 10 weeks later. Unable to persuade the Saudis to accept bin Laden, and lacking a case to indict him in U.S. courts at the time, the Clinton administration finally gave up on the capture.

Sudan expelled bin Laden on May 18, 1996, to Afghanistan. From there, he is thought to have planned and financed the twin embassy bombings of 1998, the near-destruction of the USS Cole a year ago and last month's devastation in New York and Washington.

Bin Laden's good fortune in slipping through U.S. fingers torments some former officials with the thought that the subsequent attacks might have been averted. Though far from the central figure he is now, bin Laden had a high and rising place on the U.S. counterterrorism agenda. Internal State Department talking points at the time described him as "one of the most significant financial sponsors of Islamic extremist activities in the world today" and blamed him for planning a failed attempt to blow up the hotel used by U.S. troops in Yemen in 1992.

"Had we been able to roll up bin Laden then, it would have made a significant difference," said a U.S. government official with responsibilities, then and now, in counterterrorism. "We probably never would have seen a September 11th. We would still have had networks of Sunni Islamic extremists of the sort we're dealing with here, and there would still have been terrorist attacks fomented by those folks. But there would not have been as many resources devoted to their activities, and there would not have been a single voice that so effectively articulated grievances and won support for violence."

Clinton administration officials maintain emphatically that they had no such option in 1996. In the legal, political and intelligence environment of the time, they said, there was no choice but to allow bin Laden to depart Sudan unmolested.

"The FBI did not believe we had enough evidence to indict bin Laden at that time, and therefore opposed bringing him to the United States," said Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger, who was deputy national security adviser then.

Three Clinton officials said they hoped -- one described it as "a fantasy" -- that Saudi King Fahd would accept bin Laden and order his swift beheading, as he had done for four conspirators after a June 1995 bombing in Riyadh. But Berger and Steven Simon, then director for counterterrorism on the National Security Council (NSC) staff, said the White House considered it valuable in itself to force bin Laden out of Sudan, thus tearing him away from his extensive network of businesses, investments and training camps.

"I really cared about one thing, and that was getting him out of Sudan," Simon said. "One can understand why the Saudis didn't want him -- he was a hot potato -- and, frankly, I would have been shocked at the time if the Saudis took him. My calculation was, 'It's going to take him a while to reconstitute, and that screws him up and buys time.' " Conflicting Agendas

Conflicting policy agendas on three separate fronts contributed to the missed opportunity to capture bin Laden, according to a dozen participants. The Clinton administration was riven by differences on whether to engage Sudan's government or isolate it, which influenced judgments about the sincerity of the offer. In the Saudi-American relationship, policymakers diverged on how much priority to give to counterterrorism over other interests such as support for the ailing Israeli-Palestinian talks. And there were the beginnings of a debate, intensified lately, on whether the United States wanted to indict and try bin Laden or to treat him as a combatant in an underground war.

In 1999, Sudanese President Omar Hassan Bashir referred elliptically to his government's early willingness to send bin Laden to Saudi Arabia. But the role of the U.S. government and the secret channel from Khartoum to Washington had not been disclosed before.

The Sudanese offer had its roots in a dinner at the Khartoum home of Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Othman Taha. It was Feb. 6, 1996 -- Ambassador Timothy M. Carney's last night in the country before evacuating the embassy on orders from Washington.

Paul Quaglia, then the CIA station chief in Khartoum, had led a campaign to pull out all Americans after he and his staff came under aggressive surveillance and twice had to fend off attacks, one with a knife and one with claw hammers. Now Carney was instructed, despite his objections, to withdraw all remaining Americans from the country.

Carney and David Shinn, then chief of the State Department's East Africa desk, considered the security threat "bogus," as Shinn described it. Washington's dominant decision-makers on Sudan had lost interest in engagement, preparing plans to isolate and undermine the regime. The two career diplomats thought that was a mistake, and that Washington was squandering opportunities to enlist Sudan's cooperation against radical Islamic groups.

One factor in Washington's hostility was an intelligence tip that Sudan aimed to assassinate national security adviser Anthony Lake, the most visible administration critic of Khartoum. The Secret Service took it seriously enough to remove Lake from his home, shuffling him among safe houses and conveying him around Washington in a heavily armored car. Most U.S. analysts came to believe later that it had been a false alarm.

Taha, distressed at the deteriorating relations, invited Carney and Shinn to dine with him that Tuesday night. He asked what his country could do to dissuade Washington from the view, expressed not long before by then-United Nations Ambassador Madeleine K. Albright, that Sudan was responsible for "continued sponsorship of international terror."

Carney and Shinn had a long list. Bin Laden, as they both recalled, was near the top. So, too, were three members of Egypt's Gamaat i-Islami, Arabic for Islamic Group, who had fled to Sudan after trying to kill Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Sudan also played host to operatives and training facilities for the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas, and Lebanon's Hezbollah.

"It was the first substantive chat with the U.S. government on the subject of terrorism," Carney recalled.

Taha mostly listened. He raised no objection to the request for bin Laden's expulsion, though he did not agree to it that night. His only rejoinders came on Hamas and Hezbollah, which his government, like much of the Arab world, regarded as conducting legitimate resistance to Israeli occupation.

Sudanese President Bashir, struggling for dominance over the fiery cleric Hassan Turabi, had already made overtures to the West. Not long before, he had delivered the accused terrorist known as "Carlos the Jackal" to France. Less than a month after Taha's dinner, he sent a trusted aide to Washington.

Maj. Gen. Elfatih Erwa, then minister of state for defense, arrived unannounced at the Hyatt Arlington on March 3, 1996. Using standard tradecraft, he checked into one room and then walked to another, across Wilson Boulevard from the Rosslyn Metro.

Carney and Shinn were waiting for him, but the meeting was run by covert operatives from the CIA's Africa division. The Washington Post does not identify active members of the clandestine service. Frank Knott, who was Africa division chief in the directorate of operations at the time, declined to be interviewed.

In a document dated March 8, 1996, the Americans spelled out their demands. Titled "Measures Sudan Can Take to Improve Relations with the United States," the two-page memorandum asked for six things. Second on the list -- just after an angry enumeration of attacks on the CIA station in Khartoum -- was Osama bin Laden.

"Provide us with names, dates of arrival, departure and destination and passport data on mujahedin [holy warriors] that Usama Bin Laden has brought into Sudan," the document demanded. The CIA emissaries told Erwa that they knew of about 200 such bin Laden loyalists in Sudan.

During the next several weeks, Erwa raised the stakes. The Sudanese security services, he said, would happily keep close watch on bin Laden for the United States. But if that would not suffice, the government was prepared to place him in custody and hand him over, though to whom was ambiguous. In one formulation, Erwa said Sudan would consider any legitimate proffer of criminal charges against the accused terrorist. Saudi Arabia, he said, was the most logical destination.

Susan Rice, then senior director for Africa on the NSC, remembers being intrigued with but deeply skeptical of the Sudanese offer. And unlike Berger and Simon, she argued that mere expulsion from Sudan was not enough.

"We wanted them to hand him over to a responsible external authority," she said. "We didn't want them to just let him disappear into the ether."

Lake and Secretary of State Warren Christopher were briefed, colleagues said, on efforts launched to persuade the Saudi government to take bin Laden.

The Saudi idea had some logic, since bin Laden had issued a fatwa , or religious edict, denouncing the ruling House of Saud as corrupt. Riyadh had expelled bin Laden in 1991 and stripped him of his citizenship in 1994, but it wanted no part in jailing or executing him. Saudis Feared a Backlash

Clinton administration officials recalled that the Saudis feared a backlash from the fundamentalist opponents of the regime. Though regarded as a black sheep, bin Laden was nonetheless an heir to one of Saudi Arabia's most influential families. One diplomat familiar with the talks said there was another reason: The Riyadh government was offended that the Sudanese would go to the Americans with the offer.

Some U.S. diplomats said the White House did not press the Saudis very hard. There were many conflicting priorities in the Middle East, notably an intensive effort to save the interim government of Prime Minister Shimon Peres in Israel, which was reeling under its worst spate of Hamas suicide bombings. U.S. military forces also relied heavily on Saudi forward basing to enforce the southern "no fly zone" in Iraq.

Resigned to bin Laden's departure from Sudan, some officials raised the possibility of shooting down his chartered aircraft, but the idea was never seriously pursued because bin Laden had not been linked to a dead American, and it was inconceivable that Clinton would sign the "lethal finding" necessary under the circumstances.

"In the end they said, 'Just ask him to leave the country. Just don't let him go to Somalia,' " Erwa, the Sudanese general, said in an interview. "We said he will go to Afghanistan, and they said, 'Let him.' "

On May 15, 1996, Foreign Minister Taha sent a fax to Carney in Nairobi, giving up on the transfer of custody. His government had asked bin Laden to vacate the country, Taha wrote, and he would be free to go.

Carney faxed back a question: Would bin Laden retain control of the millions of dollars in assets he had built up in Sudan? Taha gave no reply before bin Laden chartered a plane three days later for his trip to Afghanistan. Subsequent analysis by U.S. intelligence suggests that bin Laden managed to draw down and redirect the Sudanese assets from his new redoubt in Afghanistan.

From the Sudanese point of view, the failed effort to take custody of bin Laden resulted primarily from the Clinton administration's divisions on how to relate to the Khartoum government -- divisions that remain today as President Bush considers what to do with nations with a history of support for terrorist groups.

Washington, Erwa said, never could decide whether to strike out at Khartoum or demand its help.

"I think," he said, "they wanted to do both."

-------- terrorism

INDUSTRIES AND UTILITIES
Companies Responding to Potential Threat

New York Times
October 3, 2001
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/03/national/03INDU.html?searchpv=nytToday

Chemical, fuel and manufacturing industries, power and water suppliers, and agencies dealing with transportation and the environment are scrambling to safeguard a vast array of dangerous materials, to keep them out of the wrong hands.

Among the materials are cylinders of propane and pesticides, chlorine being trucked to water purification plants, or gasoline en route to service stations, and rail cars carrying suffocating ammonia to farms for use as fertilizer or to frozen food factories for use as a refrigerant.

Until Sept. 11, these materials were considered, at worst, potential environmental or safety hazards in the event of an accidental release. Thousands of worst-case scenarios chemical companies were required to file with the Environmental Protection Agency were widely regarded as extraordinarily unlikely.

But now they are a little less so.

"We're taking a new look at every single security issue," said a vice president of environmental affairs at one of the country's 10 largest companies, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The official said his company assumed there would be more attacks.

Several government officials investigating terrorist threats agreed that companies, not public institutions, faced the highest risk.

Actions range from basic inspections of fences and alarms to re- examining the background of every employee, checking immigrants' documents and issuing new identification cards.

At the Frontier El Dorado oil refinery, about 30 miles from Wichita, Kan., "security is on double coverage, and double's going to be normal for at least another few months," David Highbarger, a fire safety officer at the plant, said.

Plant managers have set up concrete barricades at the entrance and erected temporary floodlights around the perimeter until permanent ones can be installed.

Some water providers are discussing accelerating a slow shift from chlorine disinfection to other methods that avoid the use of the deadly chlorine gas, which in scattered accidents over the years has forced evacuations of small towns. Breaching a large chlorine tank would release clouds of choking gas, experts say.

Government transportation officials have told trucking companies that send 50,000 loads of gasoline a day onto American roads to eliminate lax practices like allowing drivers to keep the big rigs idling in the parking lot while they get lunch.

The Transportation Department has dispatched 300 inspectors to scan employee lists at companies hauling particularly hazardous cargo. A memorandum sent to the companies advises them to double-check the immigration papers of foreign-born employees and interview new workers face-to-face "to appraise the personality, character, motivation, honesty, integrity and reliability."

And yesterday, at the annual meeting of the American Society for Industrial Security International, in San Antonio, 16,000 private and government security experts from around the world shopped in a bazaar crammed with high-tech gadgetry for scanning fingerprints and retinas, parking lots and pipelines.

Organizers considered canceling the meeting, but were instead deluged with last-minute registrations.

The goal, security experts said, was to close as many gaps as possible until terrorists run out of targets.

"If one target looks harder to attack or damage than another, then the softer target has a greater likelihood of being attacked," said Ray Humphrey, who is the chairman of the industrial security society and a consultant based near Boston.

Mr. Humphrey said there was a limited number of extremists able to stay hidden in the United States. With enough security, he said, eventually the threat would dwindle.

Many companies have inadequate security, said a senior government official tracking terrorism, because they must balance its costs against profit margins. Yet, "most of the potential things that can be used in a way to cause great destruction or deaths are private-sector things," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

James Makris, the director of the Environmental Protection Agency's chemical emergency preparedness and prevention office, said: "Industry has an obligation to protect facilities from intrusion. If you've got a tiger, you have to keep it in a cage."

Mr. Makris said some companies might reduce their vulnerability to terrorism by reducing stockpiles of dangerous chemicals.

"When you get to a point where you crash planes into things there are no defenses," he said. "The next best thing is to minimize the amount of chemicals."

In some cases, there is simply not much more that can be done to reduce danger. Security managers for utilities, for example, said that tens of thousands of miles of transmission lines were too spread out to be patrolled. Some power companies have asked local police departments to help monitor their towers.

Nuclear plants have increased patrols and added roadblocks, but were not designed to withstand the impact of a plunging airliner, Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials said.

The threat posed by "weapons of expedience" - things like chemical rail cars or storage tanks - has been illustrated repeatedly in accidents, security experts said.

For example, a blast at a chemical plant in Toulouse, France, on Sept. 21 killed 29 people and injured 2,000, including some as far as three miles away. In July, a fire paralyzed Baltimore and disrupted Internet links for three days when a freight train carrying toxic chemicals derailed in a tunnel. The most disastrous incident by far was the 1984 chemical release in Bhopal, India, which killed more than 3,000 people and injured 200,000.

All of these incidents were accidents; if the same destructive forces were unleashed purposefully by a terrorist, many experts say the consequences would probably be much deadlier.

Terrorism experts emphasized that, in general, the greatest risk to American companies still lay not in some catastrophic followup to the events of Sept. 11, but instead in smaller acts of violence by angry employees or small groups.

"It's important not to overreact," said Bonnie S. Michelman, the president of the American Society for Industrial Security and director of security for Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

"You can create undue hysteria," Ms. Michelman said, explaining that biological or chemical attacks, although most evident in recent press coverage, are the least likely in the short run.

Still, she added, one unfortunate consequence of the recent attacks is that they have created a model that could be followed by others.

"The best thing is for businesses to understand their real vulnerabilities and harden their targets," she said.


-------- activists

Short declarations by experts needed for leukemia lawsuit

From: "Suzelle Smith" <SSmith@howarth-smith.com>
Wednesday, October 03, 2001 12:47 PM
Sir Richard Doll (011 441 865-558817)
Dr. Richard Peto (011 441 865-558817)

Please contact us at ssmith@howarth-smith.com, if you are in a position to assist us, the Court, and the public welfare.

We stress that we do not need lengthy writings, we need short declarations by those who are expert in the area, that the court is making a critical mistake in its understanding of the science here, and that at the very least, it should reopen, perhaps appoint its own experts, and permit filings on these issues of great medical and social consequence.tle).

Dear Distinguished Persons:

Some of you we know as professional colleagues. For those whom we have not met, we are the lawyers presenting half a dozen leukemia victims, exposed to partially fissioned fragments of fuel, released when Southern California Edison chose to operate the San Onofre Nuclear Power plant in 1985-1987 with defective fuel rods. The cancers developed during the time exactly consistent with the latency period and afflicted relatively young, non smokers, male and female. Interestingly, San Onofre had no reported leukemias among the workers before the fragment crisis.

In any event, we tried a case on behalf of the husband and children of Ellen Kennedy, wife of Joe Kennedy who worked in containment during the crisis. Ellen was 44 years old and developed chronic myelogenous leukemia. There were reports of fragments leaving the plant and found by at least one health physics worker in a self initiated scan of his home during 1987. There was a report of one worker whose ring dosimeter picked up one of the fragments and registered a 512 rem dose in 1986. The NRC investigated; confirmed the dose and fined SCE for their conduct related to these events, including violation of off site limits. All experts for both sides agreed that the state of science is such that after the cancer develops, it is not possible by medical test to ascertain which ray or hit of radiation caused the initiation process. The jury in the trial was instructed that they must find that SCE radiation, rather than some other radiation was the actual cause of the CML. The jury found for SCE. We appealed and the 9th Circuit in a landmark opinion, reversed, holding that the jury should have been instructed that causation under California law is defined as a substantial increase in risk of developing cancer, rather than proving the actual cause (which is currently impossible). California also has a joint tort feasor statute permitting defendants to prove contribution to cause by non named parties, so a reduction in damages often occurs when cancers are caused by more than one cause.

After this opinion was published, the Nuclear Industry, petitioned the Court for rehearing. It garnered support from not only industries which are subject to contamination laws, but also the U.S. Justice Department (often involved as a defendant in radiation litigation) and from a group of so called independent scientists, who were represented by the Atlantic Legal Foundation and attorney, Martin Kaufman. The scientists included Robert Adair, Bruce Ames, Allan Bromley and others. No association with the Nuclear Industry was disclosed by any of these scientists to the Court, although one could make some deductions based on the c.v.'s which were attached. The brief itself was drafted and signed by the lawyer. None of these individuals testified at the trial, had access to the evidence at trial, or stated that they had read any of the SCE and NRC documents detailing the radioactive capabilities of the fuel fragments. These individuals did not state that they read any of the expert testimony from plaintiffs about Mrs. Kennedy's exposure pathways. The 9th Circuit panel granted rehearing on a pure issue of law involving the Price Anderson Act, unrelated to exposure science. The position of these scientists was not mentioned by the Court at the oral argument on rehearing. Thereafter, totally unrelated to anything in the rehearing order, supplemental briefs or the oral argument, the 9th Circuit withdrew its original opinion, finding, truly out of nowhere that it was "uncontested" that Mrs. Kennedy's "probability of causation" that her CML was caused by these fragments was 1 in 100,0000. This was based on the testimony of Dr. Fred Mettler. Plaintiffs' experts did not do a PC, for a number of reasons, but we did offer extensive testimony that the fragments were highly radioactive. Dr. Mettler used his own math, calculating the dose as low as possible ,of course. The new opinion not only misuses the PC formula, but it seems to simply misunderstand and miscalculate the math. It is lawyering at its worst, making proclamations about "science," as if they were "fact," by lay persons who do not even comprehend the theories properly.

We are going to file a petition for another rehearing. Unlike the industry, we have no influential contacts or trade groups to solicit for help. You are well known as experts in this area, and if you would like to help us request the court to reconsider its opinion and its statements about PC, please let us know. We can give you the Atlantic Legal Foundation brief, which seems to be what the court, sub silentio in its orders, has taken as the gospel. We need interested scientists and public interest groups to let the court know that there is another side to this. You can read the new Kennedy opinion on the 9th Circuit Website at www.ca9.uscourts.gov., by clicking on the "Opinion" section under Kennedy v. SCE, et al, filed on September 26, 2001. We are going to ask the court to grant rehearing on this PC and causation issue because they are wrong on the basic math and exposure assumptions and therefore, wrong on their apparent conclusion as a matter of law, that a fissioned fuel fragment could not cause a leukemia or be considered a substantial contributing risk for cancer. This holding is far more important than the interests of our clients, as it impacts the public welfare in general.

We have to file our petition in 10 days and amici briefs will need to be filed shortly thereafter. We stress that we do not need lengthy writings, we need short declarations by those who are expert in the area, that the court is making a critical mistake in its understanding of the science here, and that at the very least, it should reopen, perhaps appoint its own experts, and permit filings on these issues of great medical and social consequence.

Please contact us at ssmith@howarth-smith.com, if you are in a position to assist us, the Court, and the public welfare.

Very truly yours,
Suzelle M. Smith

----

Judge Acquits Five Protesters Arrested at GOP Convention

by Robert Moran,
Wednesday October 3 , 2001,
Philadelphia Inquirer
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/1003-03.htm

Five protesters who disrupted a Center City intersection the week of the Republican National Convention were found not guilty yesterday of obstructing the highway and other charges.

Municipal Court Judge Felice Stack acquitted Linda Panetta, 35, of Philadelphia, of all charges and reduced the charges against the four other defendants after the prosecution rested its case.

Later, after hearing defense testimony, Stack found the remaining defendants not guilty of obstructing the highway, saying that even though the protesters were sitting or lying in the street at 15th Street and JFK Boulevard on July 31, 2000, motorists on that Monday morning were able to drive around them.

Found not guilty were Allison Styan, 19, of Maryland; Rebecca Johnson, 22, of Maryland; Laurel Paget-Seekins, 21, of California; and William Brown, 32, of Philadelphia.

The defendants were protesting the School of the Americas, a U.S. facility in Georgia accused by the protesters of training Latin American military personnel on how to torture, kidnap and assassinate civilians.

Despite repeated objections by prosecutor Josh Van Naarden, Stack allowed Catholic Bishop Tom Gumbleton from Detroit to testify at length about allegations that the School of the Americas was linked to specific killings and massacres in Central America during the 1980s.

Before rendering her verdict, Stack said that she had never heard of the School of the Americas until yesterday and that what she learned was "very enlightening and somewhat shocking."

The protesters wanted the government to close the School of the Americas, which the protesters say was recently renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.

A Web site for the institute says that it replaced the School of the Americas and that it promotes democratic values and respect for human rights. The institute did not respond to a request for comment.

Shawn Nolan, a lawyer for three of the defendants, called what the protesters did last year "democracy in action."

Nearly 400 people were arrested during the week of the convention. Most cases were dismissed, although a handful of protesters were convicted of misdemeanor charges. Some of the cases have led to lawsuits against the city for wrongful arrest.

Cathie Abookire, spokeswoman for the District Attorney's Office, was unable to say whether there are any other criminal cases pending.

Commenting on yesterday's trial, Abookire said prosecutors believed they had a strong case, including a police videotape showing the protesters getting arrested after they refused police commands to get back on the sidewalk.

"We disagree with the judge's decision," Abookire said.

The charges against the defendants had been thrown out by another Municipal Court judge, but they were later reinstated by a Common Pleas Court judge.

--------

In Dire Need of a Patriotism of Dissent

Common Dreams
Wednesday, October 3, 2001
the Chicago Tribune
by Lloyd J. Averill
http://commondreams.org/views01/1003-03.htm

A patriotism of dissent has been one of the most vital ingredients of American political life throughout history. It has always been in the national interest to "speak truth to power," and never more so than in times of crisis. We are now entering an era in which the nurture of an active patriotism of dissent will be a most difficult, but most essential task. Patriotic dissent is required if we hope to achieve anything approaching rational and moral balance in American policy and behavior. It is essential for people of faith and goodwill, who seek to honor the prophetic traditions of all religions, to explore what we can say to predispose such an outcome.

We need each other because, clearly, the national mood and political momentum generated by the events of Sept. 11 will move massively against patriotic dissent. It is an admirable sign of national strength when some disaster brings Americans together, and that strength has been shown in small and large ways since those sad September days. Expressions of unity demonstrate an awareness of a common humanity amid our great diversity, a capacity to come together in grief and in resolve, and the presence of shared bonds that are present but sometimes go unnoticed.

Unity is not, however, acquiescence, especially in a national tradition that values dissent. We share a common heritage, but a part of that heritage is respect for diversity of commitments, for differences in outlook and aspiration. So we must be vigilant lest the celebration of a kind of spiritual unity be turned into an expectation of, or worse a demand for, political uniformity.

I have no idea who first characterized the events in New York, Washington and western Pennsylvania as "war." The striking fact is that the characterization was taken up at once by President Bush and by his administrative apparatus, which made an immediate effort to persuade the American public that waging this new form of war would involve a long-term commitment.

Prior to the day of crisis, the president's approval rating had sunk to nearly 50 percent. He and his administration had been in trouble, even among congressional faithful, and had increasingly experienced political heavy weather among the public on a wide range of domestic and foreign issues. By late morning on Sept. 11 there was an instant transformation. Suddenly, the wartime leader of a nation victimized by cowardly attack, the president reduced his response to crisis to a few simplisms (Osama bin Laden "wanted dead or alive"), spoke them with obvious conviction to a public desperately seeking firm assurance, and soared to an unprecedented 82 percent approval.

What is the same, of course, is the man, George W. Bush, with all of his limitations of political outlook and vision, though now with a stronger sense of mission to see them realized. He is surrounded by the same advisers, many with a Cold War mentality, now given fresh range and new opportunity. There has been no transformation of the Bush program with respect to missile defense, education, the environment, patients' rights, taxes or Social Security. Those issues still are what they were, with whatever strengths or defects they had before Sept. 11. But with the radically altered political climate, they now face a strikingly altered prospect.

A patriotism of dissent is needed now on at least three levels.

On the first level, we must say "no" to the president when he promises that America under his leadership will take action against the terrorist threat, "whatever the cost." We must dissent if the cost is an assault on essential civil rights, and especially if hasty legislative action seeks to subvert due process, invade essential privacies, detain without formal charge or adequate representation and utilize secret evidence. Conveniences are expendable; essential rights are not. A reduction in the freedoms that are the essence of the American experiment, and are anathema to our ad-versaries, can never be in the interest of national security.

On a second level, we must be prepared to say "no" to still-troubling aspects of the Bush administration's foreign policy. We must be prepared to say "no" to any use of overt military force, or covert action, that destroys innocent civilians. To call such consequences "collateral damage" dehumanizes its victims and ourselves, reducing or eliminating differences between us and our terrorist adversaries. We must dissent from an American arrogance in foreign affairs that seemed to be the style of the young Bush administration, and that may become even more marked post-Sept. 11. And we must say "no" to the president, in the Congress and in public forums, on a wide range of policy issues domestic and international that possess no greater virtue or validity now than they did prior to Sep. 11. Wartime leadership should not immunize the president against organized and principled political opposition. I consider national missile defense to be among these.

On a third, pressing, more fundamental level, we must admit that we live in murderous times. If we are to honor those who died on Sept. 11, most fundamentally we must dissent from murder--from the capricious, wanton taking of human life quite apart from any demands of justice.

Political philosopher Albert Camus once said that we must make a choice: between being murderers or the accomplices of murderers, and those who refuse to do so with all of the force of their being. As individuals and as a nation, in the post-Sept. 11 world, we will be facing some agonizingly difficult decisions. There is danger that, given their difficulty, individually we may simply permit others to make them for us, in which case we may find, too late, that we have sided with the murderers.

Lloyd J. Averill is a professor emeritus from the University of Washington. He lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Reprinted with permission from Sightings, a University of Chicago Divinity School publication.

--------

40,000 people sign CND petition opposing military retaliation

For immediate release:
3 October 2001
http://www.cnduk.org/press/press71.htm

As a special session of Parliament convenes on 4 October to debate the crisis following the suicide bombing of the United States on 11 September, CND members will present a petition calling on the government to work for a peaceful solution. Kate Hudson, Vice Chair of British CND, will lead a delegation to ask MPs to tell Tony Blair to use his influence to urge the US government to seek 'justice through international law and not through militarymeans'.

In less than two weeks, the petition has attracted 40,000 signatures from across the country. Among those who have so far agreed to receive the petition are Tam Dalyell MP, Father of the House of Commons, Alice Mahon MP and Jeremy Corbyn MP.

CND urges parliament to refuse the use of bases in the UK for military retaliation and not to allow British troops to take part in such action.

Kate Hudson, CND Vice Chair, said: 'CND abhors the death of thousands of innocent civilians. Residents of the US do not deserve to die because of the policies of their government. Neither do civilians of other countries deserve such a fate.'

Alice Mahon MP, said: 'My sympathy goes out to all those, including British citizens, whose family, friends or colleagues suffered in the World Trade Centre bombings. I am distressed, too, at the sight of hundreds of thousands of Afghan families fleeing their homes in fear of what the US might do. More violence is not the answer. Terrorism cannot be eradicated without eradicating its causes.'

Thursday 4 October Handing in petition, 9am: PHOTO OPPORTUNITY CND will hand over the petitions to MPs as Parliament meets to debate the crisis, St Stephens Entrance, House of Commons, London SW1 Vigil,12 noon to 7pm: As MPs debate the crisis, CND members will hold a Vigil for peace and justice in Parliament Square, London SW1.

For information: London Region CND on 020 7607 2302 For comment: Kate Hudson on 07932 633556 Notes for editors: Saturday 13 October, CND March and Rally, 'Peace and Justice for All'. No more violence, no to Star Wars Assemble 12 noon, Hyde Park (Marble Arch end) March at 1pm to Trafalgar Square for rally Contact Nigel Chamberlain at CND on 07968 420 859

--------

Imported oil

From: Sandra Minkkinen [mailto:minkki@MIT.EDU]
Sent: Thursday, 03 October, 2002

Every time you fill up the car, you can avoid putting more money into the coffers of Saudi Arabia. Just buy from gas companies that don't import their oil from the Saudis.

Nothing is more frustrating than the feeling that every time I fill-up the tank, I am sending my money to people who are trying to kill me, my family, and my friends. I thought it might be interesting for you to know which oil companies are the best to buy gas from.

Major companies that import Middle Eastern oil (for the period 9/1/00 - 8/31/01).
Shell................ 205,742,000 barrels
Chevron/Texaco....... 144,332,000 barrels
Exxon /Mobil......... 130,082,000 barrels
Marathon............. 117,740,000 barrels
Amoco................ 62,231,000 barrels

If you do the math at $30/barrel, these imports amount to over $18 BILLION!

Here are some large companies that do not import Middle Eastern oil:
Citgo 0 barrels
Sunoco 0 barrels
Conoco 0 barrels
Sinclair 0 barrels
BP/Phillips 0 barrels
Hess 0 barrels

All of this information is available from the Department of Energy and can be easily documented. Refineries located in the U.S. are required to state where they get their oil and how much they are importing. They report on a monthly basis. Keep this list in your car; share it with friends. Stop paying for terrorism.............

But to have an impact, we need to reach literally millions of gas buyers.

It's really simple to do!!

Now, don't wimp out at this point...keep reading and I'll explain how simple it is to reach millions of people!! . I'm sending this note to about thirty people. If each of you send it to at least ten more (30 x 10 = 300)... and those 300 send it to at least ten more (300 x 10 = 3,000) .. and so on, by the time the message reaches the sixth generation of people, we will have reached over THREE MILLION consumers!

If those three million get excited and pass this on to ten friends each, then 30 million people will have been contacted! If it goes one level further, you guessed it..... THREE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE!!!

Again, all you have to do is send this to 10 people. How long would all that take? If each of us sends this e-mail out to ten more people within one day of receipt, all 300 MILLION people could conceivably be contacted within the next 8 days!!!

Sandra Minkkinen Senior Production Editor The MIT Press tel: 617.258.0575 5 Cambridge Center fax: 617.258.0562 Cambridge, MA 02142-1493 e-mail: minkki@mit.edu


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