Saturday, May 10, 2003
UNLIMITED OCCUPATION
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld yesterday pledged to keep as many U.S. troops in Iraq as necessary to stabilize the country and said it could take longer than a year to create the conditions necessary for a new Iraqi government to assume control of the nation.
Rumsfeld spoke shortly after the United States, Britain and Spain formally presented a draft resolution on Iraq's interim governance to the United Nations Security Council. The draft calls for the United States and Britain to assume the responsibilities of "occupying powers" under international law. It would grant the two countries broad authority for managing Iraq's political and economic life, including control over its oil revenue, for an initial period of a year and longer, if necessary.
Rumsfeld, briefing reporters at the Pentagon, said the resolution's reference to "an initial" occupation of a year "is probably just a review period, because anyone who thinks they know how long it's going to take is fooling themselves."
"The United States is prepared to keep any number of troops that are appropriate and necessary in Iraq for as long as it takes to create a secure and permissive environment so that [the Iraqis] can go about their business of reconstructing their country," Rumsfeld said.
Amid complaints from U.S. officials and military personnel in Iraq about continuing instability and lagging reconstruction efforts, Rumsfeld and his top military commander, Army Gen. Tommy R. Franks, conceded problems existed. But they said considerable progress has been made since the war to topple the government of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein began 53 days ago.
Insisting that conditions are improving "in almost every corner of that country," Rumsfeld urged patience. "It's going to take some time," he said at a news conference at the Pentagon. "And we accept that, and we're there to create an environment where that process can take place. And we have patience and we accept the fact that it's untidy. And I hope that others can recognize that and accept it, and put it into some historical context."
With about 135,000 U.S. forces and another 40,000 British troops now in Iraq, Rumsfeld has avoided estimating how many will be necessary over what time period to stabilize the country and ensure its return to self-governance, other than to say that U.S. troop levels could ultimately be reduced.
He has said this would depend in part upon the number of peacekeeping forces contributed by other countries.
But Rumsfeld has in recent weeks left the impression that he was interested in committing as few troops as possible for as short a time as necessary for stabilizing Iraq, given his long-standing assertion that U.S. combat forces in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan should return home as other countries assume peacekeeping obligations.
Yesterday, however, both Rumsfeld and Franks emphasized the open-ended nature of the Pentagon's troop deployments in Iraq.
"I think right now what the future will hold a year, two, three . . .ahead of us is not exactly knowable," Franks said.
Franks, head of the U.S. Central Command, which ran the war, acknowledged that basic services such as health care, electricity and water are improving but are "not where they need to be, and certainly not where they will be."
"Iraq's best days are yet to come," Franks said, "and the Iraqi people are already taking steps to build a new government that will, in fact, be of their choice."
Rumsfeld and Franks commented one day after Army Lt. Gen. David D. McKiernan, the commander of allied ground forces in Iraq, said in Baghdad that his forces could not guarantee total security in a country the size of California that has 25 million people.
Now that the 1st Armored Division, based in Germany, is heading into Iraq, the total number of U.S. forces on the ground could increase, with Pentagon officials saying that the 3rd Infantry Division -- the main force that invaded Baghdad -- could delay its departure until June.
"Security in that country is absolutely critical to everything else that's going to be done there," Franks said. "A condition has to be established so that the people of Iraq can feel free to unshutter the windows of their shops and go to work and so forth."
He said change in the composition of U.S. forces is likely to take place as heavy combat units are withdrawn and replaced with military police, engineers and less heavily armed forces more suitable to stability operations. But Franks declined to estimate how many troops would be needed over time. "I'm not sure at this point we know exactly what the force structure or size is going to look [like] -- or what the international content is going to look like as we move forward," Franks said.
Last week, senior Bush administration officials revealed a plan for creating three separate commands for managing postwar Iraq to be headed by the United States, Britain and Poland. While the U.S. command would involve primarily U.S. forces, they said, the British and Polish would command multinational forces, with Italy, Spain, Denmark, Bulgaria, Netherlands and Ukraine all agreeing to provide troops.
But by and large, these countries do not seem to be offering large numbers of troops. Earlier this week, Jerzy Szmajdzinski, Poland's defense minister, met with Rumsfeld and said that his country would need $50 million in financial assistance to provide headquarters elements and about 1,500 troops in Iraq for six months. A full year's stay would run about $90 million.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar pledged during his visit to Washington this week that Spain would send as many as 1,500 troops but said they would be forbidden from engaging in combat.
Britain, which has already reduced the number of its forces in Iraq from 45,000 to 40,000, held a meeting this week in London with representatives of nations interested in committing peacekeeping forces to the British command in Iraq. But a British official in Washington said it is "too early to [talk] about force commitments, force rotations and length of stay."
Rumsfeld said that "a large number of countries are stepping forward," adding that only a minority of them have said that their commitment of troops would be contingent upon successful passage of a U.N. Security Council resolution.
But questions remain about how many forces NATO allies would be willing to commit, particularly now that NATO is preparing to assume control of a 5,500-troop international force in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Rumsfeld has complained that the peacekeeping force in Afghanistan has been confined to the Kabul area and not deployed across the entire country because so few countries have been willing to commit forces.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld yesterday pledged to keep as many U.S. troops in Iraq as necessary to stabilize the country and said it could take longer than a year to create the conditions necessary for a new Iraqi government to assume control of the nation.
Rumsfeld spoke shortly after the United States, Britain and Spain formally presented a draft resolution on Iraq's interim governance to the United Nations Security Council. The draft calls for the United States and Britain to assume the responsibilities of "occupying powers" under international law. It would grant the two countries broad authority for managing Iraq's political and economic life, including control over its oil revenue, for an initial period of a year and longer, if necessary.
Rumsfeld, briefing reporters at the Pentagon, said the resolution's reference to "an initial" occupation of a year "is probably just a review period, because anyone who thinks they know how long it's going to take is fooling themselves."
"The United States is prepared to keep any number of troops that are appropriate and necessary in Iraq for as long as it takes to create a secure and permissive environment so that [the Iraqis] can go about their business of reconstructing their country," Rumsfeld said.
Amid complaints from U.S. officials and military personnel in Iraq about continuing instability and lagging reconstruction efforts, Rumsfeld and his top military commander, Army Gen. Tommy R. Franks, conceded problems existed. But they said considerable progress has been made since the war to topple the government of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein began 53 days ago.
Insisting that conditions are improving "in almost every corner of that country," Rumsfeld urged patience. "It's going to take some time," he said at a news conference at the Pentagon. "And we accept that, and we're there to create an environment where that process can take place. And we have patience and we accept the fact that it's untidy. And I hope that others can recognize that and accept it, and put it into some historical context."
With about 135,000 U.S. forces and another 40,000 British troops now in Iraq, Rumsfeld has avoided estimating how many will be necessary over what time period to stabilize the country and ensure its return to self-governance, other than to say that U.S. troop levels could ultimately be reduced.
He has said this would depend in part upon the number of peacekeeping forces contributed by other countries.
But Rumsfeld has in recent weeks left the impression that he was interested in committing as few troops as possible for as short a time as necessary for stabilizing Iraq, given his long-standing assertion that U.S. combat forces in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan should return home as other countries assume peacekeeping obligations.
Yesterday, however, both Rumsfeld and Franks emphasized the open-ended nature of the Pentagon's troop deployments in Iraq.
"I think right now what the future will hold a year, two, three . . .ahead of us is not exactly knowable," Franks said.
Franks, head of the U.S. Central Command, which ran the war, acknowledged that basic services such as health care, electricity and water are improving but are "not where they need to be, and certainly not where they will be."
"Iraq's best days are yet to come," Franks said, "and the Iraqi people are already taking steps to build a new government that will, in fact, be of their choice."
Rumsfeld and Franks commented one day after Army Lt. Gen. David D. McKiernan, the commander of allied ground forces in Iraq, said in Baghdad that his forces could not guarantee total security in a country the size of California that has 25 million people.
Now that the 1st Armored Division, based in Germany, is heading into Iraq, the total number of U.S. forces on the ground could increase, with Pentagon officials saying that the 3rd Infantry Division -- the main force that invaded Baghdad -- could delay its departure until June.
"Security in that country is absolutely critical to everything else that's going to be done there," Franks said. "A condition has to be established so that the people of Iraq can feel free to unshutter the windows of their shops and go to work and so forth."
He said change in the composition of U.S. forces is likely to take place as heavy combat units are withdrawn and replaced with military police, engineers and less heavily armed forces more suitable to stability operations. But Franks declined to estimate how many troops would be needed over time. "I'm not sure at this point we know exactly what the force structure or size is going to look [like] -- or what the international content is going to look like as we move forward," Franks said.
Last week, senior Bush administration officials revealed a plan for creating three separate commands for managing postwar Iraq to be headed by the United States, Britain and Poland. While the U.S. command would involve primarily U.S. forces, they said, the British and Polish would command multinational forces, with Italy, Spain, Denmark, Bulgaria, Netherlands and Ukraine all agreeing to provide troops.
But by and large, these countries do not seem to be offering large numbers of troops. Earlier this week, Jerzy Szmajdzinski, Poland's defense minister, met with Rumsfeld and said that his country would need $50 million in financial assistance to provide headquarters elements and about 1,500 troops in Iraq for six months. A full year's stay would run about $90 million.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar pledged during his visit to Washington this week that Spain would send as many as 1,500 troops but said they would be forbidden from engaging in combat.
Britain, which has already reduced the number of its forces in Iraq from 45,000 to 40,000, held a meeting this week in London with representatives of nations interested in committing peacekeeping forces to the British command in Iraq. But a British official in Washington said it is "too early to [talk] about force commitments, force rotations and length of stay."
Rumsfeld said that "a large number of countries are stepping forward," adding that only a minority of them have said that their commitment of troops would be contingent upon successful passage of a U.N. Security Council resolution.
But questions remain about how many forces NATO allies would be willing to commit, particularly now that NATO is preparing to assume control of a 5,500-troop international force in Kabul, Afghanistan.
Rumsfeld has complained that the peacekeeping force in Afghanistan has been confined to the Kabul area and not deployed across the entire country because so few countries have been willing to commit forces.
SHOCKER: RECYCLED CREDIT CARD NUMBERS
When a credit card user cuts up their card or sees it expire, they will expect that is the last they will see of it. But yesterday a bank revealed that it has recycled old credit card numbers to new customers, opening up the potential for fraud, particularly over the internet.
Clydesdale Bank yesterday admitted that its Mastercard customers might have a credit card number that was previously used by a former card holder. The expiry date is different, but the bank also confessed that when used over the internet, multiple attempts to guess the date could be made without it registering as a potentially illegal transaction.
The bank said it no longer recycles credit card numbers and has ended links with an outsourcing company that was reusing numbers. But it added that this company is used by "a number of high street banks".
Clydesdale customer Stuart Robertson contacted the Guardian's money website after finding he could access another customer's credit card. Mr Robertson cancelled his Mastercard a few years ago but on the bank's internet service he found the card was still "live". After 23 attempts he guessed the expiry date and transferred a small sum into his own account, to illustrate the breach of security.
Clydesdale spokesman Alexander Wright insisted the number of card holders affected is small: "The company we now use doesn't reissue card numbers. We will have to investigate this further."
The expiry date was not an effective barrier because the bank allows standing orders to be taken off a credit card even if the card has expired. "When someone's got a standing order set up over a long period and their credit card expires, they don't then have that payment refused by that company and thereby get a negative mark on their credit record," said Mr Wright.
When a credit card user cuts up their card or sees it expire, they will expect that is the last they will see of it. But yesterday a bank revealed that it has recycled old credit card numbers to new customers, opening up the potential for fraud, particularly over the internet.
Clydesdale Bank yesterday admitted that its Mastercard customers might have a credit card number that was previously used by a former card holder. The expiry date is different, but the bank also confessed that when used over the internet, multiple attempts to guess the date could be made without it registering as a potentially illegal transaction.
The bank said it no longer recycles credit card numbers and has ended links with an outsourcing company that was reusing numbers. But it added that this company is used by "a number of high street banks".
Clydesdale customer Stuart Robertson contacted the Guardian's money website after finding he could access another customer's credit card. Mr Robertson cancelled his Mastercard a few years ago but on the bank's internet service he found the card was still "live". After 23 attempts he guessed the expiry date and transferred a small sum into his own account, to illustrate the breach of security.
Clydesdale spokesman Alexander Wright insisted the number of card holders affected is small: "The company we now use doesn't reissue card numbers. We will have to investigate this further."
The expiry date was not an effective barrier because the bank allows standing orders to be taken off a credit card even if the card has expired. "When someone's got a standing order set up over a long period and their credit card expires, they don't then have that payment refused by that company and thereby get a negative mark on their credit record," said Mr Wright.
COALITION FINGERS THE OIL
America and Britain yesterday laid out their blueprint for postwar Iraq in a draft resolution to the United Nations security council, naming themselves as "occupying powers" and giving them control of the country's oil revenues.
The proposal, which would relegate the UN to an advisory role, alongside the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, while lifting economic sanctions, was expected to pass despite serious concerns from some permanent members.
The resolution will probably face amendments from France and Russia, who have favoured suspending the sanctions but advocate some control being vested in the UN until an Iraqi government is established.
The French president, Jacques Chirac, yesterday intimated that there was room for negotiation: "I can confirm to you that France's will [is] to undertake discussions on the future of this country in an open and constructive spirit."
Russia, which has considerable economic interests at stake, was less emollient. Before yesterday's meeting, Russian ambassador Sergei Lavrov warned that he would pose "lots of questions" to US ambassador John Negroponte.
In a further sign of the confusion over the US role in Iraq, the defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld said yesterday that a one-year timeline attached to the presence of US and British forces in Iraq was probably "just a review period" in the overall postwar plan. "Anyone who thinks they know how long it's going to take is fooling themselves," Mr Rumsfeld said. "It's not knowable."
Outside the UN, the proposals provoked a vociferous response from the European Union's commissioner for aid and development, Poul Nielsen, who accused America of seeking to seize control of Iraq's vast oil wealth.
Mr Nielson, a Dane who has just returned from a three-day fact-finding mission to Iraq said the US was "on its way to becoming a member of Opec", the Middle Eastern oil cartel.
"They will appropriate the oil," he told the Danish public service DR radio station. "It is very difficult to see how this would make sense in any other way.
"The unwillingness to give the UN a genuine, legal well-defined role, also in the broader context of rebuilding Iraq after Saddam ... speaks a language that is quite clear."
Eager to avoid another bitter transatlantic diplomatic row, the commission headquarters issued a swift rebuttal, saying Mr Nielson's views did not "reflect the opinion of the commission as a whole".
Iraqis also responded frostily to the plans, praising the lifting of sanctions but calling for the UN or an Iraqi interim government to take charge of the nation's oil wealth.
"It is a good initiative that should have taken place a long time ago," said Ragheb Naaman, 43, who works for Iraq's military industrialisation commission in charge of developing weapons. "But we don't accept that the revenues be controlled by the United States and Britain."
The text, which two senior council diplomats called "hard" and "in your face", defines the US and Britain as "occupying powers" - a legal designation apparently aimed at reassuring council members that America will adhere to its obligations under international law. A former state and defence department official told the Wall Street Journal that occupying power status meant the US cannot give all reconstruction contracts to American companies and "it can't choose the political leadership of the country".
America and Britain yesterday laid out their blueprint for postwar Iraq in a draft resolution to the United Nations security council, naming themselves as "occupying powers" and giving them control of the country's oil revenues.
The proposal, which would relegate the UN to an advisory role, alongside the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, while lifting economic sanctions, was expected to pass despite serious concerns from some permanent members.
The resolution will probably face amendments from France and Russia, who have favoured suspending the sanctions but advocate some control being vested in the UN until an Iraqi government is established.
The French president, Jacques Chirac, yesterday intimated that there was room for negotiation: "I can confirm to you that France's will [is] to undertake discussions on the future of this country in an open and constructive spirit."
Russia, which has considerable economic interests at stake, was less emollient. Before yesterday's meeting, Russian ambassador Sergei Lavrov warned that he would pose "lots of questions" to US ambassador John Negroponte.
In a further sign of the confusion over the US role in Iraq, the defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld said yesterday that a one-year timeline attached to the presence of US and British forces in Iraq was probably "just a review period" in the overall postwar plan. "Anyone who thinks they know how long it's going to take is fooling themselves," Mr Rumsfeld said. "It's not knowable."
Outside the UN, the proposals provoked a vociferous response from the European Union's commissioner for aid and development, Poul Nielsen, who accused America of seeking to seize control of Iraq's vast oil wealth.
Mr Nielson, a Dane who has just returned from a three-day fact-finding mission to Iraq said the US was "on its way to becoming a member of Opec", the Middle Eastern oil cartel.
"They will appropriate the oil," he told the Danish public service DR radio station. "It is very difficult to see how this would make sense in any other way.
"The unwillingness to give the UN a genuine, legal well-defined role, also in the broader context of rebuilding Iraq after Saddam ... speaks a language that is quite clear."
Eager to avoid another bitter transatlantic diplomatic row, the commission headquarters issued a swift rebuttal, saying Mr Nielson's views did not "reflect the opinion of the commission as a whole".
Iraqis also responded frostily to the plans, praising the lifting of sanctions but calling for the UN or an Iraqi interim government to take charge of the nation's oil wealth.
"It is a good initiative that should have taken place a long time ago," said Ragheb Naaman, 43, who works for Iraq's military industrialisation commission in charge of developing weapons. "But we don't accept that the revenues be controlled by the United States and Britain."
The text, which two senior council diplomats called "hard" and "in your face", defines the US and Britain as "occupying powers" - a legal designation apparently aimed at reassuring council members that America will adhere to its obligations under international law. A former state and defence department official told the Wall Street Journal that occupying power status meant the US cannot give all reconstruction contracts to American companies and "it can't choose the political leadership of the country".
SARS QUACKERY; A LOT OF BULL
BEIJING, May 9 ? With hotels empty and foreign businesses fleeing China in fear of SARS, it goes without saying that the new pneumonia has decimated Beijing's economy. But you would not know it here at the White Pagoda Pharmacy.
Packets of an herbal SARS prevention brew are selling like lemonade on the Fourth of July, and bottles of Long An 84 disinfectant bleach ? limit one to a customer ? seem to grow legs and race out the door.
"When we get a new product, we run out in a day, because people are crazy the way they are buying," said a plump, bored, masked cashier near the entrance, who gave her name only as Ms. Qin. "But you know ? they know ? there is no treatment for SARS."
Here in Beijing, SARS has spawned a booming industry, a macabre world of potions, creams, disinfectants, shots, gloves, masks and more, many of dubious utility. For weeks now, binge buying of the latest "must have" personal weapon against the coronavirus has left store shelves empty as neighbor fights neighbor in a perceived battle for survival. To make matters worse, every few days a newspaper, a Chinese expert or a government agency recommends a new product as particularly effective, brand name often included.
The endorsement is a bonanza for companies with products so anointed, as millions of customers rush to the stores.
Today, as newly reported SARS cases dropped to 48, only about half the recent daily average, a health official said there was growing evidence that the city's epidemic had plateaued and might soon start to decline.
Nevertheless, the lively market in SARS nostrums rolled along, with hot items like Xiong Xian Tai, an extract of newborn bull thymus that is given by injection and costs more than $100, and Zhuan Yi Yin Zi, a drink made from the spleens of healthy animals.
SARS prevention strategies range from the common, like vitamin C, to the mysterious. Doctors at several hospitals in Beijing have taken to sniffing a pungent rust-colored oil extracted from a weed as they report for work each day.
Indeed, the SARS outbreak in Beijing has created a medical marketing dream: 14 million worried but healthy people, filled with anxiety about an untreatable and often deadly virus.
Add to that a growing middle class with disposable income and a long Chinese belief in health tonics, and you have a prescription for panic buying of any product that develops the slightest buzz.
"Before SARS we sent 200 crates to Beijing a month," said Zhu Qingwen, 68, an inventor from Fujian Province who in 1993 came up with a gel that is rubbed on the hands, supposedly to fortify the immune system. "Now we are sending 300 a day. It can be used for treatment and also prevention, since it helps enhance your immunity."
There were developments outside Beijing today as well. The World Health Organization, which has been deeply concerned about the SARS epidemic spreading from Beijing to the hinterland, received permission to send a team to Hebei Province, which borders on Beijing and has a large transient population.
The team will study existing surveillance and treatment policies, to see if the outlying areas have the knowledge and resources to contain the disease should it spread there.
In the meantime, many provinces and cities in China have already given their seal of approval to medicinal teas made from herbal ingredients to be drunk by healthy people in an effort to prevent the disease.
Recipes vary widely from place to place, though, and pharmacies often run out of the ingredients to make the locally sanctioned brews, which often include things like the root of membranous milk vetch to the capsule of weeping forsythia.
Although China's acting health minister, Wu Yi, proclaimed this week that "Chinese medicine is an important force in the fight against SARS," there are no scientific studies to show that such products are effective.
"It's part of the Chinese tradition to drink these medicines, and at the very least it gives you peace of mind," said Peng Baoyu, a policeman with two masks tied over a double chin, who was buying a three-day supply of anti-SARS tea for himself at a local pharmacy.
With sales restricted in recent weeks, he had used his first allotment of 15 packages to treat his wife, child and in-laws, he said.
Since last month, prices have skyrocketed for the precious anti-SARS ingredients at China's largest wholesale herbal medicine market, in Anguo, two hours south of Beijing.
BEIJING, May 9 ? With hotels empty and foreign businesses fleeing China in fear of SARS, it goes without saying that the new pneumonia has decimated Beijing's economy. But you would not know it here at the White Pagoda Pharmacy.
Packets of an herbal SARS prevention brew are selling like lemonade on the Fourth of July, and bottles of Long An 84 disinfectant bleach ? limit one to a customer ? seem to grow legs and race out the door.
"When we get a new product, we run out in a day, because people are crazy the way they are buying," said a plump, bored, masked cashier near the entrance, who gave her name only as Ms. Qin. "But you know ? they know ? there is no treatment for SARS."
Here in Beijing, SARS has spawned a booming industry, a macabre world of potions, creams, disinfectants, shots, gloves, masks and more, many of dubious utility. For weeks now, binge buying of the latest "must have" personal weapon against the coronavirus has left store shelves empty as neighbor fights neighbor in a perceived battle for survival. To make matters worse, every few days a newspaper, a Chinese expert or a government agency recommends a new product as particularly effective, brand name often included.
The endorsement is a bonanza for companies with products so anointed, as millions of customers rush to the stores.
Today, as newly reported SARS cases dropped to 48, only about half the recent daily average, a health official said there was growing evidence that the city's epidemic had plateaued and might soon start to decline.
Nevertheless, the lively market in SARS nostrums rolled along, with hot items like Xiong Xian Tai, an extract of newborn bull thymus that is given by injection and costs more than $100, and Zhuan Yi Yin Zi, a drink made from the spleens of healthy animals.
SARS prevention strategies range from the common, like vitamin C, to the mysterious. Doctors at several hospitals in Beijing have taken to sniffing a pungent rust-colored oil extracted from a weed as they report for work each day.
Indeed, the SARS outbreak in Beijing has created a medical marketing dream: 14 million worried but healthy people, filled with anxiety about an untreatable and often deadly virus.
Add to that a growing middle class with disposable income and a long Chinese belief in health tonics, and you have a prescription for panic buying of any product that develops the slightest buzz.
"Before SARS we sent 200 crates to Beijing a month," said Zhu Qingwen, 68, an inventor from Fujian Province who in 1993 came up with a gel that is rubbed on the hands, supposedly to fortify the immune system. "Now we are sending 300 a day. It can be used for treatment and also prevention, since it helps enhance your immunity."
There were developments outside Beijing today as well. The World Health Organization, which has been deeply concerned about the SARS epidemic spreading from Beijing to the hinterland, received permission to send a team to Hebei Province, which borders on Beijing and has a large transient population.
The team will study existing surveillance and treatment policies, to see if the outlying areas have the knowledge and resources to contain the disease should it spread there.
In the meantime, many provinces and cities in China have already given their seal of approval to medicinal teas made from herbal ingredients to be drunk by healthy people in an effort to prevent the disease.
Recipes vary widely from place to place, though, and pharmacies often run out of the ingredients to make the locally sanctioned brews, which often include things like the root of membranous milk vetch to the capsule of weeping forsythia.
Although China's acting health minister, Wu Yi, proclaimed this week that "Chinese medicine is an important force in the fight against SARS," there are no scientific studies to show that such products are effective.
"It's part of the Chinese tradition to drink these medicines, and at the very least it gives you peace of mind," said Peng Baoyu, a policeman with two masks tied over a double chin, who was buying a three-day supply of anti-SARS tea for himself at a local pharmacy.
With sales restricted in recent weeks, he had used his first allotment of 15 packages to treat his wife, child and in-laws, he said.
Since last month, prices have skyrocketed for the precious anti-SARS ingredients at China's largest wholesale herbal medicine market, in Anguo, two hours south of Beijing.
Friday, May 09, 2003
UNSETTLED BY PEACE
EL CAJON, Calif. -- Ahlam Almissouri got the summons she had been waiting 12 years for last month.
Her husband, Tariq, a former colonel in the Iraqi army who had returned to the Middle East to help the U.S. oust Saddam Hussein, telephoned their home in this San Diego suburb and told her to start packing.
"Get ready to come back," he said. Hussein was finished. The Kurdish family's long exile was finally over.
Hope and joy light Almissouri's eyes at the thought of going back ? living again near her mother at her old home in Dohuk, in northern Iraq, near Turkey. Then she looks at her children, chattering across the room in the argot of the Southern California suburbs, and her face falls.
All six of them, now teenagers and young adults, were born in Iraq. They burn with hatred for Hussein. And seared into their memories is the family's terrible flight from his army in 1991, through the rugged mountains to Turkey. During those bleak, snowy days, the youngest daughter was left behind (they were later reunited) and the oldest daughter ? 8 at the time ? was plagued by a bullet wound to the wrist that needed medical attention.
But as they recount those frightening times, these kids could be any of their El Cajon peers, except for the details: "Oh, yeah, HEL-LO," says Beri, now 20, referring to the terror she felt in the mountains. She doesn't dwell on the topic, though, and the children's conversation slips easily from the long-ago journey to school, to music and to war.
How could these American children pack up and move back to Dohuk? their mother wonders. How could she feel at home in a place where her children don't feel comfortable?
"I am in the middle," she says in the family's living room a few days after receiving her husband's news. Watching her children eat ice cream and fight over the remote control, her genial expression crinkles into a worried frown. "I am so confused," she says. "It is so hard."
As the family gathers in front of the TV, switching from the satellite transmissions of the Arabic channel Al Jazeera to CNN, the situation weighs on everyone.
"My dad could come back," says Beri, who has bleached blond hair and perfectly painted toenails and wants to be a dental assistant. "I was not looking forward to the war," she adds matter-of-factly, "because I knew this time would come, and it's something we all don't want to have to deal with right now.... It's tough, dude."
_______
The family lives in a rented house with plush carpet and bright picture windows overlooking Granite Hills High School's sports fields and the hills beyond. In the yard, Ahlam has planted herbs with seeds that her mother sent from Iraq.
She loves to sip her evening tea as the sun sets, clucking over her plants and listening to her children's jokes. Twenty yards away is a new trampoline, where the children like to bounce their 45-year-old mother in her traditional Kurdish robes as she shrieks and giggles. It's comfortable, but it's a far cry from the sprawling pink house with the gardener and the maid in Dohuk.
Ahlam was brought up in that city, raised to revere the men in her family who fought the Iraqi regime and dreamed of a Kurdish state. At 18, she became a primary school teacher. One day Tariq Almissouri, an engineering graduate, strode onto campus to visit his sister, a teacher there also.
He was immediately smitten with Ahlam, but she refused to talk to him ? it wasn't appropriate for young women to speak to strange men. He dropped by again. She sent him a message: "Don't come. It's bad for my reputation."
But he persisted, eventually winning permission from Ahlam's father to marry her. In 1979 they wed. The next eight years brought them their six children.
Tariq was drafted into the army. Eventually, family members say, he rose to the rank of colonel.
It was difficult to be a Kurd in Hussein's army. For hundreds of years, Kurds, who number about 25 million and describe themselves as the largest nationality on the planet without its own state, have been dominated by powerful empires and nations: Turkey, Iran, Iraq. In the late 1980s, Hussein turned his army on the Kurds in an "ethnic cleansing" campaign, killing an estimated 180,000, including 5,000 who died in chemical attacks in Halabja, a northern city near the border with Iran.
Ahlam Almissouri lost nearly half a dozen relatives there. Meanwhile, she said, her husband had managed to walk a fine line, rising in the army while maintaining secret contacts with relatives who were Kurdish guerrillas. But he tossed his lot in with the rebels in 1991 and rose with them against the Iraqi regime after that year's Persian Gulf War, according to their oldest son, Peter, 22.
The decision upended life for Ahlam and the children, who fled Dohuk to stay with relatives elsewhere. The Iraqi army was advancing, crushing the Kurdish rebellion.
At 1 a.m. on a spring morning in 1991, Ahlam awoke with a start when a bomb crashed down a block away, shaking the house where she slept and stirring up huge clouds of dust. Peter and his brother Shivan were with her husband in another town.
The younger children were with her, except for Delene, then 3, who was at her mother-in-law's house. Terrified, Ahlam grabbed Beri, 8; Zeen, 5; and Ayad, 4, snatched up a few provisions and ran out into the frigid night.
Beri was in no shape for the journey that would follow. She had caught a bullet in the wrist when someone fired a gun at a recent gathering. Though she was not seriously hurt, she was in pain. But a visit to the doctor would have to wait.
For three days, the four, accompanied by dozens of members of their extended family, trudged over snowy mountain passes toward Turkey, their hunger growing. At night, they slept huddled together in vain attempts to stay warm.
"It was snowing, and it was so cold. So cold I cannot describe it," Ahlam says, drawing her arms around herself at the memory. "And we walk and walk and walk. It was so hard to walk in the snow."
On the third afternoon, she heard a shout and recognized her husband's voice calling her name. She turned and there he was, with Peter and Shivan each clutching one of his hands.
"I have been looking all over for you," her husband said.
Ahlam cried for joy. "I was so happy," she recalls.
Finally, the family reached a refugee camp on the Turkish border. Ahlam, tormented by thoughts of Delene, the daughter left behind with relatives, sent her husband back home to find her.
He discovered she was still in Dohuk, and when the fighting stopped, the child was delivered to the camp by relatives and reunited with her family. Now a long-haired teenager with dimples, Delene laughs at the story of her separation from the family, though her mother still cannot.
_______
In the refugee camp, the family was granted U.S. residency. Officials sent them to Phoenix, but they moved to El Cajon within a few months, drawn by its large population of Iraqi exiles.
That community now includes about 8,000 Kurds, many of whom arrived in the mid-1990s. There are also large numbers of Iraqi Catholics and Shiite Muslims from southern Iraq.
"First, when we came, oh my God, it was so hard," Ahlam says. The children felt ostracized. They didn't speak English, and they had no idea how to dress. Peter, now a hipster in jeans who has recorded his own rap song, still cringes at the memory of wearing tuxedo pants ? his nicest item ? to school.
At home, their mother felt equally out of place. Knowing that her heavy Kurdish dress and cotton head scarf would draw stares, she would change into clothes bought in the United States to run to the store.
She volunteered every day in Delene's preschool classroom and eventually was hired as a teacher's aide. And each evening, Ahlam, who spoke little English but had studied it, would sit her children on the floor and drill new words into their heads.
"She taught us the alphabet," says Peter, who was dropped into fourth grade at age 11.
"We got into fights," he says. Other students would make fun of him and his siblings. "Oh, you don't know how to speak English," they would tell him. "Go back to Iraq."
"That's how I learned English," he recalls with a laugh.
Slowly, the family began to fit in. They acquired a taste for pizza. The girls, who keep a pile of fashion magazines in the bathroom, learned to paint their toenails. The boys threw themselves into school sports. Varsity letters, prom pictures and other symbols of American high school life dot their home. And Ahlam Almissouri has a prize of her own: She proudly shows off a certificate in early childhood education from nearby Cuyamaca Community College.
It was more difficult for Tariq to find his place, family members say. Accustomed to commanding troops, he now drove a taxi, ferrying tourists around San Diego. "He thinks it's kind of like a slave job, because he picks up luggage," Delene says.
But he saw no other option. Until recently.
_______
Last fall, as the buildup to war began, Tariq, 47, was approached, like many others in El Cajon, by organizers of the Free Iraqi Forces, a U.S.-funded group that hopes to become the nucleus of Iraq's new army. Would he go to Hungary to train, then lend his language skills and knowledge of the Iraqi military and terrain to U.S. forces in Iraq?
Government agents came to the Almissouri home, members of the family said. Ahlam put out cookies and tea, and listened as they asked her husband what kind of government he wished for Iraq and whether he would like to see Hussein removed.
Tariq answered the call ? talking, as he prepared for departure ? of holding a position of responsibility again and of being reunited with friends and family.
Ahlam understood. But then her husband did something that nearly broke her heart: He signed up her beloved second son, Shivan, 21, to go with him. "She went crazy when she found out," says Beri.
Since graduating from high school a few years before, Shivan had drifted a bit, his siblings say. Some of his friends drank, and the family was worried that his life was not headed in the right direction.
Tariq felt that a stint helping the U.S. Army would do wonders for Shivan. Peter, who attends community college and wants to become a doctor, could stay in California, watch over the family and take over his father's cab business.
In February, father and son left. The house felt empty.
Ahlam was sick with worry about what might happen to her son; she knew her husband could take care of himself. And with the family breadwinner gone, making ends meet was even more difficult than it had already been on a taxi driver's earnings. Peter started driving his father's cab on weekends. Beri chipped in some earnings from her job in a coffee shop.
Whenever the telephone rang, the whole family ran for it. Shivan called, saying he had left Hungary but couldn't tell them where he was. He called again a few weeks later to say he was fine, and happy; his mother should not worry.
A letter arrived from Tariq, posted from Hungary, full of dreams for the future. Then, when the major fighting stopped, came his call with the news that he would not return. Ten days later, he called again. He had been to Baghdad. He hoped for an important role in Iraq's reconstruction.
In El Cajon, the TV flickers constantly with scenes from the foreign land that the Almissouris still, reflexively, refer to as home. Although they live for the times the phone rings with news from afar, the calls present an unexpected quandary: What happens to a family when they can't agree where home is?
"We are all confused right now," says Peter, who is nevertheless proud that his father wants to help rebuild Iraq.
Tariq, Peter says, "was a military man. He wants to have that back. He wants to have us follow him. He thinks it might be something we have been waiting for all this time. But really, he's been waiting all this time."
Beri doesn't want to go back. "That's not where I belong," she says.
Delene, who has almost no memory of Iraq, says she would like to go for a long visit. Zeen, 17, and Ayad, 16, echo that.
Their mother listens, her anxiety rising. She wishes that her children wanted to move back. She wishes that Iraq could offer them the opportunities they have here. She wishes Shivan would come home.
"I feel confused and trapped," she says.
"If I didn't have my kids, I would go back. But if I'm not with my children, I don't have a home."
EL CAJON, Calif. -- Ahlam Almissouri got the summons she had been waiting 12 years for last month.
Her husband, Tariq, a former colonel in the Iraqi army who had returned to the Middle East to help the U.S. oust Saddam Hussein, telephoned their home in this San Diego suburb and told her to start packing.
"Get ready to come back," he said. Hussein was finished. The Kurdish family's long exile was finally over.
Hope and joy light Almissouri's eyes at the thought of going back ? living again near her mother at her old home in Dohuk, in northern Iraq, near Turkey. Then she looks at her children, chattering across the room in the argot of the Southern California suburbs, and her face falls.
All six of them, now teenagers and young adults, were born in Iraq. They burn with hatred for Hussein. And seared into their memories is the family's terrible flight from his army in 1991, through the rugged mountains to Turkey. During those bleak, snowy days, the youngest daughter was left behind (they were later reunited) and the oldest daughter ? 8 at the time ? was plagued by a bullet wound to the wrist that needed medical attention.
But as they recount those frightening times, these kids could be any of their El Cajon peers, except for the details: "Oh, yeah, HEL-LO," says Beri, now 20, referring to the terror she felt in the mountains. She doesn't dwell on the topic, though, and the children's conversation slips easily from the long-ago journey to school, to music and to war.
How could these American children pack up and move back to Dohuk? their mother wonders. How could she feel at home in a place where her children don't feel comfortable?
"I am in the middle," she says in the family's living room a few days after receiving her husband's news. Watching her children eat ice cream and fight over the remote control, her genial expression crinkles into a worried frown. "I am so confused," she says. "It is so hard."
As the family gathers in front of the TV, switching from the satellite transmissions of the Arabic channel Al Jazeera to CNN, the situation weighs on everyone.
"My dad could come back," says Beri, who has bleached blond hair and perfectly painted toenails and wants to be a dental assistant. "I was not looking forward to the war," she adds matter-of-factly, "because I knew this time would come, and it's something we all don't want to have to deal with right now.... It's tough, dude."
_______
The family lives in a rented house with plush carpet and bright picture windows overlooking Granite Hills High School's sports fields and the hills beyond. In the yard, Ahlam has planted herbs with seeds that her mother sent from Iraq.
She loves to sip her evening tea as the sun sets, clucking over her plants and listening to her children's jokes. Twenty yards away is a new trampoline, where the children like to bounce their 45-year-old mother in her traditional Kurdish robes as she shrieks and giggles. It's comfortable, but it's a far cry from the sprawling pink house with the gardener and the maid in Dohuk.
Ahlam was brought up in that city, raised to revere the men in her family who fought the Iraqi regime and dreamed of a Kurdish state. At 18, she became a primary school teacher. One day Tariq Almissouri, an engineering graduate, strode onto campus to visit his sister, a teacher there also.
He was immediately smitten with Ahlam, but she refused to talk to him ? it wasn't appropriate for young women to speak to strange men. He dropped by again. She sent him a message: "Don't come. It's bad for my reputation."
But he persisted, eventually winning permission from Ahlam's father to marry her. In 1979 they wed. The next eight years brought them their six children.
Tariq was drafted into the army. Eventually, family members say, he rose to the rank of colonel.
It was difficult to be a Kurd in Hussein's army. For hundreds of years, Kurds, who number about 25 million and describe themselves as the largest nationality on the planet without its own state, have been dominated by powerful empires and nations: Turkey, Iran, Iraq. In the late 1980s, Hussein turned his army on the Kurds in an "ethnic cleansing" campaign, killing an estimated 180,000, including 5,000 who died in chemical attacks in Halabja, a northern city near the border with Iran.
Ahlam Almissouri lost nearly half a dozen relatives there. Meanwhile, she said, her husband had managed to walk a fine line, rising in the army while maintaining secret contacts with relatives who were Kurdish guerrillas. But he tossed his lot in with the rebels in 1991 and rose with them against the Iraqi regime after that year's Persian Gulf War, according to their oldest son, Peter, 22.
The decision upended life for Ahlam and the children, who fled Dohuk to stay with relatives elsewhere. The Iraqi army was advancing, crushing the Kurdish rebellion.
At 1 a.m. on a spring morning in 1991, Ahlam awoke with a start when a bomb crashed down a block away, shaking the house where she slept and stirring up huge clouds of dust. Peter and his brother Shivan were with her husband in another town.
The younger children were with her, except for Delene, then 3, who was at her mother-in-law's house. Terrified, Ahlam grabbed Beri, 8; Zeen, 5; and Ayad, 4, snatched up a few provisions and ran out into the frigid night.
Beri was in no shape for the journey that would follow. She had caught a bullet in the wrist when someone fired a gun at a recent gathering. Though she was not seriously hurt, she was in pain. But a visit to the doctor would have to wait.
For three days, the four, accompanied by dozens of members of their extended family, trudged over snowy mountain passes toward Turkey, their hunger growing. At night, they slept huddled together in vain attempts to stay warm.
"It was snowing, and it was so cold. So cold I cannot describe it," Ahlam says, drawing her arms around herself at the memory. "And we walk and walk and walk. It was so hard to walk in the snow."
On the third afternoon, she heard a shout and recognized her husband's voice calling her name. She turned and there he was, with Peter and Shivan each clutching one of his hands.
"I have been looking all over for you," her husband said.
Ahlam cried for joy. "I was so happy," she recalls.
Finally, the family reached a refugee camp on the Turkish border. Ahlam, tormented by thoughts of Delene, the daughter left behind with relatives, sent her husband back home to find her.
He discovered she was still in Dohuk, and when the fighting stopped, the child was delivered to the camp by relatives and reunited with her family. Now a long-haired teenager with dimples, Delene laughs at the story of her separation from the family, though her mother still cannot.
_______
In the refugee camp, the family was granted U.S. residency. Officials sent them to Phoenix, but they moved to El Cajon within a few months, drawn by its large population of Iraqi exiles.
That community now includes about 8,000 Kurds, many of whom arrived in the mid-1990s. There are also large numbers of Iraqi Catholics and Shiite Muslims from southern Iraq.
"First, when we came, oh my God, it was so hard," Ahlam says. The children felt ostracized. They didn't speak English, and they had no idea how to dress. Peter, now a hipster in jeans who has recorded his own rap song, still cringes at the memory of wearing tuxedo pants ? his nicest item ? to school.
At home, their mother felt equally out of place. Knowing that her heavy Kurdish dress and cotton head scarf would draw stares, she would change into clothes bought in the United States to run to the store.
She volunteered every day in Delene's preschool classroom and eventually was hired as a teacher's aide. And each evening, Ahlam, who spoke little English but had studied it, would sit her children on the floor and drill new words into their heads.
"She taught us the alphabet," says Peter, who was dropped into fourth grade at age 11.
"We got into fights," he says. Other students would make fun of him and his siblings. "Oh, you don't know how to speak English," they would tell him. "Go back to Iraq."
"That's how I learned English," he recalls with a laugh.
Slowly, the family began to fit in. They acquired a taste for pizza. The girls, who keep a pile of fashion magazines in the bathroom, learned to paint their toenails. The boys threw themselves into school sports. Varsity letters, prom pictures and other symbols of American high school life dot their home. And Ahlam Almissouri has a prize of her own: She proudly shows off a certificate in early childhood education from nearby Cuyamaca Community College.
It was more difficult for Tariq to find his place, family members say. Accustomed to commanding troops, he now drove a taxi, ferrying tourists around San Diego. "He thinks it's kind of like a slave job, because he picks up luggage," Delene says.
But he saw no other option. Until recently.
_______
Last fall, as the buildup to war began, Tariq, 47, was approached, like many others in El Cajon, by organizers of the Free Iraqi Forces, a U.S.-funded group that hopes to become the nucleus of Iraq's new army. Would he go to Hungary to train, then lend his language skills and knowledge of the Iraqi military and terrain to U.S. forces in Iraq?
Government agents came to the Almissouri home, members of the family said. Ahlam put out cookies and tea, and listened as they asked her husband what kind of government he wished for Iraq and whether he would like to see Hussein removed.
Tariq answered the call ? talking, as he prepared for departure ? of holding a position of responsibility again and of being reunited with friends and family.
Ahlam understood. But then her husband did something that nearly broke her heart: He signed up her beloved second son, Shivan, 21, to go with him. "She went crazy when she found out," says Beri.
Since graduating from high school a few years before, Shivan had drifted a bit, his siblings say. Some of his friends drank, and the family was worried that his life was not headed in the right direction.
Tariq felt that a stint helping the U.S. Army would do wonders for Shivan. Peter, who attends community college and wants to become a doctor, could stay in California, watch over the family and take over his father's cab business.
In February, father and son left. The house felt empty.
Ahlam was sick with worry about what might happen to her son; she knew her husband could take care of himself. And with the family breadwinner gone, making ends meet was even more difficult than it had already been on a taxi driver's earnings. Peter started driving his father's cab on weekends. Beri chipped in some earnings from her job in a coffee shop.
Whenever the telephone rang, the whole family ran for it. Shivan called, saying he had left Hungary but couldn't tell them where he was. He called again a few weeks later to say he was fine, and happy; his mother should not worry.
A letter arrived from Tariq, posted from Hungary, full of dreams for the future. Then, when the major fighting stopped, came his call with the news that he would not return. Ten days later, he called again. He had been to Baghdad. He hoped for an important role in Iraq's reconstruction.
In El Cajon, the TV flickers constantly with scenes from the foreign land that the Almissouris still, reflexively, refer to as home. Although they live for the times the phone rings with news from afar, the calls present an unexpected quandary: What happens to a family when they can't agree where home is?
"We are all confused right now," says Peter, who is nevertheless proud that his father wants to help rebuild Iraq.
Tariq, Peter says, "was a military man. He wants to have that back. He wants to have us follow him. He thinks it might be something we have been waiting for all this time. But really, he's been waiting all this time."
Beri doesn't want to go back. "That's not where I belong," she says.
Delene, who has almost no memory of Iraq, says she would like to go for a long visit. Zeen, 17, and Ayad, 16, echo that.
Their mother listens, her anxiety rising. She wishes that her children wanted to move back. She wishes that Iraq could offer them the opportunities they have here. She wishes Shivan would come home.
"I feel confused and trapped," she says.
"If I didn't have my kids, I would go back. But if I'm not with my children, I don't have a home."
JACKASS AND HYDE
2000: director of a company which wins $200m contract to sell nuclear reactors to North Korea
2002: declares North Korea a terrorist state, part of the axis of evil and a target for regime change (Guardian)
Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, sat on the board of a company which three years ago sold two light water nuclear reactors to North Korea - a country he now regards as part of the "axis of evil" and which has been targeted for regime change by Washington because of its efforts to build nuclear weapons.
Mr Rumsfeld was a non-executive director of ABB, a European engineering giant based in Zurich, when it won a $200m (£125m) contract to provide the design and key components for the reactors. The current defence secretary sat on the board from 1990 to 2001, earning $190,000 a year. He left to join the Bush administration.
The reactor deal was part of President Bill Clinton's policy of persuading the North Korean regime of positively engaging with the west.
The sale of the nuclear technology was a high-profile contract. ABB's then chief executive, Goran Lindahl, visited North Korea in November 1999 to announce ABB's "wide-ranging, long-term cooperation agreement" with the communist government.
The company also opened an office in the country's capital, Pyongyang, and the deal was signed a year later in 2000. Despite this, Mr Rumsfeld's office said that the defence secretary did not "recall it being brought before the board at any time".
In a statement to the American magazine Newsweek, his spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said that there "was no vote on this". A spokesman for ABB told the Guardian yesterday that "board members were informed about the project which would deliver systems and equipment for light water reactors".
Just months after Mr Rumsfeld took office, President George Bush ended the policy of engagement and negotiation pursued by Mr Clinton - saying he did not trust North Korea and pulled the plug on diplomacy. Pyongyang warned that it would respond by building nuclear missiles. A review of American policy was announced and the bilateral confidence-building steps, key to Mr Clinton's policy of detente, halted.
By January 2002, the Bush administration had placed North Korea in the "axis of evil" alongside Iraq and Iran. If there was any doubt about how the White House felt about North Korea this was dispelled by Mr Bush, who told the Washington Post last year: "I loathe [North Korea's leader] Kim Jong-il"
The success of campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq have enhanced the status of Mr Rumsfeld in Washington. Two years after leaving ABB, Mr Rumsfeld now considers North Korea a "terrorist regime ... teetering on the verge of collapse" and which was on the verge of becoming a proliferator of nuclear weapons. During a bout of diplomatic activity over Christmas he warned that the US could fight two wars at once - a reference to the forthcoming conflict with Iraq. After Baghdad fell, Mr Rumsfeld said Pyongyang should draw the "appropriate lesson".
Critics of the administration's bellicose language on North Korea say that the problem was not that Mr Rumsfeld supported the Clinton-inspired diplomacy and the ABB deal but that he did not "speak up against it". "One could draw the conclusion that economic and personal interests took precedent over non-proliferation," said Steve LaMontagne, an analyst with the Centre for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation in Washington.
Many members of the Bush administration are on record as opposing Mr Clinton's plans - saying that weapons-grade nuclear material could be extracted from the type of light water reactors that ABB sold. Mr Rumsfeld's deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, and the state department's number two diplomat, Richard Armitage, both opposed the deal as did the Republican presidential candidate, Bob Dole, whose campaign Mr Rumsfeld ran and where he also acted as defence adviser. One unnamed ABB board director told Fortune magazine that Mr Rumsfeld was involved in lobbying his hawkish friends on behalf of ABB.
The Clinton package sought to defuse tensions on the Ko rean peninsula by offering supplies of oil and new light water nuclear reactors in return for access by inspectors to Pyongyang's atomic facilities and a dismantling of its heavy water reactors which produce weapons-grade plutonium. Light water reactors are known as "proliferation-resistant" but, in the words of one expert, they are not "proliferation-proof".
The type of reactors involved in the ABB deal produce plutonium which needs refining before it can be weaponised. One US congressman and critic of the North Korean regime described the reactors as "nuclear bomb factories". North Korea expelled the inspectors last year and withdrew from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty in January at about the same time that the Bush administration authorised $3.5m to keep ABB's reactor project going.
North Korea is thought to have offered to scrap its nuclear facilities and missile pro gramme and to allow international nuclear inspectors into the country. But Pyongyang demanded that security guarantees and aid from the US must come first.
Mr Bush now insists that he will only negotiate a new deal with Pyongyang after the nuclear programme is scrapped. Washington believes that offering inducements would reward Pyongyang's "blackmail" and encourage other "rogue" states to develop weapons of mass destruction.
2000: director of a company which wins $200m contract to sell nuclear reactors to North Korea
2002: declares North Korea a terrorist state, part of the axis of evil and a target for regime change (Guardian)
Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary, sat on the board of a company which three years ago sold two light water nuclear reactors to North Korea - a country he now regards as part of the "axis of evil" and which has been targeted for regime change by Washington because of its efforts to build nuclear weapons.
Mr Rumsfeld was a non-executive director of ABB, a European engineering giant based in Zurich, when it won a $200m (£125m) contract to provide the design and key components for the reactors. The current defence secretary sat on the board from 1990 to 2001, earning $190,000 a year. He left to join the Bush administration.
The reactor deal was part of President Bill Clinton's policy of persuading the North Korean regime of positively engaging with the west.
The sale of the nuclear technology was a high-profile contract. ABB's then chief executive, Goran Lindahl, visited North Korea in November 1999 to announce ABB's "wide-ranging, long-term cooperation agreement" with the communist government.
The company also opened an office in the country's capital, Pyongyang, and the deal was signed a year later in 2000. Despite this, Mr Rumsfeld's office said that the defence secretary did not "recall it being brought before the board at any time".
In a statement to the American magazine Newsweek, his spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said that there "was no vote on this". A spokesman for ABB told the Guardian yesterday that "board members were informed about the project which would deliver systems and equipment for light water reactors".
Just months after Mr Rumsfeld took office, President George Bush ended the policy of engagement and negotiation pursued by Mr Clinton - saying he did not trust North Korea and pulled the plug on diplomacy. Pyongyang warned that it would respond by building nuclear missiles. A review of American policy was announced and the bilateral confidence-building steps, key to Mr Clinton's policy of detente, halted.
By January 2002, the Bush administration had placed North Korea in the "axis of evil" alongside Iraq and Iran. If there was any doubt about how the White House felt about North Korea this was dispelled by Mr Bush, who told the Washington Post last year: "I loathe [North Korea's leader] Kim Jong-il"
The success of campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq have enhanced the status of Mr Rumsfeld in Washington. Two years after leaving ABB, Mr Rumsfeld now considers North Korea a "terrorist regime ... teetering on the verge of collapse" and which was on the verge of becoming a proliferator of nuclear weapons. During a bout of diplomatic activity over Christmas he warned that the US could fight two wars at once - a reference to the forthcoming conflict with Iraq. After Baghdad fell, Mr Rumsfeld said Pyongyang should draw the "appropriate lesson".
Critics of the administration's bellicose language on North Korea say that the problem was not that Mr Rumsfeld supported the Clinton-inspired diplomacy and the ABB deal but that he did not "speak up against it". "One could draw the conclusion that economic and personal interests took precedent over non-proliferation," said Steve LaMontagne, an analyst with the Centre for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation in Washington.
Many members of the Bush administration are on record as opposing Mr Clinton's plans - saying that weapons-grade nuclear material could be extracted from the type of light water reactors that ABB sold. Mr Rumsfeld's deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, and the state department's number two diplomat, Richard Armitage, both opposed the deal as did the Republican presidential candidate, Bob Dole, whose campaign Mr Rumsfeld ran and where he also acted as defence adviser. One unnamed ABB board director told Fortune magazine that Mr Rumsfeld was involved in lobbying his hawkish friends on behalf of ABB.
The Clinton package sought to defuse tensions on the Ko rean peninsula by offering supplies of oil and new light water nuclear reactors in return for access by inspectors to Pyongyang's atomic facilities and a dismantling of its heavy water reactors which produce weapons-grade plutonium. Light water reactors are known as "proliferation-resistant" but, in the words of one expert, they are not "proliferation-proof".
The type of reactors involved in the ABB deal produce plutonium which needs refining before it can be weaponised. One US congressman and critic of the North Korean regime described the reactors as "nuclear bomb factories". North Korea expelled the inspectors last year and withdrew from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty in January at about the same time that the Bush administration authorised $3.5m to keep ABB's reactor project going.
North Korea is thought to have offered to scrap its nuclear facilities and missile pro gramme and to allow international nuclear inspectors into the country. But Pyongyang demanded that security guarantees and aid from the US must come first.
Mr Bush now insists that he will only negotiate a new deal with Pyongyang after the nuclear programme is scrapped. Washington believes that offering inducements would reward Pyongyang's "blackmail" and encourage other "rogue" states to develop weapons of mass destruction.
FREEDOM FOR 7,000 POWs
U.S. military forces have released 7,000 Iraqi prisoners captured in the three-week war, including more than 3,700 men who were let go after signing a "parole" document in which they swore not to engage in hostile actions against American soldiers, defense officials said yesterday.
U.S. military police still hold about 2,000 Iraqi prisoners whose backgrounds they are investigating. Among them are 200 foreign fighters who had come to attack U.S. soldiers, 178 common criminals, a number of mid-ranking Iraqi military officers and some members of the Saddam's Fedayeen paramilitary forces, the U.S. officials said at a briefing in Kuwait.
These large groups of detainees, most of them held in a temporary jail in the southern Iraq city of Umm Qasr, are separate from the 20 highly placed aides to former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein who have been captured. The aides, who are among the 55 senior officials wanted by the United States, are being housed and interrogated in solitary confinement at a prison in Baghdad, officials said.
"They're being well cared for," Army Col. John Della Jacono, a top commander of coalition forces in Iraq, said of the top-level prisoners. "They're being treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention, with dignity and respect."
The 200 foreigners in custody include men from Jordan, Iran, Syria, Kuwait and a number of other nations, Della Jacono said.
Asked what the American plans are both for the group of 20 as well as the 2,000 lower-level prisoners, U.S. military officials declined to be specific, except to say interrogators are asking them questions to determine their legal status.
"We're going through a vetting process," Della Jacono said. "We have gone through a deliberate screening of the over 7,000 that we held at one time." Of those still being held, he said, "no determination has been made as towards the disposition of these individuals." Besides being released, other possibilities for them include facing U.S. military tribunals, trials by international legal panels or prosecution in an Iraqi court, officials said.
Special hearings called for under the Geneva Conventions that govern treatment of prisoners of war have been held for as many as 100 of the Iraqi prisoners when there were questions about whether they were regular military combatants and, therefore, deserve prisoner of war status. POW status limits the extent that a detainee can be interrogated and confers some privileges in detention.
A substantial number of the 7,000 Iraqis released were civilians. They were "just at the wrong place at the wrong time," Della Jacono said.
In the agreement signed by the 3,700 or so Iraqi soldiers allowing their release, they said they understood they could return home or to their military units, but could only perform administrative or medical duties. They risk being rearrested if found without the agreement on their person.
U.S. forces transported the released soldiers to their home towns or central drop-off points, and gave them $5 as well as clothing and food.
Meanwhile, Adm. Edmund P. Giambastiani Jr., head of the U.S. Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, said yesterday that he hopes to brief Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld by mid-June on war lessons learned.
The Joint Forces Command's primary missions are to train, develop and experiment with "joint" war-fighting techniques and doctrine using more than one service, and to provide troops to other regional commanders.
Rumsfeld made Giambastiani, his former chief military assistant, head of Joint Forces Command with an eye toward turning the unit into his primary engine for transforming the U.S. military from a Cold War force to one capable of fighting 21st-century wars.
Before the war in Iraq began, Giambastiani said at a breakfast with defense writers, he "embedded" 30 officers at all levels inside U.S. Central Command, which was responsible for prosecuting the campaign. Retired Army Gen. Gary Luck, he said, served as a "senior mentor" to those officers and accompanied Gen. Tommy R. Franks, the Central Command chief, throughout the conflict, even during meetings with President Bush.
Calling the war in Iraq "a gigantic battle lab," Giambastiani said his review would focus on systems and tactics that enabled the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines to effectively fight together, what the Pentagon calls "jointness."
The particular lessons his officers have been pursuing, Giambastiani said, involve how to "drive jointness down to the lowest level," so that Army soldiers in a foxhole, for instance, can call in Air Force, Navy or Marine fighter jets for close air support.
In building joint fighting capability, he said, the premium comes in figuring how to build networks across the services that allow for the rapid movement of data across the battlefield. "It allows us to change the pace and the tempo of operations" to stay ahead of the enemy, as happened in Iraq, he said.
U.S. military forces have released 7,000 Iraqi prisoners captured in the three-week war, including more than 3,700 men who were let go after signing a "parole" document in which they swore not to engage in hostile actions against American soldiers, defense officials said yesterday.
U.S. military police still hold about 2,000 Iraqi prisoners whose backgrounds they are investigating. Among them are 200 foreign fighters who had come to attack U.S. soldiers, 178 common criminals, a number of mid-ranking Iraqi military officers and some members of the Saddam's Fedayeen paramilitary forces, the U.S. officials said at a briefing in Kuwait.
These large groups of detainees, most of them held in a temporary jail in the southern Iraq city of Umm Qasr, are separate from the 20 highly placed aides to former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein who have been captured. The aides, who are among the 55 senior officials wanted by the United States, are being housed and interrogated in solitary confinement at a prison in Baghdad, officials said.
"They're being well cared for," Army Col. John Della Jacono, a top commander of coalition forces in Iraq, said of the top-level prisoners. "They're being treated in accordance with the Geneva Convention, with dignity and respect."
The 200 foreigners in custody include men from Jordan, Iran, Syria, Kuwait and a number of other nations, Della Jacono said.
Asked what the American plans are both for the group of 20 as well as the 2,000 lower-level prisoners, U.S. military officials declined to be specific, except to say interrogators are asking them questions to determine their legal status.
"We're going through a vetting process," Della Jacono said. "We have gone through a deliberate screening of the over 7,000 that we held at one time." Of those still being held, he said, "no determination has been made as towards the disposition of these individuals." Besides being released, other possibilities for them include facing U.S. military tribunals, trials by international legal panels or prosecution in an Iraqi court, officials said.
Special hearings called for under the Geneva Conventions that govern treatment of prisoners of war have been held for as many as 100 of the Iraqi prisoners when there were questions about whether they were regular military combatants and, therefore, deserve prisoner of war status. POW status limits the extent that a detainee can be interrogated and confers some privileges in detention.
A substantial number of the 7,000 Iraqis released were civilians. They were "just at the wrong place at the wrong time," Della Jacono said.
In the agreement signed by the 3,700 or so Iraqi soldiers allowing their release, they said they understood they could return home or to their military units, but could only perform administrative or medical duties. They risk being rearrested if found without the agreement on their person.
U.S. forces transported the released soldiers to their home towns or central drop-off points, and gave them $5 as well as clothing and food.
Meanwhile, Adm. Edmund P. Giambastiani Jr., head of the U.S. Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, said yesterday that he hopes to brief Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld by mid-June on war lessons learned.
The Joint Forces Command's primary missions are to train, develop and experiment with "joint" war-fighting techniques and doctrine using more than one service, and to provide troops to other regional commanders.
Rumsfeld made Giambastiani, his former chief military assistant, head of Joint Forces Command with an eye toward turning the unit into his primary engine for transforming the U.S. military from a Cold War force to one capable of fighting 21st-century wars.
Before the war in Iraq began, Giambastiani said at a breakfast with defense writers, he "embedded" 30 officers at all levels inside U.S. Central Command, which was responsible for prosecuting the campaign. Retired Army Gen. Gary Luck, he said, served as a "senior mentor" to those officers and accompanied Gen. Tommy R. Franks, the Central Command chief, throughout the conflict, even during meetings with President Bush.
Calling the war in Iraq "a gigantic battle lab," Giambastiani said his review would focus on systems and tactics that enabled the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines to effectively fight together, what the Pentagon calls "jointness."
The particular lessons his officers have been pursuing, Giambastiani said, involve how to "drive jointness down to the lowest level," so that Army soldiers in a foxhole, for instance, can call in Air Force, Navy or Marine fighter jets for close air support.
In building joint fighting capability, he said, the premium comes in figuring how to build networks across the services that allow for the rapid movement of data across the battlefield. "It allows us to change the pace and the tempo of operations" to stay ahead of the enemy, as happened in Iraq, he said.
SHE MUST HAVE BEEN CRAZY
Ferry Biedermann IPS
Lahib Kishmesh had seemed headed for the good life. Her wealthy parents sent her to Paris in the seventies to train as a lawyer. Her success was to prove her undoing.
BAGHDAD, May 8 (IPS) - Lahib Kishmesh had seemed headed for the good life. Her wealthy parents sent her to Paris in the seventies to train as a lawyer. Her success was to prove her undoing.
"My dear Iraq, my dear Iraq, what has become of you," she reads from the scribbling on the walls of her run-down house in Baghdad's once gracious Ghadeer district. Neighbours crowd the entrance, curious to see what "crazy Lahib" is up to this time.
"Get out of here," she shouts at them. "Where were you when I needed you? Why are you not looking after me, how can I live here without water, with you people all the time staring at me?" She looks dishevelled and much older than her 48 years. Deep lines mark her face.
Kishmesh admits she is "confused". But that, she told IPS, is to be expected "after all they did to me, the way they hurt me, and the medication they gave me."
She has written her memoirs on the walls of her partially burnt house because she was worried the regime would steal her writings. "They have taken everything else away from me," she says. The house has no water supply, and she sleeps on a foam mattress on the floor.
People have different stories to tell about Kishmesh. The local lawyers association denies she was ever a lawyer. The mental hospital where she was kept says she made up the story scribbled on the walls. But several of her fellow lawyers, and an old family friend speak of the persecution she suffered.
In the mid-eighties Kishmesh is said to have defended an Egyptian employee at Babel hotel in Baghdad who got into a fight with a girlfriend of Saddam Hussein's son Uday. The man was arrested on a trumped up charge of theft. Kishmesh represented him before a panel of judges and secured his release, says a lawyer who worked closely with her.
Kishmesh says that following that she was picked up and jailed time and again. "When I realised that it didn't matter what I said, that they would pick me up anyway, I stopped caring and I said whatever I thought."
That, more than anything else, may have earned her the reputation of being crazy. Nobody in their right mind would challenge Saddam Hussein and his family the way she did.
On one occasion she was arrested after she refused to accept new paper money that bore a portrait of Saddam Hussein. Another time she got into trouble after she wrote "Saddam is a cockroach" on a wall in her neighbourhood. That was payback, she says, because while she studied in Paris she would remove graffiti that insulted the Iraqi leader.
Everyone agrees that the height of her confrontation with the regime came in 1988.
Kamal Hanna Jajjou, a trusted aide of Saddam Hussein was said to have been arranging a divorce for Saddam Hussein from Uday's mother, and his marriage with another woman. Uday beat Jajjou to death at a party in the presence of several witnesses.
Uday was arrested on his father's orders and made to stand trial. He was sentenced to a year's imprisonment, later commuted to a brief exile in Geneva.
A lawyer who knows Kishmesh well says she was asked to represent Uday at the trial. Her victory over Uday in the trial of the Egyptian may have made her perfect for his defence in the regime's eyes because it made the defence more credible.
At the trial, though, she shocked the court by pleading guilty on behalf of Uday instead of making the agreed plea that he had acted in self-defence. "She said that yes, he did this and yes, he committed a crime but would the court please have mercy on him," says the lawyer, who still wants to remain anonymous. Then on her fate was sealed.
Saadiyeh Salman, a lawyer who knows Kishmesh says leaders of lawyers associations were the Baath party faithful, and colluded with the regime. Salman herself was suspended by a lawyers association because she won a case against friends of Saddam Hussein's family.
Kishmesh spent most of the last ten years in and out of the Al-Rashad mental hospital where patients spend their days in squalid drug-induced stupor.
Her doctor at the hospital, Saad Mehdi, insists that she really is "psychotic", and that she made up the whole story of Uday. "She fixated her psychosis on a powerful person, as is often the case."
Staff at the hospital says they frequently got 'patients' who had insulted the President or his family. A psychological evaluation was a part of the procedures for this 'crime'.
Ali Al-Khattab, a medical assistant says Kishmesh was brought in regularly. "When she came in she was usually clear-headed," he told IPS. "They would treat her with electric shocks and then release her."
She was in the hospital until the very end of the regime when it was looted after the fall of Baghdad. According to the Red Cross, some of the female patients were raped.
"Iraq has to be cleansed of all the people whose hands are dirty," Kishmesh says. "And there are many." (END)
Ferry Biedermann IPS
Lahib Kishmesh had seemed headed for the good life. Her wealthy parents sent her to Paris in the seventies to train as a lawyer. Her success was to prove her undoing.
BAGHDAD, May 8 (IPS) - Lahib Kishmesh had seemed headed for the good life. Her wealthy parents sent her to Paris in the seventies to train as a lawyer. Her success was to prove her undoing.
"My dear Iraq, my dear Iraq, what has become of you," she reads from the scribbling on the walls of her run-down house in Baghdad's once gracious Ghadeer district. Neighbours crowd the entrance, curious to see what "crazy Lahib" is up to this time.
"Get out of here," she shouts at them. "Where were you when I needed you? Why are you not looking after me, how can I live here without water, with you people all the time staring at me?" She looks dishevelled and much older than her 48 years. Deep lines mark her face.
Kishmesh admits she is "confused". But that, she told IPS, is to be expected "after all they did to me, the way they hurt me, and the medication they gave me."
She has written her memoirs on the walls of her partially burnt house because she was worried the regime would steal her writings. "They have taken everything else away from me," she says. The house has no water supply, and she sleeps on a foam mattress on the floor.
People have different stories to tell about Kishmesh. The local lawyers association denies she was ever a lawyer. The mental hospital where she was kept says she made up the story scribbled on the walls. But several of her fellow lawyers, and an old family friend speak of the persecution she suffered.
In the mid-eighties Kishmesh is said to have defended an Egyptian employee at Babel hotel in Baghdad who got into a fight with a girlfriend of Saddam Hussein's son Uday. The man was arrested on a trumped up charge of theft. Kishmesh represented him before a panel of judges and secured his release, says a lawyer who worked closely with her.
Kishmesh says that following that she was picked up and jailed time and again. "When I realised that it didn't matter what I said, that they would pick me up anyway, I stopped caring and I said whatever I thought."
That, more than anything else, may have earned her the reputation of being crazy. Nobody in their right mind would challenge Saddam Hussein and his family the way she did.
On one occasion she was arrested after she refused to accept new paper money that bore a portrait of Saddam Hussein. Another time she got into trouble after she wrote "Saddam is a cockroach" on a wall in her neighbourhood. That was payback, she says, because while she studied in Paris she would remove graffiti that insulted the Iraqi leader.
Everyone agrees that the height of her confrontation with the regime came in 1988.
Kamal Hanna Jajjou, a trusted aide of Saddam Hussein was said to have been arranging a divorce for Saddam Hussein from Uday's mother, and his marriage with another woman. Uday beat Jajjou to death at a party in the presence of several witnesses.
Uday was arrested on his father's orders and made to stand trial. He was sentenced to a year's imprisonment, later commuted to a brief exile in Geneva.
A lawyer who knows Kishmesh well says she was asked to represent Uday at the trial. Her victory over Uday in the trial of the Egyptian may have made her perfect for his defence in the regime's eyes because it made the defence more credible.
At the trial, though, she shocked the court by pleading guilty on behalf of Uday instead of making the agreed plea that he had acted in self-defence. "She said that yes, he did this and yes, he committed a crime but would the court please have mercy on him," says the lawyer, who still wants to remain anonymous. Then on her fate was sealed.
Saadiyeh Salman, a lawyer who knows Kishmesh says leaders of lawyers associations were the Baath party faithful, and colluded with the regime. Salman herself was suspended by a lawyers association because she won a case against friends of Saddam Hussein's family.
Kishmesh spent most of the last ten years in and out of the Al-Rashad mental hospital where patients spend their days in squalid drug-induced stupor.
Her doctor at the hospital, Saad Mehdi, insists that she really is "psychotic", and that she made up the whole story of Uday. "She fixated her psychosis on a powerful person, as is often the case."
Staff at the hospital says they frequently got 'patients' who had insulted the President or his family. A psychological evaluation was a part of the procedures for this 'crime'.
Ali Al-Khattab, a medical assistant says Kishmesh was brought in regularly. "When she came in she was usually clear-headed," he told IPS. "They would treat her with electric shocks and then release her."
She was in the hospital until the very end of the regime when it was looted after the fall of Baghdad. According to the Red Cross, some of the female patients were raped.
"Iraq has to be cleansed of all the people whose hands are dirty," Kishmesh says. "And there are many." (END)
LT GENERAL UPBEAT ON IRAQ
Lt. Gen. David McKiernan, 52, is the American ground forces commander in Iraq. A Gulf War vet who has commanded the Army's First Cavalry Division, McKiernan now shuttles between his rear headquarters in Kuwait's Camp Doha, and Saddam?s Abu Ghurayb North palace, near Baghdad?s international airport. Recently he met there with NEWSWEEK's Rod Nordland and Kevin Peraino to discuss how the mission is going now that major combat operations have been declared over. Excerpts:
NEWSWEEK: Are you where you expected to be at this point?
David McKiernan: I haven't gone through an after-action review process yet. But I think at this point in the campaign, if you were to stand back from it six weeks ago and say at D plus 43 we're here in Baghdad, we?re turning the lights back on, we're getting power generation back on line, we're working with water treatment, hiring local police and on and on and on?I think it's a pretty remarkable achievement.
Was there a low point in the war for you?
No. Despite the decisiveness of the campaign, there was nothing easy about this. There?s a lot of hard work that goes into everything. But I was never uncomfortable with where we were at. I was never uncomfortable with what the tactical commanders were doing to fight the fight. I knew our logistics would sustain us. We had a couple of days of terrible sandstorms, where we had logistics support out there, but getting it [to the troops] was a challenge because of the weather. But it was all up there. So this business about an operational pause that was printed for a couple of days?that was all garbage.
Profile: Commander David McKiernan
Do you think Saddam Hussein is alive or dead?
I tell you the truth, honestly, I don?t know. I?ve heard everything from he?s under the rubble somewhere to he?s out of the country somewhere else. I don?t know. Saddam, [his sons] Uday and Qusay have not been found. But they will [be], eventually.
What?s the biggest clue you?ve got so far confirming the Iraqis had weapons of mass destruction?
We?ve found lots of evidence so far of laboratory equipment, of documents that we?re still going through to try to exploit for evidence of that material, but I think we haven?t found yet the big, hard evidence. But I think that will come, over time.
Let?s put it in perspective. He had at least the last 10 years experience in moving stuff around so he could avoid inspections, so he has a pretty high degree of proficiency at that. As Iraqis continue to come forward to provide information on the program, that will be a long term [process.] This whole country is a series of ammo and weapons storage [facilities,] so it?ll take a while.
IMG: condolences link
How do you see things going now that President George W. Bush has declared major combat over?
I?ve always said the success of the campaign resides in what we?re doing right now. We have to provide a level of stability and security inside of Iraq so that future government can assure that businesses, culture and education rejuvenates and Iraq becomes a stable country in this region. Right now there?s a period of power vacuum where there?s not an Iraqi government right yet. We?re trying to get the civil administration back on its feet. We?re trying to ensure stability and security across Iraq. But there are still pockets, there are still regime loyalists, there still are foreign forces, there?s crime. But every day is a step in the right direction. The vast majority of the Iraqi people are delighted they no longer have Saddam Hussein in charge in this country. Over the next couple of months, [as] the right conditions are set, this will transition from military primacy to civil administration.
How long will the transition take?
I hope to see over the next couple of months that the right conditions are met for the economy and civil administration and governance.
How do you decide when local groups step over the line and you have to intervene?
That?s easy. The authority in Iraq right now is the Coalition. Those who try to make moves that are not authorized by the Coalition, are in violation. Until there is an interim government [we will intervene.] Institutions or groups that try to take matters into their own hands are in trouble. You have to have quite a presence in the country to make sure that doesn?t happen, there will be instances where people do try to move into that power vacuum and we will have to react to that. Nobody can say that ?this Iraqi doesn?t go to work and I want that Iraqi to go in his place.? Nobody can say that ?I authorize these 100 followers of mine to carry automatic weapons.? Nobody can say that ?the money in that bank is mine and I?ll do with it whatever I want.? That?s crossing the line, and won?t be tolerated.
IMG: Honoring the Fallen
Are there other groups that you?re worried about now that the self-proclaimed mayor of Baghdad, Mohammed Zubeidi, is out of the way?
We?re worried about what are still pockets of Baathists. There hasn?t been a prison yet that had any prisoners in it, so we?re worried about that. We?re worried about black marketing. We worry about foreign influences that come in. We?re worried about certain local influences [that have to be controlled.] This is the first couple weeks of democracy and all sorts of people want to put their views forth.
Soldiers have asked us to ask you when they?re going home.
They ask me that too and I tell them when the mission is done, and as soon as we can. But we?re going to be here a while. I would expect over the next months forces [will be drawing down] but it?s conditions-based. The key to the whole thing is Iraqis stepping forward and taking control of their country. You get institutions like a police force, ministries, local and national governments up and running, then Iraqis are in control of their own country and their destiny and we can go home.
There?s a rumor that the former Minister of Information, Mohammad Saeed al-Sahaf?the one who on April 8 said ?I triple guarantee you there are no Americans in Baghdad,??tried to surrender, but was crushed to find out he wasn?t on the list of 55 Most Wanted.
Troops driving around tell me if they capture him they?re going to put him on Saturday Night Live. They?ll call him Comical Ali.
Lt. Gen. David McKiernan, 52, is the American ground forces commander in Iraq. A Gulf War vet who has commanded the Army's First Cavalry Division, McKiernan now shuttles between his rear headquarters in Kuwait's Camp Doha, and Saddam?s Abu Ghurayb North palace, near Baghdad?s international airport. Recently he met there with NEWSWEEK's Rod Nordland and Kevin Peraino to discuss how the mission is going now that major combat operations have been declared over. Excerpts:
NEWSWEEK: Are you where you expected to be at this point?
David McKiernan: I haven't gone through an after-action review process yet. But I think at this point in the campaign, if you were to stand back from it six weeks ago and say at D plus 43 we're here in Baghdad, we?re turning the lights back on, we're getting power generation back on line, we're working with water treatment, hiring local police and on and on and on?I think it's a pretty remarkable achievement.
Was there a low point in the war for you?
No. Despite the decisiveness of the campaign, there was nothing easy about this. There?s a lot of hard work that goes into everything. But I was never uncomfortable with where we were at. I was never uncomfortable with what the tactical commanders were doing to fight the fight. I knew our logistics would sustain us. We had a couple of days of terrible sandstorms, where we had logistics support out there, but getting it [to the troops] was a challenge because of the weather. But it was all up there. So this business about an operational pause that was printed for a couple of days?that was all garbage.
Profile: Commander David McKiernan
Do you think Saddam Hussein is alive or dead?
I tell you the truth, honestly, I don?t know. I?ve heard everything from he?s under the rubble somewhere to he?s out of the country somewhere else. I don?t know. Saddam, [his sons] Uday and Qusay have not been found. But they will [be], eventually.
What?s the biggest clue you?ve got so far confirming the Iraqis had weapons of mass destruction?
We?ve found lots of evidence so far of laboratory equipment, of documents that we?re still going through to try to exploit for evidence of that material, but I think we haven?t found yet the big, hard evidence. But I think that will come, over time.
Let?s put it in perspective. He had at least the last 10 years experience in moving stuff around so he could avoid inspections, so he has a pretty high degree of proficiency at that. As Iraqis continue to come forward to provide information on the program, that will be a long term [process.] This whole country is a series of ammo and weapons storage [facilities,] so it?ll take a while.
IMG: condolences link
How do you see things going now that President George W. Bush has declared major combat over?
I?ve always said the success of the campaign resides in what we?re doing right now. We have to provide a level of stability and security inside of Iraq so that future government can assure that businesses, culture and education rejuvenates and Iraq becomes a stable country in this region. Right now there?s a period of power vacuum where there?s not an Iraqi government right yet. We?re trying to get the civil administration back on its feet. We?re trying to ensure stability and security across Iraq. But there are still pockets, there are still regime loyalists, there still are foreign forces, there?s crime. But every day is a step in the right direction. The vast majority of the Iraqi people are delighted they no longer have Saddam Hussein in charge in this country. Over the next couple of months, [as] the right conditions are set, this will transition from military primacy to civil administration.
How long will the transition take?
I hope to see over the next couple of months that the right conditions are met for the economy and civil administration and governance.
How do you decide when local groups step over the line and you have to intervene?
That?s easy. The authority in Iraq right now is the Coalition. Those who try to make moves that are not authorized by the Coalition, are in violation. Until there is an interim government [we will intervene.] Institutions or groups that try to take matters into their own hands are in trouble. You have to have quite a presence in the country to make sure that doesn?t happen, there will be instances where people do try to move into that power vacuum and we will have to react to that. Nobody can say that ?this Iraqi doesn?t go to work and I want that Iraqi to go in his place.? Nobody can say that ?I authorize these 100 followers of mine to carry automatic weapons.? Nobody can say that ?the money in that bank is mine and I?ll do with it whatever I want.? That?s crossing the line, and won?t be tolerated.
IMG: Honoring the Fallen
Are there other groups that you?re worried about now that the self-proclaimed mayor of Baghdad, Mohammed Zubeidi, is out of the way?
We?re worried about what are still pockets of Baathists. There hasn?t been a prison yet that had any prisoners in it, so we?re worried about that. We?re worried about black marketing. We worry about foreign influences that come in. We?re worried about certain local influences [that have to be controlled.] This is the first couple weeks of democracy and all sorts of people want to put their views forth.
Soldiers have asked us to ask you when they?re going home.
They ask me that too and I tell them when the mission is done, and as soon as we can. But we?re going to be here a while. I would expect over the next months forces [will be drawing down] but it?s conditions-based. The key to the whole thing is Iraqis stepping forward and taking control of their country. You get institutions like a police force, ministries, local and national governments up and running, then Iraqis are in control of their own country and their destiny and we can go home.
There?s a rumor that the former Minister of Information, Mohammad Saeed al-Sahaf?the one who on April 8 said ?I triple guarantee you there are no Americans in Baghdad,??tried to surrender, but was crushed to find out he wasn?t on the list of 55 Most Wanted.
Troops driving around tell me if they capture him they?re going to put him on Saturday Night Live. They?ll call him Comical Ali.
BEEPING UP THE DRIVER
System tracks driver's face, and sounds alarm when he nods off or is distracted; 30-40% of global road fatalities are caused by fatigue
By Natalie Soh ST
A NEW technology promises to keep drivers awake and alert, and reduce the chances of their meeting an accident from inattention. Called faceLAB, it will sound an alarm whenever it senses that a driver is nodding off or distracted.
Information is captured through a camera mounted on the dashboard.
According to Seeing Machines, which is behind it, the system could be integrated into major makes of car in a few years.
Said the company's chief executive officer, Dr Alex Zelinsky: 'When we talk face to face, we nod our head and smile to communicate what we are thinking. In the same way, we're trying to get machines and humans to communicate effectively; this time, the machine can read your face and figure out what you are doing.'
More than 30 points on the driver's face are captured with an unobtrusive camera mounted on the dashboard. This tracks, measures and interprets the movement of his eyes and eyelids, and the position of his head.
The information is fed to a processor, which uses complex algorithms to figure out what you are doing. Normal behaviour has been factored into the programme, so the alarm will not sound when you blink or cough.
The system can also be customised to recognise personal idiosyncrasies.
But it will sound a reminder to keep your eyes on the road if too much time is spent yelling at your children fighting in the back seat, or peering at your cell phone.
About 30-40 per cent of road fatalities globally are caused by fatigue, when the driver nods off at the wheel, said Dr Zelinsky.
Dr Zelinsky, who is also a professor at the Australian National University, developed the software at the systems engineering department there.
Seeing Machines was set up three years ago to commercialise this. The company recently won the award for technology innovation handed out by the Australian Information Industry Association, and has also been held up as a technology pioneer by the World Economic Forum.
It is currently working closely with Volvo, which has a share in it, on a driver safety system, and has already sent sets out to car manufacturers and universities around the world.
The idea is for manufacturers to test the system and use it to record behavioural patterns among drivers, so they can improve vehicles' design for comfort and safety.
The innovative company, which employs 22 people, is also using elements of the technology to develop screens which can show 3-D visuals.
'The basic principle is to overlay two images on a screen, so that when you move your head, you can see the images pop up or change in 3-D,' explained Dr Zelinsky.
Other manufacturers have come up with such screens, but theirs require a viewer to keep his head perfectly straight while the images are combined, a very tiresome way to watch anything, he said.
'We want to use our head-tracking technology so that you can move, and we can track what you are watching and combine the images to suit wherever your head and gaze is.'
System tracks driver's face, and sounds alarm when he nods off or is distracted; 30-40% of global road fatalities are caused by fatigue
By Natalie Soh ST
A NEW technology promises to keep drivers awake and alert, and reduce the chances of their meeting an accident from inattention. Called faceLAB, it will sound an alarm whenever it senses that a driver is nodding off or distracted.
Information is captured through a camera mounted on the dashboard.
According to Seeing Machines, which is behind it, the system could be integrated into major makes of car in a few years.
Said the company's chief executive officer, Dr Alex Zelinsky: 'When we talk face to face, we nod our head and smile to communicate what we are thinking. In the same way, we're trying to get machines and humans to communicate effectively; this time, the machine can read your face and figure out what you are doing.'
More than 30 points on the driver's face are captured with an unobtrusive camera mounted on the dashboard. This tracks, measures and interprets the movement of his eyes and eyelids, and the position of his head.
The information is fed to a processor, which uses complex algorithms to figure out what you are doing. Normal behaviour has been factored into the programme, so the alarm will not sound when you blink or cough.
The system can also be customised to recognise personal idiosyncrasies.
But it will sound a reminder to keep your eyes on the road if too much time is spent yelling at your children fighting in the back seat, or peering at your cell phone.
About 30-40 per cent of road fatalities globally are caused by fatigue, when the driver nods off at the wheel, said Dr Zelinsky.
Dr Zelinsky, who is also a professor at the Australian National University, developed the software at the systems engineering department there.
Seeing Machines was set up three years ago to commercialise this. The company recently won the award for technology innovation handed out by the Australian Information Industry Association, and has also been held up as a technology pioneer by the World Economic Forum.
It is currently working closely with Volvo, which has a share in it, on a driver safety system, and has already sent sets out to car manufacturers and universities around the world.
The idea is for manufacturers to test the system and use it to record behavioural patterns among drivers, so they can improve vehicles' design for comfort and safety.
The innovative company, which employs 22 people, is also using elements of the technology to develop screens which can show 3-D visuals.
'The basic principle is to overlay two images on a screen, so that when you move your head, you can see the images pop up or change in 3-D,' explained Dr Zelinsky.
Other manufacturers have come up with such screens, but theirs require a viewer to keep his head perfectly straight while the images are combined, a very tiresome way to watch anything, he said.
'We want to use our head-tracking technology so that you can move, and we can track what you are watching and combine the images to suit wherever your head and gaze is.'
THE EX COLLECTOR
The guy who goes around collecting what others have discarded
HORRIFIC HONORIFICS
Long-winded salutations added on the names of the pompous and pretentious
The guy who goes around collecting what others have discarded
HORRIFIC HONORIFICS
Long-winded salutations added on the names of the pompous and pretentious
NAJAF FERVOUR AT FEVER PITCH
The security guard at the Al-Bader Palace Hotel in Najaf was a 300-pound behemoth who reeked of sweat, badly needed a shave and enjoyed pulling out his fully loaded silver revolver from underneath his flowing gray dishdasha gown and pointing it in my direction.
HE FLASHED IT AT me good-naturedly one afternoon on the hotel rooftop, where I had retreated to take in the view of the golden-domed shrine of Imam Ali while making calls on my Thuraya satellite phone in privacy. Safeer wanted to borrow the phone to contact far-flung relatives, and his pistol combined with his body mass made him difficult to turn down. Snatching the Thuraya out of my hands, he dialed a number in Dubai. ?Hussein!?!? he screamed, bellowing into the receiver in a voice that could have stirred Imam Ali from his mausoleum. ?Hussein?!?? When the 10-minute call was over, he planted a sloppy kiss on my cheek, scratching me with his sweaty beard stubble.
I had arrived in Najaf a day earlier, limping into the holy city of the Shiites in a Mitsubishi Pajero that I had rented in Kuwait and that had been acting strangely ever since I?d hit an abandoned military speed bump at 60mph on the highway north of Basra. We had taken the vehicle to a garage in An Nasiriya, a dismal town south of Baghdad where some of the worst fighting of the war had taken place, and after tightening a few nuts and bolts, the mechanic had sent us on our way. Two hundred miles later, the Pajero was stalling and bucking like a rodeo pony, drawing looks of astonishment as we navigated through crowds of Shiite pilgrims.
We found our way to the best hotel in town: the Al-Bader Palace, a gloomy dive frequented by Iranian pilgrims, located on a teeming roundabout a few minutes? walk from the shrine. The hotel clerk grabbed my bags and led me up a dingy stairwell to a narrow chamber overlooking an air shaft, with five skinny beds lined up side by side-each one covered with a half-inch thick mattress and a pillow that appeared to be filled with sand.
At the time of my arrival early last week, Najaf?like much of Iraq?was a city caught between euphoria and fear. Three weeks after the fall of the Saddam dictatorship, Shiites from across Iraq had just finished making a pilgrimage to the shrine of Imam Hussein in nearby Karbala, a journey banned during Saddam?s time. Now they were preparing for another major festival in Najaf, commemorating the death of the Prophet Mohammed. The pilgrims had begun trickling into town the day we arrived; soon the numbers would grow to more than 1 million, a massive human wave that blocked highways, tied up traffic for miles and filled the decrepit quarter around the shrine of Imam Ali with a mass of happy humanity. At the same time, Najaf was still in shock over the slaughter that had taken place on April 10 at the shrine?s eastern gate. An angry mob had surrounded a U.S.-backed moderate Shiite leader named Abdelmajid al-Khoie, along with the shrine?s custodian?a member of the Baath party?and hacked and shot them to death, then dumped their corpses in the street.
Moqtada al-Sadr leads the evening prayer outside the shrine of Imam Ali
IMG: Moqtada al-Sadr Some in Najaf believed that the man behind the murders may have been a zealous young cleric named Moqtada al-Sadr, who had taken over the huge following of his martyred father (murdered by Saddam?s henchmen in 1999) in the weeks since the fall of the government. He moved about town in a battered Toyota surrounded by black-bearded, black-turbaned bodyguards, denouncing the American presence. Other pro-U.S. Shiite clerics had sealed themselves indoors or gone into hiding, terrified that the mobs would turn their rage against them. Najaf in these days was an unpredictable place?teetering between freedom and anarchy, elation and despair?and the week I would spend there would offer a window onto the upheaval sweeping the country.
My primary vantage point was the Al-Bader Palace, a tumbledown four-story building at the edge of the souk, a meeting place for pilgrims, businessmen, gangsters and journalists. The Al-Bader had the only restaurant in town, and the sole offering on the menu was kebab?rolls of greasy mystery meat that I somehow ate for eight lunches and dinners without doing permanent damage to my digestive tract. Located at the busiest intersection in Najaf, the Al-Bader always seemed to be near the action.
Najaf residents run for cover during a shootout on May 2
IMG: Residents running in streets Across the street from the hotel stood a branch of one of Iraq?s largest banks, where agitated crowds formed each morning, attempting to exchange 10,000-dinar notes for 250-dinar bills: merchants had refuse to accept the larger denominations since a spate of bank robberies swept the country just after the regime?s collapse. The bank offered only 8,000 dinars for every 10,000-dinar note, infuriating people such as my translator, an English teacher from Basra whose entire salary had been paid with the larger bills. ?This is a nation of Ali Babas,? he told me, referring to the famous thief of Arab lore. Nearby sprawled the Shiite cemetery, the largest in Iraq; on my second night in town members of Najaf?s new police force chased four suspects in the Khoie killing into the graveyard, engaging them in an hour-long gunfight that echoed through the city. All the suspects, it turned out, were followers of the cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
The hotel?s main attraction was the gargantuan Safeer, a relative of the owner, who guarded the hotel and its parking lot at night. Chain-smoking ?Pine? Iraqi cigarettes and hustling journalists for money and phone access, Safeer proudly displayed a laminated paper badge given to him by the newly formed Najaf city council. It identified him as a newly recruited member of the municipal police force?a measure of how desperate the situation had become in the holy city of the Shiites.
As the Prophet Mohammed?s death anniversary approached, moving around Najaf became nearly impossible. Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims filled the town, flooding the muddy warrens around the shrine of Imam Ali. Boisterous youths carried green and black Shia flags?similar to those borne by the celebrated imam and his son Hussein into battle in seventh-century Iraq-through the streets, joining a throng of donkey carts, female pilgrims in black chadors and vendors of coconut cakes, incense, rosary beads, apples, prayer rugs and a thousand other items. On the day of the festival, Safeer had the idea, deeply unwise in retrospect, to visit the headquarters of Moqtada al-Sadr, one block from the shrine. We set out from the hotel at 9 a.m. in the crippled Pajero, and within a 100 yards we were engulfed by a sea of humanity. The mob surged around the vehicle, banging their fists against the windows in what first seemed an exuberant greeting, but quickly turned threatening. The driver hunched over the steering wheel, nervously inching forward; children darted in front of the Pajero, narrowly avoiding being crushed beneath the massive tires. I begged the driver to be careful; all it would take was one child to fall under the wheels to turn the mob against us. Finally we stopped dead in the center of an alley, surrounded by a solid mass of singing, dancing, screaming celebrants. Then Safeer came to the rescue. The 300-pound bodyguard climbed out of the Pajero, elbowed his way to the front of the car, and cleared a path through the sea of pilgrims. Inch by inch, foot by foot, we painstakingly made our way to the entrance of Moqtada al-Sadr?s alley. The holy man, it turned out, wasn?t home.
I caught up with the cleric two days later at the Mosque of Kufa, the site of the murder of Imam Ali, the Prophet Mohammed?s son-in-law and the spiritual forefather of the Shiites. The mosque was the same place from which Sadr?s father, Mohammed Sadeq al-Sadr, gave fiery speeches after Friday prayers in which he called for freedom of religion and demanded that the regime release political prisoners. In the spring of 1999, after defying warnings from Saddam?s security agents to stop the speechifying, the elder Sadr was gunned down along with two of his sons in his car in Najaf. Four years later his second-youngest son had emerged as one of the most visible new leaders in the country, with a built-in following of thousands of his father?s supporters. Sadr was making a bid to control the keys of the Shrine of Imam Ali, which would give him access to millions in donations left there by Shiite pilgrims. He was also criticizing the American presence in the country, causing worry to the U.S. nation builders in Iraq who hoped to empower pro-Western leaders.
Crossing the vast outdoor courtyard of the mosque, I hopscotched across a sea of worshipers and prayer mats and made my way to the marble-columned inner sanctum, from which Sadr would deliver his address. Sadr?s bodyguards escorted me to a vantage point beside the podium. Moments later the cleric arrived. A broad-faced man with a thick black beard and intense eyes, he wore, over his black dishdasha, a white burial shroud, a tribute to his murdered father. The crowd rose to its feet; individual worshipers sang out Sadr?s praises. The cleric?s speech was surprisingly humdrum?a call to ban alcohol in Iraq, a demand that women dress modestly and refrain from wearing jewelry?but the 30,000 followers seemed overjoyed simply to hear him speak. After prayers I followed Sadr down a corridor toward his waiting Toyota, only to be swept aside by a groping mob. The emotional catharsis, after 30 years of brutal repression by Saddam and his gang, was astonishing to observe. But the ripples of violence lurking just beneath the surface were impossible to miss.
Thursday, May 08, 2003
SADDAM'S KICKBACKS
BASRA, Iraq -- Khalan Nahi Asey needed a cement mixer. But when he settled on a reputable German supplier, his boss at South Oil Co. was furious. He demanded that the purchase be made from another firm, Al-Anqa'a, a trading company that Asey knew was controlled jointly by Saddam Hussein's fearsome intelligence agency and a local militia that helped snuff out an anti-Hussein uprising in southern Iraq in 1991.
"He would always say, 'Buy from this company, especially this company,' " said Asey, an engineer who helped put together many of South Oil's purchases of spare parts and new equipment under the United Nations-mandated oil-for-food program. "You knew that this company referred to Saddam's family and his friends. You had no choice."
Oil was at the center of the long and terrifying rule of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Through the direction of his Ministry of Oil in Baghdad and the local officials who oversaw the enterprise throughout the country, Hussein supervised the purchases of parts and equipment by Iraq's state oil companies under the U.N. program, exploiting them as opportunities to enrich his family, curry favor with foreign governments and sustain the security apparatus that kept him in power.
"They got all the oil money," said Mustafa A.S. Badar, chief engineer of the Iraqi Drilling Co., who supervises operations throughout the southern half of the country. "Saddam and his family and the people they knew got everything."
Hussein's government forced suppliers to kick back 10 percent of the value of their deals in cash to his Oil Ministry, according to interviews with current and former state oil executives in southern Iraq as well as trading companies that did business with those firms. Nominally, the payments covered "general repairs and service" on products purchased by the oil companies. In fact, the money was sometimes handed over in suitcases to senior oil executives, according to a former head of the foreign purchasing department at South Oil Co. and an engineer at the firm. Sometimes it was wired into secret bank accounts in Jordan controlled by Hussein and his family, said the head of the purchasing department, who added that he gave the wiring instructions to the suppliers.
"They would always talk about this 10 percent side deal in the meetings," said Saad Mohammed Ali Ashoor, chief geologist at South Oil, who supervises a laboratory of 30 research scientists and frequently orders new instruments. "Everyone knows it. It is not a secret. Without this side contract, the Ministry of Oil would never approve a purchase."
Trading companies and manufacturers from Russia, France and China -- nations more supportive of Iraq at the U.N. Security Council -- were accorded priority in their bids to meet orders for parts and machinery, according to the executives. Companies from Syria, which was a conduit for smuggling oil out of and banned goods into Iraq, have also benefited in that way.
Those supervising purchasing in the oil companies were pressured by superiors and Oil Ministry officials to direct contracts to trading companies controlled or owned partially by Hussein, his relatives and other high government officials.
"Any company that did not include a relative of the government or involve an important political interest could never get a contract from South Oil," said Jamil Mala, the Basra representative of Al-Ramla Chemical Trading Co., a firm based in the United Arab Emirates.
Oil for Cash
It has long been known that Hussein and his coterie harvested vast wealth from Iraq's oil. The country holds the second-largest known reserves in the world, behind Saudi Arabia. According to widespread reports confirmed by three senior engineers at South Oil as well as officials in Baghdad, Hussein's government secured millions of dollars in surcharges extracted from traders buying oil from Iraq under the oil-for-food program, which in the past six years has handled $64 billion in Iraqi oil receipts and fed most of the Iraqi population before the war. Iraq also netted billions more from sales of oil delivered by truck to Jordan, through a pipeline to Syria, and by tanker ships into the Persian Gulf and out to the global market. A study released last year by the U.S. General Accounting Office asserted that Iraq earned $6.6 billion from surcharges and smuggling in 1997 through 2001.
Hussein also took advantage of abundant opportunities to harness the purchasing power of his oil companies to increase his family's wealth and maintain alliances. South Oil Co. alone spent about $400 million a year on spare parts and equipment under the U.N. program, according to the former foreign purchase officer. North Oil Co., which controls the prodigious fields around Kirkuk, had a budget nearly as large. Iraq Drilling Co., the State Company for Oil Projects and the Oil Exploration Co. all had substantial budgets as well. Since the beginning of the program, the U.N. has allowed Iraq to spend $1.85 billion on spare parts and equipment to repair its oil fields.
Hussein's government frequently complained that such sums were inadequate. Starved of money, the oil companies were forced to make do with rusted parts and jury-rigged repairs. Production was slowing. But while officials said the budgets were indeed tight, they also blame the dilapidated state of Iraq's fields on Hussein's enforced system of selecting suppliers based not on quality but on the imperative to put money in friendly hands. Despite Iraq's prodigious oil wealth, cars are scarce.
"I would request turbines [originally] from General Electric and the boss would change it to Al-Anqa'a or another special company," a senior South Oil Co. engineer said. "We never wanted to buy from Al-Anqa'a or these Chinese companies or Russian companies because their quality is no good. Now, it's affecting production."
Despite the fact that they are running one of the most important oil companies in the world, South Oil's high-level managers live in crumbling houses built decades ago, with dysfunctional plumbing and holes in walls and roofs.
Meanwhile, those closest to Hussein thrived. South Oil's former director general, Abdul Bari, a member of Hussein's Baath Party ruling clique, was driving a late-model Nissan sport-utility vehicle between his three local homes in Basra -- one alongside the Shat al Arab waterway with a lawn the size of a football field -- before he went into hiding as the war unfolded.
BASRA, Iraq -- Khalan Nahi Asey needed a cement mixer. But when he settled on a reputable German supplier, his boss at South Oil Co. was furious. He demanded that the purchase be made from another firm, Al-Anqa'a, a trading company that Asey knew was controlled jointly by Saddam Hussein's fearsome intelligence agency and a local militia that helped snuff out an anti-Hussein uprising in southern Iraq in 1991.
"He would always say, 'Buy from this company, especially this company,' " said Asey, an engineer who helped put together many of South Oil's purchases of spare parts and new equipment under the United Nations-mandated oil-for-food program. "You knew that this company referred to Saddam's family and his friends. You had no choice."
Oil was at the center of the long and terrifying rule of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. Through the direction of his Ministry of Oil in Baghdad and the local officials who oversaw the enterprise throughout the country, Hussein supervised the purchases of parts and equipment by Iraq's state oil companies under the U.N. program, exploiting them as opportunities to enrich his family, curry favor with foreign governments and sustain the security apparatus that kept him in power.
"They got all the oil money," said Mustafa A.S. Badar, chief engineer of the Iraqi Drilling Co., who supervises operations throughout the southern half of the country. "Saddam and his family and the people they knew got everything."
Hussein's government forced suppliers to kick back 10 percent of the value of their deals in cash to his Oil Ministry, according to interviews with current and former state oil executives in southern Iraq as well as trading companies that did business with those firms. Nominally, the payments covered "general repairs and service" on products purchased by the oil companies. In fact, the money was sometimes handed over in suitcases to senior oil executives, according to a former head of the foreign purchasing department at South Oil Co. and an engineer at the firm. Sometimes it was wired into secret bank accounts in Jordan controlled by Hussein and his family, said the head of the purchasing department, who added that he gave the wiring instructions to the suppliers.
"They would always talk about this 10 percent side deal in the meetings," said Saad Mohammed Ali Ashoor, chief geologist at South Oil, who supervises a laboratory of 30 research scientists and frequently orders new instruments. "Everyone knows it. It is not a secret. Without this side contract, the Ministry of Oil would never approve a purchase."
Trading companies and manufacturers from Russia, France and China -- nations more supportive of Iraq at the U.N. Security Council -- were accorded priority in their bids to meet orders for parts and machinery, according to the executives. Companies from Syria, which was a conduit for smuggling oil out of and banned goods into Iraq, have also benefited in that way.
Those supervising purchasing in the oil companies were pressured by superiors and Oil Ministry officials to direct contracts to trading companies controlled or owned partially by Hussein, his relatives and other high government officials.
"Any company that did not include a relative of the government or involve an important political interest could never get a contract from South Oil," said Jamil Mala, the Basra representative of Al-Ramla Chemical Trading Co., a firm based in the United Arab Emirates.
Oil for Cash
It has long been known that Hussein and his coterie harvested vast wealth from Iraq's oil. The country holds the second-largest known reserves in the world, behind Saudi Arabia. According to widespread reports confirmed by three senior engineers at South Oil as well as officials in Baghdad, Hussein's government secured millions of dollars in surcharges extracted from traders buying oil from Iraq under the oil-for-food program, which in the past six years has handled $64 billion in Iraqi oil receipts and fed most of the Iraqi population before the war. Iraq also netted billions more from sales of oil delivered by truck to Jordan, through a pipeline to Syria, and by tanker ships into the Persian Gulf and out to the global market. A study released last year by the U.S. General Accounting Office asserted that Iraq earned $6.6 billion from surcharges and smuggling in 1997 through 2001.
Hussein also took advantage of abundant opportunities to harness the purchasing power of his oil companies to increase his family's wealth and maintain alliances. South Oil Co. alone spent about $400 million a year on spare parts and equipment under the U.N. program, according to the former foreign purchase officer. North Oil Co., which controls the prodigious fields around Kirkuk, had a budget nearly as large. Iraq Drilling Co., the State Company for Oil Projects and the Oil Exploration Co. all had substantial budgets as well. Since the beginning of the program, the U.N. has allowed Iraq to spend $1.85 billion on spare parts and equipment to repair its oil fields.
Hussein's government frequently complained that such sums were inadequate. Starved of money, the oil companies were forced to make do with rusted parts and jury-rigged repairs. Production was slowing. But while officials said the budgets were indeed tight, they also blame the dilapidated state of Iraq's fields on Hussein's enforced system of selecting suppliers based not on quality but on the imperative to put money in friendly hands. Despite Iraq's prodigious oil wealth, cars are scarce.
"I would request turbines [originally] from General Electric and the boss would change it to Al-Anqa'a or another special company," a senior South Oil Co. engineer said. "We never wanted to buy from Al-Anqa'a or these Chinese companies or Russian companies because their quality is no good. Now, it's affecting production."
Despite the fact that they are running one of the most important oil companies in the world, South Oil's high-level managers live in crumbling houses built decades ago, with dysfunctional plumbing and holes in walls and roofs.
Meanwhile, those closest to Hussein thrived. South Oil's former director general, Abdul Bari, a member of Hussein's Baath Party ruling clique, was driving a late-model Nissan sport-utility vehicle between his three local homes in Basra -- one alongside the Shat al Arab waterway with a lawn the size of a football field -- before he went into hiding as the war unfolded.
HAMAS, HEZBOLLAH TARGETED
Wielding new powers granted by a six-month-old federal court decision, the FBI has greatly intensified decade-old investigations of alleged U.S. supporters of the Islamic Resistance Movement and Hezbollah terrorist groups, according to government officials.
Confident that its efforts to track the al Qaeda terrorist network in this country are beginning to pay off, the FBI is devoting more resources to the two Middle Eastern groups, which command more widespread support in Arab and Muslim communities here. Officials say that there are active Hezbollah cells in this country but that most of their renewed efforts are aimed at alleged financial supporters of both groups -- including Islamic centers, charities and criminal rings from Washington to Detroit to Los Angeles.
The stepped-up investigations in at least two dozen U.S. cities were triggered by a November 2002 ruling from a secretive three-judge appeals panel. The renewed efforts are another example of the more aggressive tactics the FBI has been freed to use in the war on terror since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
The court ruling authorized federal agents who pursue criminal prosecution of terrorism suspects to use decades worth of classified wiretaps and intelligence reports from foreign security agencies that previously had been off-limits.
"It's a trove of information that's created enormous possibilities, a whole new world for us," said a senior U.S. counterterrorism official who works on criminal cases. "Before, we were playing with one hand tied behind our backs."
Before the ruling, wiretap and search information from intelligence probes was not usable in criminal cases because the standards for securing an intelligence warrant are lower. Traditionally, intelligence agents kept track of people believed to be engaged in terrorism and espionage, but did not develop criminal cases.
Because of the ruling, federal prosecutors and FBI counterterrorism agents who work on criminal cases are now getting their first chance to examine tens of thousands of pages of wiretap transcripts and reports compiled over many years by fellow FBI agents who pursued intelligence cases. The ruling was issued by an appellate panel that adjudicates investigations begun under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Stanley Cohen, a New York attorney who represents several men in this country who the U.S. government contends are officials of the Islamic Resistance Movement, also known as Hamas, said he has detected reinvigorated investigations of his clients after the ruling.
Prosecutors "haven't figured out how many pieces of candy they can eat," he said. "It's been quite a topic of discussion [among defense lawyers] on how and when the next shoe will drop."
The first shoe to drop was the indictment in February of Florida college professor Sami Al-Arian on charges of conspiracy to commit murder via suicide attacks in Israel and the Palestinian territories. For years, Al-Arian had denied that he was an operative of Palestinian Islamic Jihad -- which the U.S. government has designated a terrorist group because of its suicide bombings of Israelis.
No charges were filed against Al-Arian until the 50-count indictment, the first to exploit FISA information. It contains scores of transcribed pages from secretly intercepted telephone conversations, e-mails and faxes made available to FBI criminal investigators only months ago. Authorities said they prove that Al-Arian helped direct Palestinian Islamic Jihad's worldwide operations. Al-Arian's lawyers deny the charges, saying he is a victim of anti-Muslim conspiracies.
U.S. officials said the investigation into alleged supporters of Hamas focuses in part on the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, the nation's largest Muslim charity until agents shut it down in 2001. Last year, a federal judge in Washington ruled that the charity supports the families of Hamas suicide bombers, paid for many trips by Hamas officials to this country, and "has had financial connections to Hamas since its creation in 1989." Holy Land officials deny terrorist ties.
Hamas is a militant group, founded in 1987 and based in the Palestinian territories, that seeks the establishment of an Islamic state there and in Israel, and works to end the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. It runs an extensive network of social service agencies in the territories and has not targeted U.S. interests.
The probe of suspected backers of Hezbollah largely focuses on networks of Islamic centers that allegedly raise money for the group, officials said. In addition, investigators are looking into rings that commit crimes such as credit card fraud and send the profits to Hezbollah in Lebanon, the officials said.
A radical Lebanese political party that was formed in 1982 to represent Shiite Muslims, Hezbollah, or Party of God, is funded by Iran and is dedicated to destroying Israel and establishing Islamic rule in the area. Its militias forced Israel from southern Lebanon in 2000.
Prosecutors' goal is to shut down Hamas and Hezbollah support networks through a variety of tactics, from filing criminal charges or lawsuits to deporting individuals. One likely tactic is the filing of racketeering charges, which would allow agents to investigate activities that go back decades. By contrast, a criminal charge of providing material support to terrorists could encompass only activities since 1995, when U.S. officials deemed Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist groups.
Many Arab and Muslim activists denounce the probes, saying they admire Hamas and Hezbollah for their armed resistance to Israel.
"Mr. Bush believes Hezbollah, Hamas and other Palestinian factions are terrorists, but we believe they are freedom fighters," said Osama Siblani, publisher of the Arab American News, a newspaper in Dearborn, Mich. "Hezbollah liberated south Lebanon from Israel after 22 years. Why wouldn't the Lebanese be appreciative to the people who liberated them" by sending them money?
"By criminalizing attempts to send money to Hezbollah or to support it, the FBI is confusing and alienating people here who could be allies in the war on terrorism," said James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, a Washington nonprofit group.
U.S. officials believe Hamas and Hezbollah are unlikely to mount an attack on U.S. soil, but say attacks are more conceivable overseas. If Iran decides it is the next target of U.S. military action, "then we've got a real problem," a senior FBI official said.
Hezbollah has "a worldwide presence, and we see them actively casing and surveilling American facilities," CIA Director George J. Tenet told Congress in February.
In recent weeks, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has said that the government is concerned about attacks by "regional extremist organizations" against U.S. interests -- a reference, sources said, to Hamas and Hezbollah.
Some officials from both terrorist groups have said the U.S. assault in Iraq obligates Muslims to attack Americans, even as others indicated they would not attack U.S. targets. "The [U.S.] strike on Iraq would be the continuation of the Crusaders' war, so Muslims should threaten and strike Western interests, and hit them everywhere," Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said in February.
Knowledgeable sources said one person under investigation is Howard University professor Abdelhaleem Ashqar, who U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler ruled in 2002 was "a senior Hamas activist."
Ashqar was jailed for six months in 1998 for refusing to testify before a New York grand jury looking into Hamas finances. Now agents are using hundreds of pages of formerly unexploitable documents -- including bugs of his Mississippi apartment in the mid-1990s -- in a possible attempt to bring immigration charges against him, sources said. Cohen, his attorney, said that while Ashqar once may have associated with Hamas, "there's no allegation [he] did anything with Hamas after it was declared a terrorist group" in 1995.
A Howard University spokesman declined to comment on the case.
U.S. officials say they similarly have tracked Hezbollah in this country since the early 1980s. That is when the group kidnapped a number of Americans in Beirut, and was involved in bombings of U.S. embassy buildings and a Marine barracks there. U.S. officials say Hezbollah helped train al Qaeda members in explosives before they bombed U.S. embassies in Africa in 1998.
"Hezbollah may be the A-team of terrorists," Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage said last year. "They have a blood debt to us. . . . We're not going to forget it."
Abu Nahidian, the director of the Manassas Mosque in Virginia, said recently that area Muslims who dispatch money to clerics close to Hezbollah in Lebanon have come under scrutiny by the FBI. He added that agents don't understand it is a religious obligation to give alms to religious charities requesting help.
"They're listening and asking questions," Nahidian said, and "people have been badly harassed" by the FBI.
He also said U.S. agents should have understood that a man named Mohamad Hammoud was acting on religious impulses when he sent money to Hezbollah-linked charities in the 1990s. But a federal jury in Charlotte disagreed, and last June it convicted Hammoud of funneling profits to Hezbollah from a huge cigarette smuggling operation he ran. U.S. officials say compatriots also arranged delivery of military equipment, such as stun guns and night-vision goggles, to Hezbollah.
Agents are also looking into the possible Hezbollah ties of Detroit resident Ali Nasrallah, who was convicted in 1999 of helping to run one of the nation's biggest credit card scams.
After Sept. 11, 2001, federal agents reopened the case. It could not be learned whether officials are relying on FISA files in the new probe, but Tom Matuszak, the local prosecutor who put Nasrallah in prison four years ago, said, "This is no longer a credit card case; it's a terrorism case."
Wielding new powers granted by a six-month-old federal court decision, the FBI has greatly intensified decade-old investigations of alleged U.S. supporters of the Islamic Resistance Movement and Hezbollah terrorist groups, according to government officials.
Confident that its efforts to track the al Qaeda terrorist network in this country are beginning to pay off, the FBI is devoting more resources to the two Middle Eastern groups, which command more widespread support in Arab and Muslim communities here. Officials say that there are active Hezbollah cells in this country but that most of their renewed efforts are aimed at alleged financial supporters of both groups -- including Islamic centers, charities and criminal rings from Washington to Detroit to Los Angeles.
The stepped-up investigations in at least two dozen U.S. cities were triggered by a November 2002 ruling from a secretive three-judge appeals panel. The renewed efforts are another example of the more aggressive tactics the FBI has been freed to use in the war on terror since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
The court ruling authorized federal agents who pursue criminal prosecution of terrorism suspects to use decades worth of classified wiretaps and intelligence reports from foreign security agencies that previously had been off-limits.
"It's a trove of information that's created enormous possibilities, a whole new world for us," said a senior U.S. counterterrorism official who works on criminal cases. "Before, we were playing with one hand tied behind our backs."
Before the ruling, wiretap and search information from intelligence probes was not usable in criminal cases because the standards for securing an intelligence warrant are lower. Traditionally, intelligence agents kept track of people believed to be engaged in terrorism and espionage, but did not develop criminal cases.
Because of the ruling, federal prosecutors and FBI counterterrorism agents who work on criminal cases are now getting their first chance to examine tens of thousands of pages of wiretap transcripts and reports compiled over many years by fellow FBI agents who pursued intelligence cases. The ruling was issued by an appellate panel that adjudicates investigations begun under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Stanley Cohen, a New York attorney who represents several men in this country who the U.S. government contends are officials of the Islamic Resistance Movement, also known as Hamas, said he has detected reinvigorated investigations of his clients after the ruling.
Prosecutors "haven't figured out how many pieces of candy they can eat," he said. "It's been quite a topic of discussion [among defense lawyers] on how and when the next shoe will drop."
The first shoe to drop was the indictment in February of Florida college professor Sami Al-Arian on charges of conspiracy to commit murder via suicide attacks in Israel and the Palestinian territories. For years, Al-Arian had denied that he was an operative of Palestinian Islamic Jihad -- which the U.S. government has designated a terrorist group because of its suicide bombings of Israelis.
No charges were filed against Al-Arian until the 50-count indictment, the first to exploit FISA information. It contains scores of transcribed pages from secretly intercepted telephone conversations, e-mails and faxes made available to FBI criminal investigators only months ago. Authorities said they prove that Al-Arian helped direct Palestinian Islamic Jihad's worldwide operations. Al-Arian's lawyers deny the charges, saying he is a victim of anti-Muslim conspiracies.
U.S. officials said the investigation into alleged supporters of Hamas focuses in part on the Texas-based Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, the nation's largest Muslim charity until agents shut it down in 2001. Last year, a federal judge in Washington ruled that the charity supports the families of Hamas suicide bombers, paid for many trips by Hamas officials to this country, and "has had financial connections to Hamas since its creation in 1989." Holy Land officials deny terrorist ties.
Hamas is a militant group, founded in 1987 and based in the Palestinian territories, that seeks the establishment of an Islamic state there and in Israel, and works to end the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. It runs an extensive network of social service agencies in the territories and has not targeted U.S. interests.
The probe of suspected backers of Hezbollah largely focuses on networks of Islamic centers that allegedly raise money for the group, officials said. In addition, investigators are looking into rings that commit crimes such as credit card fraud and send the profits to Hezbollah in Lebanon, the officials said.
A radical Lebanese political party that was formed in 1982 to represent Shiite Muslims, Hezbollah, or Party of God, is funded by Iran and is dedicated to destroying Israel and establishing Islamic rule in the area. Its militias forced Israel from southern Lebanon in 2000.
Prosecutors' goal is to shut down Hamas and Hezbollah support networks through a variety of tactics, from filing criminal charges or lawsuits to deporting individuals. One likely tactic is the filing of racketeering charges, which would allow agents to investigate activities that go back decades. By contrast, a criminal charge of providing material support to terrorists could encompass only activities since 1995, when U.S. officials deemed Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist groups.
Many Arab and Muslim activists denounce the probes, saying they admire Hamas and Hezbollah for their armed resistance to Israel.
"Mr. Bush believes Hezbollah, Hamas and other Palestinian factions are terrorists, but we believe they are freedom fighters," said Osama Siblani, publisher of the Arab American News, a newspaper in Dearborn, Mich. "Hezbollah liberated south Lebanon from Israel after 22 years. Why wouldn't the Lebanese be appreciative to the people who liberated them" by sending them money?
"By criminalizing attempts to send money to Hezbollah or to support it, the FBI is confusing and alienating people here who could be allies in the war on terrorism," said James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, a Washington nonprofit group.
U.S. officials believe Hamas and Hezbollah are unlikely to mount an attack on U.S. soil, but say attacks are more conceivable overseas. If Iran decides it is the next target of U.S. military action, "then we've got a real problem," a senior FBI official said.
Hezbollah has "a worldwide presence, and we see them actively casing and surveilling American facilities," CIA Director George J. Tenet told Congress in February.
In recent weeks, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has said that the government is concerned about attacks by "regional extremist organizations" against U.S. interests -- a reference, sources said, to Hamas and Hezbollah.
Some officials from both terrorist groups have said the U.S. assault in Iraq obligates Muslims to attack Americans, even as others indicated they would not attack U.S. targets. "The [U.S.] strike on Iraq would be the continuation of the Crusaders' war, so Muslims should threaten and strike Western interests, and hit them everywhere," Hamas spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said in February.
Knowledgeable sources said one person under investigation is Howard University professor Abdelhaleem Ashqar, who U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler ruled in 2002 was "a senior Hamas activist."
Ashqar was jailed for six months in 1998 for refusing to testify before a New York grand jury looking into Hamas finances. Now agents are using hundreds of pages of formerly unexploitable documents -- including bugs of his Mississippi apartment in the mid-1990s -- in a possible attempt to bring immigration charges against him, sources said. Cohen, his attorney, said that while Ashqar once may have associated with Hamas, "there's no allegation [he] did anything with Hamas after it was declared a terrorist group" in 1995.
A Howard University spokesman declined to comment on the case.
U.S. officials say they similarly have tracked Hezbollah in this country since the early 1980s. That is when the group kidnapped a number of Americans in Beirut, and was involved in bombings of U.S. embassy buildings and a Marine barracks there. U.S. officials say Hezbollah helped train al Qaeda members in explosives before they bombed U.S. embassies in Africa in 1998.
"Hezbollah may be the A-team of terrorists," Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage said last year. "They have a blood debt to us. . . . We're not going to forget it."
Abu Nahidian, the director of the Manassas Mosque in Virginia, said recently that area Muslims who dispatch money to clerics close to Hezbollah in Lebanon have come under scrutiny by the FBI. He added that agents don't understand it is a religious obligation to give alms to religious charities requesting help.
"They're listening and asking questions," Nahidian said, and "people have been badly harassed" by the FBI.
He also said U.S. agents should have understood that a man named Mohamad Hammoud was acting on religious impulses when he sent money to Hezbollah-linked charities in the 1990s. But a federal jury in Charlotte disagreed, and last June it convicted Hammoud of funneling profits to Hezbollah from a huge cigarette smuggling operation he ran. U.S. officials say compatriots also arranged delivery of military equipment, such as stun guns and night-vision goggles, to Hezbollah.
Agents are also looking into the possible Hezbollah ties of Detroit resident Ali Nasrallah, who was convicted in 1999 of helping to run one of the nation's biggest credit card scams.
After Sept. 11, 2001, federal agents reopened the case. It could not be learned whether officials are relying on FISA files in the new probe, but Tom Matuszak, the local prosecutor who put Nasrallah in prison four years ago, said, "This is no longer a credit card case; it's a terrorism case."
REBUILDING ROMANCE IN BASRA
BASRA, Iraq -- Ahmed Mahood's is a fairy-tale love story. After fleeing Iraq 11 years ago, the 32-year-old returned to his homeland in March with the U.S. military and helped depose the hated Saddam Hussein. On Wednesday, he married the beautiful young woman he had last seen when she was 9.
"I just remember she was very cute," he said of his bride, Rana, during the wedding celebrations. In the year he and his cousin were engaged, he only had Rana's picture, her voice on the telephone and her e-mails to treasure.
In the predominantly Shiite south, the past two months were a holy time when people do not marry, celebrate or listen to music. The war, too, intervened. Now, couples who could not marry for months -- or in some cases for years because grooms were in hiding from Saddam's regime -- are getting married.
The celebrations are raucous but bittersweet, as the couples face the future full of hope for a happier life without Saddam -- yet uncertain about their prospects in this shattered country. Indeed, at rites where men normally carry guns to fire off in wild salutes of happiness, today's grooms are carrying them for protection.
Alaa Abass' wedding was not gilded with happily-ever-after optimism. After the ceremony Tuesday, the 30-year-old took his bride back to his home in one of Basra's poor neighborhoods, speeding through an apocalyptic landscape in this once beautiful city. Whirls of silver lining that looters had stripped from telecommunications cables lay in ribbons all over the road like a present for the bride. Barefoot children ran screaming happily beside the wedding convoy.
Mahood, a handsome, energetic man who came back to his country as a member of the Pentagon-trained Free Iraqi Forces, plans to bring his wife home to Portland, Ore. But the best hope the thoughtful, restrained Abass has is to get out of the Hayaneya neighborhood, known in Basra as the main den of the Ali Babas -- the popular nickname here for looters and thieves.
Iraqi weddings are loud, exuberant affairs, Flower-decked wedding cars, trailed by convoys of buses and vans, race through the streets tooting their horns. Musicians, squashed with their instruments into taxis, blast out sounds. Dancers pulsate wildly on flatbed trucks.
But compared to the usual Iraqi wedding tradition, this week's celebrations were considered tame. Families are avoiding large ostentatious celebrations because of poor security and the losses of the war.
"A lot of people were killed or hurt in the war. We've got to respect their feelings," said Mahood, who proudly wore his camouflage uniform, with the U.S. flag on his shoulder, for the first part of Wednesday's celebrations.
As he and his family members danced ecstatically in his family home, his mother, dying of lung cancer, lay on her back on a mat in the corner watching a dreamed-of event unfold before her eyes.
When Mahood became engaged to his cousin last May, he never imagined that within a year he would be getting married in an Iraq free of Saddam.
In 1991, when Shiites in the south rose up against the regime in the wake of the Persian Gulf War, Mahood fought with the rebels for two days before Saddam's army regained control of Basra. The regime arrested his brother, who had not been a part of the rebellion, in order to pressure him to surrender to them.
"My father said, `If you turn yourself in, you'll be shot for sure.' " Mahood fled, seeking help from the U.S. Army, and was eventually granted asylum.
After he went to the Americans, another brother was detained. But eventually, both brothers were freed by the regime.
When Mahood wanted to marry, he consulted his family, who recommended the match to him. But he made the decision that Rana was the one for him. And with his connections to America and good looks, he was clearly a catch for Rana, who has carried his picture with her since she was 17.
His wedding plan had to be secret. In January, he knew he was coming to Iraq but could say nothing to his fiancee because of military secrecy.
"I said, `What do you think if some day I'm going to be there at your door? How will you feel?' She said, `It's not going to happen.' I said, `Wait and see.' "
Soon after he entered the southern city of Umm al Qasr as part of the Army's 354th Civil Affairs Brigade, his family in Iraq saw him interviewed on CNN. The whole family, including Rana, turned up at his unit to see him. It was the first time he had seen his fiancee since she was 9. Now he's stationed in Baghdad and asked for 10 days off to get married.
Abass also married a cousin, to whom he became engaged to seven months ago. He was reluctant to marry because of the poor security situation, but when a brother visited from the north of Iraq, the family decided to go ahead with the celebration.
"Can you imagine that I go to my wedding and I have to carry a gun with me because I'm afraid of thieves? And when I sleep in the hotel, it's under my pillow," Abass said. He and his bride went to a Basra hotel for their wedding night but were confronted with no water and electricity blackouts.
Abass works as a fisherman on a commercial vessel. The family house in Hayaneya is small and crowded, and he hopes that life in Iraq will improve so that he can move somewhere better.
"The area is a lower-class area, a very lower-class area. You can see with your own eyes how many Ali Babas there are in the area," he said, referring to the dozens of people, including children and women, industriously stripping rubber from stolen copper telecommunications cable in the streets all around his family house.
"It makes us afraid for the future. There are no educated people around here, and people are not logical in how they deal with one another. If I have the chance and enough money, I'll leave the area as soon as I can."
Mahood used to be an engineer working on flat panel displays for fighter planes in the United States but is now unemployed. He is not a U.S. citizen yet but believes his work with the Free Iraqi Forces will speed up his acceptance as a citizen.
"I'm going to take her back home. Here, I don't see a future. It will take at least 10 years now," he said.
After more than a decade in the United States, he said it would be unbearable to live in Iraq, with its problems and deprivations.
"I live in the U.S. and I have a beautiful life," he said. "I want everyone here to have the same life. I hope my country will be another U.S.: freedom, a safe place to live and a future for the children here."
BASRA, Iraq -- Ahmed Mahood's is a fairy-tale love story. After fleeing Iraq 11 years ago, the 32-year-old returned to his homeland in March with the U.S. military and helped depose the hated Saddam Hussein. On Wednesday, he married the beautiful young woman he had last seen when she was 9.
"I just remember she was very cute," he said of his bride, Rana, during the wedding celebrations. In the year he and his cousin were engaged, he only had Rana's picture, her voice on the telephone and her e-mails to treasure.
In the predominantly Shiite south, the past two months were a holy time when people do not marry, celebrate or listen to music. The war, too, intervened. Now, couples who could not marry for months -- or in some cases for years because grooms were in hiding from Saddam's regime -- are getting married.
The celebrations are raucous but bittersweet, as the couples face the future full of hope for a happier life without Saddam -- yet uncertain about their prospects in this shattered country. Indeed, at rites where men normally carry guns to fire off in wild salutes of happiness, today's grooms are carrying them for protection.
Alaa Abass' wedding was not gilded with happily-ever-after optimism. After the ceremony Tuesday, the 30-year-old took his bride back to his home in one of Basra's poor neighborhoods, speeding through an apocalyptic landscape in this once beautiful city. Whirls of silver lining that looters had stripped from telecommunications cables lay in ribbons all over the road like a present for the bride. Barefoot children ran screaming happily beside the wedding convoy.
Mahood, a handsome, energetic man who came back to his country as a member of the Pentagon-trained Free Iraqi Forces, plans to bring his wife home to Portland, Ore. But the best hope the thoughtful, restrained Abass has is to get out of the Hayaneya neighborhood, known in Basra as the main den of the Ali Babas -- the popular nickname here for looters and thieves.
Iraqi weddings are loud, exuberant affairs, Flower-decked wedding cars, trailed by convoys of buses and vans, race through the streets tooting their horns. Musicians, squashed with their instruments into taxis, blast out sounds. Dancers pulsate wildly on flatbed trucks.
But compared to the usual Iraqi wedding tradition, this week's celebrations were considered tame. Families are avoiding large ostentatious celebrations because of poor security and the losses of the war.
"A lot of people were killed or hurt in the war. We've got to respect their feelings," said Mahood, who proudly wore his camouflage uniform, with the U.S. flag on his shoulder, for the first part of Wednesday's celebrations.
As he and his family members danced ecstatically in his family home, his mother, dying of lung cancer, lay on her back on a mat in the corner watching a dreamed-of event unfold before her eyes.
When Mahood became engaged to his cousin last May, he never imagined that within a year he would be getting married in an Iraq free of Saddam.
In 1991, when Shiites in the south rose up against the regime in the wake of the Persian Gulf War, Mahood fought with the rebels for two days before Saddam's army regained control of Basra. The regime arrested his brother, who had not been a part of the rebellion, in order to pressure him to surrender to them.
"My father said, `If you turn yourself in, you'll be shot for sure.' " Mahood fled, seeking help from the U.S. Army, and was eventually granted asylum.
After he went to the Americans, another brother was detained. But eventually, both brothers were freed by the regime.
When Mahood wanted to marry, he consulted his family, who recommended the match to him. But he made the decision that Rana was the one for him. And with his connections to America and good looks, he was clearly a catch for Rana, who has carried his picture with her since she was 17.
His wedding plan had to be secret. In January, he knew he was coming to Iraq but could say nothing to his fiancee because of military secrecy.
"I said, `What do you think if some day I'm going to be there at your door? How will you feel?' She said, `It's not going to happen.' I said, `Wait and see.' "
Soon after he entered the southern city of Umm al Qasr as part of the Army's 354th Civil Affairs Brigade, his family in Iraq saw him interviewed on CNN. The whole family, including Rana, turned up at his unit to see him. It was the first time he had seen his fiancee since she was 9. Now he's stationed in Baghdad and asked for 10 days off to get married.
Abass also married a cousin, to whom he became engaged to seven months ago. He was reluctant to marry because of the poor security situation, but when a brother visited from the north of Iraq, the family decided to go ahead with the celebration.
"Can you imagine that I go to my wedding and I have to carry a gun with me because I'm afraid of thieves? And when I sleep in the hotel, it's under my pillow," Abass said. He and his bride went to a Basra hotel for their wedding night but were confronted with no water and electricity blackouts.
Abass works as a fisherman on a commercial vessel. The family house in Hayaneya is small and crowded, and he hopes that life in Iraq will improve so that he can move somewhere better.
"The area is a lower-class area, a very lower-class area. You can see with your own eyes how many Ali Babas there are in the area," he said, referring to the dozens of people, including children and women, industriously stripping rubber from stolen copper telecommunications cable in the streets all around his family house.
"It makes us afraid for the future. There are no educated people around here, and people are not logical in how they deal with one another. If I have the chance and enough money, I'll leave the area as soon as I can."
Mahood used to be an engineer working on flat panel displays for fighter planes in the United States but is now unemployed. He is not a U.S. citizen yet but believes his work with the Free Iraqi Forces will speed up his acceptance as a citizen.
"I'm going to take her back home. Here, I don't see a future. It will take at least 10 years now," he said.
After more than a decade in the United States, he said it would be unbearable to live in Iraq, with its problems and deprivations.
"I live in the U.S. and I have a beautiful life," he said. "I want everyone here to have the same life. I hope my country will be another U.S.: freedom, a safe place to live and a future for the children here."
GETTING ZAPPED AT CHANGI
SINGAPORE -- At Singapore Changi Airport, passengers walk past a thermal-imaging scanner that instantly shows whether any of them has a fever.
All over the city, taxi drivers, government workers, waitresses, students, bank tellers and bellboys take their temperatures at least once a day. So do visitors to government buildings, reporters going to news conferences and women arriving at the beauty parlor.
Many residents proudly wear the country's new badge of honor: a sticker showing they are fever-free.
It is a brave new world here in Singapore, where government-ordered mass temperature testing has become one of the most important measures in preventing the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome.
The autocratic city-state, which has suffered 27 deaths and huge economic losses from the disease, has moved aggressively to contain the pneumonia-like virus and restore public confidence. So far, the effort appears to be working.
"The government in Singapore can control anything," said cabdriver Tan Boon Hoe, displaying a pile of company-issued stickers that show his temperature has been normal for 10 days.
Checking for fevers is one of the least intrusive measures. The government has quarantined more than 3,100 Singaporeans in their homes for 10-day periods, installing Web cams ? cameras connected to the Internet ? in those residences to monitor people once or twice a day. Those caught flouting the quarantine must wear electronic bracelets that signal their movements. Soldiers and police detectives help track down people who may have come in contact with SARS patients.
Doctors have concluded that fever is the most obvious sign of SARS' onset. To detect cases early, the government is setting up high-tech temperature scanners at all entry points to the country, and it aims to distribute digital thermometers to every schoolchild and household. Officials hope that nearly everyone's temperature in the country of 4 million will be monitored daily by midmonth. The fever checks could continue indefinitely.
"Our social behavior will change in the sense that we will all take our temperature twice a day," said Dr. Balaji Sadasivan, minister of state for health and the environment, "and instead of talking about the weather we will ask, 'What's your temperature today?' "
If SARS persists in pockets around the world, Singapore officials predict that temperature screening at airports will become as commonplace as X-raying baggage for bombs.
The disease has created one of Singapore's worst crises in its nearly 38 years of independence. The wealthy city-state has reported 204 probable SARS cases ? third in number behind China, where the disease originated, and Hong Kong.
Singapore is one of Southeast Asia's most important financial centers and a transportation hub. About 1,300 U.S. companies operate here, and the economy depends on business travelers and tourists.
The government estimates that SARS could cost Singapore $860 million and cut its economic growth by half this year. The number of visitors in late April was 71% less than a year earlier. Singapore Airlines has slashed a fifth of its flights. In many hotels, occupancy has plummeted to 20%. Unemployment went up slightly in March and is expected to rise further. The government has pledged $135 million to help hotels and airlines and is paying some quarantined workers a daily stipend of $40.
Far beyond most cities, Singapore is noted for its cleanliness and order. It is also known for an overbearing form of government that some call "the nanny state." Singapore is famous for banning chewing gum and ordering its citizens to flush public toilets. Individual liberty is second to the greater good. The government has the power to lock up opponents without trial.
In combating SARS, Singapore did not hesitate to impose draconian measures.
"It's a time when a benevolent dictatorship can take action more quickly than a Western democracy," Singapore resident Lawrence Harding said after passing through the airport temperature scanner. "People listen to what the government says and do what they're told."
Some Singaporeans have complained about the strict quarantine measures, but most are reassured by the government's tough response. During the worst weeks, many people stopped going to restaurants and shopping malls, but the temperature checks are helping to bring back confidence and customers.
Singapore's problems began when Esther Mok, a 23-year-old former airline flight attendant, went on a shopping trip to Hong Kong in February.
In Hong Kong, she stayed at the Metropole Hotel on the same floor as a doctor who had recently arrived from southern China. The doctor was highly contagious and apparently spread SARS by coughing or sneezing. He gave it to Mok and at least five other guests, including travelers who carried the bug to Toronto and Hanoi, causing outbreaks there.
On her return to Singapore, Mok became a modern-day Typhoid Mary.
Soon after her return, she was hospitalized with a fever and respiratory problems. SARS had ravaged southern China since November, but at that point, the Chinese government had revealed little about the virus. For a week, Singapore doctors were in the dark and Mok spread the disease to 20 other people.
Among them were her parents, her 73-year-old grandmother, her uncle and her pastor, health officials say. All of them died, except her grandmother. Mok also gave the virus to a nurse who had helped care for her. The nurse passed it on to others, including a woman who was in the intensive-care unit with a heart ailment. Before the heart patient died, she gave the virus to 25 more people, including a man who had been admitted for an ulcer. He was transferred to another hospital before doctors realized he had SARS.
At the second hospital, the ulcer patient gave the disease to 35 others, including his brother, officials say. The brother then spread it to the city's wholesale vegetable market.
Doctors say that all but six of the island's probable SARS cases can be traced to Mok. The other carriers arrived from abroad with the illness but apparently have not passed it on. Mok has recovered but remains in the hospital, trying to cope with her grief and avoid the hostility of Singaporeans initially angry with her for spreading the virus.
"People are finally realizing there is no one to blame, least of all Esther," said Dr. Lim Suet Wun, chief executive of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, which is handling all
the city-state's SARS cases. "She did what every Singaporean does, travel and shop. That's no crime. She came to a hospital. That's no crime. It's really a misfortune she happened to be the person."
In the early stages of the disease, nearly all of Singapore's victims contracted the virus in hospitals. Like the New York firefighters who entered the World Trade Center's twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001, Singapore's health care workers who treated the first SARS patients have become local heroes.
"The people in the early days who went into wards were extremely courageous," said Lim, who received master's degrees in public health and business administration from UCLA in 1990. "The risk and the lack of knowledge at that point were astounding."
Unlike some places where SARS has struck, Singapore was quick to act once doctors understood the nature of the disease.
Tan Tock Seng was designated to care for SARS patients. Special ambulances were assigned to pick up suspected cases. After the ulcer patient's transfer, moving any patients or doctors between hospitals was prohibited, except to bring SARS cases to Tan Tock Seng. Finally, visitors were banned from all hospitals.
The government closed schools and the Pasir Panjang vegetable market for weeks. Health workers, police detectives and soldiers have attempted to trace every person who had come in contact with a SARS patient and ordered into quarantine anyone who might have been exposed to the virus.
Officials say they call quarantined homes at random intervals ? sometimes in the middle of the night ? asking residents to turn on government-installed Web cameras and show themselves. Those who aren't home ? or who don't answer the phone ? are ordered to wear electronic bracelets so authorities can track their movements. One repeat offender went out drinking in bars and boasted to coffee shop customers that he had broken quarantine. He was arrested and faces six months in jail.
At the same time, the government has flooded the public with information about SARS. Top officials have held news conferences almost daily. The Straits Times, the country's main newspaper, runs dozens of SARS stories daily.
Singapore's strict measures seem to have satisfied the World Health Organization. The agency has warned travelers to avoid Beijing, southern China, Hong Kong and, for a time, Toronto, but it never advised against travel to Singapore. On Tuesday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention removed Singapore from its list of countries that travelers should avoid.
Today, this island nation appears to be bringing the disease under control. Five new probable cases have been reported since April 28, and no new infections of health-care workers have been reported since April 17. A total of 1,015 people remain quarantined. If no new cases arise by the end of next week, officials will declare the virus contained.
To detect any remaining cases and guard against the arrival of new ones, the government is placing a high priority on the temperature screening effort. Nurses armed with ear thermometers are stationed at the entrances of hospitals, government ministries and other public buildings to check for fevers among workers and visitors. Those found to have high temperatures are examined and, in some cases, sent to the hospital.
The thermal scanners, which were developed by Singapore's defense industry, are in short supply. Currently, only passengers arriving at Singapore's airport from SARS-affected areas and all departing passengers are scanned. Monitors will soon be in place to check every passenger who arrives, departs or changes planes. Scanners also are being set up to check those arriving in Singapore by car or boat.
The scanner is an infrared camera that senses a subject's temperature and displays his or her image on a monitor. If the person's temperature is below 99.5 degrees, the face on the monitor will appear green. If it is at or above 99.5, the face will appear red. Since the scanners went into service on April 11, 964 people have been stopped for running a fever. Thirty were sent to the hospital, but only one has been identified as a suspected SARS case and is being held for observation.
After weeks of anxiety over SARS, passengers seem to welcome the scanners.
"I think it's a very good idea," said Veronica Diermayr, an Austrian research scientist and Singapore resident who was traveling to Indonesia. "I think they ought to set it up everywhere. It brings back confidence. Everyone can be sure that this area is fever-free."
SINGAPORE -- At Singapore Changi Airport, passengers walk past a thermal-imaging scanner that instantly shows whether any of them has a fever.
All over the city, taxi drivers, government workers, waitresses, students, bank tellers and bellboys take their temperatures at least once a day. So do visitors to government buildings, reporters going to news conferences and women arriving at the beauty parlor.
Many residents proudly wear the country's new badge of honor: a sticker showing they are fever-free.
It is a brave new world here in Singapore, where government-ordered mass temperature testing has become one of the most important measures in preventing the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome.
The autocratic city-state, which has suffered 27 deaths and huge economic losses from the disease, has moved aggressively to contain the pneumonia-like virus and restore public confidence. So far, the effort appears to be working.
"The government in Singapore can control anything," said cabdriver Tan Boon Hoe, displaying a pile of company-issued stickers that show his temperature has been normal for 10 days.
Checking for fevers is one of the least intrusive measures. The government has quarantined more than 3,100 Singaporeans in their homes for 10-day periods, installing Web cams ? cameras connected to the Internet ? in those residences to monitor people once or twice a day. Those caught flouting the quarantine must wear electronic bracelets that signal their movements. Soldiers and police detectives help track down people who may have come in contact with SARS patients.
Doctors have concluded that fever is the most obvious sign of SARS' onset. To detect cases early, the government is setting up high-tech temperature scanners at all entry points to the country, and it aims to distribute digital thermometers to every schoolchild and household. Officials hope that nearly everyone's temperature in the country of 4 million will be monitored daily by midmonth. The fever checks could continue indefinitely.
"Our social behavior will change in the sense that we will all take our temperature twice a day," said Dr. Balaji Sadasivan, minister of state for health and the environment, "and instead of talking about the weather we will ask, 'What's your temperature today?' "
If SARS persists in pockets around the world, Singapore officials predict that temperature screening at airports will become as commonplace as X-raying baggage for bombs.
The disease has created one of Singapore's worst crises in its nearly 38 years of independence. The wealthy city-state has reported 204 probable SARS cases ? third in number behind China, where the disease originated, and Hong Kong.
Singapore is one of Southeast Asia's most important financial centers and a transportation hub. About 1,300 U.S. companies operate here, and the economy depends on business travelers and tourists.
The government estimates that SARS could cost Singapore $860 million and cut its economic growth by half this year. The number of visitors in late April was 71% less than a year earlier. Singapore Airlines has slashed a fifth of its flights. In many hotels, occupancy has plummeted to 20%. Unemployment went up slightly in March and is expected to rise further. The government has pledged $135 million to help hotels and airlines and is paying some quarantined workers a daily stipend of $40.
Far beyond most cities, Singapore is noted for its cleanliness and order. It is also known for an overbearing form of government that some call "the nanny state." Singapore is famous for banning chewing gum and ordering its citizens to flush public toilets. Individual liberty is second to the greater good. The government has the power to lock up opponents without trial.
In combating SARS, Singapore did not hesitate to impose draconian measures.
"It's a time when a benevolent dictatorship can take action more quickly than a Western democracy," Singapore resident Lawrence Harding said after passing through the airport temperature scanner. "People listen to what the government says and do what they're told."
Some Singaporeans have complained about the strict quarantine measures, but most are reassured by the government's tough response. During the worst weeks, many people stopped going to restaurants and shopping malls, but the temperature checks are helping to bring back confidence and customers.
Singapore's problems began when Esther Mok, a 23-year-old former airline flight attendant, went on a shopping trip to Hong Kong in February.
In Hong Kong, she stayed at the Metropole Hotel on the same floor as a doctor who had recently arrived from southern China. The doctor was highly contagious and apparently spread SARS by coughing or sneezing. He gave it to Mok and at least five other guests, including travelers who carried the bug to Toronto and Hanoi, causing outbreaks there.
On her return to Singapore, Mok became a modern-day Typhoid Mary.
Soon after her return, she was hospitalized with a fever and respiratory problems. SARS had ravaged southern China since November, but at that point, the Chinese government had revealed little about the virus. For a week, Singapore doctors were in the dark and Mok spread the disease to 20 other people.
Among them were her parents, her 73-year-old grandmother, her uncle and her pastor, health officials say. All of them died, except her grandmother. Mok also gave the virus to a nurse who had helped care for her. The nurse passed it on to others, including a woman who was in the intensive-care unit with a heart ailment. Before the heart patient died, she gave the virus to 25 more people, including a man who had been admitted for an ulcer. He was transferred to another hospital before doctors realized he had SARS.
At the second hospital, the ulcer patient gave the disease to 35 others, including his brother, officials say. The brother then spread it to the city's wholesale vegetable market.
Doctors say that all but six of the island's probable SARS cases can be traced to Mok. The other carriers arrived from abroad with the illness but apparently have not passed it on. Mok has recovered but remains in the hospital, trying to cope with her grief and avoid the hostility of Singaporeans initially angry with her for spreading the virus.
"People are finally realizing there is no one to blame, least of all Esther," said Dr. Lim Suet Wun, chief executive of Tan Tock Seng Hospital, which is handling all
the city-state's SARS cases. "She did what every Singaporean does, travel and shop. That's no crime. She came to a hospital. That's no crime. It's really a misfortune she happened to be the person."
In the early stages of the disease, nearly all of Singapore's victims contracted the virus in hospitals. Like the New York firefighters who entered the World Trade Center's twin towers on Sept. 11, 2001, Singapore's health care workers who treated the first SARS patients have become local heroes.
"The people in the early days who went into wards were extremely courageous," said Lim, who received master's degrees in public health and business administration from UCLA in 1990. "The risk and the lack of knowledge at that point were astounding."
Unlike some places where SARS has struck, Singapore was quick to act once doctors understood the nature of the disease.
Tan Tock Seng was designated to care for SARS patients. Special ambulances were assigned to pick up suspected cases. After the ulcer patient's transfer, moving any patients or doctors between hospitals was prohibited, except to bring SARS cases to Tan Tock Seng. Finally, visitors were banned from all hospitals.
The government closed schools and the Pasir Panjang vegetable market for weeks. Health workers, police detectives and soldiers have attempted to trace every person who had come in contact with a SARS patient and ordered into quarantine anyone who might have been exposed to the virus.
Officials say they call quarantined homes at random intervals ? sometimes in the middle of the night ? asking residents to turn on government-installed Web cameras and show themselves. Those who aren't home ? or who don't answer the phone ? are ordered to wear electronic bracelets so authorities can track their movements. One repeat offender went out drinking in bars and boasted to coffee shop customers that he had broken quarantine. He was arrested and faces six months in jail.
At the same time, the government has flooded the public with information about SARS. Top officials have held news conferences almost daily. The Straits Times, the country's main newspaper, runs dozens of SARS stories daily.
Singapore's strict measures seem to have satisfied the World Health Organization. The agency has warned travelers to avoid Beijing, southern China, Hong Kong and, for a time, Toronto, but it never advised against travel to Singapore. On Tuesday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention removed Singapore from its list of countries that travelers should avoid.
Today, this island nation appears to be bringing the disease under control. Five new probable cases have been reported since April 28, and no new infections of health-care workers have been reported since April 17. A total of 1,015 people remain quarantined. If no new cases arise by the end of next week, officials will declare the virus contained.
To detect any remaining cases and guard against the arrival of new ones, the government is placing a high priority on the temperature screening effort. Nurses armed with ear thermometers are stationed at the entrances of hospitals, government ministries and other public buildings to check for fevers among workers and visitors. Those found to have high temperatures are examined and, in some cases, sent to the hospital.
The thermal scanners, which were developed by Singapore's defense industry, are in short supply. Currently, only passengers arriving at Singapore's airport from SARS-affected areas and all departing passengers are scanned. Monitors will soon be in place to check every passenger who arrives, departs or changes planes. Scanners also are being set up to check those arriving in Singapore by car or boat.
The scanner is an infrared camera that senses a subject's temperature and displays his or her image on a monitor. If the person's temperature is below 99.5 degrees, the face on the monitor will appear green. If it is at or above 99.5, the face will appear red. Since the scanners went into service on April 11, 964 people have been stopped for running a fever. Thirty were sent to the hospital, but only one has been identified as a suspected SARS case and is being held for observation.
After weeks of anxiety over SARS, passengers seem to welcome the scanners.
"I think it's a very good idea," said Veronica Diermayr, an Austrian research scientist and Singapore resident who was traveling to Indonesia. "I think they ought to set it up everywhere. It brings back confidence. Everyone can be sure that this area is fever-free."
ANGLICAN CHURCH SEX SHOCKER
The Anglican Church in Queensland was investigating more than 150 cases of abuse, Archbishop of Brisbane Dr Phillip Aspinall said today.
He has also criticised as too slow the Queensland Blue Card system which is supposed to guarantee the suitability of people to work with children.
Dr Aspinall said that since he had arrived in Brisbane five clergy had had their licences suspended pending investigation and that the church had opened 157 files relating to complaints of abuse.
He said although he did not have all the details, some some of the clergy had been reinstated. But where investigations had revealed concerns, the church would continue to monitor them.
Dr Aspinall said that of the 157 cases being currently investigated, not all related to children and that some involved adults.
"They're not all recent events, some of them go back to the 1930s," Dr Aspinall told ABC Radio.
He said the investigations were often complex, but the church followed a set of principles in dealing with them.
"If a matter involves children, it's reported to the police," Dr Aspinall said.
"If it's a serious matter involving a currently serving clergyman then the person is stood aside from their duties while it's investigated."
Dr Aspinall said although all clergy were required to have the blue card, not all did.
"I can't say that they all have them because the system itself is slow in issuing them," Dr Aspinall said.
"But certainly before any priest can function in Queensland, they either must show their blue card or must show that they have lodged an application for a blue card.
"We will allow clergy to function in the interim while their application is being processed, but if their application is declined, then those clergy must cease functioning immediately."
He said the church would not shuffle people sideways in an attempt to hush up an issue.
"If a complaint of serious sexual abuse or abuse of a child is made then the person is stood down immediately while the matter's investigated," Dr Aspinall said.
- AAP
SADDAM TAPE UNDER PROBE
The White House does not know whether Saddam Hussein is alive, but intelligence experts are to evaluate an audiotape obtained by The Age newspaper said to contain the voice of the deposed Iraqi leader.
"We don't know whether Saddam Hussein is alive or dead," spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters. "Different people have different opinions ... The tape is going to be analysed."
Fleischer was responding to reporters' questions about the The Age's claim to have obtained a recording of Saddam urging Iraqis to resist US occupation.
The Age reported that two men gave an audiotape of the appeal allegedly made by Saddam to its staff in Baghdad after being unable to deliver it to correspondents of an Arab television channel.
"The intelligence community is evaluating the tape," said a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "The assessment process is ongoing."
But he added: "We have no specific evidence that he's alive or he's dead. Basically we are where we were weeks ago."
In the 15-minute recording, purportedly made on Monday, a "tired-sounding" voice calls on Iraq's people to unite in an underground war against the US-led occupying forces, the newspaper said.
"We have to go back to the secret style of struggle that we began our life with," the voice is quoted as saying.
"Through this secret means, I am talking to you from inside Great Iraq and I say to you, the main task for you, Arab and Kurd, Shia and Sunni, Muslim and Christian and the whole Iraqi people of all religions, your main task is to kick the enemy out from our country."
Saddam and his close aides were the target of two US bombing and missile attacks during the US-led invasion of Iraq which began on March 20.
During the war Saddam appeared in a number of videotaped messages which were authenticated by US intelligence services but has not been seen or heard from since US forces stormed into Baghdad a month ago.
The speaker on the tape warns Iraqis that anyone who agrees to work with the United States in setting up a new regime is "working against you".
"The Iraqi people challenged the whole world by celebrating the 28th of April", Saddam's birthday, the speaker says.
A protest in the town of Faluja to mark Saddam's birthday turned into a violent confrontation between demonstrators and US troops in which several people were killed or wounded.
"It was an Iraqi decision, because they consider Saddam Hussein as a brother or as a father to them," says the speaker.
He goes on to claim that many Iraqis who initially welcomed the US forces were now turning against them. The tape ends with a defiant appeal for Iraqis to revolt.
The tape emerged a day after US authorities announced that family members of Saddam stole nearly $US1 billion ($A1.56 billion) from Iraq's Central Bank shortly before the US-led invasion of Iraq began in March.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said US forces in Iraq had found about $US700 million ($A1.09 billion) and 90 million euro ($A160.79 million) stashed in at least two locations.
- AFP
The White House does not know whether Saddam Hussein is alive, but intelligence experts are to evaluate an audiotape obtained by The Age newspaper said to contain the voice of the deposed Iraqi leader.
"We don't know whether Saddam Hussein is alive or dead," spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters. "Different people have different opinions ... The tape is going to be analysed."
Fleischer was responding to reporters' questions about the The Age's claim to have obtained a recording of Saddam urging Iraqis to resist US occupation.
The Age reported that two men gave an audiotape of the appeal allegedly made by Saddam to its staff in Baghdad after being unable to deliver it to correspondents of an Arab television channel.
"The intelligence community is evaluating the tape," said a US official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "The assessment process is ongoing."
But he added: "We have no specific evidence that he's alive or he's dead. Basically we are where we were weeks ago."
In the 15-minute recording, purportedly made on Monday, a "tired-sounding" voice calls on Iraq's people to unite in an underground war against the US-led occupying forces, the newspaper said.
"We have to go back to the secret style of struggle that we began our life with," the voice is quoted as saying.
"Through this secret means, I am talking to you from inside Great Iraq and I say to you, the main task for you, Arab and Kurd, Shia and Sunni, Muslim and Christian and the whole Iraqi people of all religions, your main task is to kick the enemy out from our country."
Saddam and his close aides were the target of two US bombing and missile attacks during the US-led invasion of Iraq which began on March 20.
During the war Saddam appeared in a number of videotaped messages which were authenticated by US intelligence services but has not been seen or heard from since US forces stormed into Baghdad a month ago.
The speaker on the tape warns Iraqis that anyone who agrees to work with the United States in setting up a new regime is "working against you".
"The Iraqi people challenged the whole world by celebrating the 28th of April", Saddam's birthday, the speaker says.
A protest in the town of Faluja to mark Saddam's birthday turned into a violent confrontation between demonstrators and US troops in which several people were killed or wounded.
"It was an Iraqi decision, because they consider Saddam Hussein as a brother or as a father to them," says the speaker.
He goes on to claim that many Iraqis who initially welcomed the US forces were now turning against them. The tape ends with a defiant appeal for Iraqis to revolt.
The tape emerged a day after US authorities announced that family members of Saddam stole nearly $US1 billion ($A1.56 billion) from Iraq's Central Bank shortly before the US-led invasion of Iraq began in March.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said US forces in Iraq had found about $US700 million ($A1.09 billion) and 90 million euro ($A160.79 million) stashed in at least two locations.
- AFP
FEARS OF GENOCIDE IN CONGO
BUNIA, Congo (CNN) -- Under pressure from the international community, Uganda is withdrawing its troops from the Democratic Republic of the Congo -- but it is creating fears that renewed ethnic fighting and civilian slaughter will erupt.
Panicked Congolese -- fearing a power vacuum and limited role from U.N. peacekeepers will lead to new killing fields -- are desperately trying to escape the country's northeast although most are unable to leave the region.
Uganda was one of five nations neighboring Congo which were sucked into a war in the country and which withdrew forces as part of a peace deal.
But Uganda has since sent troops back into the country to fight what it says were Ugandan dissidents training there. Uganda's most recent withdrawal is to be completed this week.
Taking the place of the withdrawing Ugandans are 800 Uruguayan peacekeepers with a mandate only to protect United Nations personnel.
Uganda says it offered to stay for a couple of more months to hand over control -- gradually and properly, it says -- to a U.N. force with a robust mandate.
There are also contingents of Congolese police, sent to the northeast by Congo President Joseph Kabila.
The man Kabila put in charge, Maj. Gen. Kisempia Sungilanga Lombe, is confident everything will be fine.
"War isn't like a game of football," he said. "Blow the whistle and the match is over. War is something that gradually consumes itself."
Human Rights Watch, based in the United States, said ethnic killings between Congo's Hema minority and Lendu majority have claimed at least 4,000 lives in the past eight months.
"Our husbands are dying," one Congolese woman said. "Our children are left fatherless. Our lives are bad."
The International Rescue Committee, a voluntary relief organization, estimated there were 200,000 deaths since 1998 as a direct result of the war. Many more have died from malnutrition or disease because the war has limited humanitarian aid.
In one Hema-dominated suburb of Bunia, which is frequently threatened by armed Lendu, about 45 people were victims of a single attack carried out last August.
Dselo Dhena, a Hema teacher, said finding peace is difficult.
"We have no peace and we want peace but we don't know who can give us peace," Dhena said. "Even people who surround us seem to be all against us. Nobody for us, only God is for us"
In April, hundreds of people were killed in a massacre in and around the Roman Catholic mission at Drodro, near the Uganda border.
The massacre took place one day after warring Congolese factions signed a political settlement to end several years of conflict.
War broke out in August 1998 when Rwanda and Uganda sent troops to back rebels seeking to oust then-President Laurent Kabila. They accused him of backing insurgents threatening regional security.
Zimbabwe, Angola and Namibia sent troops to back Kabila, splitting the country into rebel- and government-held areas.
Most foreign troops withdrew after a series of peace deals, but fighting among rival rebel factions, tribal fighters and Ugandan troops has continued in eastern and northeastern Congo, including Bunia.
Uganda had backed the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC), but relations have soured in recent months after the rebels demanded the withdrawal of Ugandan troops. The UPC, a Hema armed group, is now backed by Rwanda.
Since the war began, the Congolese rebels have split into more than a dozen factions. Uganda and Rwanda back rival groups.
Near Bunia, people blamed UPC members for violence.
A man, who told CNN he survived an attack in which his six friends were executed at a roadblock, said: "They themselves told us they were UPC soldiers looking for men like us to kill."
Injured, the man was taken to a hospital by Father Jo Deneckera, a Belgian priest and missionary. Groups of Lendu and Hema are armed and capable of genocide, Deneckera said.
"The Hema also killed very many people. Yes, then they will make a genocide," Deneckera said. "But then the other side is the same."
Hema professor Pilo Kamaragi said he fears that with the departure of Uganda troops there will be massacres between the rival factions.
"If it was up to me, I would change the status of Ugandan troops into U.N. peacekeepers," he added.
BUNIA, Congo (CNN) -- Under pressure from the international community, Uganda is withdrawing its troops from the Democratic Republic of the Congo -- but it is creating fears that renewed ethnic fighting and civilian slaughter will erupt.
Panicked Congolese -- fearing a power vacuum and limited role from U.N. peacekeepers will lead to new killing fields -- are desperately trying to escape the country's northeast although most are unable to leave the region.
Uganda was one of five nations neighboring Congo which were sucked into a war in the country and which withdrew forces as part of a peace deal.
But Uganda has since sent troops back into the country to fight what it says were Ugandan dissidents training there. Uganda's most recent withdrawal is to be completed this week.
Taking the place of the withdrawing Ugandans are 800 Uruguayan peacekeepers with a mandate only to protect United Nations personnel.
Uganda says it offered to stay for a couple of more months to hand over control -- gradually and properly, it says -- to a U.N. force with a robust mandate.
There are also contingents of Congolese police, sent to the northeast by Congo President Joseph Kabila.
The man Kabila put in charge, Maj. Gen. Kisempia Sungilanga Lombe, is confident everything will be fine.
"War isn't like a game of football," he said. "Blow the whistle and the match is over. War is something that gradually consumes itself."
Human Rights Watch, based in the United States, said ethnic killings between Congo's Hema minority and Lendu majority have claimed at least 4,000 lives in the past eight months.
"Our husbands are dying," one Congolese woman said. "Our children are left fatherless. Our lives are bad."
The International Rescue Committee, a voluntary relief organization, estimated there were 200,000 deaths since 1998 as a direct result of the war. Many more have died from malnutrition or disease because the war has limited humanitarian aid.
In one Hema-dominated suburb of Bunia, which is frequently threatened by armed Lendu, about 45 people were victims of a single attack carried out last August.
Dselo Dhena, a Hema teacher, said finding peace is difficult.
"We have no peace and we want peace but we don't know who can give us peace," Dhena said. "Even people who surround us seem to be all against us. Nobody for us, only God is for us"
In April, hundreds of people were killed in a massacre in and around the Roman Catholic mission at Drodro, near the Uganda border.
The massacre took place one day after warring Congolese factions signed a political settlement to end several years of conflict.
War broke out in August 1998 when Rwanda and Uganda sent troops to back rebels seeking to oust then-President Laurent Kabila. They accused him of backing insurgents threatening regional security.
Zimbabwe, Angola and Namibia sent troops to back Kabila, splitting the country into rebel- and government-held areas.
Most foreign troops withdrew after a series of peace deals, but fighting among rival rebel factions, tribal fighters and Ugandan troops has continued in eastern and northeastern Congo, including Bunia.
Uganda had backed the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC), but relations have soured in recent months after the rebels demanded the withdrawal of Ugandan troops. The UPC, a Hema armed group, is now backed by Rwanda.
Since the war began, the Congolese rebels have split into more than a dozen factions. Uganda and Rwanda back rival groups.
Near Bunia, people blamed UPC members for violence.
A man, who told CNN he survived an attack in which his six friends were executed at a roadblock, said: "They themselves told us they were UPC soldiers looking for men like us to kill."
Injured, the man was taken to a hospital by Father Jo Deneckera, a Belgian priest and missionary. Groups of Lendu and Hema are armed and capable of genocide, Deneckera said.
"The Hema also killed very many people. Yes, then they will make a genocide," Deneckera said. "But then the other side is the same."
Hema professor Pilo Kamaragi said he fears that with the departure of Uganda troops there will be massacres between the rival factions.
"If it was up to me, I would change the status of Ugandan troops into U.N. peacekeepers," he added.
STILLING PC SECURITY FEARS
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Consumers shouldn't be worried that Microsoft Corp.'s new security technology will wrest control of their PCs and give it to media companies, Bill Gates said this week. They can always choose not to use it, he said.
The Microsoft co-founder expects consumers as well as governments and businesses to embrace the system, which hard-wires security into silicon chips rather than just software. It's designed to offer unprecedented levels of protection against hacking and eavesdropping.
"This is a mechanism that if people want to use, for example, to protect medical records, they can use it," Gates said in an interview with The Associated Press. "It's a lot of work to do this stuff, and we think consumers will want those privacy guarantees. If they don't want them, then fine, ask me about our other work."
The technology has raised eyebrows not only for the absolute control it would grant such creators of digital content as music and movie companies but also because it is being driven by Microsoft, which has a reputation for strong-arming the computer industry.
Gates spoke about the technology, known officially as the "Next Generation Secure Computing Base," at the 12th annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, where developers were getting their first look at it.
The technology is a key element of the software giant's effort to create a more secure computing environment, which would be a tremendous boon, Gates said.
Pros and cons mulled
The creators of top-secret government documents, financial records or other sensitive material could assign rights to sensitive files, allowing them to be viewed only on trusted computers running the system. Anyone else -- hackers included -- would be locked out.
But the same platform could be employed by content creators -- who include software makers like Microsoft. They could severely limit how materials are copied or even how long they last -- a stark contrast from the freedoms of today's computers.
Gates said the format of digital content is up to their creators, and Microsoft is only providing a platform on which record labels and movie studios -- as well as others -- can build. He said it's in the content provider's interest to use simple copy protection schemes.
"What you are seeing now is recognition they need to provide their content in easily accessible forms or else it ends up encouraging piracy," Gates told the AP.
He said Microsoft is not working in a vacuum on the project. It requires broad industry support to ensure secure channels across the computer.
The technology, formerly code-named Palladium, will create what amounts to a secure computer within a computer. Certain areas of memory, the processor and even the channels to the display, keyboard and networks are locked down and accessible only by trusted software.
Intel Corp., Advanced Micro Devices Inc. and others are working on the hardware aspects, which are required before Microsoft can implement it into its operating systems.
Will others in industry follow?
"This won't happen without Intel and AMD deciding both on the processor chip and the system design they'll build these things in," Gates said. "And there's even some work that needs to go in the video display and keyboard."
Users can opt to "turn off" the system when it becomes available, most likely in the next generation of Windows expected in 2004 or 2005. But doing so might well severely hamper consumers' access to digital information that's important to them -- and which may indeed be necessary in their work environment.
Though no one doubts the need for better security, some have questioned whether Microsoft is best suited to be leading the charge, given its software monopoly and its history of skirting antitrust laws.
"They just don't understand," Gates said. "That's like saying because we make a word processor, that reporters write what we want them to write or something. I can give you examples to prove that's not the case."
Some critics and competitors have raised concerns that the technology could be used to reinforce Microsoft's dominance.
Secure documents created in Microsoft Office, for instance, could be unusable on other operating systems or with other office productivity suites.
In the interview, Gates said it's up to other companies to ensure interoperability.
"I don't know what's going to be capable there. I don't do the software on those systems," he said. "I don't hold the keys. If they do the implementation, then it's like saying they have the same features as every other thing we do in Windows. It's up to them."
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Consumers shouldn't be worried that Microsoft Corp.'s new security technology will wrest control of their PCs and give it to media companies, Bill Gates said this week. They can always choose not to use it, he said.
The Microsoft co-founder expects consumers as well as governments and businesses to embrace the system, which hard-wires security into silicon chips rather than just software. It's designed to offer unprecedented levels of protection against hacking and eavesdropping.
"This is a mechanism that if people want to use, for example, to protect medical records, they can use it," Gates said in an interview with The Associated Press. "It's a lot of work to do this stuff, and we think consumers will want those privacy guarantees. If they don't want them, then fine, ask me about our other work."
The technology has raised eyebrows not only for the absolute control it would grant such creators of digital content as music and movie companies but also because it is being driven by Microsoft, which has a reputation for strong-arming the computer industry.
Gates spoke about the technology, known officially as the "Next Generation Secure Computing Base," at the 12th annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, where developers were getting their first look at it.
The technology is a key element of the software giant's effort to create a more secure computing environment, which would be a tremendous boon, Gates said.
Pros and cons mulled
The creators of top-secret government documents, financial records or other sensitive material could assign rights to sensitive files, allowing them to be viewed only on trusted computers running the system. Anyone else -- hackers included -- would be locked out.
But the same platform could be employed by content creators -- who include software makers like Microsoft. They could severely limit how materials are copied or even how long they last -- a stark contrast from the freedoms of today's computers.
Gates said the format of digital content is up to their creators, and Microsoft is only providing a platform on which record labels and movie studios -- as well as others -- can build. He said it's in the content provider's interest to use simple copy protection schemes.
"What you are seeing now is recognition they need to provide their content in easily accessible forms or else it ends up encouraging piracy," Gates told the AP.
He said Microsoft is not working in a vacuum on the project. It requires broad industry support to ensure secure channels across the computer.
The technology, formerly code-named Palladium, will create what amounts to a secure computer within a computer. Certain areas of memory, the processor and even the channels to the display, keyboard and networks are locked down and accessible only by trusted software.
Intel Corp., Advanced Micro Devices Inc. and others are working on the hardware aspects, which are required before Microsoft can implement it into its operating systems.
Will others in industry follow?
"This won't happen without Intel and AMD deciding both on the processor chip and the system design they'll build these things in," Gates said. "And there's even some work that needs to go in the video display and keyboard."
Users can opt to "turn off" the system when it becomes available, most likely in the next generation of Windows expected in 2004 or 2005. But doing so might well severely hamper consumers' access to digital information that's important to them -- and which may indeed be necessary in their work environment.
Though no one doubts the need for better security, some have questioned whether Microsoft is best suited to be leading the charge, given its software monopoly and its history of skirting antitrust laws.
"They just don't understand," Gates said. "That's like saying because we make a word processor, that reporters write what we want them to write or something. I can give you examples to prove that's not the case."
Some critics and competitors have raised concerns that the technology could be used to reinforce Microsoft's dominance.
Secure documents created in Microsoft Office, for instance, could be unusable on other operating systems or with other office productivity suites.
In the interview, Gates said it's up to other companies to ensure interoperability.
"I don't know what's going to be capable there. I don't do the software on those systems," he said. "I don't hold the keys. If they do the implementation, then it's like saying they have the same features as every other thing we do in Windows. It's up to them."
AIR ATTACK FOILED
U.S. and Pakistani authorities have broken up an al Qaeda plan to fly an explosives-laden aircraft into the U.S. consulate in Karachi, a suicide plot reminiscent of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that shows the weakened terrorist network is still capable of pursuing serious assaults, officials said yesterday.
The plan was foiled by the arrests earlier this week in Karachi of six suspected al Qaeda members, including two who had roles in the Sept. 11 attacks and the bombing of the USS Cole in 2000, U.S. intelligence officials said. The arrests led to the discovery of hundreds of pounds of high explosives, as well as grenades, assault rifles and detonators hidden in several different caches, Pakistani and U.S. officials say.
The details of the aerial assault plan, which was nearing fruition, came from the suspects themselves during interrogations by the Pakistani intelligence service, two U.S. officials said. One Bush administration official said the group had not yet obtained an airplane, but believed they were close to gaining access to one.
The information prompted an urgent analysis and warning from the new Terrorist Threat Integration Center, an intelligence clearinghouse run by the CIA, sources said. The Department of Homeland Security, in turn, privately issued an advisory about the plot on Thursday to pilots and airports in the United States.
Authorities said that although there is no information indicating specific plans for a similar attack on U.S. soil, the plot underscores al Qaeda's continued "fixation" on using airplanes as weapons. U.S. officials also note that al Qaeda operatives frequently aim for multiple targets.
"Recent reliable reporting indicates that al Qaeda was in the late stages of planning an aerial suicide attack against the U.S. Consulate in Karachi," said the advisory, which was posted yesterday on the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association Web site.
"Operatives were planning to pack a small fixed-wing aircraft or helicopter with explosives and crash it into the consulate," it read. "This plot and a similar plot last year to fly a small explosive-laden aircraft into a U.S. warship in the Persian Gulf demonstrate al Qaeda's continued fixation with using explosive-laden small aircraft in attacks."
The advisory also warned that the potential destruction from such an attack would be "the equivalent of a medium-sized truck bomb."
The notice was issued on the same day that the State Department warned Americans to avoid travel to Saudi Arabia because of "credible" information indicating al Qaeda plans for an attack on U.S. targets there. President Bush, in his address to the nation Thursday night from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, warned that "the war on terror is not over" and said al Qaeda is "wounded, not destroyed."
But authorities also said the case is further evidence of the success that U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies and their allies have had in thwarting terrorist attacks.
Among the six men arrested in the raid were Tawfiq bin Attash, a Yemeni national who allegedly planned the October 2000 suicide bombing of the USS Cole that killed 17 U.S. sailors in the Yemeni port of Aden, and Ali Abd Aziz, the nephew of a captured al Qaeda lieutenant who has been identified by the FBI as a key paymaster in the Sept. 11 plot.
Bin Attash, called "a major-league killer" by one CIA officer, also is believed to have played a role in orchestrating the bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa in August 1998, and attended a January 2000 meeting in Malaysia with two of the Sept. 11 hijackers.
Aziz is the nephew of al Qaeda's operations chief, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, who was captured in Pakistan on March 1 and is being interrogated at an undisclosed location. FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III identified Aziz in testimony last year as the al Qaeda operative who wired nearly $120,000 from the United Arab Emirates to several Sept. 11 hijackers, including ringleader Mohamed Atta.
Although both men were keenly sought by U.S. officials, neither was considered among al Qaeda's senior leadership until recently, officials said. The increasing number of detentions by U.S. forces has dramatically thinned the ranks of Osama bin Laden's terrorist leaders, experts said.
Vincent Cannistraro, a former CIA counterterrorism official, said the case "takes another couple of experienced al Qaeda people off the street. They don't have that many experienced people left, people who have the background in orchestrating these sorts of attacks."
But Rand Corp. terrorism expert Bruce Hoffman said the plot also shows that "al Qaeda may be down, but it's clearly not out.
"This group is still quite capable of planning reasonably destructive operations," Hoffman said. "It's not September11th level of sophistication, but it shows the enormous capacity of this organization to withstand even the severe kind of punishment we've meted out to it in the last 18 months."
Al Qaeda operatives have long developed flamboyant plans that use airplanes as weapons, a tactic used most successfully in the Sept. 11 jetliner attacks that felled the World Trade Center and damaged the Pentagon, killing 3,000 people. In another example, Khalid Sheik Mohammed helped conceive a foiled plot in the mid-1990s in which terrorists planned to blow up a dozen jetliners over the Pacific and crash a small plane into CIA headquarters in Langley.
The U.S. consulate in Karachi, a city that has been a center of militant Islamic activity, was the target of a car bombing last June that killed 12 Pakistanis but no Americans. About 28 U.S. government employees were in the building at the time. In another plot that was thwarted in December, militants had planned to ram an explosives-laden Volkswagen into another vehicle carrying U.S. diplomats.
RANKLED BY BAATH RETURNEES
BAGHDAD, May 6 -- Seeking to resuscitate Iraq's government, U.S. occupation authorities have decided to allow hundreds of Baath Party members to return to high-ranking ministerial and other posts, rankling many Iraqis who contend the new leadership should exclude officials from former president Saddam Hussein's repressive political apparatus.
Scores of Baath members have reclaimed jobs as managers, directors and directors-general, the most senior positions under ministers and their deputies, in several large ministries, including those responsible for trade, industry, oil, irrigation, health and education. Numerous Baathists also have been welcomed back to the top ranks of the national police force, which the U.S. administration authorized to resume operations Sunday to curb lawlessness on the streets of Baghdad and other large cities.
In some cases, even those at the top have Baath credentials. Baghdad's new police chief, Gen. Hamid Othman, had previously been the chief -- a post that required party membership. The acting minister of industry, Ahmed Rashid Gailini, said in an interview that he, too, was a party member, although at "a very low rank." Others in the ministry, including at least one director-general, held more significant posts in the party leadership, according to ministry employees.
U.S. officials said the only Baath members automatically disqualified are the 55 senior officials in Hussein's government deemed most wanted by the United States, as well as those believed to have been involved in human-rights violations or terrorism. Rank-and-file party members and mid-level officials "are free to go back to their jobs so long as we don't find blood on their hands," a senior U.S. official said.
Dealing with the estimated 2 million people who were Baath Party members has emerged as a controversial and complicated aspect of the postwar reconstruction. Many Iraqis, particularly those leading formerly exiled political groups opposed to Hussein, want Baathists to be scrutinized before they are permitted to reclaim high-level jobs, in the way former Nazis were vetted in postwar Germany.
Iraqi opposition leaders contend that including Baathists without appropriate checks could invite corruption and rile those who were persecuted by the party. But U.S. officials insist that preventing former party members from returning to work until they are screened would delay efforts to restart crucial government services.
Under Hussein, almost every government official of high or medium rank had to be a party member, including many technocrats on whom the U.S. administration is depending to get ministries running again.
"If we took all the party members and told them to sit at home, basically everything would stop," the senior official said.
The official maintained that the former Baathists who have been working with the U.S. administration and others who have gone back to their jobs without objection from U.S. authorities were those who joined the party "by necessity," meaning they signed up to advance their careers.
For U.S. administrators here, it is easier in many ways to interact with Baathist officials than with the Shiite Muslim clerics and tribal sheiks who have sought to establish themselves as power brokers in postwar Iraq. The party's founding ideology promoted secular, modern Arabism. Many of Iraq's best-educated people were members. Many members speak English, dress in business suits and possess diplomas from Western universities.
"You start working with whoever is good at delivering services and doing a good job," said Ron Johnson, senior vice president of the nonprofit Research Triangle Institute, a North Carolina company that received a $7.9 million U.S. Agency for International Development grant to promote Iraqi participation in reconstruction. "You just have to start with whoever is there."
Johnson said some Baath Party officials will prove acceptable to Iraqis, just as former Soviet Communist Party members took roles in government and industry after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. Acknowledging that this is not a "pristine process," he said the process would evolve slowly. He also said the Americans are not always well-positioned to tell the good from the bad. "We don't carry a magic lens where a prism opens up and we say, 'Aha! A bad guy there!' " he said.
It is difficult to know exactly how many members the party had. Although officials in Hussein's government used to claim more than 5 million members among Iraq's 24 million people, Western analysts place the number of full-fledged members at about 2 million.
Timothy Carney, a retired U.S. ambassador to Sudan who is responsible for restarting the Industry Ministry, said that responsibility for determining who was too deeply involved in the party -- and weeding them out of government jobs -- would rest with Iraqis.
"Among the Iraqis, everyone knows who was either too bad or too Baath," he said. "The bottom line is the ultimate triage is going to be with the future Iraqi authority. If we are introduced to someone who was either active in the production or development of weapons of mass destruction or in terrorism or a major human-rights violator, we will remove those people as we become aware of them. Others will be subjected more to an Iraqi process than a coalition process."
That process began today outside a small, state-owned battery factory. Carney and top officials from the Industry Ministry, including acting minister Gailini, had gathered there for meetings because ministry headquarters in downtown Baghdad was gutted by looters. Dozens of angry employees from the Sawari Chemical Manufacturing Co., one of 52 enterprises owned by the ministry, held a demonstration to protest the reinstatement of the plant director, who they said was corrupt and too deeply involved in Baathist politics.
"We want an independent, non-Baathist, honest administrator who will look into the welfare of the employees," said Mohammed Sabah, 30, a lab technician, who was holding a cloth banner that read, "We demand new management free from the past regime's thugs."
Sabah and some of his colleagues said the director, Alaa Maher Douri, did not meet the U.S. test for disqualification, but they wanted him out regardless. "His hands may not have been bloody, but he was corrupt," said Ali Rifaat, 34, a plant technician.
Eventually, a representative of the workers was permitted inside to meet with Gailini, Carney and other ministry officials. Several hours later, after intense discussions in a large, green-hued office, Gailini announced that Douri and three other directors-general would be fired. Carney said he would support Gailini's decision and would deliver an edict to that effect from Jay M. Garner, the retired Army lieutenant general who is heading the postwar reconstruction effort.
"We listened to the picketers and we do agree with some of their reasons," Gailini said. But he warned that he would not be amenable to changing any director just because he was part of the party.
"There were many good people in the party -- many smart, technical people," he said. "We cannot exclude everyone."
Other Iraqis are not as charitable. "They kept us from getting jobs in the past, so what's wrong with us keeping them from getting jobs now?" asked Ahmed Karim, a bookseller.
Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress, which opposed the Baath government from exile and now is taking a leading role in forming a new government, said Iraq must be "cleansed from Baathist ideas."
"They have been a criminal party," he said in a recent interview. "All of them are compromised. It's very difficult to find a Baathist who was not compromised."
Those who were active in the party insisted that the organization, which came to power in a 1968 coup, has disbanded. Party offices, once a feature of every neighborhood, have been taken over and turned into schools, community centers and clinics.
"We're finished," said Jabbar Kadhim, a director-general at the Industry Ministry who used to be a local party leader.
Many Iraqis, however, have not been as quick to reach that conclusion. There is a widespread fear here that former Baath leaders have transformed themselves into a clandestine group and will try to disrupt the new government.
"They got their start as an underground organization," said an aide to Chalabi. "They are still a threat."
But Kadhim said that would occur only if former Baathists were shut out of the new government.
"If the party members are treated in a normal manner and they are given their rights, there will be no more party," Kadhim said. "If not, the Baath Party will rise again."
BAGHDAD, May 6 -- Seeking to resuscitate Iraq's government, U.S. occupation authorities have decided to allow hundreds of Baath Party members to return to high-ranking ministerial and other posts, rankling many Iraqis who contend the new leadership should exclude officials from former president Saddam Hussein's repressive political apparatus.
Scores of Baath members have reclaimed jobs as managers, directors and directors-general, the most senior positions under ministers and their deputies, in several large ministries, including those responsible for trade, industry, oil, irrigation, health and education. Numerous Baathists also have been welcomed back to the top ranks of the national police force, which the U.S. administration authorized to resume operations Sunday to curb lawlessness on the streets of Baghdad and other large cities.
In some cases, even those at the top have Baath credentials. Baghdad's new police chief, Gen. Hamid Othman, had previously been the chief -- a post that required party membership. The acting minister of industry, Ahmed Rashid Gailini, said in an interview that he, too, was a party member, although at "a very low rank." Others in the ministry, including at least one director-general, held more significant posts in the party leadership, according to ministry employees.
U.S. officials said the only Baath members automatically disqualified are the 55 senior officials in Hussein's government deemed most wanted by the United States, as well as those believed to have been involved in human-rights violations or terrorism. Rank-and-file party members and mid-level officials "are free to go back to their jobs so long as we don't find blood on their hands," a senior U.S. official said.
Dealing with the estimated 2 million people who were Baath Party members has emerged as a controversial and complicated aspect of the postwar reconstruction. Many Iraqis, particularly those leading formerly exiled political groups opposed to Hussein, want Baathists to be scrutinized before they are permitted to reclaim high-level jobs, in the way former Nazis were vetted in postwar Germany.
Iraqi opposition leaders contend that including Baathists without appropriate checks could invite corruption and rile those who were persecuted by the party. But U.S. officials insist that preventing former party members from returning to work until they are screened would delay efforts to restart crucial government services.
Under Hussein, almost every government official of high or medium rank had to be a party member, including many technocrats on whom the U.S. administration is depending to get ministries running again.
"If we took all the party members and told them to sit at home, basically everything would stop," the senior official said.
The official maintained that the former Baathists who have been working with the U.S. administration and others who have gone back to their jobs without objection from U.S. authorities were those who joined the party "by necessity," meaning they signed up to advance their careers.
For U.S. administrators here, it is easier in many ways to interact with Baathist officials than with the Shiite Muslim clerics and tribal sheiks who have sought to establish themselves as power brokers in postwar Iraq. The party's founding ideology promoted secular, modern Arabism. Many of Iraq's best-educated people were members. Many members speak English, dress in business suits and possess diplomas from Western universities.
"You start working with whoever is good at delivering services and doing a good job," said Ron Johnson, senior vice president of the nonprofit Research Triangle Institute, a North Carolina company that received a $7.9 million U.S. Agency for International Development grant to promote Iraqi participation in reconstruction. "You just have to start with whoever is there."
Johnson said some Baath Party officials will prove acceptable to Iraqis, just as former Soviet Communist Party members took roles in government and industry after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. Acknowledging that this is not a "pristine process," he said the process would evolve slowly. He also said the Americans are not always well-positioned to tell the good from the bad. "We don't carry a magic lens where a prism opens up and we say, 'Aha! A bad guy there!' " he said.
It is difficult to know exactly how many members the party had. Although officials in Hussein's government used to claim more than 5 million members among Iraq's 24 million people, Western analysts place the number of full-fledged members at about 2 million.
Timothy Carney, a retired U.S. ambassador to Sudan who is responsible for restarting the Industry Ministry, said that responsibility for determining who was too deeply involved in the party -- and weeding them out of government jobs -- would rest with Iraqis.
"Among the Iraqis, everyone knows who was either too bad or too Baath," he said. "The bottom line is the ultimate triage is going to be with the future Iraqi authority. If we are introduced to someone who was either active in the production or development of weapons of mass destruction or in terrorism or a major human-rights violator, we will remove those people as we become aware of them. Others will be subjected more to an Iraqi process than a coalition process."
That process began today outside a small, state-owned battery factory. Carney and top officials from the Industry Ministry, including acting minister Gailini, had gathered there for meetings because ministry headquarters in downtown Baghdad was gutted by looters. Dozens of angry employees from the Sawari Chemical Manufacturing Co., one of 52 enterprises owned by the ministry, held a demonstration to protest the reinstatement of the plant director, who they said was corrupt and too deeply involved in Baathist politics.
"We want an independent, non-Baathist, honest administrator who will look into the welfare of the employees," said Mohammed Sabah, 30, a lab technician, who was holding a cloth banner that read, "We demand new management free from the past regime's thugs."
Sabah and some of his colleagues said the director, Alaa Maher Douri, did not meet the U.S. test for disqualification, but they wanted him out regardless. "His hands may not have been bloody, but he was corrupt," said Ali Rifaat, 34, a plant technician.
Eventually, a representative of the workers was permitted inside to meet with Gailini, Carney and other ministry officials. Several hours later, after intense discussions in a large, green-hued office, Gailini announced that Douri and three other directors-general would be fired. Carney said he would support Gailini's decision and would deliver an edict to that effect from Jay M. Garner, the retired Army lieutenant general who is heading the postwar reconstruction effort.
"We listened to the picketers and we do agree with some of their reasons," Gailini said. But he warned that he would not be amenable to changing any director just because he was part of the party.
"There were many good people in the party -- many smart, technical people," he said. "We cannot exclude everyone."
Other Iraqis are not as charitable. "They kept us from getting jobs in the past, so what's wrong with us keeping them from getting jobs now?" asked Ahmed Karim, a bookseller.
Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress, which opposed the Baath government from exile and now is taking a leading role in forming a new government, said Iraq must be "cleansed from Baathist ideas."
"They have been a criminal party," he said in a recent interview. "All of them are compromised. It's very difficult to find a Baathist who was not compromised."
Those who were active in the party insisted that the organization, which came to power in a 1968 coup, has disbanded. Party offices, once a feature of every neighborhood, have been taken over and turned into schools, community centers and clinics.
"We're finished," said Jabbar Kadhim, a director-general at the Industry Ministry who used to be a local party leader.
Many Iraqis, however, have not been as quick to reach that conclusion. There is a widespread fear here that former Baath leaders have transformed themselves into a clandestine group and will try to disrupt the new government.
"They got their start as an underground organization," said an aide to Chalabi. "They are still a threat."
But Kadhim said that would occur only if former Baathists were shut out of the new government.
"If the party members are treated in a normal manner and they are given their rights, there will be no more party," Kadhim said. "If not, the Baath Party will rise again."
INTERIM CHAOS
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 7 ? With raucous new political movements sprouting across the country, Iraq's organized opposition parties rushed to complete a plan today for an interim assembly that would satisfy the increasingly insistent public demand for a working government.
The opposition leaders, many of them newly returned exiles, hoped to present a formula to American officials as early as Thursday, in advance of the first visit of L. Paul Bremer III, the Bush administration's newly appointed special envoy to Iraq.
As the parties haggled, chiefly over whether to guarantee a dominant role for the country's long-repressed Shiite Muslim majority, ordinary Iraqis were experiencing their own political awakening. Some were energized, others bewildered as they watched parties commandeer buildings, scrawl their slogans on walls and muscle into neighborhood clinics to take credit for providing services.
"I don't believe in parties," said Dr. Muhammad Abdulkhader, a volunteer in a clinic set up after the war that has since been claimed by the Islamic Party of Iraq. "They all just work for themselves."
With services like garbage collection and law enforcement still in a state of virtual collapse, politics may provide little more than a distraction from the more immediate problems faced by Iraqis.
In Basra, the country's second-largest city, which has suffered from overflowing sewage and a lack of clean water, the World Health Organization today reported an increase in cholera cases linked to an overflow of sewage and persistent lack of clean water.
Shortages of gasoline and cooking oil continued even as Thamir Ghadhban, the newly appointed head of Iraq's oil sector, pledged to raise oil production to two-thirds of prewar levels by the end of the month to cover domestic needs.
The Sydney Morning Herald, meanwhile, reported that it had received a 15-minute audiotape purported to contain Saddam Hussein's voice calling on Iraqis to rise up against the American occupation. The White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, said the government would analyze the tape.
Whether or not Mr. Hussein is still alive or still in Iraq, Iraqis have seized on their new freedom to express themselves. After surviving decades of a government that made the ruling Baath Party a tool of repression and the only legal political outlet, many people have plunged into politics in ways both silly and sublime.
Bearded religious men claiming to represent the Hawza, the Shiite religious authority based in the southern city of Najaf, have applied their political energy to occupying hospitals and food-distribution centers.
Posters of Ayatollah Muhammad Bakr al-Hakim, an important political figure who heads the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, have suddenly appeared on lampposts and street signs all over Baghdad.
Ayatollah Hakim, whose representatives have been horse-trading on his behalf with other opposition leaders, is expected to return to Iraq from exile in Iran this week.
The Dawa Party, a rival Shiite group, has taken over a former government social club. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of the main Kurdish groups, has seized at least five compounds.
A few men calling themselves the Kurdistan Freedom Congress have installed themselves in a lovely abandoned town house overlooking the Tigris River that was once occupied by a senior officer of the Republican Guard.
A respected former foreign minister of Iraq, Adnan Pachachi, has also returned from more than 30 years in exile this week. He announced today that he planned a grass-roots campaign to sound out Iraqi public opinion, but said he would not participate in any interim government that was not elected.
Other opposition leaders have said they do not expect elections for at least one year. During the transition, they hope to recruit Iraqis to join them in a national assembly of about 350 people.
The eruption of political activity has only added to the general anxiety felt by some Iraqis at the abrupt changes in their lives.
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 7 ? With raucous new political movements sprouting across the country, Iraq's organized opposition parties rushed to complete a plan today for an interim assembly that would satisfy the increasingly insistent public demand for a working government.
The opposition leaders, many of them newly returned exiles, hoped to present a formula to American officials as early as Thursday, in advance of the first visit of L. Paul Bremer III, the Bush administration's newly appointed special envoy to Iraq.
As the parties haggled, chiefly over whether to guarantee a dominant role for the country's long-repressed Shiite Muslim majority, ordinary Iraqis were experiencing their own political awakening. Some were energized, others bewildered as they watched parties commandeer buildings, scrawl their slogans on walls and muscle into neighborhood clinics to take credit for providing services.
"I don't believe in parties," said Dr. Muhammad Abdulkhader, a volunteer in a clinic set up after the war that has since been claimed by the Islamic Party of Iraq. "They all just work for themselves."
With services like garbage collection and law enforcement still in a state of virtual collapse, politics may provide little more than a distraction from the more immediate problems faced by Iraqis.
In Basra, the country's second-largest city, which has suffered from overflowing sewage and a lack of clean water, the World Health Organization today reported an increase in cholera cases linked to an overflow of sewage and persistent lack of clean water.
Shortages of gasoline and cooking oil continued even as Thamir Ghadhban, the newly appointed head of Iraq's oil sector, pledged to raise oil production to two-thirds of prewar levels by the end of the month to cover domestic needs.
The Sydney Morning Herald, meanwhile, reported that it had received a 15-minute audiotape purported to contain Saddam Hussein's voice calling on Iraqis to rise up against the American occupation. The White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, said the government would analyze the tape.
Whether or not Mr. Hussein is still alive or still in Iraq, Iraqis have seized on their new freedom to express themselves. After surviving decades of a government that made the ruling Baath Party a tool of repression and the only legal political outlet, many people have plunged into politics in ways both silly and sublime.
Bearded religious men claiming to represent the Hawza, the Shiite religious authority based in the southern city of Najaf, have applied their political energy to occupying hospitals and food-distribution centers.
Posters of Ayatollah Muhammad Bakr al-Hakim, an important political figure who heads the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, have suddenly appeared on lampposts and street signs all over Baghdad.
Ayatollah Hakim, whose representatives have been horse-trading on his behalf with other opposition leaders, is expected to return to Iraq from exile in Iran this week.
The Dawa Party, a rival Shiite group, has taken over a former government social club. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of the main Kurdish groups, has seized at least five compounds.
A few men calling themselves the Kurdistan Freedom Congress have installed themselves in a lovely abandoned town house overlooking the Tigris River that was once occupied by a senior officer of the Republican Guard.
A respected former foreign minister of Iraq, Adnan Pachachi, has also returned from more than 30 years in exile this week. He announced today that he planned a grass-roots campaign to sound out Iraqi public opinion, but said he would not participate in any interim government that was not elected.
Other opposition leaders have said they do not expect elections for at least one year. During the transition, they hope to recruit Iraqis to join them in a national assembly of about 350 people.
The eruption of political activity has only added to the general anxiety felt by some Iraqis at the abrupt changes in their lives.
FRANKENSTEINIAN TRAILER
WASHINGTON, May 7 ? The Pentagon said today that American forces in Iraq are testing a trailer that they suspect the Iraqis operated as a mobile biological weapons laboratory.
"The facility, this mobile production facility, came into our hands on the 19th of April at a Kurdish checkpoint near a place called Tallkayf in northern Iraq," Stephen Cambone, an Under Secretary of Defense, said this afternoon.
The official emphasized that it was too soon to tell whether the trailer was "the smoking gun," or irrefutable evidence that Saddam Hussein's government indeed had weapons of mass destruction.
But Mr. Cambone said the trailer appears to be the kind of mobile lab that Secretary of State Colin L. Powell described several months ago in a report to the United Nations Security Council. That report was delivered as the Bush administration sought justification to forcibly disarm Mr. Hussein's government.
"The Kurds reported to us that the trailer may have been in the company of military vehicles prior to that, and along with a decontamination truck," Mr. Cambone said.
The vehicles was painted in what appeared to be a military color scheme, Mr. Cambone said. He listed several characteristics that American military officials regard as suspicious: a fermenter, which could be used for growing cultures; gas cylinders to supply clean air for production, and "a system to capture and compress exhaust gases to eliminate any signature of the production."
Mr. Cambone said that some of the equipment on the trailer could have been used for purposes other than producing biological weapons agents, but that American and British weapons experts have concluded, based in part on information from a defector, "that the unit does not appear to perform any function beyond what the defector said it was for, which was the production of biological agents."
Although the findings were not conclusive as of today, and may not be for some time, they were nevertheless important, for the White House as well as the Pentagon.
The Bush administration has repeatedly cited Mr. Hussein's supposed possession of deadly weapons as the basic reason for going to war to unseat him. And the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, has repeatedly been pressed on that point, as he was just today.
"Well, we went to war, didn't we, to find these ? because we said that these weapons were a direct and imminent threat to the United States," one reporter said at today's White House briefing. "Isn't that true?"
"Absolutely," Mr. Fleischer replied. "One of the reasons that we went to war was because of their possession of weapons of mass destruction. And nothing has changed on that front at all."
"We have always had confidence, we continue to have confidence that weapons of mass destruction will be found," Mr. Fleischer said.
WASHINGTON, May 7 ? The Pentagon said today that American forces in Iraq are testing a trailer that they suspect the Iraqis operated as a mobile biological weapons laboratory.
"The facility, this mobile production facility, came into our hands on the 19th of April at a Kurdish checkpoint near a place called Tallkayf in northern Iraq," Stephen Cambone, an Under Secretary of Defense, said this afternoon.
The official emphasized that it was too soon to tell whether the trailer was "the smoking gun," or irrefutable evidence that Saddam Hussein's government indeed had weapons of mass destruction.
But Mr. Cambone said the trailer appears to be the kind of mobile lab that Secretary of State Colin L. Powell described several months ago in a report to the United Nations Security Council. That report was delivered as the Bush administration sought justification to forcibly disarm Mr. Hussein's government.
"The Kurds reported to us that the trailer may have been in the company of military vehicles prior to that, and along with a decontamination truck," Mr. Cambone said.
The vehicles was painted in what appeared to be a military color scheme, Mr. Cambone said. He listed several characteristics that American military officials regard as suspicious: a fermenter, which could be used for growing cultures; gas cylinders to supply clean air for production, and "a system to capture and compress exhaust gases to eliminate any signature of the production."
Mr. Cambone said that some of the equipment on the trailer could have been used for purposes other than producing biological weapons agents, but that American and British weapons experts have concluded, based in part on information from a defector, "that the unit does not appear to perform any function beyond what the defector said it was for, which was the production of biological agents."
Although the findings were not conclusive as of today, and may not be for some time, they were nevertheless important, for the White House as well as the Pentagon.
The Bush administration has repeatedly cited Mr. Hussein's supposed possession of deadly weapons as the basic reason for going to war to unseat him. And the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, has repeatedly been pressed on that point, as he was just today.
"Well, we went to war, didn't we, to find these ? because we said that these weapons were a direct and imminent threat to the United States," one reporter said at today's White House briefing. "Isn't that true?"
"Absolutely," Mr. Fleischer replied. "One of the reasons that we went to war was because of their possession of weapons of mass destruction. And nothing has changed on that front at all."
"We have always had confidence, we continue to have confidence that weapons of mass destruction will be found," Mr. Fleischer said.
PYONGYANG'S NUKE SHENANIGANS
WASHINGTON, April 7 ? After assuring the White House for months that North Korea had not begun producing plutonium for nuclear weapons, American intelligence officials changed their assessment last month, concluding that the country may have produced relatively small amounts, according to senior administration and intelligence officials.
The new assessment was delivered to the White House in mid-April, after President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, ordered a review of the intelligence. A little more than a week later, North Korean officials, meeting with the United States in Beijing, boasted that they had already turned 8,000 spent nuclear-fuel rods into weapons-grade material, and strongly hinted they would export it unless they struck a deal with the United States.
Intelligence officials say they believe that the North Korean claim was an exaggeration, intended to extract concessions from Mr. Bush, who said late last month he would not give in to what he has termed "blackmail." But his aides remain divided about what blend of incentives and threats to use in dealing with the government of Kim Jong Il.
Mr. Bush's top foreign policy advisers met today to review their next steps on North Korea, with some officials at the Pentagon urging that Mr. Bush move vigorously to intercept missiles and illicit drugs being shipped out of the country. Those exports create much of the hard currency that the North uses to finance its nuclear program.
At the same time, officials say they are likely to engage in a second round of talks with North Korea. That is partly to satisfy China, which has become a major player in pressuring the North to dismantle its nuclear facilities.
The changed assessment reflects the inexact nature of intelligence about North Korea. But the possibility that the North is already reprocessing nuclear material ? and thus could soon begin producing weapons beyond the two the C.I.A. believes it manufactured more than a decade ago ? is bound to change the tenor of Mr. Bush's meetings in the next two weeks with the leaders of South Korea and Japan.
"It means we don't have forever to solve this problem," one senior American official said.
In the last few days, intelligence officials have seen renewed activity around the main reprocessing site, at the Yongbyon nuclear complex. But officials familiar with the intelligence said that this did not necessarily mean that the North was now running the the main reprocessing facility. "It's fair to say the experts have come to no hard conclusions," the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, told reporters today.
One senior intelligence official said today that "we don't have confirmation that they are reprocessing on a large scale." But small-scale production, the official said, was a distinct possibility.
The history of intelligence gathering in North Korea features numerous major mistakes. Its suspected development of two weapons during the first Bush administration went undetected until the International Atomic Energy Agency got into the country and found that a significant amount of plutonium was unaccounted for. In 1998, the intelligence community raised alarms about a large cave that they suspected was the site of a hidden reactor and reprocessing facility. The United States demanded entry, but the cave turned out to be empty.
The United States was also slow to detect the fact that the North had set up a clandestine, second nuclear project utilizing highly enriched uranium. While such a project had long been suspected, it was South Korea that came up with the evidence two years ago that the effort was speeding forward. The current crisis arose when the United States confronted the North Koreans with that evidence seven months ago.
Today, the effort to assess whether reprocessing is under way suffers from the absence of nuclear inspectors, who were ejected from the country on New Year's Eve. "Without the I.A.E.A. inspectors there, there is a much greater level of uncertainty about whether reprocessing is taking place or not," said Joel Wit, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
So the administration finds itself, he noted, in the opposite situation it faced in Iraq. There, the government of Saddam Hussein insisted it held no weapons, and Mr. Bush is seeking to prove that it did. In North Korea, the government is boasting of a major program, in hopes of winning a negotiating advantage ? or threatening American allies.
"That's the whole point of all of North korea's behavior," Mr. Wit said. "You don't know whether it's a threat or whether it is the truth."
WASHINGTON, April 7 ? After assuring the White House for months that North Korea had not begun producing plutonium for nuclear weapons, American intelligence officials changed their assessment last month, concluding that the country may have produced relatively small amounts, according to senior administration and intelligence officials.
The new assessment was delivered to the White House in mid-April, after President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, ordered a review of the intelligence. A little more than a week later, North Korean officials, meeting with the United States in Beijing, boasted that they had already turned 8,000 spent nuclear-fuel rods into weapons-grade material, and strongly hinted they would export it unless they struck a deal with the United States.
Intelligence officials say they believe that the North Korean claim was an exaggeration, intended to extract concessions from Mr. Bush, who said late last month he would not give in to what he has termed "blackmail." But his aides remain divided about what blend of incentives and threats to use in dealing with the government of Kim Jong Il.
Mr. Bush's top foreign policy advisers met today to review their next steps on North Korea, with some officials at the Pentagon urging that Mr. Bush move vigorously to intercept missiles and illicit drugs being shipped out of the country. Those exports create much of the hard currency that the North uses to finance its nuclear program.
At the same time, officials say they are likely to engage in a second round of talks with North Korea. That is partly to satisfy China, which has become a major player in pressuring the North to dismantle its nuclear facilities.
The changed assessment reflects the inexact nature of intelligence about North Korea. But the possibility that the North is already reprocessing nuclear material ? and thus could soon begin producing weapons beyond the two the C.I.A. believes it manufactured more than a decade ago ? is bound to change the tenor of Mr. Bush's meetings in the next two weeks with the leaders of South Korea and Japan.
"It means we don't have forever to solve this problem," one senior American official said.
In the last few days, intelligence officials have seen renewed activity around the main reprocessing site, at the Yongbyon nuclear complex. But officials familiar with the intelligence said that this did not necessarily mean that the North was now running the the main reprocessing facility. "It's fair to say the experts have come to no hard conclusions," the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, told reporters today.
One senior intelligence official said today that "we don't have confirmation that they are reprocessing on a large scale." But small-scale production, the official said, was a distinct possibility.
The history of intelligence gathering in North Korea features numerous major mistakes. Its suspected development of two weapons during the first Bush administration went undetected until the International Atomic Energy Agency got into the country and found that a significant amount of plutonium was unaccounted for. In 1998, the intelligence community raised alarms about a large cave that they suspected was the site of a hidden reactor and reprocessing facility. The United States demanded entry, but the cave turned out to be empty.
The United States was also slow to detect the fact that the North had set up a clandestine, second nuclear project utilizing highly enriched uranium. While such a project had long been suspected, it was South Korea that came up with the evidence two years ago that the effort was speeding forward. The current crisis arose when the United States confronted the North Koreans with that evidence seven months ago.
Today, the effort to assess whether reprocessing is under way suffers from the absence of nuclear inspectors, who were ejected from the country on New Year's Eve. "Without the I.A.E.A. inspectors there, there is a much greater level of uncertainty about whether reprocessing is taking place or not," said Joel Wit, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
So the administration finds itself, he noted, in the opposite situation it faced in Iraq. There, the government of Saddam Hussein insisted it held no weapons, and Mr. Bush is seeking to prove that it did. In North Korea, the government is boasting of a major program, in hopes of winning a negotiating advantage ? or threatening American allies.
"That's the whole point of all of North korea's behavior," Mr. Wit said. "You don't know whether it's a threat or whether it is the truth."
Tuesday, May 06, 2003
NUCLEAR GERRYMANDERING
North Korea has targeted 100 U.S. cities with nuclear missiles and has vowed to use them if hit with new economic sanctions, Sky News reported Monday.
"It's obvious North Korea may have minimum 100 nuclear warheads, maximum 300," said Kim Myong Chol, executive director of the Center for Korea-American Peace. "They all lock onto American cities."
Kim, who calls himself the "unofficial spokesman for North Korea," made his remarks on Australia's Channel Nine Network...
North Korea has targeted 100 U.S. cities with nuclear missiles and has vowed to use them if hit with new economic sanctions, Sky News reported Monday.
"It's obvious North Korea may have minimum 100 nuclear warheads, maximum 300," said Kim Myong Chol, executive director of the Center for Korea-American Peace. "They all lock onto American cities."
Kim, who calls himself the "unofficial spokesman for North Korea," made his remarks on Australia's Channel Nine Network...
SEA CHANGE IN TURBULENT BAGHDAD
BAGHDAD -- U.S. officials gave the first details Monday of their plan for an interim Iraqi government, saying it will be headed by a council of as many as nine leaders and suggesting that the majority would be drawn from Iraqi exile groups that have yet to demonstrate much popular support here.
Although a new transitional government will not be chosen until the end of the month, the U.S. civil administrator for Iraq, retired Army Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, said five men had already begun meeting and would probably be part of the council. "By the middle of the month you'll really see a beginning of a nucleus of an Iraqi government, with an Iraqi face on it, that is dealing with the coalition," Garner said before leaving Baghdad for a two-day visit to the southern city of Basra.
Garner identified the five Iraqi leaders as Ahmad Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress, Massoud Barzani of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, Jalal Talabani of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, Iyad Allawi of the Iraqi National Accord and Abdelaziz Hakim of the Iran-based Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
Garner's announcement came amid growing criticism that the U.S.-led effort to rebuild the country was languishing. The much-anticipated return of police to the streets of Baghdad was limited Monday to a few traffic officers, most of whom were working without guns in a city echoing with gunfire and who were still awaiting their promised $20 emergency stipend.
Although 135,000 allied troops occupy the country, neither they nor Garner's Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance govern it.
The vacuum left after the swift collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime can be felt in cities and villages throughout Iraq, with clan leaders reclaiming long-lost power and Shiite religious leaders asserting authority over municipal services in several cities. One notable exception to the ongoing political chaos is Mosul, which Monday became the country's first major city to establish an elected government. The 24-man interim city council was chosen by 150 delegates at a convention of religious, ethnic and tribal leaders.
Though Garner did not spell out the selection process for the five men who are already meeting on a nascent national council, they are well-known leaders of some of the largest exile opposition groups to emerge over the last decade ? groups that have received U.S. support. The two Kurdish leaders have been living in northern Iraq, which has essentially functioned as a separate country since 1991. The other three men have been out of the country for many years, because Hussein had squelched all internal rivals to the ruling Baath Party.
Representatives of Sunni Muslims and Iraqi Christians might be added to the leadership group, Garner said. Chalabi, Hakim and Allawi are Shiite Muslims, though few Shiites claim Chalabi as their leader and Allawi heads a Sunni-dominated, though secular-leaning, organization. Garner gave no hint that more Shiites, who make up 60% of the population, might be included.
Though leaders of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq have said they do not favor an Iran-style regime for Iraq, several fundamentalist Shiite parties do want Iraq to become a religion-based Islamic republic, a construction strongly opposed by the Bush administration.
Criticism From Imam
In carefully worded criticism of the plan, Sheik Khamal Jawad Chochachi, imam at Baghdad's sprawling Khadamia Mosque, said "it would be better if there would be three or four more" Shiites on the council. "That would be more fair," he said.
The interim government is officially to be chosen by Iraqi delegates at a meeting late this month, and a spokesman for Chalabi emphasized that the leadership choices were "not set in stone." But with opposition groups now clearly driving the process, it would seem natural that the five men leading the top opposition groups be selected, said the spokesman, Zaab Sethna.
In his statement, Garner indicated that the U.S. recognized that its failure to get essential public services back in operation was costing it the goodwill of many Iraqis and that it is serious about installing a transitional government quickly.
"The month of May is a key month" for getting all the public services up and running "and getting the law enforcement system back," he told reporters.
For the few Iraqis who know his name, Garner had become a primary target of complaint. Bush administration officials disclosed plans last week to place a former State Department official over Garner.
L. Paul Bremer III, a former ambassador and head of the State Department's counter-terrorism office who is expected to arrive in Iraq by next week, will oversee all political and reconstruction efforts.
On Monday, Garner said his job was intended to be temporary and that Bremer's position had long been planned. He also acknowledged two failures on the part of his office: not yet having a television station up and running and failing to predict or address the lawlessness that has crippled the county.
"We didn't anticipate the looting that occurred to the degree it did," he said in Basra.
Also Monday, officials announced the appointment of Ole Wohlers Olsen, a Danish diplomat, as southeast Iraq regional coordinator for the U.S. reconstruction office. "We have now a very serious job in front of us in the most mistreated part of Iraq," Olsen said in Basra.
The chaos unleashed by days of looting after the fall of Hussein still plagues Iraq nearly a month later.
Many shops remain shuttered because of gunfire, and others close early so employees can get home before dark. Phone systems are so damaged that many people believe cellular services will have to replace land lines. And with power and water still out in many parts of the country, many Iraqis believe the U.S. planned much better for the war than for its aftermath.
As Garner spoke, five traffic-control officers directed cars through a busy intersection in the Mansour neighborhood and hoped for the best. They had a single, well-worn revolver among them. Their uniform: blue trousers and a white dress shirt.
"Most officers remain in their houses because they have no guns, while the thieves have rifles. They have no uniforms," said one officer, who asked not to be named. "The Americans took officers' badges from them, right in front of people on the streets. You think anyone will respect us after that?"
Many parts of the country, including Baghdad, continue to seem on the brink of anarchy, with the presence of coalition troops providing limited comfort.
Paid but Not Working
On Monday, a gunman fired at a journalist's car as it passed two men staggering along a residential street in blood-soaked clothing, apparently victims of gunshot wounds.
The day before, hundreds of looters streamed in and out of one of Hussein's palaces ? a palace that had been looted previously and that U.S. Army troops had guarded until two days earlier.
They had been called to perform other duties, apparently because commanders believed there was nothing left in the palace worth protecting. But upon learning of the looting, the soldiers roared back, and 20 minutes of gunfire ensued as they shot out the tires of looters' cars and fired over the heads of those who tried to flee.
It was unclear if any looters fired on the soldiers or if all the gunfire came from the U.S. side, but the troops confiscated many weapons.
At Baghdad police headquarters, one police officer pulled four crisp $5 bills from his wallet. He had been paid the emergency stipend to come back to work, he said, but hadn't been allowed to do his job.
U.S. soldiers "don't control the streets and they don't allow us to control them," the officer complained. "Thousands of us want to work. We know where the guns are, where the thieves are."
Several men came into the room, asking for an investigation into the death of a friend. "You'll have to bring the body in here," said the officer, who asked not to be identified. "We can't go out."
Another officer at the station, Jabar Okaili, rolled up his shirt sleeve to reveal a bandaged stab wound. "We were working before the Americans said to," Okaili said. "We captured some thieves. Then they opened fire and they cut me. When we ran away, the Americans caught us and put handcuffs on us."
Still trying to train and vet officers ? some of whom were close to Hussein's regime and moonlighted as spies or muscle ? U.S. forces are being cautious and deliberate in returning them to work.
"They'll be back," one U.S. officer said. "But many aren't ready yet."
BAGHDAD -- U.S. officials gave the first details Monday of their plan for an interim Iraqi government, saying it will be headed by a council of as many as nine leaders and suggesting that the majority would be drawn from Iraqi exile groups that have yet to demonstrate much popular support here.
Although a new transitional government will not be chosen until the end of the month, the U.S. civil administrator for Iraq, retired Army Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, said five men had already begun meeting and would probably be part of the council. "By the middle of the month you'll really see a beginning of a nucleus of an Iraqi government, with an Iraqi face on it, that is dealing with the coalition," Garner said before leaving Baghdad for a two-day visit to the southern city of Basra.
Garner identified the five Iraqi leaders as Ahmad Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress, Massoud Barzani of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, Jalal Talabani of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, Iyad Allawi of the Iraqi National Accord and Abdelaziz Hakim of the Iran-based Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
Garner's announcement came amid growing criticism that the U.S.-led effort to rebuild the country was languishing. The much-anticipated return of police to the streets of Baghdad was limited Monday to a few traffic officers, most of whom were working without guns in a city echoing with gunfire and who were still awaiting their promised $20 emergency stipend.
Although 135,000 allied troops occupy the country, neither they nor Garner's Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance govern it.
The vacuum left after the swift collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime can be felt in cities and villages throughout Iraq, with clan leaders reclaiming long-lost power and Shiite religious leaders asserting authority over municipal services in several cities. One notable exception to the ongoing political chaos is Mosul, which Monday became the country's first major city to establish an elected government. The 24-man interim city council was chosen by 150 delegates at a convention of religious, ethnic and tribal leaders.
Though Garner did not spell out the selection process for the five men who are already meeting on a nascent national council, they are well-known leaders of some of the largest exile opposition groups to emerge over the last decade ? groups that have received U.S. support. The two Kurdish leaders have been living in northern Iraq, which has essentially functioned as a separate country since 1991. The other three men have been out of the country for many years, because Hussein had squelched all internal rivals to the ruling Baath Party.
Representatives of Sunni Muslims and Iraqi Christians might be added to the leadership group, Garner said. Chalabi, Hakim and Allawi are Shiite Muslims, though few Shiites claim Chalabi as their leader and Allawi heads a Sunni-dominated, though secular-leaning, organization. Garner gave no hint that more Shiites, who make up 60% of the population, might be included.
Though leaders of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq have said they do not favor an Iran-style regime for Iraq, several fundamentalist Shiite parties do want Iraq to become a religion-based Islamic republic, a construction strongly opposed by the Bush administration.
Criticism From Imam
In carefully worded criticism of the plan, Sheik Khamal Jawad Chochachi, imam at Baghdad's sprawling Khadamia Mosque, said "it would be better if there would be three or four more" Shiites on the council. "That would be more fair," he said.
The interim government is officially to be chosen by Iraqi delegates at a meeting late this month, and a spokesman for Chalabi emphasized that the leadership choices were "not set in stone." But with opposition groups now clearly driving the process, it would seem natural that the five men leading the top opposition groups be selected, said the spokesman, Zaab Sethna.
In his statement, Garner indicated that the U.S. recognized that its failure to get essential public services back in operation was costing it the goodwill of many Iraqis and that it is serious about installing a transitional government quickly.
"The month of May is a key month" for getting all the public services up and running "and getting the law enforcement system back," he told reporters.
For the few Iraqis who know his name, Garner had become a primary target of complaint. Bush administration officials disclosed plans last week to place a former State Department official over Garner.
L. Paul Bremer III, a former ambassador and head of the State Department's counter-terrorism office who is expected to arrive in Iraq by next week, will oversee all political and reconstruction efforts.
On Monday, Garner said his job was intended to be temporary and that Bremer's position had long been planned. He also acknowledged two failures on the part of his office: not yet having a television station up and running and failing to predict or address the lawlessness that has crippled the county.
"We didn't anticipate the looting that occurred to the degree it did," he said in Basra.
Also Monday, officials announced the appointment of Ole Wohlers Olsen, a Danish diplomat, as southeast Iraq regional coordinator for the U.S. reconstruction office. "We have now a very serious job in front of us in the most mistreated part of Iraq," Olsen said in Basra.
The chaos unleashed by days of looting after the fall of Hussein still plagues Iraq nearly a month later.
Many shops remain shuttered because of gunfire, and others close early so employees can get home before dark. Phone systems are so damaged that many people believe cellular services will have to replace land lines. And with power and water still out in many parts of the country, many Iraqis believe the U.S. planned much better for the war than for its aftermath.
As Garner spoke, five traffic-control officers directed cars through a busy intersection in the Mansour neighborhood and hoped for the best. They had a single, well-worn revolver among them. Their uniform: blue trousers and a white dress shirt.
"Most officers remain in their houses because they have no guns, while the thieves have rifles. They have no uniforms," said one officer, who asked not to be named. "The Americans took officers' badges from them, right in front of people on the streets. You think anyone will respect us after that?"
Many parts of the country, including Baghdad, continue to seem on the brink of anarchy, with the presence of coalition troops providing limited comfort.
Paid but Not Working
On Monday, a gunman fired at a journalist's car as it passed two men staggering along a residential street in blood-soaked clothing, apparently victims of gunshot wounds.
The day before, hundreds of looters streamed in and out of one of Hussein's palaces ? a palace that had been looted previously and that U.S. Army troops had guarded until two days earlier.
They had been called to perform other duties, apparently because commanders believed there was nothing left in the palace worth protecting. But upon learning of the looting, the soldiers roared back, and 20 minutes of gunfire ensued as they shot out the tires of looters' cars and fired over the heads of those who tried to flee.
It was unclear if any looters fired on the soldiers or if all the gunfire came from the U.S. side, but the troops confiscated many weapons.
At Baghdad police headquarters, one police officer pulled four crisp $5 bills from his wallet. He had been paid the emergency stipend to come back to work, he said, but hadn't been allowed to do his job.
U.S. soldiers "don't control the streets and they don't allow us to control them," the officer complained. "Thousands of us want to work. We know where the guns are, where the thieves are."
Several men came into the room, asking for an investigation into the death of a friend. "You'll have to bring the body in here," said the officer, who asked not to be identified. "We can't go out."
Another officer at the station, Jabar Okaili, rolled up his shirt sleeve to reveal a bandaged stab wound. "We were working before the Americans said to," Okaili said. "We captured some thieves. Then they opened fire and they cut me. When we ran away, the Americans caught us and put handcuffs on us."
Still trying to train and vet officers ? some of whom were close to Hussein's regime and moonlighted as spies or muscle ? U.S. forces are being cautious and deliberate in returning them to work.
"They'll be back," one U.S. officer said. "But many aren't ready yet."
SECRET OVERTURES
Britain tried to defuse the Iraq crisis by communicating through secret channels with Saddam Hussein's regime for at least two years, according to documents found by The Daily Telegraph in Baghdad.
Peter Hain, the Welsh Secretary and a former Foreign Office minister, confirmed the contents of the files found in the Iraqi foreign ministry.
They detail private overtures to Iraq, several involving Mr Hain, in 2000 and 2001, apparently with the support of the Clinton administration.
Using many intermediaries, including Arab governments, Britain sought to assure Saddam that it was serious about effecting a deal being offered through the United Nations.
The offer was that if Iraq readmitted weapons inspectors in line with UN resolution 1284, sanctions would be lifted within six months.
Iraq repeatedly spurned the opportunity to rehabilitate itself, although resolution 1284 gave the inspectors a far softer mandate than the terms under which they were eventually admitted last November.
"It was quite clear to me that this was going nowhere because Saddam was not interested in having weapons inspectors," Mr Hain said.
"We let it wither. It was clear that the Iraqis were trying to manoeuvre a situation to gain a diplomatic coup. Nevertheless, it was worth trying, especially given the involvement of many Middle Eastern foreign ministers."
The documents came from the same set of files purporting to show that George Galloway, the Labour MP, benefited from oil and food contracts in Iraq - an allegation he denies.
Mr Galloway claims that he helped to promote a secret dialogue between Britain and Iraq. He told the Sunday Herald in Glasgow that Mr Hain knew of his visit to Baghdad over Christmas 1999, when he stayed with Tariq Aziz, the deputy prime minister.
"Hain agreed we should start such a dialogue," he said.
Mr Hain denied that Mr Galloway was a go-between. "Galloway had absolutely no role at all," he said. "He did tell me he had spent Christmas Day with Tariq Aziz and I was astonished to hear about it."
Robin Cook, the former Foreign Secretary, said: "It is fair to say that we were looking for a way of resolving the crisis in our own interests. We wanted inspectors to go back. It was in co-operation with the Clinton administration. That changed with the election of a new administration."
The documents show intense Iraqi interest in opening a dialogue with Britain, at least since 1998. Baghdad hoped to break the American-imposed isolation by wooing Tony Blair away from the policy of containment.
However, moves to establish contacts in early 1998 through two former ambassadors to Iraq, Sir John Moberly and Sir Terence Clark, came to nothing. The next attempt was made in early 2000 after the Security Council passed resolution 1284.
This offered Iraq a suspension of sanctions and eventual lifting of the embargo if it started to co-operate with weapons inspectors.
Britain, facing criticism that the years of sanctions were causing unacceptable suffering to ordinary Iraqis while failing to weaken Saddam, issued private assurances that the offer was genuine.
A British charity, the Next Century Foundation, tried several times to mediate between Mr Hain and Iraqi officials. Signals were also passed on through Arab foreign ministers.
The documents include a copy of a letter from Mr Cook, telling his Jordanian counterpart, Abdul Illah Khatib, on September 1, 2000: "As soon as Iraq begins co-operating with [weapons inspectors], it will be on the road to the suspension of sanctions." By the end of 2000, hope was fading. The incoming government of President George W Bush was openly committed to toppling Saddam.
Two months after September 11, when war with Iraq was already being debated in Washington, the Next Century Foundation tried to arrange a meeting between Mr Hain and Naji Sabri, the Iraqi foreign minister, at the UN.
William Morris, the charity's secretary general, who confirms the contents of the documents, said: "People of good conscience were trying to avert war, but I knew it was futile."
Britain tried to defuse the Iraq crisis by communicating through secret channels with Saddam Hussein's regime for at least two years, according to documents found by The Daily Telegraph in Baghdad.
Peter Hain, the Welsh Secretary and a former Foreign Office minister, confirmed the contents of the files found in the Iraqi foreign ministry.
They detail private overtures to Iraq, several involving Mr Hain, in 2000 and 2001, apparently with the support of the Clinton administration.
Using many intermediaries, including Arab governments, Britain sought to assure Saddam that it was serious about effecting a deal being offered through the United Nations.
The offer was that if Iraq readmitted weapons inspectors in line with UN resolution 1284, sanctions would be lifted within six months.
Iraq repeatedly spurned the opportunity to rehabilitate itself, although resolution 1284 gave the inspectors a far softer mandate than the terms under which they were eventually admitted last November.
"It was quite clear to me that this was going nowhere because Saddam was not interested in having weapons inspectors," Mr Hain said.
"We let it wither. It was clear that the Iraqis were trying to manoeuvre a situation to gain a diplomatic coup. Nevertheless, it was worth trying, especially given the involvement of many Middle Eastern foreign ministers."
The documents came from the same set of files purporting to show that George Galloway, the Labour MP, benefited from oil and food contracts in Iraq - an allegation he denies.
Mr Galloway claims that he helped to promote a secret dialogue between Britain and Iraq. He told the Sunday Herald in Glasgow that Mr Hain knew of his visit to Baghdad over Christmas 1999, when he stayed with Tariq Aziz, the deputy prime minister.
"Hain agreed we should start such a dialogue," he said.
Mr Hain denied that Mr Galloway was a go-between. "Galloway had absolutely no role at all," he said. "He did tell me he had spent Christmas Day with Tariq Aziz and I was astonished to hear about it."
Robin Cook, the former Foreign Secretary, said: "It is fair to say that we were looking for a way of resolving the crisis in our own interests. We wanted inspectors to go back. It was in co-operation with the Clinton administration. That changed with the election of a new administration."
The documents show intense Iraqi interest in opening a dialogue with Britain, at least since 1998. Baghdad hoped to break the American-imposed isolation by wooing Tony Blair away from the policy of containment.
However, moves to establish contacts in early 1998 through two former ambassadors to Iraq, Sir John Moberly and Sir Terence Clark, came to nothing. The next attempt was made in early 2000 after the Security Council passed resolution 1284.
This offered Iraq a suspension of sanctions and eventual lifting of the embargo if it started to co-operate with weapons inspectors.
Britain, facing criticism that the years of sanctions were causing unacceptable suffering to ordinary Iraqis while failing to weaken Saddam, issued private assurances that the offer was genuine.
A British charity, the Next Century Foundation, tried several times to mediate between Mr Hain and Iraqi officials. Signals were also passed on through Arab foreign ministers.
The documents include a copy of a letter from Mr Cook, telling his Jordanian counterpart, Abdul Illah Khatib, on September 1, 2000: "As soon as Iraq begins co-operating with [weapons inspectors], it will be on the road to the suspension of sanctions." By the end of 2000, hope was fading. The incoming government of President George W Bush was openly committed to toppling Saddam.
Two months after September 11, when war with Iraq was already being debated in Washington, the Next Century Foundation tried to arrange a meeting between Mr Hain and Naji Sabri, the Iraqi foreign minister, at the UN.
William Morris, the charity's secretary general, who confirms the contents of the documents, said: "People of good conscience were trying to avert war, but I knew it was futile."
BREAKING THE BANK
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 5 ? In the hours before American bombs began falling on the Iraqi capital, one of President Saddam Hussein's sons and a close adviser carried off nearly $1 billion in cash from the country's Central Bank, according to American and Iraqi officials here.
The removal of the money, which would amount to one of the largest bank robberies in history, was performed under the direct orders of Mr. Hussein, according to an Iraqi official with knowledge of the incident. The official, who asked not to be identified, said that no financial rationale had been offered for removing the money from the bank's vaults, and that no one had been told where the money would be taken.
"When you get an order from Saddam Hussein, you do not discuss it," said the Iraqi official, who held a senior position in a bank under Mr. Hussein's government. He said he had been told about the seizure of the cash by the Iraqi financial officials who had turned over the money to Mr. Hussein's son and the adviser.
The allegations provide a glimpse into the final days of Mr. Hussein's rule ? which, with its emphasis on family connections, has been compared to the mafia ? and perhaps a clue about how he intended to finance his escape and survive out of power.
Qusay Saddam Hussein, Mr. Hussein's second son, presided over the seizure of the money, along with Abid al-Hamid Mahmood, the president's personal assistant, the Iraqi official here said. The seizure took place at 4 a.m. on March 18, just hours before the first American air assault.
The two men carried a letter from the president, bearing his signature, authorizing the removal of the money, the official said.
The sheer volume of the cash was so great ? some $900 million in American $100 bills and as much as $100 million worth of euros ? that three tractor-trailers were needed to cart it off, the Iraqi official said. It took a team of workers two hours to load up the cash. Their work was completed before employees of the downtown Baghdad bank arrived for work.
The seizure of the money was confirmed by a United States Treasury official assigned to work with Iraqi financial officers here to rebuild the country's banking and financial system.
Iraqi officials said they were uncertain of the effects that the disappearance of $1 billion would have on the Iraqi economy. The Iraqi official said the removal of the money amounted to about a quarter of the Central Bank's hard currency reserves.
The billion dollars is nearly twice the amount of hard currency believed to have been looted by Iraqis in the three weeks after the collapse of the Iraqi government. American and Iraqi officials said about $400 million in American dollars and at least $40 million in Iraqi currency were taken by looters from banks across the country after April 9.
The disappearance of such a sizable amount of cash as $1 billion is giving rise to fears here that it is being used to finance remnants of Mr. Hussein's government, many of whose senior members are believed to be hiding in Baghdad or its environs.
Some members of the Iraqi National Congress, an umbrella organization for groups that opposed Mr. Hussein, assert that the money may be a central element in what they described as an extensive "post-occupation strategy" devised by Mr. Hussein that envisioned an American takeover of the capital and his eventual return to power.
Neither Iraqi nor American officials claimed to know the whereabouts of the $1 billion or, for that matter, of Saddam Hussein, Qusay Hussein or Mr. Mahmood. All three men are being sought by the United States.
The Iraqi official insisted on anonymity because, he said, he feared that he could fall victim to Mr. Hussein or one of his associates who remain at large.
Some Americans suspect that the money may have been spirited across the border into Syria, in much the same way some senior officials in Mr. Hussein's government are believed to have fled Iraq.
Col. Ted Seel, a United States Army Special Forces officer who said he was aware of the seizure of money from the Central Bank, said intelligence information at the time indicated that a group of tractor-trailers crossed the Iraqi border into Syria. Colonel Seel, who is assigned to the Iraqi National Congress, said the trucks' contents were unknown.
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 5 ? In the hours before American bombs began falling on the Iraqi capital, one of President Saddam Hussein's sons and a close adviser carried off nearly $1 billion in cash from the country's Central Bank, according to American and Iraqi officials here.
The removal of the money, which would amount to one of the largest bank robberies in history, was performed under the direct orders of Mr. Hussein, according to an Iraqi official with knowledge of the incident. The official, who asked not to be identified, said that no financial rationale had been offered for removing the money from the bank's vaults, and that no one had been told where the money would be taken.
"When you get an order from Saddam Hussein, you do not discuss it," said the Iraqi official, who held a senior position in a bank under Mr. Hussein's government. He said he had been told about the seizure of the cash by the Iraqi financial officials who had turned over the money to Mr. Hussein's son and the adviser.
The allegations provide a glimpse into the final days of Mr. Hussein's rule ? which, with its emphasis on family connections, has been compared to the mafia ? and perhaps a clue about how he intended to finance his escape and survive out of power.
Qusay Saddam Hussein, Mr. Hussein's second son, presided over the seizure of the money, along with Abid al-Hamid Mahmood, the president's personal assistant, the Iraqi official here said. The seizure took place at 4 a.m. on March 18, just hours before the first American air assault.
The two men carried a letter from the president, bearing his signature, authorizing the removal of the money, the official said.
The sheer volume of the cash was so great ? some $900 million in American $100 bills and as much as $100 million worth of euros ? that three tractor-trailers were needed to cart it off, the Iraqi official said. It took a team of workers two hours to load up the cash. Their work was completed before employees of the downtown Baghdad bank arrived for work.
The seizure of the money was confirmed by a United States Treasury official assigned to work with Iraqi financial officers here to rebuild the country's banking and financial system.
Iraqi officials said they were uncertain of the effects that the disappearance of $1 billion would have on the Iraqi economy. The Iraqi official said the removal of the money amounted to about a quarter of the Central Bank's hard currency reserves.
The billion dollars is nearly twice the amount of hard currency believed to have been looted by Iraqis in the three weeks after the collapse of the Iraqi government. American and Iraqi officials said about $400 million in American dollars and at least $40 million in Iraqi currency were taken by looters from banks across the country after April 9.
The disappearance of such a sizable amount of cash as $1 billion is giving rise to fears here that it is being used to finance remnants of Mr. Hussein's government, many of whose senior members are believed to be hiding in Baghdad or its environs.
Some members of the Iraqi National Congress, an umbrella organization for groups that opposed Mr. Hussein, assert that the money may be a central element in what they described as an extensive "post-occupation strategy" devised by Mr. Hussein that envisioned an American takeover of the capital and his eventual return to power.
Neither Iraqi nor American officials claimed to know the whereabouts of the $1 billion or, for that matter, of Saddam Hussein, Qusay Hussein or Mr. Mahmood. All three men are being sought by the United States.
The Iraqi official insisted on anonymity because, he said, he feared that he could fall victim to Mr. Hussein or one of his associates who remain at large.
Some Americans suspect that the money may have been spirited across the border into Syria, in much the same way some senior officials in Mr. Hussein's government are believed to have fled Iraq.
Col. Ted Seel, a United States Army Special Forces officer who said he was aware of the seizure of money from the Central Bank, said intelligence information at the time indicated that a group of tractor-trailers crossed the Iraqi border into Syria. Colonel Seel, who is assigned to the Iraqi National Congress, said the trucks' contents were unknown.
YANKING OFF $1 BILLION
Mar 18 eve of Baghdad blitz Saddam yanked off $1 billion from Iraq National Bank.
Qusay showed up with a letter, three flatbed trucks and drivers
Chalabi speaks on TV showing off secret documents indicating Saddam Regime hired Al-Jazeera newsmen as informants
Mar 18 eve of Baghdad blitz Saddam yanked off $1 billion from Iraq National Bank.
Qusay showed up with a letter, three flatbed trucks and drivers
Chalabi speaks on TV showing off secret documents indicating Saddam Regime hired Al-Jazeera newsmen as informants
COOLING HEELS IN CENTRAL ASIA
The al-Qa'ida terrorist network is believed to have moved its operational base to central Asia, home affairs ministers from the G8 industrial nations said yesterday.
After a meeting in Paris, Nicolas Sarkozy, the French Interior Minister, said the organisation, headed by Osama bin Laden, still posed a real threat. He said al-Qa'ida, formerly based in Afganistan, had apparently set up new bases in the former Soviet republics of Chechnya and Georgia.
"We don't expect to lower our guard for a long time," he said. "All the G8 countries have a similar analysis. The terrorist threat is real, it's still present."
Mr Sarkozy denied that the divisions among G8 members over Iraq would hamper the group's fight against terrorism. John Ashcroft, the US Attorney General, attended yesterday's meeting, becoming one of the most senior American officials to visit Paris since tensions erupted over Iraq.
Mr Sarkozy said: "French-American co-operation never stopped, because it concerns the security of our citizens. Those disagreements [on Iraq] are real but that does not necessitate discord on the fight against terrorism."
David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, said the terrorist threat had not lessened. "Whilst we've ... damaged the morale of those who were able to draw on the tacit support of the regime, the network out there remains a problem."
The G8 ministers endorsed a call by Britain for their nations to use biometric data ? such as fingerprints and iris scanning ? to prevent the forgery of travel documents and passports. A working group will draw up proposals by the end of the year to ensure that systems used by different countries are compatible.
The ministers also agreed to set up a database containing 150,000 images of child pornography and pictures of alleged paedophiles in an attempt to improve intelligence-sharing.
The al-Qa'ida terrorist network is believed to have moved its operational base to central Asia, home affairs ministers from the G8 industrial nations said yesterday.
After a meeting in Paris, Nicolas Sarkozy, the French Interior Minister, said the organisation, headed by Osama bin Laden, still posed a real threat. He said al-Qa'ida, formerly based in Afganistan, had apparently set up new bases in the former Soviet republics of Chechnya and Georgia.
"We don't expect to lower our guard for a long time," he said. "All the G8 countries have a similar analysis. The terrorist threat is real, it's still present."
Mr Sarkozy denied that the divisions among G8 members over Iraq would hamper the group's fight against terrorism. John Ashcroft, the US Attorney General, attended yesterday's meeting, becoming one of the most senior American officials to visit Paris since tensions erupted over Iraq.
Mr Sarkozy said: "French-American co-operation never stopped, because it concerns the security of our citizens. Those disagreements [on Iraq] are real but that does not necessitate discord on the fight against terrorism."
David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, said the terrorist threat had not lessened. "Whilst we've ... damaged the morale of those who were able to draw on the tacit support of the regime, the network out there remains a problem."
The G8 ministers endorsed a call by Britain for their nations to use biometric data ? such as fingerprints and iris scanning ? to prevent the forgery of travel documents and passports. A working group will draw up proposals by the end of the year to ensure that systems used by different countries are compatible.
The ministers also agreed to set up a database containing 150,000 images of child pornography and pictures of alleged paedophiles in an attempt to improve intelligence-sharing.
RESTORING IRAQI MARSHES
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is studying ways to restore perhaps a quarter of the marshes of southern Iraq, drained by Saddam Hussein to crush the local Shiite population, according to a senior official.
Andrew Natsios, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, told Reuters that research showed "we could probably restore maybe 25 percent of the marshlands with the existing water flows."
"...We are looking at what is hydrologically feasible given the current technology and water flows," Natsios said.
The Iraqi marshes between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers were home to a unique culture and complex ecosystem that lasted thousands of years. The wetlands were largely drained by Saddam to punish the population for supporting a Shi'ite uprising against his rule that erupted after the 1991 Gulf War.
Nearly 300,000 Marsh Arabs, also known as Ma'adan, were bombed, rounded up by troops, killed or forced to march out of the wetlands. Many others disappeared while the marshes that sustained them turned into a salt-encrusted wasteland. Now, fewer than 20,000 remain.
ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER
A report released by the United Nations Environment Program in 2001 found only 7 percent of the once-extensive marshlands remained. UNEP described the deliberate destruction as one of the worst environmental disasters in history, ranking it with the desiccation of the Aral Sea and the deforestation of the Amazon rain forests.
Last month, UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer said efforts were needed to revive the marshes, but it would be a difficult and complex project.
"We are not blue-eyes optimists, and we know that this cannot be done tomorrow," he said.
In the interview on Friday, Natsios said much of the water that once fed the marshes had been diverted by flood controls and dam systems put in by Iran, Syria and Turkey to use the headwaters of the rivers.
"The consequence of that is that there is not enough water flow in either river to restore the marshes to what they were," he said.
The marshlands once played a crucial environment role, cleaning the water flowing down river of impurities and providing a breeding ground and stop-over point for migratory birds.
Scientists said the flow of detritus from the marshes into the Gulf had also supported fish populations. The environmental degradation put an estimated 40 species of birds and untold species of fish at risk, and has already led to the extinction of at least seven species.
Thomas Crisman, director of the Howard T. Odum Center for Wetlands at the University of Florida, and a member of a team that recently reported on the feasibility of restoring the marshes, said many factors would be involved.
"It's not instant coffee where you just add water," he said. "It's the quality as well as the quantity of the water available and the timing of the flow of that water, as well as the willingness of people to return."
Crisman said Natsios was premature in trying to predict how much can be restored.
"What we're trying to figure out is how to restore the ecology and at the same time try to figure out how to restore a culture," he said.
The Ma'adan settled deep in the marshes, moving around by boat. They made elaborate dwellings out of thick reeds that sat on woven mats suspended above the water.
Rapid evaporation has left some areas with salt crusts 2 feet deep. Unless fresh water is pumped through at sufficient speed, they will become lifeless salt ponds.
Human rights groups have called the assault on the marshes and its people genocide, and said it could be among the charges if Saddam is ever prosecuted for war crimes.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is studying ways to restore perhaps a quarter of the marshes of southern Iraq, drained by Saddam Hussein to crush the local Shiite population, according to a senior official.
Andrew Natsios, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, told Reuters that research showed "we could probably restore maybe 25 percent of the marshlands with the existing water flows."
"...We are looking at what is hydrologically feasible given the current technology and water flows," Natsios said.
The Iraqi marshes between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers were home to a unique culture and complex ecosystem that lasted thousands of years. The wetlands were largely drained by Saddam to punish the population for supporting a Shi'ite uprising against his rule that erupted after the 1991 Gulf War.
Nearly 300,000 Marsh Arabs, also known as Ma'adan, were bombed, rounded up by troops, killed or forced to march out of the wetlands. Many others disappeared while the marshes that sustained them turned into a salt-encrusted wasteland. Now, fewer than 20,000 remain.
ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER
A report released by the United Nations Environment Program in 2001 found only 7 percent of the once-extensive marshlands remained. UNEP described the deliberate destruction as one of the worst environmental disasters in history, ranking it with the desiccation of the Aral Sea and the deforestation of the Amazon rain forests.
Last month, UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer said efforts were needed to revive the marshes, but it would be a difficult and complex project.
"We are not blue-eyes optimists, and we know that this cannot be done tomorrow," he said.
In the interview on Friday, Natsios said much of the water that once fed the marshes had been diverted by flood controls and dam systems put in by Iran, Syria and Turkey to use the headwaters of the rivers.
"The consequence of that is that there is not enough water flow in either river to restore the marshes to what they were," he said.
The marshlands once played a crucial environment role, cleaning the water flowing down river of impurities and providing a breeding ground and stop-over point for migratory birds.
Scientists said the flow of detritus from the marshes into the Gulf had also supported fish populations. The environmental degradation put an estimated 40 species of birds and untold species of fish at risk, and has already led to the extinction of at least seven species.
Thomas Crisman, director of the Howard T. Odum Center for Wetlands at the University of Florida, and a member of a team that recently reported on the feasibility of restoring the marshes, said many factors would be involved.
"It's not instant coffee where you just add water," he said. "It's the quality as well as the quantity of the water available and the timing of the flow of that water, as well as the willingness of people to return."
Crisman said Natsios was premature in trying to predict how much can be restored.
"What we're trying to figure out is how to restore the ecology and at the same time try to figure out how to restore a culture," he said.
The Ma'adan settled deep in the marshes, moving around by boat. They made elaborate dwellings out of thick reeds that sat on woven mats suspended above the water.
Rapid evaporation has left some areas with salt crusts 2 feet deep. Unless fresh water is pumped through at sufficient speed, they will become lifeless salt ponds.
Human rights groups have called the assault on the marshes and its people genocide, and said it could be among the charges if Saddam is ever prosecuted for war crimes.
Monday, May 05, 2003
PAN-HANDLING
Former chemical analyst at Pan Pharmaceuticals testified that he saw spilled pill-making powder being swept up from the floor and 'uploaded' onto the assembly line
Former chemical analyst at Pan Pharmaceuticals testified that he saw spilled pill-making powder being swept up from the floor and 'uploaded' onto the assembly line
LIKELY BIOWEAPON
Sars virus can survive for weeks outside the body. Can spread by touch -- doorknobs, tabletops etc
Spread via faeces/diarrhoea
Sars virus can survive for weeks outside the body. Can spread by touch -- doorknobs, tabletops etc
Spread via faeces/diarrhoea
MEDICINE CHEST TO PANDORA'S BOX
In the bushy suburb of Symonston on Canberra's fringes, kangaroos and horses often graze near a new office building. On quiet days staff watch the animals from the modern bunker that houses the Adverse Drug Reaction Unit.
But on the morning of Thursday, January 16, it was the arrival of blue cards filled in by hospital doctors and general practitioners that caught the attention of these government regulators. The patient details coming in from around the country were alarming: hallucinations; blurred vision; an elderly woman becoming drowsy; confusion and unsteady walking.
It was the height of the holiday season, Australians were on the move and taking their travel sickness pills. Laboratory staff entering the reports on the central database - three that morning, another two by afternoon - were puzzled. Usually, adverse reactions erupt when a relatively new product hits the shelves after pre-market trials that were too small. But Travacalm had been on the market for years, and its active ingredient, hyoscine hydrobromide, had been been used in anti-travel sickness formulas for 50 years.
Lab staff were also puzzled by a second curiosity: patients said they had taken one tablet from the packet and been fine, but taken the next and had become violently ill.
The sixth blue card landed and Travacalm's producer got a telephone call from the Adverse Drug Reaction Unit, part of the Federal Government's medicines regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration.
Sydney-based Key Pharmaceuticals was also receiving complaints from consumers. The complaints related to the same batch of Travacalm Original. But, checking its records, Key found the signed certificate of analysis clearing the batch provided by its supplier, Pan Pharmaceuticals. As John McEwen, the TGA's principal medical adviser, hastily convened a teleconference of clinicians, Key alerted Pan to the problem.
Key's quality assurance and regulatory manager is Sonya Sparre. She says guarantees that the Travacalm had met all the required tests were given directly by Pan's chief executive, Jim Selim, and a quality assurance manager she declined to name.
A written report of the results of the crucial "uniformity of content" test was handed over as proof. "It is now alleged that it was falsified," Sparre says.
Meanwhile, the TGA's medical expert panel was concerned. But, if the scientific results showed no malfunction in Pan machinery, they could not pinpoint what was happening, recalls McEwen.
TGA laboratory staff decided to run their own tests. They bought a packet of Travacalm from a pharmacy. As Canberra burned that weekend, staff stayed on testing.
What they found was a huge disparity between tablets: some had seven times the level of hyoscine hydrobromide, a controlled substance that must be restricted to less than 2 per cent of each dose, while others had none at all.
A conference call between the TGA and Key on the Monday agreed to an immediate recall of all batches of the product made by Pan. Letters were sent to retailers and a media release issued by the TGA warning of "excessive side effects", rating the recall "class 1" or life threatening. But, as fire chaos dominated the media that day, the story was unnoticed.
It would be different the next time the TGA issued a press release about Pan's products. Last Monday, all hell broke loose when the TGA announced a compulsory recall of all products made by Pan and a six-month manufacturing ban on the company.
The recall list stands at 1369. As panicked shoppers clamoured for brand and product names this week, the TGA's phone system collapsed under the weight of 320,000 calls in the first two days. Hits to its website skyrocketed from 500 a day to 70,000.
Now questions familiar from other corporate collapses are being asked again. How closely did Pan's directors scrutinise the company's operations? How soon did the government health regulator tumble to what was happening? And how diligently did Pan's client companies, who on-sold its tainted pills to consumers, check what was sold under their brand name?
The short answer: it took the Travacalm episode to prompt investigations thorough enough to uncover systematic substitution of ingredients, manipulation of test results and substandard manufacturing processes.
When Key failed to extract an explanation from Pan, the company sent for testing of another product made by Pan, Travacalm HO tablets. When they, too, failed, Key advised the TGA and the second product was recalled on January 30. By now, the TGA suspected it had more than an isolated incident on its hands.
McEwen says previous audits did not look for fraud, and that it was only when fraud was suspected that the TGA did more detailed auditing that discovered the problems. Senior TGA officers arrived at Pan unannounced on January 30. A request to access computer records was met first with the response that the computer was unavailable, then that a person with the password was unavailable. By the time a password was found, the TGA says, the computer had been reformatted and information deleted.
The TGA returned on February 13 with Australian Federal Police officers who helped the TGA execute a search warrant. A Pan computer was seized.
Pan later told the TGA it had identified an employee as the problem. On February 27, the company filed a claim in the NSW Supreme Court alleging breach of contract against an analyst, Shyama Jain. Jain, who declined to comment for this story, has begun his own unfair dismissal action against the company in the Industrial Relations Commission.
The TGA had more bad news for Pan. "On the basis of that first audit we placed a condition on their licence that did not authorise Pan to manufacture any product that required uniformity of content," says Rita Maclachlan, the TGA's director of the office of devices, blood and tissues and responsible for its manufacturing audit program.
On February 24 a second surprise audit was launched. The next week, between the Easter break and Anzac Day, the TGA sought advice from the Australian Government Solicitor, its own legal team, and a medical committee that met for a full day to view a draft of the report.
Among its findings: Large amounts of raw herb materials were passed as suitable for use on March 13, but sampling found none had been tested. Machinery was not cleaned between batches, raising the potential of contamination and allergic reactions. There were four examples of manipulation of results of vitamin, cough and cold and energy products between October and January. Another four examples of fabrication of results of vitamins for export, where at least two products were found in March to be over-strength. Beef cartilage was substituted for shark cartilage over a two-year period.
The advice of the TGA's medicines evaluation committeewas that there was a clear risk, and the longer the products remained in the market, the more the risk grew.
On Thursday April 24 the TGA rang Pan director Ken Baxter, the board's designated contact point for regulators, to request a meeting with all four directors the following Monday.
The directors say it was a bolt from the blue, although they had known about Travacalm. In January, Key had alerted Selim who had told his fellow directors.
Director Colin Henson says the explanation given to the board and the remedy of the dismissal of the analyst "to my mind were satisfactory".
Henson finds it "curious" that the TGA did not tell the board directly of the full situation until April 24. He says the board would have acted earlier if the TGA had alerted it.
McEwen says the report, which "needs to stand up to an appeal process and legal action", was not finalised until last Sunday.
McEwen says the TGA would "be foolish not to learn from the experience" with Pan. But he defends its audit process as
being of international standard.
Key says it kept the manufacture of its other products with Pan after the Travacalm incident because the TGA had not told it otherwise. Pan still had a TGA licence.
John Dwyer, chair of a NSW health department committee looking at consumer protection and complementary healthcare, says, "The TGA is poorly resourced and a weak organisation in terms of setting standards and documenting if those standards are not met." "It is like charging the guy with manslaughter after the baby is dead. Had the manufacturer been subject to continuous quality control it would not have happened."
Pan's boardhas yet to offer any explanation for how its manufacturing processes became corrupted. Selim resigned as chief executive on Thursday.
The company acknowleges that "there are serious problems, there are deficiencies to be dealt with" but says it is still investigating the cause.
Perhaps the biggest mystery is the fact that warning bells about Selim's past had not attracted attention.
The man who had started Pan in 1974 had a history of regulatory run-ins. Some of the detail was sitting openly on newspaper clippings files; more came in unprompted phone-calls from people who had worked with him.
The nation might count itself lucky that the impact of the Travacalm problem was limited to the 19 people who ended up in hospital and the 68 others who experienced what the TGA describes as "potentially life-threatening" adverse reactions. In coming weeks, the regulator, the board and the leaders of the industry where Selim flourished for three decades will have a lot of explaining to do.
In the bushy suburb of Symonston on Canberra's fringes, kangaroos and horses often graze near a new office building. On quiet days staff watch the animals from the modern bunker that houses the Adverse Drug Reaction Unit.
But on the morning of Thursday, January 16, it was the arrival of blue cards filled in by hospital doctors and general practitioners that caught the attention of these government regulators. The patient details coming in from around the country were alarming: hallucinations; blurred vision; an elderly woman becoming drowsy; confusion and unsteady walking.
It was the height of the holiday season, Australians were on the move and taking their travel sickness pills. Laboratory staff entering the reports on the central database - three that morning, another two by afternoon - were puzzled. Usually, adverse reactions erupt when a relatively new product hits the shelves after pre-market trials that were too small. But Travacalm had been on the market for years, and its active ingredient, hyoscine hydrobromide, had been been used in anti-travel sickness formulas for 50 years.
Lab staff were also puzzled by a second curiosity: patients said they had taken one tablet from the packet and been fine, but taken the next and had become violently ill.
The sixth blue card landed and Travacalm's producer got a telephone call from the Adverse Drug Reaction Unit, part of the Federal Government's medicines regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration.
Sydney-based Key Pharmaceuticals was also receiving complaints from consumers. The complaints related to the same batch of Travacalm Original. But, checking its records, Key found the signed certificate of analysis clearing the batch provided by its supplier, Pan Pharmaceuticals. As John McEwen, the TGA's principal medical adviser, hastily convened a teleconference of clinicians, Key alerted Pan to the problem.
Key's quality assurance and regulatory manager is Sonya Sparre. She says guarantees that the Travacalm had met all the required tests were given directly by Pan's chief executive, Jim Selim, and a quality assurance manager she declined to name.
A written report of the results of the crucial "uniformity of content" test was handed over as proof. "It is now alleged that it was falsified," Sparre says.
Meanwhile, the TGA's medical expert panel was concerned. But, if the scientific results showed no malfunction in Pan machinery, they could not pinpoint what was happening, recalls McEwen.
TGA laboratory staff decided to run their own tests. They bought a packet of Travacalm from a pharmacy. As Canberra burned that weekend, staff stayed on testing.
What they found was a huge disparity between tablets: some had seven times the level of hyoscine hydrobromide, a controlled substance that must be restricted to less than 2 per cent of each dose, while others had none at all.
A conference call between the TGA and Key on the Monday agreed to an immediate recall of all batches of the product made by Pan. Letters were sent to retailers and a media release issued by the TGA warning of "excessive side effects", rating the recall "class 1" or life threatening. But, as fire chaos dominated the media that day, the story was unnoticed.
It would be different the next time the TGA issued a press release about Pan's products. Last Monday, all hell broke loose when the TGA announced a compulsory recall of all products made by Pan and a six-month manufacturing ban on the company.
The recall list stands at 1369. As panicked shoppers clamoured for brand and product names this week, the TGA's phone system collapsed under the weight of 320,000 calls in the first two days. Hits to its website skyrocketed from 500 a day to 70,000.
Now questions familiar from other corporate collapses are being asked again. How closely did Pan's directors scrutinise the company's operations? How soon did the government health regulator tumble to what was happening? And how diligently did Pan's client companies, who on-sold its tainted pills to consumers, check what was sold under their brand name?
The short answer: it took the Travacalm episode to prompt investigations thorough enough to uncover systematic substitution of ingredients, manipulation of test results and substandard manufacturing processes.
When Key failed to extract an explanation from Pan, the company sent for testing of another product made by Pan, Travacalm HO tablets. When they, too, failed, Key advised the TGA and the second product was recalled on January 30. By now, the TGA suspected it had more than an isolated incident on its hands.
McEwen says previous audits did not look for fraud, and that it was only when fraud was suspected that the TGA did more detailed auditing that discovered the problems. Senior TGA officers arrived at Pan unannounced on January 30. A request to access computer records was met first with the response that the computer was unavailable, then that a person with the password was unavailable. By the time a password was found, the TGA says, the computer had been reformatted and information deleted.
The TGA returned on February 13 with Australian Federal Police officers who helped the TGA execute a search warrant. A Pan computer was seized.
Pan later told the TGA it had identified an employee as the problem. On February 27, the company filed a claim in the NSW Supreme Court alleging breach of contract against an analyst, Shyama Jain. Jain, who declined to comment for this story, has begun his own unfair dismissal action against the company in the Industrial Relations Commission.
The TGA had more bad news for Pan. "On the basis of that first audit we placed a condition on their licence that did not authorise Pan to manufacture any product that required uniformity of content," says Rita Maclachlan, the TGA's director of the office of devices, blood and tissues and responsible for its manufacturing audit program.
On February 24 a second surprise audit was launched. The next week, between the Easter break and Anzac Day, the TGA sought advice from the Australian Government Solicitor, its own legal team, and a medical committee that met for a full day to view a draft of the report.
Among its findings: Large amounts of raw herb materials were passed as suitable for use on March 13, but sampling found none had been tested. Machinery was not cleaned between batches, raising the potential of contamination and allergic reactions. There were four examples of manipulation of results of vitamin, cough and cold and energy products between October and January. Another four examples of fabrication of results of vitamins for export, where at least two products were found in March to be over-strength. Beef cartilage was substituted for shark cartilage over a two-year period.
The advice of the TGA's medicines evaluation committeewas that there was a clear risk, and the longer the products remained in the market, the more the risk grew.
On Thursday April 24 the TGA rang Pan director Ken Baxter, the board's designated contact point for regulators, to request a meeting with all four directors the following Monday.
The directors say it was a bolt from the blue, although they had known about Travacalm. In January, Key had alerted Selim who had told his fellow directors.
Director Colin Henson says the explanation given to the board and the remedy of the dismissal of the analyst "to my mind were satisfactory".
Henson finds it "curious" that the TGA did not tell the board directly of the full situation until April 24. He says the board would have acted earlier if the TGA had alerted it.
McEwen says the report, which "needs to stand up to an appeal process and legal action", was not finalised until last Sunday.
McEwen says the TGA would "be foolish not to learn from the experience" with Pan. But he defends its audit process as
being of international standard.
Key says it kept the manufacture of its other products with Pan after the Travacalm incident because the TGA had not told it otherwise. Pan still had a TGA licence.
John Dwyer, chair of a NSW health department committee looking at consumer protection and complementary healthcare, says, "The TGA is poorly resourced and a weak organisation in terms of setting standards and documenting if those standards are not met." "It is like charging the guy with manslaughter after the baby is dead. Had the manufacturer been subject to continuous quality control it would not have happened."
Pan's boardhas yet to offer any explanation for how its manufacturing processes became corrupted. Selim resigned as chief executive on Thursday.
The company acknowleges that "there are serious problems, there are deficiencies to be dealt with" but says it is still investigating the cause.
Perhaps the biggest mystery is the fact that warning bells about Selim's past had not attracted attention.
The man who had started Pan in 1974 had a history of regulatory run-ins. Some of the detail was sitting openly on newspaper clippings files; more came in unprompted phone-calls from people who had worked with him.
The nation might count itself lucky that the impact of the Travacalm problem was limited to the 19 people who ended up in hospital and the 68 others who experienced what the TGA describes as "potentially life-threatening" adverse reactions. In coming weeks, the regulator, the board and the leaders of the industry where Selim flourished for three decades will have a lot of explaining to do.
JITTERY COPS IN BAGHDAD
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Police in Iraq's capital returned to work in force Sunday, but there were few patrols on Baghdad's lawless streets as officers struggled to navigate a chaotic new order that had yet to determine salaries, responsibilities or even chain of command.
The verdict: In Baghdad, even some of the police don't feel safe yet.
Hundreds of officers milled about stations after the U.S.-led coalition issued a radio appeal for all officers in the four main police forces to return to work as of Sunday.
Although a smattering of police officers had returned to their jobs on their own initiative in the days after the Americans took Baghdad, Sunday was the first official day of work.
But while they surveyed looted offices and mangled patrol cars, few officers were seen on the beat. In a city where the law of the gun now prevails in most places, many of the mostly unarmed policemen said they didn't feel secure.
"You will probably notice that the citizens are respecting the American patrols more than the Iraqi patrols. That's because the Americans have weapons," said Col. Karim Sarhan, 47, cruising the streets in a white Nissan Maxima with police lights but no license plates.
But danger remains even for the American troops. A 3rd Infantry Division soldier was shot in the head and seriously wounded by an Iraqi civilian Sunday at a Baghdad intersection, the U.S. Central Command said.
The soldier was evacuated to a military hospital, the command said. No further details were released.
Most Iraqis and many high-level U.S. military officials see law and order as the most urgent task of the still-to-be-formed new government. Until the streets are safe, they say, stores can't open, factories can't produce and children can't attend school.
But getting police to restore order among citizens who have long considered them enforcers of a repressive regime is a monumental task. Complicating matters, officers complained that the coalition appeared confused about their duties.
"Everybody is imposing himself as the commander. There is no organization," Sgt. Haider Jamal shouted at policemen, journalists and U.S. troops. "If you don't give me my salary, I'll become a looter."
Gen. Hamid Othman, the new Baghdad police chief, said he was still working on assignments and duties.
"Within two or three days, things will be normalized," he said. "Our goal is to achieve security and safety, in cooperation with Baghdad's citizens."
Philip Hall, a coalition liaison with the Interior Ministry, which controls the police, acknowledged the disarray but said police will soon be back in force.
"Today marks a very important start in resuming civilian life in Baghdad," Hall said. "We recognize that there is a very difficult security situation at the moment, and we therefore see an urgent need for the police force."
In Hillah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, Los Angeles Police Department officers from a reserve Marines unit trained about 20 Iraqi police officers Sunday. Soldiers in central Karbala began a four-week training program and reserve Marines with police experience in nearby Najaf made recommendations for training there, U.S. Central Command said.
In Baghdad, many officers reported for duty to the police academy. A fleet of Humvees filled with U.S. Military Police stood ready, but their commander, Col. Ted Spain, said joint patrols were still days away.
Coalition officials said all returning officers would receive a one-time emergency payment of $20 while payrolls were being reconstituted. The officers also will get pistols; no larger weapons will be allowed.
But the guard at the academy gate, 1st Sgt. Ibrahim Youssef, had a Kalashnikov slung over his shoulder. He said the U.S. Military Police had told him it was OK because "a pistol is not enough to deal with the criminals."
Military police refused comment, but Hall said: "We'll be talking with them about that."
Around Baghdad, police stations were filled with officers surveying damage and discussing their fate. At the New Baghdad precinct, policemen debated who would pay them as they picked through looted offices.
"No patrols today," said Capt. Oweid Jabbar. "Maybe tomorrow."
A few patrols set out from the Traffic Police headquarters, where Saddam Hussein's portrait still stood with the motto: "God save Iraq and Saddam."
Maj. Gen. Kais Mohammed Naif, head of the traffic force, presided from a dusty desk in a looted office, his only other furniture a garish set of yellow couches. He estimated that 90 percent of his 1,100 officers returned Sunday.
Outside, an officer who wouldn't give his name said none of the police would obey the commander. "He was a (Baath) party member. That's why he was head of the traffic police," the officer murmured.
Indeed, patrols seemed largely disorganized. At one intersection, 10 officers directed traffic, but most motorists ignored them. The intersection was clogged in gridlock.
"Citizens do not respect our orders. They witnessed a change, and their concept is that this lawlessness is democracy," said Sarhan, the traffic police colonel. "This is chaos, not democracy."
Sameer Majid, 42, selling satellite dishes from his otherwise empty appliance shop, said he doesn't care who polices the streets as long as there is safety.
"Saddam Hussein cut off the hands of the thieves. There were no thieves," he said. He considered for a moment and shrugged, conceding: "There were also no satellite dishes."
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Police in Iraq's capital returned to work in force Sunday, but there were few patrols on Baghdad's lawless streets as officers struggled to navigate a chaotic new order that had yet to determine salaries, responsibilities or even chain of command.
The verdict: In Baghdad, even some of the police don't feel safe yet.
Hundreds of officers milled about stations after the U.S.-led coalition issued a radio appeal for all officers in the four main police forces to return to work as of Sunday.
Although a smattering of police officers had returned to their jobs on their own initiative in the days after the Americans took Baghdad, Sunday was the first official day of work.
But while they surveyed looted offices and mangled patrol cars, few officers were seen on the beat. In a city where the law of the gun now prevails in most places, many of the mostly unarmed policemen said they didn't feel secure.
"You will probably notice that the citizens are respecting the American patrols more than the Iraqi patrols. That's because the Americans have weapons," said Col. Karim Sarhan, 47, cruising the streets in a white Nissan Maxima with police lights but no license plates.
But danger remains even for the American troops. A 3rd Infantry Division soldier was shot in the head and seriously wounded by an Iraqi civilian Sunday at a Baghdad intersection, the U.S. Central Command said.
The soldier was evacuated to a military hospital, the command said. No further details were released.
Most Iraqis and many high-level U.S. military officials see law and order as the most urgent task of the still-to-be-formed new government. Until the streets are safe, they say, stores can't open, factories can't produce and children can't attend school.
But getting police to restore order among citizens who have long considered them enforcers of a repressive regime is a monumental task. Complicating matters, officers complained that the coalition appeared confused about their duties.
"Everybody is imposing himself as the commander. There is no organization," Sgt. Haider Jamal shouted at policemen, journalists and U.S. troops. "If you don't give me my salary, I'll become a looter."
Gen. Hamid Othman, the new Baghdad police chief, said he was still working on assignments and duties.
"Within two or three days, things will be normalized," he said. "Our goal is to achieve security and safety, in cooperation with Baghdad's citizens."
Philip Hall, a coalition liaison with the Interior Ministry, which controls the police, acknowledged the disarray but said police will soon be back in force.
"Today marks a very important start in resuming civilian life in Baghdad," Hall said. "We recognize that there is a very difficult security situation at the moment, and we therefore see an urgent need for the police force."
In Hillah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, Los Angeles Police Department officers from a reserve Marines unit trained about 20 Iraqi police officers Sunday. Soldiers in central Karbala began a four-week training program and reserve Marines with police experience in nearby Najaf made recommendations for training there, U.S. Central Command said.
In Baghdad, many officers reported for duty to the police academy. A fleet of Humvees filled with U.S. Military Police stood ready, but their commander, Col. Ted Spain, said joint patrols were still days away.
Coalition officials said all returning officers would receive a one-time emergency payment of $20 while payrolls were being reconstituted. The officers also will get pistols; no larger weapons will be allowed.
But the guard at the academy gate, 1st Sgt. Ibrahim Youssef, had a Kalashnikov slung over his shoulder. He said the U.S. Military Police had told him it was OK because "a pistol is not enough to deal with the criminals."
Military police refused comment, but Hall said: "We'll be talking with them about that."
Around Baghdad, police stations were filled with officers surveying damage and discussing their fate. At the New Baghdad precinct, policemen debated who would pay them as they picked through looted offices.
"No patrols today," said Capt. Oweid Jabbar. "Maybe tomorrow."
A few patrols set out from the Traffic Police headquarters, where Saddam Hussein's portrait still stood with the motto: "God save Iraq and Saddam."
Maj. Gen. Kais Mohammed Naif, head of the traffic force, presided from a dusty desk in a looted office, his only other furniture a garish set of yellow couches. He estimated that 90 percent of his 1,100 officers returned Sunday.
Outside, an officer who wouldn't give his name said none of the police would obey the commander. "He was a (Baath) party member. That's why he was head of the traffic police," the officer murmured.
Indeed, patrols seemed largely disorganized. At one intersection, 10 officers directed traffic, but most motorists ignored them. The intersection was clogged in gridlock.
"Citizens do not respect our orders. They witnessed a change, and their concept is that this lawlessness is democracy," said Sarhan, the traffic police colonel. "This is chaos, not democracy."
Sameer Majid, 42, selling satellite dishes from his otherwise empty appliance shop, said he doesn't care who polices the streets as long as there is safety.
"Saddam Hussein cut off the hands of the thieves. There were no thieves," he said. He considered for a moment and shrugged, conceding: "There were also no satellite dishes."
SMS A CAB
London's traffic problems are undoubtedly worse than Auckland's and far worse than anything Wellington has to worry about.
But former Wellingtonian Nick Middleton thinks his new company, a text message minicab service called Cab2go, could be the answer.
Developed over two years, the concept is simple.
Would-be travellers text their location, desired destination and name to the Cab2go number and back comes a list of fare options and estimated times of arrival from licensed cab companies.
Once the customer has chosen a ride, Cab2go sends back an SMS giving details of the cab dispatched, including the licensed driver's name, car colour, make, model and registration.
"I had the idea about two years ago," says Middleton.
"It came out of the frustration of leaving clubs and bars and having to negotiate for a taxi. It really put a downer on the whole night.
"And you always hear about the muggings and sexual assaults, and all the intimidation that goes on too."
Middleton says the aim of his service is to "get rid of the cowboy element. Minicabs generally have a very bad name out there so we wanted to identify companies of integrity that wish to promote their reputation".
He arrived in the UK in 1998 and found himself swept up in the dotcom boom, working for a company called Protx.
"The company was worth a hundred million when I started but became a casualty of the tech wreck. So I went travelling and the idea for Cab2go emerged."
Initially he held off because others were supposedly planning something similar.
"But two years on, after I had been home to New Zealand for a visit, no one had actually come out with it and I decided it's what I really wanted to do. So I started work on it."
As part of his market research, Middleton had to meet a range of minicab companies.
"There was an initial resistance from some companies. But as soon as we went in there and gave them a five-minute demonstration their whole attitude changed completely.
"They understood exactly how it worked and realised it was going to be an important service that they should be part of."
Cab2go was launched in Fulham as a trial to iron out teething problems.
If the trial works out he hopes to expand fairly quickly to cover the whole of London.
"I really hope to make a difference in London," Middleton says. "If all goes well, Cab2go will be the safest, most convenient and best value for money taxi ride."
London's traffic problems are undoubtedly worse than Auckland's and far worse than anything Wellington has to worry about.
But former Wellingtonian Nick Middleton thinks his new company, a text message minicab service called Cab2go, could be the answer.
Developed over two years, the concept is simple.
Would-be travellers text their location, desired destination and name to the Cab2go number and back comes a list of fare options and estimated times of arrival from licensed cab companies.
Once the customer has chosen a ride, Cab2go sends back an SMS giving details of the cab dispatched, including the licensed driver's name, car colour, make, model and registration.
"I had the idea about two years ago," says Middleton.
"It came out of the frustration of leaving clubs and bars and having to negotiate for a taxi. It really put a downer on the whole night.
"And you always hear about the muggings and sexual assaults, and all the intimidation that goes on too."
Middleton says the aim of his service is to "get rid of the cowboy element. Minicabs generally have a very bad name out there so we wanted to identify companies of integrity that wish to promote their reputation".
He arrived in the UK in 1998 and found himself swept up in the dotcom boom, working for a company called Protx.
"The company was worth a hundred million when I started but became a casualty of the tech wreck. So I went travelling and the idea for Cab2go emerged."
Initially he held off because others were supposedly planning something similar.
"But two years on, after I had been home to New Zealand for a visit, no one had actually come out with it and I decided it's what I really wanted to do. So I started work on it."
As part of his market research, Middleton had to meet a range of minicab companies.
"There was an initial resistance from some companies. But as soon as we went in there and gave them a five-minute demonstration their whole attitude changed completely.
"They understood exactly how it worked and realised it was going to be an important service that they should be part of."
Cab2go was launched in Fulham as a trial to iron out teething problems.
If the trial works out he hopes to expand fairly quickly to cover the whole of London.
"I really hope to make a difference in London," Middleton says. "If all goes well, Cab2go will be the safest, most convenient and best value for money taxi ride."
BROAD BUNGLING AUSSIES
Sixty per cent of Australian adults are overweight or obese, according to a study of 11,000 people.
Australians are now equal with Americans as the most overweight people in the world, with a new study showing that the rate of obesity in Australia has more than doubled in the past 20 years.
And, for the first time, excess weight has been conclusively linked to television watching, finding that even physically active people are at greater risk of obesity if they spend long periods of time in front of the television.
The study of more than 11,000 Australian adults aged 25 and older, published in yesterday's Medical Journal of Australia, found that almost 60 per cent are overweight or obese.
Among young people, obesity is less prevalent in women than men, but women showed a more rapid rise in their body mass index (calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by height in metres squared) and higher rates of obesity by the 35 to 44 age group. People with a BMI of 25 to 30 are considered overweight, while those with a BMI over 30 are considered obese.
One of the study's authors, Paul Zimmet, director of Melbourne's International Diabetes Institute, said obesity, which had reached epidemic proportions in Australia, had huge public health ramifications.
Most prominent among those is the surge in type 2 diabetes, which usually develops later in life and is largely due to being overweight and not exercising enough. Obesity has also been linked with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, arthritis and some types of cancer.
Professor Zimmet said an obesity summit held in NSW last year estimated it costs the nation up to $13 billion a year.
Nearly a million Australians now have type 2 diabetes. The figure has quadrupled in the past 20 years and led experts to coin the term "diabesity".
There is no single reason why obesity had skyrocketed in the past two decades, he said. Instead, it was because of a combination of lifestyle, poor diet and lack of exercise.
The mechanisation of work, and safety issues - which, for example, might prevent children walking or riding bikes to school - has led to a more sedentary, indoors lifestyle. Professor Zimmet said the link between television viewing, physical activity and obesity, long hypothesised but never demonstrated, was one of the most important findings of the study. "We found that TV viewing has more of an impact on obesity than physical activity," he said.
A professor of public health nutrition at Deakin University, Boyd Swinburn, said one of the most disturbing trends was the increase in child obesity, which often continued into adulthood. Obesity can also have a serious impact on psychological health.
"If you have children who are overweight, their chances of being overweight as adults are 30 to 50 per cent, while for overweight adolescents, their chances are 60 to 70 per cent," Professor Swinburn said.
There are some genetic differences that made people more prone to obesity than others, he said, but the tendency could be controlled by eating well and exercising regularly.
Professor Zimmet said parents were often unfairly accused of allowing their children to become fat, when the fault lay with a more complex set of societal trends and conditions, including lack of access to efficient public transport, public parks and exercise venues.
Sixty per cent of Australian adults are overweight or obese, according to a study of 11,000 people.
Australians are now equal with Americans as the most overweight people in the world, with a new study showing that the rate of obesity in Australia has more than doubled in the past 20 years.
And, for the first time, excess weight has been conclusively linked to television watching, finding that even physically active people are at greater risk of obesity if they spend long periods of time in front of the television.
The study of more than 11,000 Australian adults aged 25 and older, published in yesterday's Medical Journal of Australia, found that almost 60 per cent are overweight or obese.
Among young people, obesity is less prevalent in women than men, but women showed a more rapid rise in their body mass index (calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by height in metres squared) and higher rates of obesity by the 35 to 44 age group. People with a BMI of 25 to 30 are considered overweight, while those with a BMI over 30 are considered obese.
One of the study's authors, Paul Zimmet, director of Melbourne's International Diabetes Institute, said obesity, which had reached epidemic proportions in Australia, had huge public health ramifications.
Most prominent among those is the surge in type 2 diabetes, which usually develops later in life and is largely due to being overweight and not exercising enough. Obesity has also been linked with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, arthritis and some types of cancer.
Professor Zimmet said an obesity summit held in NSW last year estimated it costs the nation up to $13 billion a year.
Nearly a million Australians now have type 2 diabetes. The figure has quadrupled in the past 20 years and led experts to coin the term "diabesity".
There is no single reason why obesity had skyrocketed in the past two decades, he said. Instead, it was because of a combination of lifestyle, poor diet and lack of exercise.
The mechanisation of work, and safety issues - which, for example, might prevent children walking or riding bikes to school - has led to a more sedentary, indoors lifestyle. Professor Zimmet said the link between television viewing, physical activity and obesity, long hypothesised but never demonstrated, was one of the most important findings of the study. "We found that TV viewing has more of an impact on obesity than physical activity," he said.
A professor of public health nutrition at Deakin University, Boyd Swinburn, said one of the most disturbing trends was the increase in child obesity, which often continued into adulthood. Obesity can also have a serious impact on psychological health.
"If you have children who are overweight, their chances of being overweight as adults are 30 to 50 per cent, while for overweight adolescents, their chances are 60 to 70 per cent," Professor Swinburn said.
There are some genetic differences that made people more prone to obesity than others, he said, but the tendency could be controlled by eating well and exercising regularly.
Professor Zimmet said parents were often unfairly accused of allowing their children to become fat, when the fault lay with a more complex set of societal trends and conditions, including lack of access to efficient public transport, public parks and exercise venues.
BROAD BUNGLING AUSSIES
Sixty per cent of Australian adults are overweight or obese, according to a study of 11,000 people.
Australians are now equal with Americans as the most overweight people in the world, with a new study showing that the rate of obesity in Australia has more than doubled in the past 20 years.
And, for the first time, excess weight has been conclusively linked to television watching, finding that even physically active people are at greater risk of obesity if they spend long periods of time in front of the television.
The study of more than 11,000 Australian adults aged 25 and older, published in yesterday's Medical Journal of Australia, found that almost 60 per cent are overweight or obese.
Among young people, obesity is less prevalent in women than men, but women showed a more rapid rise in their body mass index (calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by height in metres squared) and higher rates of obesity by the 35 to 44 age group. People with a BMI of 25 to 30 are considered overweight, while those with a BMI over 30 are considered obese.
One of the study's authors, Paul Zimmet, director of Melbourne's International Diabetes Institute, said obesity, which had reached epidemic proportions in Australia, had huge public health ramifications.
Most prominent among those is the surge in type 2 diabetes, which usually develops later in life and is largely due to being overweight and not exercising enough. Obesity has also been linked with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, arthritis and some types of cancer.
Professor Zimmet said an obesity summit held in NSW last year estimated it costs the nation up to $13 billion a year.
Nearly a million Australians now have type 2 diabetes. The figure has quadrupled in the past 20 years and led experts to coin the term "diabesity".
There is no single reason why obesity had skyrocketed in the past two decades, he said. Instead, it was because of a combination of lifestyle, poor diet and lack of exercise.
The mechanisation of work, and safety issues - which, for example, might prevent children walking or riding bikes to school - has led to a more sedentary, indoors lifestyle. Professor Zimmet said the link between television viewing, physical activity and obesity, long hypothesised but never demonstrated, was one of the most important findings of the study. "We found that TV viewing has more of an impact on obesity than physical activity," he said.
A professor of public health nutrition at Deakin University, Boyd Swinburn, said one of the most disturbing trends was the increase in child obesity, which often continued into adulthood. Obesity can also have a serious impact on psychological health.
"If you have children who are overweight, their chances of being overweight as adults are 30 to 50 per cent, while for overweight adolescents, their chances are 60 to 70 per cent," Professor Swinburn said.
There are some genetic differences that made people more prone to obesity than others, he said, but the tendency could be controlled by eating well and exercising regularly.
Professor Zimmet said parents were often unfairly accused of allowing their children to become fat, when the fault lay with a more complex set of societal trends and conditions, including lack of access to efficient public transport, public parks and exercise venues.
Printer friendly version Printer friendly version Email to a friend Email to a friend
Sixty per cent of Australian adults are overweight or obese, according to a study of 11,000 people.
Australians are now equal with Americans as the most overweight people in the world, with a new study showing that the rate of obesity in Australia has more than doubled in the past 20 years.
And, for the first time, excess weight has been conclusively linked to television watching, finding that even physically active people are at greater risk of obesity if they spend long periods of time in front of the television.
The study of more than 11,000 Australian adults aged 25 and older, published in yesterday's Medical Journal of Australia, found that almost 60 per cent are overweight or obese.
Among young people, obesity is less prevalent in women than men, but women showed a more rapid rise in their body mass index (calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by height in metres squared) and higher rates of obesity by the 35 to 44 age group. People with a BMI of 25 to 30 are considered overweight, while those with a BMI over 30 are considered obese.
One of the study's authors, Paul Zimmet, director of Melbourne's International Diabetes Institute, said obesity, which had reached epidemic proportions in Australia, had huge public health ramifications.
Most prominent among those is the surge in type 2 diabetes, which usually develops later in life and is largely due to being overweight and not exercising enough. Obesity has also been linked with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, arthritis and some types of cancer.
Professor Zimmet said an obesity summit held in NSW last year estimated it costs the nation up to $13 billion a year.
Nearly a million Australians now have type 2 diabetes. The figure has quadrupled in the past 20 years and led experts to coin the term "diabesity".
There is no single reason why obesity had skyrocketed in the past two decades, he said. Instead, it was because of a combination of lifestyle, poor diet and lack of exercise.
The mechanisation of work, and safety issues - which, for example, might prevent children walking or riding bikes to school - has led to a more sedentary, indoors lifestyle. Professor Zimmet said the link between television viewing, physical activity and obesity, long hypothesised but never demonstrated, was one of the most important findings of the study. "We found that TV viewing has more of an impact on obesity than physical activity," he said.
A professor of public health nutrition at Deakin University, Boyd Swinburn, said one of the most disturbing trends was the increase in child obesity, which often continued into adulthood. Obesity can also have a serious impact on psychological health.
"If you have children who are overweight, their chances of being overweight as adults are 30 to 50 per cent, while for overweight adolescents, their chances are 60 to 70 per cent," Professor Swinburn said.
There are some genetic differences that made people more prone to obesity than others, he said, but the tendency could be controlled by eating well and exercising regularly.
Professor Zimmet said parents were often unfairly accused of allowing their children to become fat, when the fault lay with a more complex set of societal trends and conditions, including lack of access to efficient public transport, public parks and exercise venues.
Printer friendly version Printer friendly version Email to a friend Email to a friend
FENDING OFF FORECLOSURE
More than 2 million Americans are now falling behind on their mortgage payments. How they can work with banks to get back on track.
Banks are giving delinquent mortgagees much more leeway than ever before - perhaps by default.
While delinquent mortgage payments have dropped slightly, according to the latest figures released by the Mortgage Bankers Association of America (MBA), foreclosures are still on the rise.
The percentage of loans in foreclosure was 1.18 percent in the fourth quarter of 2002, the latest figure available. That's up from 1.15 percent in the third quarter.
MBA chief economist Doug Duncan is somewhat optimistic that foreclosures have peaked, noting that they usually lag unemployment and delinquencies.
On the latter front, there is a shred of good news. The MBA's National Delinquency Survey for the fourth quarter of 2002 shows 4.53 percent of almost 45 million mortgage loans in the US were at least 30 days late, down from 4.66 percent during the previous three months.
"We are not out of the woods," says Mr. Duncan, who expects delinquencies will continue to fall. "It's heavily dependent on what we see in the economy going ahead."
But with the economy still down, un- employment up, and the percentage of mortgage debt to total debt rising, "the increase in foreclosures is not over yet," says Thomas Hickey, economist for TransUnion, a provider of global business intelligence services in Jackson, Miss.
"The unemployment rate will continue to climb in 2003 and the economic growth rate will be slow until 2004," he adds.
Regardless of economic conditions, lenders are taking clear steps to help borrowers avoid foreclosure. The key, they say, is for consumers to face the issue head-on.
"We just need customers to talk to us, but many people are too embarrassed," says Chuck Maness, senior vice president of National City Home Loan Services in Cleveland. "Our philosophy is to help every borrower to stay in their home.... We make absolutely no money on a foreclosure."
National City Corp. implemented a loss-mitigation program about two years ago, offering consumers a variety of repayment options to avoid foreclosure. Many other lenders, including Freddie Mac, Chase Manhattan, and Wells Fargo, have similar programs.
Among the most common options given to people struggling to meet their house payments:
Repayment plans: These plans often give homeowners additional time to bring an account up to date. For example, if a homeowner loses a job and falls behind on the mortgage before regaining employment, then the bank may arrange for the borrower to send a payment and a half for several months until the loan is current.
Modification plans: These plans are used when a borrower falls behind and cannot make up the back payments. Banks sometimes will add those payments and interest owed to the loan, giving the borrower a fresh start.
Forbearance plans: This option is usually connected with natural disasters. When the house owned by one National City customer flooded, it forced the family into a hotel while repairs were done. This extra expenses prevented the customer from making timely payments. The bank granted forbearance until the insurance company reimbursed the customer for the expenses and the loan was brought current.
Preforeclosure sales This option helps people who can no longer afford their house. The bank allows the customer to sell the house for less than it was worth, and forgives some past-due interest. The amount forgiven varies, but Mr. Maness says it ranges up to 20 percent of interest due.
Whatever the terms, financial experts say proactive consumers find more grace with lenders than those who ignore late notices and avoid phone calls.
"There is leeway with the bank, but most Americans don't know it," says Fred Siegel, founder of the Siegel Group, a real estate development and consulting firm in New Orleans. "Banks are more much more lenient today than they were a decade ago because interest rates are so low."
Experts say the best approach is to be honest with the lender and negotiate a lower interest loan or an extended payment plan. Mercy abounds for borrowers facing a job loss, illness, or other unforeseen circumstances.
Yet there are limits. After homeowners fall three payments behind, banks forward such cases to an attorney. But foreclosure proceedings take up to a year in most states, according to experts, giving customers even more time to work out a repayment plan, save their home, and salvage their credit rating.
"If the bank thinks you are trying, then they will work with you," says Mr. Siegel. who recommends that troubled borrowers consider using nonprofit credit-counseling services to act as a mediator in the foreclosure process. "If they think you are avoiding the issue, then they are going to go on with the foreclosure."
When all else fails, legal experts say, file for bankruptcy.
"You don't want to file bankruptcy unless you have exhausted all the other options, because it stays on your record for years," says attorney Stuart Gordon, chairman of the bankruptcy and insolvency department of Shaw, Licitra, Bohner, Esernio, Schwartz and Pfluger, P.C., in Garden City, N.Y.
"The worst thing people can do is nothing," he adds. "You get legal fees, late fees, default fees, and before you know it, there are so many fees that you can't keep up."
Individuals with a source of income should file Chapter 13 bankruptcy, Mr. Gordon says, enabling them to keep their homes and work out a repayment plan with their creditors.
But experts warn that Chapter 7 bankruptcy is not as viable an option to hold onto a home as once it was. Higher property values have built substantial equity in many homes, giving lenders more to gain from foreclosing than in the past, says John Penberthy, chair of the American Bar Association's Consumer Bankruptcy Subsection.
"With the exception of Florida and Texas, no state exemption statute allows you to keep the house when a Chapter 7 is filed," says Mr. Penberthy. But "if a debtor has enough disposable income to catch the mortgage up within 12 months [since unsecured obligations, like credit-card payments, do not have to be made], a Chapter 7 is viable option to save a home."
More than 2 million Americans are now falling behind on their mortgage payments. How they can work with banks to get back on track.
Banks are giving delinquent mortgagees much more leeway than ever before - perhaps by default.
While delinquent mortgage payments have dropped slightly, according to the latest figures released by the Mortgage Bankers Association of America (MBA), foreclosures are still on the rise.
The percentage of loans in foreclosure was 1.18 percent in the fourth quarter of 2002, the latest figure available. That's up from 1.15 percent in the third quarter.
MBA chief economist Doug Duncan is somewhat optimistic that foreclosures have peaked, noting that they usually lag unemployment and delinquencies.
On the latter front, there is a shred of good news. The MBA's National Delinquency Survey for the fourth quarter of 2002 shows 4.53 percent of almost 45 million mortgage loans in the US were at least 30 days late, down from 4.66 percent during the previous three months.
"We are not out of the woods," says Mr. Duncan, who expects delinquencies will continue to fall. "It's heavily dependent on what we see in the economy going ahead."
But with the economy still down, un- employment up, and the percentage of mortgage debt to total debt rising, "the increase in foreclosures is not over yet," says Thomas Hickey, economist for TransUnion, a provider of global business intelligence services in Jackson, Miss.
"The unemployment rate will continue to climb in 2003 and the economic growth rate will be slow until 2004," he adds.
Regardless of economic conditions, lenders are taking clear steps to help borrowers avoid foreclosure. The key, they say, is for consumers to face the issue head-on.
"We just need customers to talk to us, but many people are too embarrassed," says Chuck Maness, senior vice president of National City Home Loan Services in Cleveland. "Our philosophy is to help every borrower to stay in their home.... We make absolutely no money on a foreclosure."
National City Corp. implemented a loss-mitigation program about two years ago, offering consumers a variety of repayment options to avoid foreclosure. Many other lenders, including Freddie Mac, Chase Manhattan, and Wells Fargo, have similar programs.
Among the most common options given to people struggling to meet their house payments:
Repayment plans: These plans often give homeowners additional time to bring an account up to date. For example, if a homeowner loses a job and falls behind on the mortgage before regaining employment, then the bank may arrange for the borrower to send a payment and a half for several months until the loan is current.
Modification plans: These plans are used when a borrower falls behind and cannot make up the back payments. Banks sometimes will add those payments and interest owed to the loan, giving the borrower a fresh start.
Forbearance plans: This option is usually connected with natural disasters. When the house owned by one National City customer flooded, it forced the family into a hotel while repairs were done. This extra expenses prevented the customer from making timely payments. The bank granted forbearance until the insurance company reimbursed the customer for the expenses and the loan was brought current.
Preforeclosure sales This option helps people who can no longer afford their house. The bank allows the customer to sell the house for less than it was worth, and forgives some past-due interest. The amount forgiven varies, but Mr. Maness says it ranges up to 20 percent of interest due.
Whatever the terms, financial experts say proactive consumers find more grace with lenders than those who ignore late notices and avoid phone calls.
"There is leeway with the bank, but most Americans don't know it," says Fred Siegel, founder of the Siegel Group, a real estate development and consulting firm in New Orleans. "Banks are more much more lenient today than they were a decade ago because interest rates are so low."
Experts say the best approach is to be honest with the lender and negotiate a lower interest loan or an extended payment plan. Mercy abounds for borrowers facing a job loss, illness, or other unforeseen circumstances.
Yet there are limits. After homeowners fall three payments behind, banks forward such cases to an attorney. But foreclosure proceedings take up to a year in most states, according to experts, giving customers even more time to work out a repayment plan, save their home, and salvage their credit rating.
"If the bank thinks you are trying, then they will work with you," says Mr. Siegel. who recommends that troubled borrowers consider using nonprofit credit-counseling services to act as a mediator in the foreclosure process. "If they think you are avoiding the issue, then they are going to go on with the foreclosure."
When all else fails, legal experts say, file for bankruptcy.
"You don't want to file bankruptcy unless you have exhausted all the other options, because it stays on your record for years," says attorney Stuart Gordon, chairman of the bankruptcy and insolvency department of Shaw, Licitra, Bohner, Esernio, Schwartz and Pfluger, P.C., in Garden City, N.Y.
"The worst thing people can do is nothing," he adds. "You get legal fees, late fees, default fees, and before you know it, there are so many fees that you can't keep up."
Individuals with a source of income should file Chapter 13 bankruptcy, Mr. Gordon says, enabling them to keep their homes and work out a repayment plan with their creditors.
But experts warn that Chapter 7 bankruptcy is not as viable an option to hold onto a home as once it was. Higher property values have built substantial equity in many homes, giving lenders more to gain from foreclosing than in the past, says John Penberthy, chair of the American Bar Association's Consumer Bankruptcy Subsection.
"With the exception of Florida and Texas, no state exemption statute allows you to keep the house when a Chapter 7 is filed," says Mr. Penberthy. But "if a debtor has enough disposable income to catch the mortgage up within 12 months [since unsecured obligations, like credit-card payments, do not have to be made], a Chapter 7 is viable option to save a home."
DIM SUM SARS HYSTERIA
SAN FRANCISCO -- There was no SARS at the dim sum parlor that had been the subject of so many rumors, no SARS among the 139 passengers detained on a plane last month in San Jose. Almost no SARS in the Bay Area, in fact, save for a handful of patients who had all gotten better.
Still, when Betty Louie, a Chinatown merchant, got a hay fever attack in a booth at a gem show in San Mateo, the crowd instantly parted.
"You should have seen people's reactions," said the Chinese American shopkeeper, who was born here and almost never travels to Asia. "The guy standing next to me literally ran away."
Did she imagine it? She doesn't think so. Neither does Stan Kwan, a limousine driver who keeps getting not-so-delicate questions from customers about his health and the health of previous passengers. Nor does Terry Lam, a travel agent who, the other day, had to send a packet of travel materials by mail because the client was afraid to set foot in Chinatown.
The SARS epidemic does not exist in the United States. There have been just 56 probable cases in the entire country -- and no deaths -- since the world outbreak began late last year in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong. But for America's Chinese communities, the stigma associated with the world's latest fear factor appears to be hanging on.
Tourists are staying away from Chinatowns around the country. Parents are warning their children to avoid teenage hangouts popular with Chinese kids. Chinese Americans are cringing at the bad jokes and suspicious questions.
Tony Lee, a Chinese American college student who works for the city of Arcadia organizing recreational events for children and the elderly, says a handful of non-Asians approached him recently on the job, asking whether he had had the ailment.
"I tell them you've got to read the newspaper," he said, noting the paucity of cases in Los Angeles County -- only five "probable" cases out of 9.6 million people.
There have been about 6,000 cases of severe acute respiratory syndrome in the world, with about 400 deaths -- the vast majority in China or Hong Kong. Outside of Asia, only Toronto has experienced a significant number of SARS cases.
The disease seems to be primarily transmitted through droplets sneezed or coughed out by an infected person, not casual contact. Many of the cases have involved health-care workers who caught the virus while treating patients.
The brunt of the fears in this country, of course, are not borne by Chinese Americans, or even by Asian Americans in general, but by anyone who has recently returned from Asia, regardless of their ethnicity. The fear of SARS has proven to be an equal-opportunity affliction.
But the large Chinese communities in America have become easy targets of suspicion, in part because of their closer ties to Asia, but also because of the not-always-correct assumption that Asian Americans are constantly jetting back and forth there, and thus are more exposed to the disease. Further fueling the fears has been a planet-wide outbreak of oversized SARS headlines and endless photographs of Asian people wearing protective masks.
It's a wearisome burden, especially given that, for example, the entire city of San Francisco has logged just one probable SARS case out of a population of 770,000.
"It's starting to get irritating," said Louie, whose family's stores have anchored Chinatown's Grant Avenue tourist strip for generations. "It's like saying to a Middle Eastern person, 'Well, you're Middle Eastern, so you must know Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.' It's, 'Oh, you look Asian, so you must have SARS.' "
Better safe than sorry, counter the cautious.
Kowsigan Majuran, 15, an Alhambra High School sophomore, said his parents ordered him not to go see "Better Luck Tomorrow," the buzz film about Asian American honor students enmeshed in a crime ring. His mother, a Sri Lankan immigrant, said too many Chinese American children might be in the audience, and who knew what he might catch cooped up in a theater with them.
"It's better to be prepared," said Pathmini Majuran, the family matriarch, speaking through an interpreter.
She has told her son not to hang out with Chinese American kids in the area's popular "PC bang" computer game rooms. Or to eat food from Chinese restaurants, or fish from Asian markets, or any food whatsoever, now, without a thorough handwashing. Or to drink tap water. Or skip showers. Or wear anything but freshly laundered clothes.
Except for the movie, which he attended over his mother's objections, the teenager says he has indulged her, although it's tough to avoid Chinese Americans in a place in which they make up one-third of the city's population.
"I'm really not worried about this," he said. "I don't see the disease anywhere around me. My parents are just being protective."
The biggest effect of this new stigma has been on the economies of many Chinatowns. The ongoing reports of flight and fear have been echoed in Boston, Seattle and other locales, where mom-and-pop businesses have been hard-hit by the public urge to stay away. Tourism-related businesses have been devastated.
"People are canceling trips, not only to China and Southeast Asia, but even to Europe," said Charles Chan, a travel agent in San Francisco's heavily Asian Sunset District. "People are afraid they'll get the virus just sitting on a plane."
Throughout the suburban Chinatowns of the San Gabriel Valley, restaurants, markets -- even a ballroom offering dance lessons -- are still fielding queries from callers wondering whether their employees have been exposed to the disease.
Efforts have been made to counter the negative SARS buzz, but complete success has proved elusive.
In New York City, which has had only two probable SARS cases, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg recently journeyed to Chinatown for lunch. The mayor enjoyed his baked scallops with sweet corn at the Sweet-N-Tart-Restaurant, but the main item on his menu was reassurance.
Despite the mayor's effort, Spencer Chan, the restaurant's owner, said a feeling of vulnerability is still present in the neighborhood.
The scenery reflects it: Almost-empty food markets with piles of vegetables or fresh fish stand open. Clerks wait for customers in souvenir stores. "Big sale. 20-50% off," proclaimed a sign in the window of Golden Gate Buddhist Supplies on Mulberry Street. Chan estimated that his own restaurant's revenue has diminished 25% due to public anxiety about SARS.
A survey of more than 200 businesses in Chinatown by the Asian American Business Development Center reported that 84% of owners had a decline in revenue because of SARS fears.
At the Museum of Chinese in the Americas in Chinatown, officials said five schools had canceled visits and a class from a public school on Staten Island arrived with only half the students who had registered for the field trip. Stephanie Hsu, an education associate at the museum, fears that the reluctance of visitors will rekindle the historic isolation of Chinatown.
"Chinatown has always been held at arm's length," she said, noting that only in recent history has it evolved into a place in which visitors could "step into the foreign" without leaving the city. The notion that such districts might find themselves set apart again, after so many generations, is worse than hurtful, she said: "It is dangerous."
More subtly, the situation has affected the psyche of Asian America. Although many have given no more thought to the disease than anyone else in the country, others feel that an unwanted cloud has settled over their lives.
At the least-expected moment, SARS will pop up in a conversation, some say. Am I being singled out? Should I worry? Or will this all pass with the headlines?
"The other day, I saw a bus driver wearing a face mask -- a public employee!" said Rose Pak, chief consultant to the Chinese Chamber of Commerce in San Francisco. "I was so mad, I wanted to chase after that bus, yelling, 'Hey, you wear that thing through your whole route? Or just only in Chinatown?' "
Complicating the question is the fact that the shunning isn't being done solely by non-Asians. In San Francisco's Chinatown, taped-up notices at family association clubhouses ask members to keep out for 10 days if they or their relatives have visited a country affectedby SARS. The signs, in hand-lettered Chinese, flutter from doorway after doorway, reassuring some locals and offending others.
"A lot of people come here, and if someone's not healthy, it's no good," said retiree Ping Yu Lui, standing in the narrow glass doorway of his family association as several elderly men nodded. In the back room, their wives chatted, mahjong tiles clattering and swishing. SARS has been especially lethal for older patients, and the Chinatown associations tend to draw an older demographic.
But Pak, the consultant to the local Chinese chamber, believes that the signs stem from overreaction and crass liability worries.
"They're just chicken," she said. "They're not even effective. How do they know who's been to China and who hasn't? If they're so concerned about the community interest, why aren't they talking about spitting and illegal garbage dumping? Why don't they take up a broom?"
Whether the suspicions are internal or external, baseless or well-founded, many say the situation is starting to get old.
Some Asian American interest groups are sufficiently worried that they've taken proactive measures against stigma. The Asian American Journalists Assn. recently sent guidelines for SARS coverage to members of the media, urging journalists not to refer to it as a "mystery illness" or an "Asian disease."
"People are extra-sensitive," said Stewart Kwoh, president and executive director of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center in Los Angeles, adding that, so far, his organization has received no complaints involving SARS stigma, which he perceives as merely sporadic, at least for now.
"But paranoia and racial targeting are certainly off-base, even as sporadic, occasional reactions," Kwoh said. "If people are concerned, and they should be, we just need the public health people to keep repeating what they know."
Others are less understanding. In Monterey Park, travel agent Gi Diep says empathy has become harder to muster with every lost customer.
Gesturing toward Atlantic Boulevard, jammed with cars whose drivers weren't stopping to pick up plane tickets, she grimaced. "There's so many cars out there, you can get hurt by one of them before you get SARS."
SAN FRANCISCO -- There was no SARS at the dim sum parlor that had been the subject of so many rumors, no SARS among the 139 passengers detained on a plane last month in San Jose. Almost no SARS in the Bay Area, in fact, save for a handful of patients who had all gotten better.
Still, when Betty Louie, a Chinatown merchant, got a hay fever attack in a booth at a gem show in San Mateo, the crowd instantly parted.
"You should have seen people's reactions," said the Chinese American shopkeeper, who was born here and almost never travels to Asia. "The guy standing next to me literally ran away."
Did she imagine it? She doesn't think so. Neither does Stan Kwan, a limousine driver who keeps getting not-so-delicate questions from customers about his health and the health of previous passengers. Nor does Terry Lam, a travel agent who, the other day, had to send a packet of travel materials by mail because the client was afraid to set foot in Chinatown.
The SARS epidemic does not exist in the United States. There have been just 56 probable cases in the entire country -- and no deaths -- since the world outbreak began late last year in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong. But for America's Chinese communities, the stigma associated with the world's latest fear factor appears to be hanging on.
Tourists are staying away from Chinatowns around the country. Parents are warning their children to avoid teenage hangouts popular with Chinese kids. Chinese Americans are cringing at the bad jokes and suspicious questions.
Tony Lee, a Chinese American college student who works for the city of Arcadia organizing recreational events for children and the elderly, says a handful of non-Asians approached him recently on the job, asking whether he had had the ailment.
"I tell them you've got to read the newspaper," he said, noting the paucity of cases in Los Angeles County -- only five "probable" cases out of 9.6 million people.
There have been about 6,000 cases of severe acute respiratory syndrome in the world, with about 400 deaths -- the vast majority in China or Hong Kong. Outside of Asia, only Toronto has experienced a significant number of SARS cases.
The disease seems to be primarily transmitted through droplets sneezed or coughed out by an infected person, not casual contact. Many of the cases have involved health-care workers who caught the virus while treating patients.
The brunt of the fears in this country, of course, are not borne by Chinese Americans, or even by Asian Americans in general, but by anyone who has recently returned from Asia, regardless of their ethnicity. The fear of SARS has proven to be an equal-opportunity affliction.
But the large Chinese communities in America have become easy targets of suspicion, in part because of their closer ties to Asia, but also because of the not-always-correct assumption that Asian Americans are constantly jetting back and forth there, and thus are more exposed to the disease. Further fueling the fears has been a planet-wide outbreak of oversized SARS headlines and endless photographs of Asian people wearing protective masks.
It's a wearisome burden, especially given that, for example, the entire city of San Francisco has logged just one probable SARS case out of a population of 770,000.
"It's starting to get irritating," said Louie, whose family's stores have anchored Chinatown's Grant Avenue tourist strip for generations. "It's like saying to a Middle Eastern person, 'Well, you're Middle Eastern, so you must know Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.' It's, 'Oh, you look Asian, so you must have SARS.' "
Better safe than sorry, counter the cautious.
Kowsigan Majuran, 15, an Alhambra High School sophomore, said his parents ordered him not to go see "Better Luck Tomorrow," the buzz film about Asian American honor students enmeshed in a crime ring. His mother, a Sri Lankan immigrant, said too many Chinese American children might be in the audience, and who knew what he might catch cooped up in a theater with them.
"It's better to be prepared," said Pathmini Majuran, the family matriarch, speaking through an interpreter.
She has told her son not to hang out with Chinese American kids in the area's popular "PC bang" computer game rooms. Or to eat food from Chinese restaurants, or fish from Asian markets, or any food whatsoever, now, without a thorough handwashing. Or to drink tap water. Or skip showers. Or wear anything but freshly laundered clothes.
Except for the movie, which he attended over his mother's objections, the teenager says he has indulged her, although it's tough to avoid Chinese Americans in a place in which they make up one-third of the city's population.
"I'm really not worried about this," he said. "I don't see the disease anywhere around me. My parents are just being protective."
The biggest effect of this new stigma has been on the economies of many Chinatowns. The ongoing reports of flight and fear have been echoed in Boston, Seattle and other locales, where mom-and-pop businesses have been hard-hit by the public urge to stay away. Tourism-related businesses have been devastated.
"People are canceling trips, not only to China and Southeast Asia, but even to Europe," said Charles Chan, a travel agent in San Francisco's heavily Asian Sunset District. "People are afraid they'll get the virus just sitting on a plane."
Throughout the suburban Chinatowns of the San Gabriel Valley, restaurants, markets -- even a ballroom offering dance lessons -- are still fielding queries from callers wondering whether their employees have been exposed to the disease.
Efforts have been made to counter the negative SARS buzz, but complete success has proved elusive.
In New York City, which has had only two probable SARS cases, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg recently journeyed to Chinatown for lunch. The mayor enjoyed his baked scallops with sweet corn at the Sweet-N-Tart-Restaurant, but the main item on his menu was reassurance.
Despite the mayor's effort, Spencer Chan, the restaurant's owner, said a feeling of vulnerability is still present in the neighborhood.
The scenery reflects it: Almost-empty food markets with piles of vegetables or fresh fish stand open. Clerks wait for customers in souvenir stores. "Big sale. 20-50% off," proclaimed a sign in the window of Golden Gate Buddhist Supplies on Mulberry Street. Chan estimated that his own restaurant's revenue has diminished 25% due to public anxiety about SARS.
A survey of more than 200 businesses in Chinatown by the Asian American Business Development Center reported that 84% of owners had a decline in revenue because of SARS fears.
At the Museum of Chinese in the Americas in Chinatown, officials said five schools had canceled visits and a class from a public school on Staten Island arrived with only half the students who had registered for the field trip. Stephanie Hsu, an education associate at the museum, fears that the reluctance of visitors will rekindle the historic isolation of Chinatown.
"Chinatown has always been held at arm's length," she said, noting that only in recent history has it evolved into a place in which visitors could "step into the foreign" without leaving the city. The notion that such districts might find themselves set apart again, after so many generations, is worse than hurtful, she said: "It is dangerous."
More subtly, the situation has affected the psyche of Asian America. Although many have given no more thought to the disease than anyone else in the country, others feel that an unwanted cloud has settled over their lives.
At the least-expected moment, SARS will pop up in a conversation, some say. Am I being singled out? Should I worry? Or will this all pass with the headlines?
"The other day, I saw a bus driver wearing a face mask -- a public employee!" said Rose Pak, chief consultant to the Chinese Chamber of Commerce in San Francisco. "I was so mad, I wanted to chase after that bus, yelling, 'Hey, you wear that thing through your whole route? Or just only in Chinatown?' "
Complicating the question is the fact that the shunning isn't being done solely by non-Asians. In San Francisco's Chinatown, taped-up notices at family association clubhouses ask members to keep out for 10 days if they or their relatives have visited a country affectedby SARS. The signs, in hand-lettered Chinese, flutter from doorway after doorway, reassuring some locals and offending others.
"A lot of people come here, and if someone's not healthy, it's no good," said retiree Ping Yu Lui, standing in the narrow glass doorway of his family association as several elderly men nodded. In the back room, their wives chatted, mahjong tiles clattering and swishing. SARS has been especially lethal for older patients, and the Chinatown associations tend to draw an older demographic.
But Pak, the consultant to the local Chinese chamber, believes that the signs stem from overreaction and crass liability worries.
"They're just chicken," she said. "They're not even effective. How do they know who's been to China and who hasn't? If they're so concerned about the community interest, why aren't they talking about spitting and illegal garbage dumping? Why don't they take up a broom?"
Whether the suspicions are internal or external, baseless or well-founded, many say the situation is starting to get old.
Some Asian American interest groups are sufficiently worried that they've taken proactive measures against stigma. The Asian American Journalists Assn. recently sent guidelines for SARS coverage to members of the media, urging journalists not to refer to it as a "mystery illness" or an "Asian disease."
"People are extra-sensitive," said Stewart Kwoh, president and executive director of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center in Los Angeles, adding that, so far, his organization has received no complaints involving SARS stigma, which he perceives as merely sporadic, at least for now.
"But paranoia and racial targeting are certainly off-base, even as sporadic, occasional reactions," Kwoh said. "If people are concerned, and they should be, we just need the public health people to keep repeating what they know."
Others are less understanding. In Monterey Park, travel agent Gi Diep says empathy has become harder to muster with every lost customer.
Gesturing toward Atlantic Boulevard, jammed with cars whose drivers weren't stopping to pick up plane tickets, she grimaced. "There's so many cars out there, you can get hurt by one of them before you get SARS."
OUTFOXED AND OUTGUNNED
Gunners' 2-3 defeat by Leeds leaves it eight points back with two games left
AT THE end of the day, Arsene Wenger's own predictions have rebounded on him like a curse gone wrong.
Ever for the fleet-footed Thierry Henry (right), the obstacle posed by Lucas Radebe's Leeds was too much.
Before the season started, he predicted a shift in the English Premiership's balance of power to Arsenal. On the strength of a 4-1 win over Leeds United last September, he famously said the team would go through the season unbeaten.
And before yesterday's return fixture against Leeds at Highbury, he insisted that the title race was still open, even though Manchester United opened up an eight-point lead the day before with a 4-1 win over Charlton.
But, after watching his team lose 2-3 and handing United its eighth League title in 10 seasons, the simple truth of the matter is that the Frenchman's words have not been matched by his team on the pitch.
Yesterday, it faced a relegation-threatened opponent which had lost six of its previous nine games but which showed greater hunger, drive and resilience.
Sure, Arsenal had more class with flair players like Thierry Henry, Robert Pires and Dennis Bergkamp.
And without injured skipper Patrick Vieira, Ray Parlour and Gilberto Silva showed enough panache in midfield to drive their team forward.
But that was simply not enough against Leeds, which packed eight players behind the ball for much of the game in its own fight for survival.
The Arsenal forwards elected to pass the ball around when a direct approach was called for, especially since the latter was what gave them the two goals.
In defence, without regulars Lauren and Sol Campbell Arsenal found Leeds' Australian strike partnership of Harry Kewell and Mark Viduka threatening whenever they ventured forward.
And fortune simply deserted them when it mattered.
In truth, the defending champion Arsenal chased the game from the start after Leeds took the lead in the third minute.
Kewell was somewhat lucky when Jason Wilcox's long punt from an Arsenal corner sent him racing away.
But there was no luck involved in the next two touches, which took the ball away from Keown and sent the ball screaming across David Seaman and into the net.
As Arsenal's domination increased, Leeds' central midfield pairing of Erik Bakke and Dominic Matteo dropped back to defend.
And the home side got a deserved equaliser after 32 minutes, with Henry heading in the rebound after Parlour's 30-metre shot was saved by Paul Robinson and hit the bar.
Wiltord had the ball in the net five minutes later, but his effort was ruled out for off-side, and the teams went into the break deadlocked.
But, four minutes after the restart, Leeds took the lead once again, when Ian Harte's free-kick deflected off Cole and Gilberto Silva and into the net.
The home side continued dominating, and some neat passes later, Pires set up Bergkamp in the box, and the Dutchman made no mistake from five metres out after 63 minutes.
But, as his team missed countless other chances, Leeds simply hung on for a point which guarantee its survival - and then three points when Viduka made it 3-2 two minutes from time.
For Arsenal and Wenger, Wednesday's game in hand against Southampton will be no more than a full-dress rehearsal for the May 17 FA Cup final - where they will try to avoid ending up with nothing this season.
Gunners' 2-3 defeat by Leeds leaves it eight points back with two games left
AT THE end of the day, Arsene Wenger's own predictions have rebounded on him like a curse gone wrong.
Ever for the fleet-footed Thierry Henry (right), the obstacle posed by Lucas Radebe's Leeds was too much.
Before the season started, he predicted a shift in the English Premiership's balance of power to Arsenal. On the strength of a 4-1 win over Leeds United last September, he famously said the team would go through the season unbeaten.
And before yesterday's return fixture against Leeds at Highbury, he insisted that the title race was still open, even though Manchester United opened up an eight-point lead the day before with a 4-1 win over Charlton.
But, after watching his team lose 2-3 and handing United its eighth League title in 10 seasons, the simple truth of the matter is that the Frenchman's words have not been matched by his team on the pitch.
Yesterday, it faced a relegation-threatened opponent which had lost six of its previous nine games but which showed greater hunger, drive and resilience.
Sure, Arsenal had more class with flair players like Thierry Henry, Robert Pires and Dennis Bergkamp.
And without injured skipper Patrick Vieira, Ray Parlour and Gilberto Silva showed enough panache in midfield to drive their team forward.
But that was simply not enough against Leeds, which packed eight players behind the ball for much of the game in its own fight for survival.
The Arsenal forwards elected to pass the ball around when a direct approach was called for, especially since the latter was what gave them the two goals.
In defence, without regulars Lauren and Sol Campbell Arsenal found Leeds' Australian strike partnership of Harry Kewell and Mark Viduka threatening whenever they ventured forward.
And fortune simply deserted them when it mattered.
In truth, the defending champion Arsenal chased the game from the start after Leeds took the lead in the third minute.
Kewell was somewhat lucky when Jason Wilcox's long punt from an Arsenal corner sent him racing away.
But there was no luck involved in the next two touches, which took the ball away from Keown and sent the ball screaming across David Seaman and into the net.
As Arsenal's domination increased, Leeds' central midfield pairing of Erik Bakke and Dominic Matteo dropped back to defend.
And the home side got a deserved equaliser after 32 minutes, with Henry heading in the rebound after Parlour's 30-metre shot was saved by Paul Robinson and hit the bar.
Wiltord had the ball in the net five minutes later, but his effort was ruled out for off-side, and the teams went into the break deadlocked.
But, four minutes after the restart, Leeds took the lead once again, when Ian Harte's free-kick deflected off Cole and Gilberto Silva and into the net.
The home side continued dominating, and some neat passes later, Pires set up Bergkamp in the box, and the Dutchman made no mistake from five metres out after 63 minutes.
But, as his team missed countless other chances, Leeds simply hung on for a point which guarantee its survival - and then three points when Viduka made it 3-2 two minutes from time.
For Arsenal and Wenger, Wednesday's game in hand against Southampton will be no more than a full-dress rehearsal for the May 17 FA Cup final - where they will try to avoid ending up with nothing this season.
NOT DOGMATIC, JUST A TAD FIERY
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 2 ? It was Friday afternoon and the women in the Nimo Beauty Salon were talking politics. While thousands of people flocked to mosques for prayer services, the women here debated the difficulties of democracy while getting cuts and colors.
What, for instance, if the people elect a religious leader? Would the Americans allow this to happen even if the Iraqis wanted it? And where would that leave Iraqi women?
As enormous change sweeps Iraq, some women are viewing newfound religious freedoms nervously. Iraq does not have a history of religious fundamentalism. Its women enjoyed near parity with men for several decades through the 1970's.
But the current situation is something new. Exhausted Iraqis are looking for answers in the chaos and power vacuum that has ensued since the war ended. One customer at Nimo's heard a conservative Muslim religious leader on local radio calling for all women to wear the hijab, a head covering. Religious services have been attended as never before.
"I want to move freely, live a joyful life out in the open," said Nimo Din'Kha Skander, the owner of the salon. Nimo's is small but well known; Ms. Din'Kha Skander likes to recall how Saddam Hussein's second wife had her hair done there.
"I don't want a government of religion," Ms. Din'Kha Skander continued. Religion, she said, is "a private thing."
Over the past decade, younger women have grown more literal with their Islam. If a decade ago, only 2 or 3 women out of a college class of 30 were covering their heads, said Tara al-Chalabi, 31, a member of the United Nations staff here, now the ratio is reversed. She attributes that to the constraints and privations that have shaped young people's lives.
Suha Turaihi, a retired diplomat who served in India, elaborated: "For 20 years they didn't travel ? they were not exposed to Western values as we were. They are children of wars and embargo."
At the same time, women's rights were being curtailed by Mr. Hussein's edicts. For instance, women younger than 45 have not been allowed to travel alone, but have had to be accompanied by brothers, fathers or sons. The restrictions as well as the recent social conservatism have come as a blow to older, educated women, who fought against head scarves, arranged marriages and other constraints.
"I can't bear it, I can't accept it," said Amel al-Khoudairy, owner of an art gallery that was destroyed in the looting that followed the toppling of the government. "It was our pride that we didn't wear hijab. I was one of the first in my family not to."
Beginning in the 1920's, women began getting university educations, first to become teachers and later to enter medicine, diplomacy and other professions. By the 1950's, women were traveling abroad alone to study. Ms. Turaihi left for college in Beirut in 1956 at age 18. She said she was so focused on her career as a diplomat that she never married.
The question in the beauty parlor ? a one-room shop in Baghdad's bustling Karrada neighborhood ? was what would happen next. An American-led team is running the country, a force that most said they rarely saw or heard. In the opinion of some Iraqi women, Americans are the preferred leaders. An American-led government could be more amenable to women in politics, they said.
"When an Iraqi comes to rule, after two years he turns on us ? he becomes a dragon," said Hanah Radhi, wearing a hajib as she waited for a facial.
Of the 12 women interviewed for this article, mostly middle- and upper-class women in Baghdad, Iraq's most cosmopolitan city, only Ms. Turaihi thought it possible that a religious leader could be voted into power. Suad al-Radhi, 85, said Iraqi society was too diverse, with many religious groupings ? Sunni, Shiite, Christian ? for any one to take over.
"In Iraq, religion did not play the central role," said Ms. Radhi, former head in Baghdad of the Red Crescent, a counterpart to the Red Cross. "The country is made of several religions. That created tolerance."
Even if one group became strong enough and was supported by a majority of the people, the United States would not allow a religious leader to run the government, predicted Balkis Mj-ali, a political scientist at Baghdad University.
"America will not give the freedom to the Iraqi government to do what it wants," Ms. Mj-ali said. "Elections are a well-known game. Leaders will come and go, but America will still be in control of Iraq, its oil and its future."
Nuha al-Radhi, the daughter of Suad al-Radhi, is an artist and writer who spent the last seven years in Lebanon after publishing "Baghdad Diaries," a book she feared would cause her trouble with the government. Back in Baghdad as of Thursday, she expressed frustration with the United States, saying it has so far mismanaged the postwar occupation and has been too slow to restore public services.
"America is in its ivory tower palace," she said, referring to the American authority's base in a palace. "We are used to having coups and revolutions. But usually people who stage them take over the country afterward."
At home with her mother, Ms. Radhi said, "Iraqi women are tough as old boots."
Her mother added, "They have always kept this country going." As for religion, the daughter said, "we are not dogmatic, just a little fiery."
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 2 ? It was Friday afternoon and the women in the Nimo Beauty Salon were talking politics. While thousands of people flocked to mosques for prayer services, the women here debated the difficulties of democracy while getting cuts and colors.
What, for instance, if the people elect a religious leader? Would the Americans allow this to happen even if the Iraqis wanted it? And where would that leave Iraqi women?
As enormous change sweeps Iraq, some women are viewing newfound religious freedoms nervously. Iraq does not have a history of religious fundamentalism. Its women enjoyed near parity with men for several decades through the 1970's.
But the current situation is something new. Exhausted Iraqis are looking for answers in the chaos and power vacuum that has ensued since the war ended. One customer at Nimo's heard a conservative Muslim religious leader on local radio calling for all women to wear the hijab, a head covering. Religious services have been attended as never before.
"I want to move freely, live a joyful life out in the open," said Nimo Din'Kha Skander, the owner of the salon. Nimo's is small but well known; Ms. Din'Kha Skander likes to recall how Saddam Hussein's second wife had her hair done there.
"I don't want a government of religion," Ms. Din'Kha Skander continued. Religion, she said, is "a private thing."
Over the past decade, younger women have grown more literal with their Islam. If a decade ago, only 2 or 3 women out of a college class of 30 were covering their heads, said Tara al-Chalabi, 31, a member of the United Nations staff here, now the ratio is reversed. She attributes that to the constraints and privations that have shaped young people's lives.
Suha Turaihi, a retired diplomat who served in India, elaborated: "For 20 years they didn't travel ? they were not exposed to Western values as we were. They are children of wars and embargo."
At the same time, women's rights were being curtailed by Mr. Hussein's edicts. For instance, women younger than 45 have not been allowed to travel alone, but have had to be accompanied by brothers, fathers or sons. The restrictions as well as the recent social conservatism have come as a blow to older, educated women, who fought against head scarves, arranged marriages and other constraints.
"I can't bear it, I can't accept it," said Amel al-Khoudairy, owner of an art gallery that was destroyed in the looting that followed the toppling of the government. "It was our pride that we didn't wear hijab. I was one of the first in my family not to."
Beginning in the 1920's, women began getting university educations, first to become teachers and later to enter medicine, diplomacy and other professions. By the 1950's, women were traveling abroad alone to study. Ms. Turaihi left for college in Beirut in 1956 at age 18. She said she was so focused on her career as a diplomat that she never married.
The question in the beauty parlor ? a one-room shop in Baghdad's bustling Karrada neighborhood ? was what would happen next. An American-led team is running the country, a force that most said they rarely saw or heard. In the opinion of some Iraqi women, Americans are the preferred leaders. An American-led government could be more amenable to women in politics, they said.
"When an Iraqi comes to rule, after two years he turns on us ? he becomes a dragon," said Hanah Radhi, wearing a hajib as she waited for a facial.
Of the 12 women interviewed for this article, mostly middle- and upper-class women in Baghdad, Iraq's most cosmopolitan city, only Ms. Turaihi thought it possible that a religious leader could be voted into power. Suad al-Radhi, 85, said Iraqi society was too diverse, with many religious groupings ? Sunni, Shiite, Christian ? for any one to take over.
"In Iraq, religion did not play the central role," said Ms. Radhi, former head in Baghdad of the Red Crescent, a counterpart to the Red Cross. "The country is made of several religions. That created tolerance."
Even if one group became strong enough and was supported by a majority of the people, the United States would not allow a religious leader to run the government, predicted Balkis Mj-ali, a political scientist at Baghdad University.
"America will not give the freedom to the Iraqi government to do what it wants," Ms. Mj-ali said. "Elections are a well-known game. Leaders will come and go, but America will still be in control of Iraq, its oil and its future."
Nuha al-Radhi, the daughter of Suad al-Radhi, is an artist and writer who spent the last seven years in Lebanon after publishing "Baghdad Diaries," a book she feared would cause her trouble with the government. Back in Baghdad as of Thursday, she expressed frustration with the United States, saying it has so far mismanaged the postwar occupation and has been too slow to restore public services.
"America is in its ivory tower palace," she said, referring to the American authority's base in a palace. "We are used to having coups and revolutions. But usually people who stage them take over the country afterward."
At home with her mother, Ms. Radhi said, "Iraqi women are tough as old boots."
Her mother added, "They have always kept this country going." As for religion, the daughter said, "we are not dogmatic, just a little fiery."
