Intelligence

April 30, 2005

60 years after the bullet, Hitler is still an enigma

TheStar.com - 60 years after the bullet, Hitler is still an enigma

Debating the whys of evil may be futile

And some argue we shouldn't even ask

LYNDA HURST
FEATURE WRITER

He died 60 years ago today.

To be precise, Adolf Hitler took a revolver and shot himself in the mouth. He probably bit a cyanide capsule to ensure success.

The last thing he would have been aware of was the roar of artillery shells as Russian tanks smashed through the shattered streets of Berlin. It shook the walls of the Chancellery air-raid shelter where he'd been hunkered down all month. By mid-afternoon that April 30, they were just blocks away.

Closing in.

Defeat, failure and retribution were arriving for the leader of the Nazi Third Reich, the "nobody from Vienna" who had been responsible for World War II and the deaths of 55 million people, the man who had calculatedly set out to eradicate the Jewish people, the man for whom 10-year-old boys were now being used to ward off the Red Army.

But Hitler was calm on his last day.

The maps on which he'd been feverishly moving around phantom regiments the past few weeks lay untouched.

The furious, vein-popping rages, during which he'd blamed his fall on, alternately, the German people, traitors among his military staff and, of course, the Jews, finally were at an end.

The day before, he'd been told of the fate of his one-time ally, the strutting Benito Mussolini. Il Duce and his mistress Clara Petacci had been shot, their bodies hung upside-down in a Milan square, there to be desecrated by cursing Italians.

That was not going to happen to him.

With his bride of 36 hours, Eva Braun, Hitler shook hands with those still in the bunker, among them the last, trusted lieutenants who remained, Josef Goebbels and Martin Bormann, then went into his study and closed the door. Within minutes, a single shot rang out.

When the group entered, they found Hitler sprawled dead on the blood-soaked sofa. Beside him lay Eva, who had poisoned herself.

Wrapped in blankets, the bodies were quickly carried up and out to the Chancellery garden where they, exactly as the Fuhrer had ordered the day before, were doused with gasoline and set on fire. His SS bodyguards gave a final "heil" salute, then disappeared back into the bunker.

It was 11 days after Hitler's 56th birthday.

The Third Reich, which he had predicted would endure for a thousand years, had lasted just 12 years and three months. It would outlive him by just seven days. On May 7, Germany unconditionally surrendered to the Allied Forces — the Soviet Union, Britain, France and the United States. The next day was celebrated as VE day.

By then, the Russians had found his remains, and scooped the ashes and bits of bone into a cigar box, where they disappeared into history.

But with his death, a mystery — some would say an obsession — was born:

Who was Adolf Hitler?

What was he?

He saw himself as nothing less than the Chosen One; the redeemer of German pride after the humiliating defeat and harsh peace terms of World War I.

In 1918, recovering from a gas attack and temporary blindness, he had had a vision of his mission, and harked back to it in Munich in 1936: "I go with the certainty of a sleepwalker along the path laid out for me by Providence."

That was his view.

To millions of Germans, he is a shameful aberration. A cultural deviation. To his victims, especially the survivors of the "final solution," he is a monster, a madman, the devil incarnate.

The late theologian and philosopher Emil Fackenheim said Hitler was more than a bad man, in the sense of human badness, but something else, something beyond that, "the explanation for which, if there is one, can be known or fathomed only by God."

For nearly 60 years, historians have tried to fill in the ground between the two poles.

The evidence is there to assess Hitler as a thug, a political criminal, a malevolent mediocrity with flashes of genius. A brilliant propagandist, but an "unperson"; a hollow man with no inner self. A supreme actor who believed his own act. And, ultimately, the arch-conceiver of atrocities, executed by others, that lie beyond comprehension.

That's what he was. But some essential element is missing.

How could this failed artist from Austria, a puffed-up slacker and beer-hall ranter, come to embody Germany's myth-ridden dreams of destiny? How could he emerge from the far-right political fringes to gain absolute power over a seemingly civilized nation?

He had never been promoted above corporal in WWI, yet 20 years later, he would unleash a world war, an Armageddon, and very nearly win it.

The much-vaunted charisma doesn't survive in the film footage.

To modern eyes, in full hysterical tirade at his meticulously staged torch-and-flag rallies, Hitler looks demented, repellent, out of control — his vehemence a demonic parody of an evangelist. At other times, chatting with his henchmen at Berchtesgaden, say, he's merely a round-shouldered nonentity with a ridiculous smudge of a moustache.

"Hitler had many different faces," Bernd Freytag von Loringhoven, a maps officer and one of last remaining survivors of the final days in the bunker, told Reuters this week.

"He could be kind. The Austrian charm would sometimes come through. He was always asking people about their health. But he was mostly ice cold and deeply distrustful of everyone."

There's no question that Hitler started out as a vulgar rabble-rouser, a fanatical outsider, says University of Toronto historian and author Michael Marrus, a leading expert on the Holocaust. "But you shouldn't go away thinking what a bunch of patsies the Germans were," he adds.

"At first he was looked on as a gangster who'd taken over the state. But he had the ability to manipulate high-powered professionals; they became convinced of his strategic capacity. There's no question there was something there, a genius."

What was there was an "evil genius," according to Hitler's first full biographer, the late British historian Alan Bullock. "To achieve what he did, Hitler needed — and possessed — talents out of the ordinary which in sum amounted to political genius, however evil its fruits," he wrote in 1952.

The field marshals may have looked down their upper-class noses at Hitler, but they bowed to his military tactics. When he virtually eliminated unemployment and curbed spiralling inflation, industrialists hailed him as an economic saviour.

And ordinary people?

The Nazi Party never received more than 37 per cent of the vote before elections were halted in 1932. But there are those who believe Hitler had his grip on an all-too-willing population. And many Germans did embrace his messianic message of natural superiority, their right to have lebensraum, living space, and to dominate Europe.

They shared his loathing and fear of Bolshevism, knowing — or not knowing — that in his mind, Communists and Jews were one and the same.

In the unstable Germany of the 1930s, there was a desire for a strong leader, says McGill University historian and author Peter Hoffmann. "But a lot of people shook their heads when they saw the crowds' reaction to him. They thought these people were fools or black sheep."

An acknowledged expert on the German Resistance (which included his father), Hoffmann says ordinary people didn't want another war. Berliners flatly refused to cheer when troops marched through the streets in September 1938, and Hitler delayed his plans in consequence.

As American journalist William Shirer recorded in his 1947 Berlin Diary, "they stood at the curb in utter silence ... the most striking demonstration against the war I've ever seen."

War came, nevertheless, exactly one year later, declared by Britain and France after Hitler provoked it by invading Poland. The pretext? The abuse of the German minority there.

"That is when the nation rallied around its leader, right or wrong," says Hoffmann. "They were at war. The propaganda was powerful. And when they were air-bombed by the Allies, it strengthened their feeling even more."

Hitler's histrionic oratory may have whipped up the public, but in private, according to British historian Ian Kershaw, it could test the patience of even devoted listeners.

In his recent two-volume biography of Hitler (Hubris and Nemesis) — currently the academic gold standard — Kershaw says he was a non-stop talker whose adjutants feared that a casual comment by a guest could lead to a stupefying all-night lecture.

But, as Kershaw makes clear, he was also a shrewd political boss with an uncanny ability to see people's motivations. He pitted those beneath him against each other to thwart united action against him. And God help those who crossed him.

It is, of course, the other central question that truly mystifies, that guarantees a steady stream of books, punctuated by films, year after year, long after Hitler's death.

The knee-jerk anti-Semitism of his early years was far from untypical in the culture of the times, and not just in Germany and Austria. But something, it's agreed, happened, probably just after WWI, to make it full-blown. Something that, by 1942, would transform it into the obscenity of the Holocaust.

Theories abound.

Everyone is searching for the "Eureka!" explanation, according to Ron Rosenbaum. His 1999 book, Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil, exhaustively investigated the world of the sense-makers. He had hoped to discover "if not the truth about Hitler, then some truths about what we talk about when we talk about Hitler."

He found "one-bullet theories" in spades, ranging from the absurd and desperate to the intriguing. A startling number of them focused on a real or imagined Jewish encounter in Hitler's early life in Austria.

A sampling:

Hitler's unknown paternal grandfather possibly was Jewish (unprovable). The incompetent doctor who painfully and futilely treated his mother for breast cancer in 1907 was Jewish (yet Hitler kept in friendly touch with him for years). The Viennese prostitute who gave him syphilis was Jewish, a notion that Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal, among others, has advanced.

The syphilis theory could account for Hitler's well-documented paranoid rages, his multiple health problems (from skin lesions to an abnormal heartbeat), his lack of sexual interest in Eva Braun, and the fact that in 1936 he appointed Germany's leading syphilis expert as his own personal physician.

It might also account for Hitler's progressively irrational outbursts.

After the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944, Germany's last, unsuccessful offensive, he exploded. "We will not capitulate. Never. We can go down. But we will take a world with us."

There is convincing, if circumstantial, medical evidence for syphilis-linked insanity, say proponents. But Ian Kershaw is skeptical, saying it is based on "dodgy hearsay" — like all the others.

Not everyone is intrigued by the "why" of Hitler.

Emphatically not French filmmaker Claude Lanzmann. The creator of the nine-hour Holocaust documentary Shoah famously believes that any attempt to explain Hitler is to exculpate him; to understand him is to humanize him. That comes too close to a posthumous victory.

Lanzmann was furious that Rosenbaum used a baby picture of Hitler on his book cover: No explanation can "bridge the gap, explain the transformation from baby picture to murderer of a million babies," he argued. "It is not just a gap, it is an abyss."

To the University of Toronto's Michael Marrus, "combing over every crumb" of Hitler's early life is a perverse obsession, leading to "`Hitler chic, Hitler camp,' his being part of our intellectual furniture."

Rosenbaum, however, thinks the "why" is important, but wrote that "the longing to believe in a single-pointed explanation may come from the fantasy alternative it offers. If only that one thing hadn't happened, that one factor wasn't there, no Hitler, no Holocaust."

On that, at least, there is virtual unanimity. Other historians have had their doubts, but Kershaw is convinced that Hitler believed every word of his ideology of hatred.

"Complicity was massive, from the Wehrmacht leadership and captains of industry down to Party hacks, bureaucratic minions, and ordinary Germans," wrote Kershaw. "(But) without Hitler, and the unique regime he headed, the creation of a program to bring about the physical extermination of the Jews of Europe would have been unthinkable."

That was also the conclusion of his first assessor, Alan Bullock, who concluded that what happened in Germany between 1933 and 1945 happened for one reason only: "The evidence seems to me to leave no doubt that no other man played a role in the history of the Third Reich remotely comparable to that of Adolf Hitler's."

To Bullock, Hitler was a "moral cretin," a cynical egotist, immune to conscience or the sufferings of others — such things didn't exist in his moral universe.

The conception of the Nazi Party, the tactics it employed to curb opposition, the propaganda it used to draw in the German people, were all, unquestionably, Hitler's, he wrote. And "it took the combined efforts of the three most powerful nations in the world to break his hold."

Is that the reason why so many are still so fascinated by the Hitler enigma?

"You'd have to ask those who are," scoffs McGill's Peter Hoffmann. He is not among them.

"Great crimes and criminals have a mysterious attraction," he concedes. "Both philosophers and psychologists are at a loss to explain it."

All we really need to know, says Michael Marrus, is this: "Civilization, technology, the social indices of success are all so fragile that, if we are not vigilant, gangsters can take over."

But the search for an explanation, a key to Hitler, will almost certainly go on. Not so much to provide a resolution, but to help people see clearly if — or perhaps when — a new version of him arrives in their midst.

Additional articles by Lynda Hurst

April 30, 2005 at 10:52 AM in Europe | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 26, 2005

Belgium's agents lose their guns

BBC NEWS | Europe | Belgium's agents lose their guns

Belgium's secret service has confiscated guns from its agents following a near miss last year.

Members of the Surete de l'Etat were ordered to disarm after news emerged that an agent only narrowly escaped injury when another opened fire.

Weapons will be issued only if specifically needed, the justice ministry told the BBC News website.

Separately, the work of the state security body may change if a ban on phone tapping is lifted.

Agents could previously take their guns home with them, said Saar Vanderplaetsen, chief spokeswoman for Justice Minister Laurette Onkelinx.

The shooting incident happened in October or November but was only brought to the notice of Surete chief Koen Dassen in February.

A working group is now examining the Surete's internal procedures and Mr Dassen has ordered the confiscation for the period of the study.

Ms Vanderplaetsen said she could not comment on the actual incident, in which the Libre Belgique newspaper reported that an agent who was "without a doubt under the influence of antidepressants" had discharged his weapon.

'Reassurance'

The justice minister's spokeswoman stressed that Surete agents were not involved in normal police work such as making arrests, but in collecting information.

According to Libre Belgique, however, agents prefer to be armed while out on missions as they often find themselves in hostile environments when investigating, for example, organised crime, and like to think they can defend themselves.

"It's a bit of a shame that they should be taking measures now... when there was never any problem before," one unnamed agent told the paper.

Ms Vanderplaetsen told the BBC that a proposal by the minister to change the law to allow telephone taps could take effect within months.

The measure would give Belgium's secret police similar surveillance rights to those enjoyed by European counterparts.

A report in the UK's Daily Telegraph newspaper notes that the Belgian security apparatus has been a source of frustration for other Western agencies.

April 26, 2005 at 02:06 PM in Espionage - general | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 25, 2005

Dossier reveals secrets of forming Al Qaeda cell

TheStar.com - Dossier reveals secrets of forming Al Qaeda cell

`Millennium bomber' to be sentenced

Mission was to blast the L.A. airport

MICHELLE SHEPHARD
STAFF REPORTER

U.S. court documents prepared for the sentencing of "millennium bomber" Ahmed Ressam provide a rare glimpse of how security agents gather intelligence, and details of how a Canadian Al Qaeda cell is formed.

They describe how the former Montreal resident told international investigators, including members of the RCMP and CSIS, the secrets of Al Qaeda, including codes used to disguise phone numbers, how safe houses are changed every six months to avoid detection and the quest by Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant to obtain Canadian passports.

For 205 hours, starting just after his April, 2001, conviction on terrorism charges, 37-year-old Ressam co-operated with authorities. But then he stopped last year, which breaches the agreement he made in the hopes of receiving a lenient sentence, the U.S. government claims in court records.

Terrorism charges against two suspected Al Qaeda members — one currently detained in Vancouver, B.C., and the other in Britain — are now expected to be withdrawn since the cases relied heavily on Ressam's testimony.

Samir Ait Mohamed, an alleged member of Ressam's Montreal cell who has been held in Vancouver since 2001 as he fights his extradition to the United States to face terrorism charges, is described in these documents as having a "relationship with someone in movement in Algeria," and wanting to set up his own training camp.

Ressam also told investigators, the documents state, that Mohamed gave him the gun found in his Montreal apartment and was interested in learning about explosives.

According to court documents, Ressam described other men, who had trained in Afghanistan and were supposed to be part of the Montreal cell, but could not get into Canada. And he detailed the "names of people involved in recruiting in Canada."

On Wednesday, a Seattle, Wa., judge must sentence Ressam, taking into account the wealth of intelligence he provided to American agencies and others around the world, with the need to punish him for his crimes and decision to cease co-operation.

The most recent court documents, filed by U.S. government lawyers, explain what information Ressam provided for the judge's consideration in sentencing.

His lawyers are asking for a sentence of 12 years saying he has put his life at risk, provided incredible knowledge that has led to arrests and convictions and that the initial deal was made before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Government lawyers have suggested 35 years.

Ressam has been in protective custody since his Dec. 14, 1999, arrest at a port in Seattle where he was driving a rented car packed with explosives he brought from Canada. Ressam later admitted to training in an Al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan and being a member of a Montreal cell of Algerian GIA extremists, court documents state. His mission was to bomb the Los Angeles airport on the eve of the millennium.

While Ressam was part of bin Laden's plan to fight the United States and he received training at the Al Qaeda camp, his plan may not have been officially sanctioned.

April 25, 2005 at 07:50 AM in Al Qaeda | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 21, 2005

Steadfast Beliefs in a Tumultuous World

Steadfast Beliefs in a Tumultuous World (washingtonpost.com)

By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 20, 2005; Page A01

VATICAN CITY, April 19 -- In his words and actions, the man who on Tuesday became Pope Benedict XVI has shown a determination to hold fast to the moral certainties that have guided him from the horrors of Nazi Germany through the tumult of the 1960s -- even though these beliefs appear to be falling out of public favor across Europe and much of the developed world.

The choice of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, 78, to succeed John Paul II signals a stubborn unwillingness by the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church to abandon Europe to secularism. Despite John Paul's efforts to re-evangelize the church's historic heartland, Catholicism has been waning for decades across Western Europe, and nowhere more than in the new pope's home country, where an ecclesiastical tax collected by the government has produced a well-funded church whose pews are largely empty and whose influence on public life is in decline.

The cardinals could have turned away from Europe and chosen a pope from the vibrant congregations of Latin America, Africa or Asia. But in electing Ratzinger they chose to make one more attempt to hold on to the Christian identity of the continent, said the Rev. Joseph Fessio, a friend and former doctoral student of the new pope.

Fessio, who is provost of Ave Maria University in Naples, Fla., said the name that Ratzinger chose for himself -- Benedict -- is a sign of his determination to re-energize European Catholicism.

"The Benedictine order, in the midst of a collapsing and immoral superpower called the Roman Empire, civilized and Christianized Europe," Fessio said. "Today, Cardinal Ratzinger is our best hope to revitalize Christian culture in Europe -- and probably our last chance, too."

Fessio and others who have worked closely over the years with Ratzinger say that his reputation as a harsh disciplinarian and intellectual bulldog does not conform with the affable man they know.

"He's a kind of simple person. He chuckles," said the Rev. Augustine DiNoia, a Dominican priest from the United States who served as Ratzinger's second-in-command at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican department in charge of doctrinal orthodoxy.

Yet the new pope faces a major challenge: overcoming the perception that he is a cold, forbidding figure and demonstrating the friendly, pastoral instincts that made his predecessor so compelling, particularly to young Catholics. Unless Benedict can project a kindly aura and brighter outlook, it is hard to imagine how he can succeed where even John Paul failed, said Giuseppe Alberigo, a professor of church history at the University of Bologna who has known the new pope since the 1960s.

"He has a shy character, rather mild, but with a rigidity on important questions," Alberigo said. "I don't think that a pope with such a pessimistic vision will be able to deal with the great social problems of the world, or the issue of Islam."

Ratzinger's searing experience as a Nazi conscript during World War II left him with an abiding distrust of nationalism and socialism, along with a passionate belief in holding firm to enduring truths, according to those who know him well.

Born into a lower-middle-class family, Ratzinger grew up in Bavaria, a deeply Catholic and politically conservative region. His father was a rural police officer, his mother a cook in small hotels. His father, he has said, went to Mass three times each Sunday.

Ratzinger's biographer, John L. Allen Jr., has pointed out that his formative years coincided with the life span of the Third Reich. He was 6 when Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933 and 18 when the war ended in 1945.

Though his family made no public show of opposition -- in fact, one of his great uncles had written a series of crudely anti-Semitic books -- Ratzinger has described his father as opposing Nazism, largely as an outgrowth of his faith. "My father was one who with unfailing clairvoyance saw that a victory of Hitler's would not be a victory for Germany but rather a victory for the Antichrist," he wrote in his 1998 memoir, "Milestones."

Although the Roman Catholic Church in general and the wartime pope, Pius XII, in particular have been accused of not doing enough to oppose the Holocaust, Ratzinger's personal experience left him convinced that the church was the only institution that could stand up to false ideologies.

"Despite many human failings, the church was the alternative to the destructive ideology of the brown rulers; in the inferno that had swallowed up the powerful, she had stood firm with a force coming to her from eternity," he wrote.

Ratzinger entered a seminary in 1939, following in the footsteps of his older brother Georg, who also became a priest. But in 1943 he was conscripted along with his entire class into the Nazi antiaircraft corps and sent to defend a factory that made aircraft engines. He told Time magazine in 1993 that a badly infected finger prevented him from ever firing a shot.

He was subsequently drafted into forced labor, then into an army unit. In the final months of the war, Ratzinger deserted from his unit. He later spent several weeks in an American POW camp before making his way back home to the town of Traunstein and reentering the seminary.

In 1951 he was ordained a priest, along with his brother. He went on to earn a doctorate in theology at the University of Munich, where he developed a love of patristics, the study of the key thinkers in the first eight centuries of the church.

By the 1960s, patristics had gone out of style. The leading lights in Catholic theology were grappling with modernism, and Ratzinger was soon embroiled in a watershed event in his life and the life of the entire church: the Second Vatican Council.

The council, first convened by Pope John XXIII, brought nearly 3,000 bishops and their expert advisers, including many theologians, to Rome for a series of meetings from 1962 to 1965 that resulted in 16 major documents and caused a revolution in Catholic thinking and practice.

Most famously, Vatican II cleared the way for the Mass to be said not just in Latin but also in the modern languages spoken by Catholics around the world. But alongside the liturgical reforms came even more far-reaching changes in other areas. The council's "Constitution on Divine Revelation" accepted a critical approach to the Bible. Its "Declaration on Religious Freedom" accepted the idea that governments should be neutral toward religion. Its "Decree on Ecumenism" endorsed the search for unity with other Christians, abandoning centuries of hostility toward Protestants.

Yet many of these documents created as many questions as they answered -- questions that were still being debated by cardinals as they went into this week's conclave, such as how far Catholics should go toward accepting other faiths as paths to God, and how much power the pope should share with bishops and their national associations.

Ratzinger attended the council as an adviser to Cardinal Joseph Frings, an ecclesial moderate who emerged as a leader of the progressive wing in the council's debates. The future pope gained a reputation as a reformer at the time, serving on the board of the reformist journal Concilium.

In 1968, many of the reformers, including Ratzinger, were shaken by two events: the anti-establishment and antiwar student riots that convulsed Europe, and the sharp dissent that greeted Pope Paul VI's encyclical against contraception, Humanae Vitae. By 1972, Ratzinger and several other leading theologians left Concilium to form a rival journal, Communio, with a more traditional line.

Dennis Doyle, a historian of the church at the University of Dayton in Ohio, said there is still debate over whether Ratzinger's views changed, or whether he remained constant and the world changed around him. What is clear, he said, is that Ratzinger "has always been quite happy with the results of the council in terms of basic documents" but felt that the implementation was becoming "too political, too focused on immanence -- God's presence in this world -- and not focused enough on transcendence, God's invitation to man for communion in eternity."

In a sign of his relative conservatism and rising discontent, Ratzinger left a prestigious post at Germany's University of Teubingen to help launch a new, more orthodox Catholic university at Regensburg in his native Bavaria. His academic career effectively ended, however, when he was named archbishop of Munich and Freising and elevated to cardinal in 1977.

Ratzinger first met Karol Wojtyla, the future John Paul II, the following year, when both came to Rome to attend the conclave to replace Paul VI. They had crossed paths at the Second Vatican Council and had read each other's books, but when they met in person, there was "spontaneous sympathy," Ratzinger told John Paul's biographer, George Weigel.

Once he became pope, John Paul called Ratzinger to Rome to head the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the institutional successor to the Inquisition. Though it has a staff of only about 40, it wields enormous influence through its ability to censure theologians and vet documents from other Vatican departments for doctrinal orthodoxy.

By all accounts, Ratzinger wielded those tools heavily. With his antagonism to nationalism, he helped John Paul keep a tight rein on national bishops' conferences. With his insistence on the supremacy of Catholicism over other faiths, he wrote a letter, Dominus Iesus, that declared that all other religions were "defective" by comparison. And with his belief in holding fast to absolute truth, he oversaw the disciplining of theologians who questioned the church's doctrine on papal infallibility as well as its bans on contraception and ordination of women as priests.

Some of the new pope's ardent admirers believe that he is not, by nature, rigid.

"He has been misrepresented because of the role he has had as prefect of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. Anyone who has that job is always disliked," said the Rev. Thomas Williams, dean of theology at the Pontifical University Regina Apostolarum in Rome.

But as pope, he will face a church that is still deeply divided on many issues and pulled in many directions, from demands for a tough stand against the impact of economic globalization in Latin America, to calls for the empowerment of women and the laity in the United States, to open violation of the ban on condom use by bishops concerned about HIV/AIDS in Africa. Given his lifelong belief in constancy, it is hard to see how Benedict XVI could waver now.

Special correspondents Sarah Delaney and William Magnuson contributed to this report.

April 21, 2005 at 12:39 AM in Holy Grail | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 20, 2005

Canada Unveils Plan to Bolster Influence Internationally

Canada Unveils Plan to Bolster Influence Internationally (washingtonpost.com)

By Doug Struck
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, April 20, 2005; Page A17

TORONTO, April 19 -- Canada's government said Tuesday it would beef up its military, bolster its diplomatic corps and overhaul its foreign aid in a bid to reverse the country's diminishing influence in global affairs.

"Our international presence has suffered," Prime Minister Paul Martin said in releasing a long-promised foreign policy review. "Now is the time to rebuild."

The proposals were promptly attacked as too limited and too vague by Martin's opponents, who questioned why the plan was abruptly announced just as speculation about a possible election was sweeping Ottawa.

"This is not the dynamic action plan we had hoped to see," said Belinda Stronach, a member of the opposition Conservative Party in Parliament. "There is virtually nothing new here."

Martin's ruling Liberal Party has been stunned by plummeting public approval following an influence-peddling scandal involving Martin's predecessor, Jean Chretien. A Conservative Party legislator, Stockwell Day, said at a news conference in Ottawa on Tuesday that there "seemed to be a rush" to announce the foreign policy review to counteract the drop in the polls.

Martin said the plan fulfilled a campaign pledge to "redefine Canada's role in the world" in response to periodic hand-wringing over the country's perceived loss of status as a military and political power.

"You cannot have a robust foreign policy if all you're prepared to engage in is empty moralizing," Martin said.

The review proposes changes in the military that include instituting a central command, increasing the size of the 62,000-member active-duty military by 5,000, boosting the special operations forces, adding equipment, including helicopters and ships, and creating an emergency response team capable of dealing with disasters anywhere.

The plan, together with a five-year, $10 billion budget increase for the military proposed by Martin, "takes us to where we need to go," Defense Minister Bill Graham said Tuesday.

"I can't imagine they will be able to finance it," Conservative legislator Gordon O'Connor said.

The plan also calls for doubling foreign aid in five years but recommends paring the number of countries receiving it from 155 to 25. The shorter list of countries, mostly in Africa, would receive two-thirds of Canada's foreign aid by 2010 under the plan.

"We're not abandoning anybody," the minister of international cooperation, Aileen Carroll, told reporters. By "targeting" aid, Canada will concentrate on areas where it can be a main donor and "not the 15th donor in that country," she said.

The plan also urges strengthening the United Nations, increasing ties with the "new global powers" China, India and Brazil, and diversifying trade links with countries other than the United States, which now buys about 80 percent of Canada's exports.

Martin continued the tradition of walking a tightrope in relations with the United States. Canada would remain a supporter of NATO and "the great Western alliance," the prime minister said Monday, but it would not "be out there as the handmaiden of any country."

April 20, 2005 at 08:34 PM in US | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 18, 2005

'Special Reconnaissance Regiment' (SRR)

'Special Reconnaissance Regiment' (SRR)

By Pure Pursuit 7/4/05
Apr 9, 2005, 07:52

Email this article
Printer friendly page

The formation of a new UK Special Forces Regiment was announced today by Defence Secretary, Geoff Hoon.

In a written statement to Parliament, Mr Hoon declared the 'Special Reconnaissance Regiment' (SRR) will be operational from April 6th 2005.
Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon said:

"The creation of the Special Reconnaissance Regiment demonstrates our commitment to shaping our Armed Forces to meet the ongoing challenge of tackling international terrorism. The new Regiment will help to meet the growing need for special reconnaissance capability."

The new Regiment has been formed to meet a growing worldwide demand for special reconnaissance capability - as announced in the Strategic Defence Review New Chapter in July 2002.

The Regiment will ensure improved support to international expeditionary operations at a time when it is most needed in the ongoing fight against international terrorism. Special reconnaissance covers a wide range of specialist skills and activities related to covert surveillance.

The SRR will draw personnel from existing capabilities and recruit new volunteers from serving members of the Armed Forces where necessary. Due to the specialist nature of the unit it will come under the command of Director Special Forces and be a part of the UK Special Forces group.

Source:Ocnus.net 2004

April 18, 2005 at 04:17 PM in Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR) | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Intelligence aid for special services

Intelligence aid for special services - Britain - Times Online

By Michael Evans, Defence Editor

ELITE army surveillance specialists who have spent years monitoring republican and loyalist terrorists in Northern Ireland are to be drafted into a new military unit to be used on missions overseas.

The wealth of experience gleaned over the years by men and women of 14 Intelligence Company will be available to assist the SAS and the Special Boat Service (SBS) in all future operations abroad. The “super-spooks” regiment will be tied in closely with MI6.

The setting-up of the Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR), to be based at Hereford, home of the SAS, was announced yesterday by Geoff Hoon, the Defence Secretary, in a written statement to the Commons.

It is part of the Government’s strategy to expand the special forces to meet the threat posed by international terrorism. In December it was announced that the 1st Battalion The Parachute Regiment was being converted into a “ranger” unit to be attached to the SAS and SBS to provide back-up for discreet covert missions.

From today the SRR will be on hand to provide additional capability, involving covert surveillance of terrorist organisations before an operation by British special forces. The Pathfinder Platoon has a similar role for the Army’s 16 Air Assault Brigade. Although 14 Intelligence Company has had its expertise exported to other military units in the past, the announcement means that its specialist skills will be developed for worldwide missions.

The new regiment will also be open to any other member of the three Armed Forces who feels that he or she has the aptitude for what is potentially one of the most dangerous roles in the counter-terrorist business. The SRR will be small, probably fewer than 100 people.

Men and women have served in 14 Intelligence Company because experience in Northern Ireland showed that “couples” operating in civilian clothes and in unmarked cars often had a better chance of carrying out their surveillance missions undetected by their targets.

In the expanded role as part of an expeditionary force, the question of whether the women members of the new regiment will be deployed will depend on the circumstances and the mission.

Copyright 2005 Times Newspapers Ltd

April 18, 2005 at 04:11 PM in Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR) | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Top secret intelligence unit will quit Belfast for new role in Iraq

Top secret intelligence unit will quit Belfast for new role in Iraq - Britain - Times Online

By Michael Evans, Defence Editor
THE most secret military unit serving in Northern Ireland is to be pulled out of the Province and posted to Iraq and to other operational missions overseas.

The Joint Support Group (JSG), which runs agents under the control of the Intelligence Corps, is one of a number of units expected to leave Belfast as part of the “normalisation process” under which the Government plans to cut troop levels by more than half to about 5,000.

Paul Murphy, the Northern Ireland Secretary, announced in February that MI5 will take over primacy for national security intelligence in Northern Ireland by 2007.

The JSG is the successor of the Force Research Unit (FRU), which acquired notoriety in the 1980s amid allegations that the unit of about 40 intelligence officers colluded with Special Branch officers of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the loyalist terrorist Ulster Defence Association (UDA) in the murder of several republicans.

Brian Nelson, who was the UDA’s chief intelligence officer when he was recruited to become one of the FRU’s top agents, was jailed for ten years in 1992 after admitting five counts of conspiracy to murder. He died of a brain haemorrhage in April 2003.

The FRU and its former leader, Brigadier Gordon Kerr, who became military attaché in Beijing, are the subject of continuing inquiries by Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, who retired as Metropolitan Police Commissioner in January.

The JSG has continued the role performed by the FRU, although agent-handling rules were tightened after concerns were raised over the level of control of informers after Nelson’s confessions.

The Government’s intention is to complete the withdrawals from Ulster within two years of a final peace settlement but steps are being taken to exploit the unique experience gleaned in Northern Ireland in theatres of operation elsewhere in the world.

This month Geoff Hoon, the Defence Secretary, announced the establishment of a new regiment, the Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR), to provide covert surveillance expertise for operations by the SAS and the Special Boat Service.

Although he did not specify which experts he had in mind, the new regiment is largely based around the surveillance specialists of the 14th Intelligence Company, also known as “the Det” (Detachment), which has operated in Northern Ireland for many years.

April 18, 2005 at 04:07 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 17, 2005

Inside the secret world of anarchists preparing for G8 summit

Inside the secret world of anarchists preparing for G8 summit - Britain - Times Online

By Adam Luck
The Times penetrated a group of militants who are intent on organised chaos when world leaders come to Scotland

A REMOTE farm in the Lanarkshire countryside was transformed last weekend into a city of well laid-out army tents and marquees resembling a military encampment.

The military aspect was no accident. This was a “war summit”, where about 300 anarchists — some dressed in urban guerrilla garb in freezing temperatures — had gathered to draw up plans to paralyse Scotland during the G8 meeting at Gleneagles in July.

At this so-called Festival of Dissent, held on the land surrounding the imposing 17th-century Birkhill House at Coalburn, a secretive group of militants drew up plans to blockade the summit by cutting road and rail links.

Under the plans, tens of thousands of protesters are to be housed in three camps strategically placed across Scotland and will be deployed through a communications network designed to outflank the police.

Despite the group’s obsessive secrecy, The Times was able to penetrate it to discover the nature of many of its plans — and the willingness of some militants to resort to violence in their determination to disrupt the summit.

After attending a series of meetings under an assumed identity, a Times journalist also established that two key figures in the network are a university dropout named Alessio Lunghi and Mark Aston, a university administrator.

Mr Lunghi, 27, is a leading light within the Wombles, the hardcore anarchist group that was behind the May Day chaos visited on London in 2002. The son of an Italian wine importer and a primary school inspector, Mr Lunghi, from South London, has been directly involved in anti-G8 groups in the run-up to the summit.

He favours combat trousers and heavy, military-style boots, and admitted at one meeting that there was no point to the anti-globalisation protests if there was no violence.

Mr Aston, who works at Cardiff University and was the vice-president of the Cardiff branch of the Association of University Teachers last year, is a key organiser of the anti-globalisation group Dissent, which was behind the festival.

Set up in 2003, Dissent is an umbrella organisation for anarchists and other radical groups, which say that they wish to see the overthrow of capitalism through “direct action”.

The event last weekend at the farm 32 miles southeast of Glasgow attracted radicals from Canada, France, Germany, South Korea, Spain and Iceland, along with a broad section of Britain’s anti-globalisation movement.

These included a PhD student from Cambridge University, a sales representative from London, a professional artist from Cambridge and an assortment of eco- warriors. They were housed in a tent city set in the farm’s 50 acres that included a military-style mess hall, where activists lined up in orderly queues for vegan meals.

Using a large map of the Gleneagles area pinned to the canvas wall of the main marquee, Mr Aston explained to the listening militants the benefits of cutting off the A9 trunk road from Glasgow to Perth and the Forth Road Bridge. “This would effectively cut off the north of Scotland,” he said. “We have to make sure that we can transport the protesters around the area and make sure they have maximum impact and blockade Gleneagles.”

Protesters from outside Scotland would converge on three camps — in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Stirling. Their exact locations are a closely guarded secret.

Activists at one meeting boasted that they knew the intended location for the main police camp, which will house many of the thousands of officers whose task will be to prevent any disruption of the summit. It is believed that some groups intend to target that camp. Mr Aston noted the success of text-messaging in marshalling protesters during anti-globalisation protests abroad and also discussed using motorcycle couriers to disperse information.

Among the foreigners were two Icelandic activists who gave their names as Oli and Runar. Runar, who said he was an art professor in Iceland until being made redundant when his radical activities upset the authorities, said: “We are here to learn about the techniques required for direct action. In Iceland we have serious campaigns against developing hydroelectric dams coming up this summer and felt we needed to come here to understand what we can do.”

The main action — which is scheduled for July 6 — is designed to prevent support workers, journalists and international and British civil servants, rather than the main leaders, from reaching Gleneagles. Several thousand foreign and British civil servants are expected to set the stage for the G8 leaders’ three-day meeting, where Tony Blair, as the host leader (if Labour is re-elected on May 5), has pledged to push forward his plan to relieve debt and poverty in Africa.

As plans for the summit are being polished in Western capitals, the organisers of the campaign were preparing their own detailed designs in the hope that they can plunge the event into chaos. The festival focused on a series of workshops that included using blockading techniques, surveillance and counter-surveillance, arrest role play, first aid and “dealing with trauma”.

Activists were told not to use inflammatory language or discuss detailed strategy or tactics in open meetings because of fears that undercover police or journalists were present. Security was tight, with mobile phones and cameras banned.

Nevertheless, activists openly discussed their involvement in previous anti-G8 riots at Evian in France, and Genoa. They also made clear their hatred for the “British State”.

One organiser of an “arrest role play” workshop, who did not give his name, said: “The British State has a soft and fluffy image, but it is not. It can be as violent as the Italian, German and Swiss police. Do not be fooled.”

More than 10,000 police are expected to be drafted in from across Britain to protect world leaders, including Presidents Bush and Putin, in an exercise expected to cost £20 million. Just how seriously the G8 anarchists treat the prospect of violence can be gauged by the setting-up of a trauma group to help protesters to deal with not only the aftermath of any physical injuries received during the G8 summit but also with their long-term effects.

One organiser also stated that they needed to pool funds to “sue the police as fast as we can” because it would “help the recovery process”.

In a “blockading workshop”, activists openly discussed paralysing Scotland’s rail network by using equipment to simulate a signal that there was a train on the line, and methods of interfering with level crossings.

One clean-cut English student, who did not give his name, explained the use of “track circuit operating clips” — which resemble battery jump leads — to turn the signals red on a rail line and effectively close it down. “There is an electrical current and you attach the clips to the tracks and it breaks the circuit,” he said. “This makes it look like there is a train on the line and stops everything.”

The blockading workshops also saw discussion about methods to block motorways, including the scattering of waste metals and plans for activists to dress as motorway maintenance workers before placing cones to create traffic jams.

Although Mr Lunghi did not attend the festival, he was at a meeting this month at a community centre in Reading of a “South East Assembly”, gathered to deal with the logistical difficulties of helping protesters to reach Scotland from London.

It was at an earlier meeting of the South East Assembly umbrella, in East London, that Mr Lunghi addressed the question of violence during the protests against the Gleneagles summit. Asked whether it was likely, he smiled and said: “Well, I would hope so. There’s no point going otherwise.”

Asked yesterday about the campaign, Abby Mordin, 29, a resident of the Talamh co-operative that owns Birkhill House and its estate, said: “Dissent is not about riots but peaceful protest. It is a way to get a strong message across and making sure the world leaders have important issues on the agenda. We had workshops about dealing with the media and peaceful blockades to block roads.”

Mr Aston said: “I would really rather not give an interview to The Times.” Alessio Lunghi refused to comment.

SECURITY IN NUMBERS

100,000 people expected at the Make Poverty History march in Edinburgh on July 2

50,000 protesters expected at a rally outside the Gleneagles Hotel on July 6

10,000 police on standby during the summit, from Scottish forces and from England and Wales

1,151 the regular strength of Tayside police force, which covers the Gleneagles Hotel

1,500 delegates from the eight countries attending the summit

3,000 members of the media covering the summit

£150m estimated cost of hosting the summit

£20m amount provided by the Treasury for security

April 17, 2005 at 05:04 PM in Current Terrorism | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 16, 2005

MBASSADOR EDWARD P. DJEREJIAN

Baker Institute - Ambassador Djerejian - Biography

AMBASSADOR EDWARD P. DJEREJIAN, the founding Director of the The Honorable Edward P. DjerejianJames A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University, is one of the United States’ most distinguished diplomats with his career spanning the administrations of eight U.S. Presidents. A leading expert on the complex political, security, economic, religious, and ethnic issues of the Middle East, Ambassador Djerejian has played key roles in the Arab-Israeli peace process, the U.S.-led coalition against Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, successful efforts to end the civil war in Lebanon, the release of U.S. hostages in Lebanon, and the establishment of collective and bilateral security arrangements in the Persian Gulf.

Prior to his nomination by President Clinton as United States Ambassador to Israel, Ambassador Djerejian served both President Bush and President Clinton as Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and President Reagan and President Bush as U.S. Ambassador to the Syrian Arab Republic. Ambassador Djerejian has also served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs, as Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Press Secretary for Foreign Affairs in the White House, and as Deputy Chief of the U.S. mission to the Kingdom of Jordan.

A foreign service officer since 1962, other assignments include political officer in Beirut, Lebanon, and Casablanca, Morocco, Consul General in Bordeaux, France, and he headed the political section in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow during the critical period in U.S.-Soviet relations marked by the invasion of Afghanistan. Ambassador Djerejian served in the United States Army as a First Lieutenant in the Republic of Korea following his graduation from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. He holds a Bachelor of Science, an Honorary Doctorate in Humanities from Georgetown University, and an Honorary Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, from Middlebury College, and is fluent in Arabic, Russian, French, and Armenian.

Ambassador Djerejian has been awarded the Presidential Distinguished Service Award, the Department of State's Distinguished Honor Award, the President's Meritorious Service Award and the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.

Ambassador Djerejian was asked by Secretary of State Colin Powell to chair a congressionally mandated Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World. The advisory group published its report on October 1, 2003. The report is accessible on the Baker Institute Webpage.
Download file

Last updated September 2004

April 16, 2005 at 12:03 PM in US | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 10, 2005

Seven states of rebellion

TheStar.com - Seven states of rebellion

Nearly 60 years after independence, India faces bloody insurgencies on its eastern and northern borders.

MARTIN REGG COHN
ASIA BUREAU

GUWAHATI, India — Dealers at the Fancy Bazaar bargain over the best blends of Assam tea, oblivious to monsoon rains.

But when the bombs go off, all bets are off. The merchants shut their eyes and shutter their shops.

By the time security forces rushed to the scene of a bomb blast here last month, the shopkeepers claimed to have seen nothing. In strife-torn Assam state, being a police witness to deadly attacks is no way to stay alive.

Opening a burlap sack of the finest blend, Kailash Sharma insists he wasn't around when separatist insurgents planted bombs outside his teashop.

Nor was he alarmed by the blast — the latest in a series of daring strikes that have left more than 80 dead here in the past six months.

"The rebels need to make their presence felt," he shrugs, carefully sorting the fragrant tea grains on his counter. "It's part of our daily life."

This remote, rain-soaked Indian hill state has been a battleground between guerrillas and the security services for nearly 25 years.

The fighting has left more than 10,000 people dead, the economy on life support and the tea industry withering.

Assam's strife is hardly an isolated case. Nearly six decades after independence, New Delhi is still struggling to wipe out perennial rebellions along its border regions.

Groups like the National Democratic Front of Bodoland, the Kuki Revolutionary Army, the Hynniewtrep International Liberation Council and the People's War Group see India as the enemy.

More than 30 rebel armies hiding out in five tribal states along India's northeastern fringe — sandwiched between Bangladesh and Burma — still bitterly resist central rule.

Alongside Assam, Nagaland's former headhunters have been at war with the country since India attained independence in 1947, in the subcontinent's longest-running insurgency.

With more than 25,000 lives lost, a temporary truce is in effect, but the rebel leadership threatened against last month to resume fighting unless its goal of a Greater Nagaland is granted.

Fighters in Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura states are also at war.

Maoist Naxalite rebels in Andhra Pradesh, along India's east coast, are waging ideological warfare and a peasant-style rebellion against Hyderabad, the high-tech state capital that is home to India's software giants, leaving more than 6,000 dead over the past 30 years.

Islamist militants in the disputed Himalayan state of Jammu and Kashmir have been fighting since 1989 to break free from predominantly Hindu India, leaving an estimated 80,000 dead and prompting border conflicts with neighbouring Pakistan in the northwest. Analysts blame cross-border infiltration from Pakistan, which has provided logistical support for Islamist fighters since the early 1990s.

In sharp contrast to these entrenched conflicts, the western state of Punjab — where Sikh separatists waged a vicious decade-long war in the early 1980s that left 17,000 dead — is now at peace.

Canadians were reminded of Punjab's turmoil last month when a Vancouver court acquitted two Sikh-Canadians of plotting the bombing of an Air India flight in 1985 that left all 329 passengers and crew dead.

Punjab remains the only success story among the festering conflicts plaguing the Indian federation, made up of dozens of major linguistic and ethnic groups sprawled across the subcontinent.

Through a combination of tough — sometimes brutal — policing and superior intelligence-gathering, Punjab's local government achieved what other embattled states have so far failed to do.

"We have been arguing for a long time that India should be following the Punjab model in Kashmir and the northeast," says security analyst Suba Chandran of New Delhi's Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies.

"Unfortunately, we never learned the lessons of the Punjab, which was a great success story."

Regional alienation is hardly surprising in a country of 1 billion people covering a huge landmass. The violence stems from a combination of ethnic resentment, police brutality, local corruption and incompetent politicians.

"It has to do with the heterogeneous nature of society and the failure of local government," Chandran argues.

Political scientist Harish Puri, who has researched separatist movements across India and as far away as Quebec, says people felt exploited by a central government that extracted their resources but neglected their needs.

"The average Assamese always felt that the rest of India totally ignored them, so when the fighters gave hell to the government, there was a vicarious satisfaction," says Puri.

Over time, grassroots support for separatist violence across India has declined as battle fatigue set in. Yet despite their declining popularity, the rebels have become deeply entrenched in Assam, thanks to strong cash flow from extortion and corruption.

"They have lost legitimacy; they're in the business of trading arms and drugs," says Puri. "It's part of an industry, and they have links with the police and the bureaucracy."

Running a rebellion is a big business. Equipping the rebels — and enriching the movement — requires a well-organized system of "taxation" by intimidation. Tea traders and plantation owners are among the biggest targets for extortion tactics.

Anil Jain, a merchant in the colonial-era Fancy Bazaar that was bombed last month, describes how a climate of fear has paralyzed the state capital and stunted economic development over the past 20 years.

Rebels fight the government in

the northeast states of Assam, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura, as do Maoist Naxalites in Andhra Pradesh and Islamist militants in the disputed Himalayan

state of Jammu and Kashmir
"All of Assam is paying a price, in fact the entire northeast," he complains.

Jain was expected to make his own contribution to rebels from the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA), who assessed him with a so-called "demand note."

When he refused to remit, the rebels sent an envoy who led him away on a scooter for a month-long interrogation that almost cost him his life after a death warrant was issued.

As a prominent merchant, Jain had enough connections to survive. But not everyone is so lucky in encounters with hardened insurgents hungry for cash flow.

As one of Assam's most successful tea brokers, Kamal Das travels to various plantations tasting the best teas and hearing the worst stories.

For plantation managers who must survive in isolated locations, acquiescing to rebel extortion has become a way of buying peace and a cost of doing business.

"No one wants to have a confrontation that stops their business, because if they don't pay, they could be abducted," Das says.

So-called taxation collected by the rebels ranges from $40,000 to $275,000 a year for the bigger plantations, subject to negotiation.

"They forward a demand note and thereafter you negotiate a settlement," Das explains, sipping a cup of tea made from fresh leaves he has just brought in from a plantation visit.

"Then, they add this to the cost of production."

During his years in the jungles of the northeast hinterland and neighbouring Burma, former rebel leader Sunil Nath came to count on extortion cash flow to fund his operating budget in the propaganda department.

"You need funds because it's a parallel organization," he says.

After years in jail, Nath swore off his rebel ways. But he says Assam's indigenous peoples feel hemmed in by the uncontrolled influx of Muslim migrants from nearby Bangladesh, which exacerbates unemployment.

"The boys think that India is an empire run out of New Delhi, and Assam is a colony," says Nath. "They are willing to give up their lives for the cause and believe the next generation will carry on the revolt."

Nath, however, says his time in jail convinced him that the fight against India was futile and that ULFA had lost its way.

More instability creates greater poverty, he says, and sympathy has been replaced by fear.

"People have lost faith in ULFA's capacity to succeed in the fight."

An attack in August that killed 15 people — including many schoolchildren — outraged the public. More bombs rained down on Assam and Nagaland in October, leaving 80 dead.

"Sorry to sound pessimistic, but I don't foresee any positive developments," says Nath. "It's too difficult for the military to eliminate them."

Assam's recently retired police chief, Harekrishna Deka, agrees that "the rebels are well entrenched ... their back is not broken."

The insurgents are motivated by a sense that "the country was decolonized at independence, but it was followed by a new form of colonization by the Indian heartland," says Deka, a former intelligence chief.

"Even now, they can do a lot of mischief, with the potential to harass the security forces and the government."

Indeed, just days after Deka retired from the force, rebels planted bombs at the state capital's parade grounds, where the chief minister was reviewing an honour guard. The politicians and police fled in a panic. The security services are more accustomed to dishing it out than dodging bombs.

Deka acknowledges that there were widespread concerns about police tactics before he took over the force in 2000.

"They call it `secret killings.' It was (alleged) before me, but I didn't feel it could deliver the goods," he says.

Defence lawyer Bashkar Dev Konwar says widespread human rights violations have driven more young people into rebel camps.

"The term we use is `administrative liquidation,' and it's a form of state terror to repress another form of terror," says Konwar, pulling out a sheaf of files listing the dozens of people who died in police custody from beatings or torture, or during staged "encounters" with army commandos in civilian clothes.

"It's as if the state machinery is above the law."

But India's new army chief — Gen. Joginder Jaswant Singh, himself a Sikh from the Punjab — promised earlier this year to try a softer style.

"Kashmir, Assam and Manipur are an integral part of India, so our approach has to be different here: winning hearts and minds," he said.

"It's an over-1 million-strong army facing challenges in every corner of the country."

From end to end, with no end in sight.

April 10, 2005 at 01:14 PM in Far East | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Saudi confirms death of top Al-Qaeda pair in gunbattle

Saudi confirms death of top Al-Qaeda pair in gunbattle - Yahoo! UK & Ireland News

RIYADH (AFP) - Saudi Arabia said its security forces killed the Al-Qaeda chief in the kingdom and the Moroccan mastermind of the Madrid train bombings in a three-day gunbattle which dealt a heavy blow to the terror network.

Saud al-Otaibi, "head of the gang" responsible for a string of shootings and bombings since May 2003, and Abdel Karim al-Mejati were among 15 extremists killed in Al-Qassim, some 320 kilometers (200 miles) north of Riyadh and viewed as a haven for Islamist militants, the interior ministry said.

The battle, which ended on Tuesday, was the bloodiest in a nearly two-year-old campaign by security forces against Islamist militants behind the wave of attacks in the conservative Muslim Gulf country.

The killing of Otaibi, whom the ministry portrayed as the militants' chief and identified by his middle name of al-Qotaini, and Mejati, had previously been reported but not confirmed in an official statement.

Interior ministry spokesman Brigadier Mansur al-Turki told AFP on Thursday that the "initial investigation" showed the pair were among those killed.

The interior ministry named 10 of the 15 killed in the gunbattle, one of whom was Mejati's son, Adam, and named three of six militants who were captured, five of them wounded.

Saleh al-Oufi, who was alleged to be Al-Qaeda's chief in the oil-rich kingdom and whom a Saudi dissident group had said was killed in the clashes, was not mentioned. It was not clear if he was among those whose names were withheld.

Otaibi and Mejati, whom the ministry said held French citizenship and entered Saudi Arabia on a forged passport, figured on Riyadh's most-wanted list of 26 militants.

All but three on the list, including Oufi, are now confirmed to have been killed or arrested.

Mejati faced an outstanding 20-year jail term handed down in absentia by a Moroccan court in December 2003 for his role in that year's Casablanca bombings in which 45 people died.

Moroccan police believe Mejati was one of the ringleaders of a homegrown Islamic militant movement called the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM), which is also believed to have been behind the March 2004 Madrid train bombings, in which 191 people were killed and 1,900 wounded.

The Saudi interior ministry did not mention Mejati's alleged connection to the Casablanca and Madrid attacks. But it described him as an expert in manufacturing bombs who was previously in Afghanistan and took part in attacks in Saudi Arabia, including "the abduction and killing of a (foreign) resident."

The reference was apparently to American engineer Paul Johnson, who was taken hostage and beheaded last June.

Security forces shot dead Abdul Aziz al-Muqrin, head of the so-called "Al-Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula," and three associates in Riyadh shortly after the group posted photos on the Internet showing the beheading.

The interior ministry said that Otaibi was named "head of the gang" after Muqrin's death.

This conflicted with past reports that Oufi was chosen as Muqrin's successor. Late last year, there were claims that Otaibi replaced Oufi after he was killed by security forces.

The ministry statement gave a litany of attacks in the kingdom over the past two years in which the militants killed or arrested during the Al-Qassim gunbattle were involved.

The attacks, and a series of firefights between security forces and Al-Qaeda suspects, have cost the lives of 90 civilians, 39 security personnel and 108 militants since May 2003, according to official figures.

But the ministry also identified several of the militants as active contributors to Islamist websites, which they use to spread their "misleading propaganda," a reference to the wide use of the Internet by Saudi and other extremists in the region.

The ministry said among those in custody was Hamad al-Humaidi, one of the theoreticians of the ideology of "takfeer" -- branding other Muslims as infidels in order to legitimize violence against them.

Authorities previously said that 14 security personnel were wounded in the confrontation, which was follow

April 10, 2005 at 09:22 AM in Al Qaeda | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 05, 2005

Tory or conservative

conservativehome.com

Last week a press officer at Conservative Campaign HQ asked* journalists to stop describing Conservatives as Tories. It was a fruitless request as ‘Tory’ is much less of a mouthful for broadcasters and much snappier for headline-writers.

ves respond to cour

This site is also happy to call the Conservative Party the Tory Party. Partly because we regard conservatism as describing (1) a way of thinking and (2) a set of beliefs that are independent of Britain’s Tories.

In America the distinction between conservatives and Republicans is well understood. Conservatives are just one part – although the dominant part – of George W Bush’s Republican coalition.

This memo examines whether five types of conservative – fiscal, social, compassionate, national security and national sovereignty – should vote for Michael Howard at May 5th’s General Election. Our clear recommendation is ‘yes’ although, on every front, Britain’s Tories could offer more…
1. Should fiscal conservatives vote Tory?

Fiscal conservatives can vote for Michael Howard with confidence. Through the James Review the Conservatives have identified £35bn of government waste. Eliminating this waste will afford an £8bn reduction in government borrowing, a £23bn increase in frontline spending and £4bn of tax cuts. This conservativehome.com memo has already complained about the timidity of the Tory tax-cutting agenda but, on balance, Oliver Letwin’s willingness to cut out some of the fat from government will avoid the risk of third term Labour tax rises. It is unlikely, however, to immediately put Britain on the kind of footing that will allow it to stop losing business to the countries of Central Europe and their competitive tax regimes.

Economic issues were once decisive in elections. A government that had delivered (or, at least, presided over) prosperity was a sure bet for re-election. A government with a record of slow growth, unemployment or inflation would struggle at the polls. Labour believes that its economic record is its trump card and we can expect Gordon Brown to be given front-and-centre status during the campaign – despite his rift with Tony Blair. But as The Sun wrote* yesterday, Labour have not built a strong economy – they inherited one: “On Gordon Brown’s first day in office as Chancellor, a senior Treasury official told him that the Tories had left him a “solid gold economic legacy”. The fear then was Labour would waste it. But it did not. It nurtured it and the economy went from strength to strength.”

The Tories do not believe that the economy has gone from strength to strength. 66 extra taxes – many imposed stealthily and on the lowest income households – have slowed the economy. Gordon Brown’s 1997 decision to grant independence to the Bank of England has underpinned monetary stability but only the election of Michael Howard will protect the Bank’s independence. Labour and Liberal Democrat support for the eurozone will bind the British economy to an interest rate manufactured by Frankfurt’s European Central Bank. A Frankfurt interest rate will often be wrong for British industry and mortgage payers.
2. Should social conservatives vote Tory?

Two recent statements by Tory leader Michael Howard illustrate the confused relationship that Tories have with socially conservative voters. In an interview* with a gay lifestyle magazine the Tory leader regretted the Section 28 legislation (that he introduced in the 1980s) that protected schoolchildren from the ‘promotion’ of homosexuality. But he also reassured pro-life voters by supporting a reduction in the time limit on abortions.

On the plus side Michael Howard has also opposed the Mental Capacity Bill (a backdoor to euthanasia) and has appointed Theresa May to fashion a more family-friendly Conservative agenda.

There is no sign, however, that the Tories are willing to abolish the penalty that married couples face from the tax system. This is a retreat from bold promises to support marriage that were made by John Major in 1997 and by William Hague in 2001. Tory policy on family breakdown is more Chamberlain than Churchill.

But if the Tories are imperfect on issues of importance to social conservatives they are certainly preferable to Labour and Liberal Democrats. The LibDems are Britain’s most liberal party with permissive policies on pornography, abortion and family life. Visit this* website for gruesome details.
3. Should compassionate conservatives vote Tory?

Iain Duncan Smith put compassionate conservatism at the heart of his leadership. The policies that emerged from that time are still Tory policy:

- The school choice agenda will most help children in poorer communities that have been prisoners of failing schools. Faith-based schools will also flourish under this policy.

- A 1000% increase in drug rehab places will help more young people to escape the conveyor belt to crime. Tories also oppose Labour’s more lenient approach to cannabis.

- 40,000 extra neighbourhood police officers and the direct election of police authorities will take Britain closer to the kind of zero tolerance policing that most protects poorer communities.

Since Michael Howard became leader the Tories have promised to match Labour’s spending commitments on international aid. They will also channel more money through proven development charities and make less use of often corrupt government channels.

Unfortunately the Tories are not actively promoting their one nation agenda and are instead focusing on ‘core vote’ issues like immigration and travellers’ rights. These policies are energising the Tory base but they are not helping the party connect with values voters who seek moral permission to vote Tory. This might be the difference between the 35% that the Tories are polling and the 43%/44% that they need to win a parliamentary majority.
4. Should national security conservatives vote Tory?

This is Britain’s first post 9/11 election but homeland security won’t play the kind of role that it did in America’s recent contest. Pundits are fairly convinced that insofar as Iraq is discussed Labour’s vote will suffer. US pollster Frank Luntz has recommended that the anti-war Liberal Democrats widely distribute images of Tony Blair standing alongside George Bush. Luntz told* The Times that he’d never seen focus groups react so strongly (and negatively) to an image.

Without a 9/11 experience Britain’s voters have been unwilling to support strong action against the terror threat. This may explain why Michael Howard told The Sunday Times that he wouldn’t have voted for the particular motion that Tony Blair put before Parliament to authorise the Iraq war, if “he knew then what he knows now”. Although he made it clear that he still supported the removal of Saddam he confused voters and made himself vulnerable to charges of opportunism.

Overall, however, the election of the Tories would be good news for the war on terror. The Tories are committed to increased investment in Britain’s armed forces and their opposition to further European integration will mean that Britain will remain free to support pre-emptive action against terrorist-supporting nations.

A little more of the case against Tony Blair’s stewardship of the war on terror is outlined in this opinionated article.
5. Should national sovereignty conservatives vote Tory?

Patriotic conservatives will find the Conservative Party more sceptical towards Europe than at any time in modern history. William Hague and IDS led the party in a more pro-British direction and Michael Howard has consolidated the trend. The Tories are the only one of the three major parties to oppose the EU constitution and British membership of the euro. They are also committed to repatriation of fishing and international development policies from Brussels.

These policies would be more credible if – as The Daily Telegraph has recommended – the Tories attached their demands to a threat to withdraw from the EU. Michael Howard has concluded, however, that such a policy could cause a dangerous split with Ken Clarke, Michael Heseltine and other party grandees.

Some Euro-sceptics will therefore be tempted by UKIP’s ‘out-of-Europe’ message but a slippage of likely Tory voters to UKIP will only benefit Labour and LibDem candidates who are, of course, more committed to the European bandwagon. Large votes for the United Kingdom Independence Party threaten Tory MPs sat on thin majorities. Oliver Letwin and David Davis, for example. This is undoubtedly why arch-europhile Peter Mandelson has been encouraging* the BBC to give more media attention to UKIP. Every time a conservative is tempted to think of voting UKIP they should remember that that is exactly what Peter Mandelson, New Labour strategist, desires.

April 5, 2005 at 11:51 PM in UK | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 04, 2005

Report: Human Damage to Earth Worsening Fast

Yahoo! News - Report: Human Damage to Earth Worsening Fast

By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent

OSLO (Reuters) - Humans are damaging the planet at an unprecedented rate and raising risks of abrupt collapses in nature that could spur disease, deforestation or "dead zones" in the seas, an international report said on Wednesday.

The study, by 1,360 experts in 95 nations, said a rising human population had polluted or over-exploited two thirds of the ecological systems on which life depends, ranging from clean air to fresh water, in the past 50 years.

"At the heart of this assessment is a stark warning," said the 45-member board of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment.

"Human activity is putting such strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planet's ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted," it said.

Ten to 30 percent of mammal, bird and amphibian species were already threatened with extinction, according to the assessment, the biggest review of the planet's life support systems.

"Over the past 50 years, humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than in any comparable time in human history, largely to meet rapidly growing demands for food, fresh water, timber, fiber and fuel," the report said.

"This has resulted in a substantial and largely irreversible loss in the diversity of life on earth," it added. More land was changed to cropland since 1945, for instance, than in the 18th and 19th centuries combined.

GETTING WORSE

"The harmful consequences of this degradation could grow significantly worse in the next 50 years," it said. The report was compiled by experts, including from U.N. agencies and international scientific and development organizations.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the study "shows how human activities are causing environmental damage on a massive scale throughout the world, and how biodiversity -- the very basis for life on earth -- is declining at an alarming rate."

The report said there was evidence that strains on nature could trigger abrupt changes like the collapse of cod fisheries off Newfoundland in Canada in 1992 after years of over-fishing.

Future changes could bring sudden outbreaks of disease. Warming of the Great Lakes in Africa due to climate change, for instance, could create conditions for a spread of cholera.

And a build-up of nitrogen from fertilizers washed off farmland into seas could spur abrupt blooms of algae that choke fish or create oxygen-depleted "dead zones" along coasts.

It said deforestation often led to less rainfall. And at some point, lack of rain could suddenly undermine growing conditions for remaining forests in a region.

The report said that in 100 years, global warming widely blamed on burning of fossil fuels in cars, factories and power plants, might take over as the main source of damage. The report mainly looks at other, shorter-term risks.

And it estimated that many ecosystems were worth more if used in a way that maintains them for future generations.

A wetland in Canada was worth $6,000 a hectare (2.47 acres), as a habitat for animals and plants, a filter for pollution, a store for water and a site for human recreation, against $2,000 if converted to farmland, it said. A Thai mangrove was worth $1,000 a hectare against $200 as a shrimp farm.

"Ecosystems and the services they provide are financially significant and...to degrade and damage them is tantamount to economic suicide," said Klaus Toepfer, head of the U.N. Environment Program.

The study urged changes in consumption, better education, new technology and higher prices for exploiting ecosystems.

"Governments should recognize that natural services have costs," A.H. Zakri of the U.N. University and a co-chair of the report told Reuters. "Protection of natural services is unlikely to be a priority for those who see them as free and limitless."

April 4, 2005 at 01:16 PM in UK | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 03, 2005

Dubai

Telegraph | Expat | Mentor for Dubai

Simon McCrum has lived in Dubai with his family for the past three years. He moved in mid-2001 from Hong Kong where he lived for ten years. Simon works for a British Bank, is in his late thirties, has an English wife and three small children.

Living in Dubai, particularly with small children, is fabulous. For eight months of the year the climate is wonderful, schools are of the very highest standards, crime is very low and there is a very active social life on offer for those who wish to take part and best of all, there is no income tax!

Despite some things being incredibly cheap, Dubai is an expensive city. If you are negotiating a 'package' before moving out to Dubai, keep in mind that the cost of living (excluding housing) for a western expat is at least as high as it is in Central London.

Western expats tend to live in either Jumeirah or Umm Suquiem. These two areas can be found between the coast and the Sheikh Zayed Highway, south of the Dubai Creek. There are many other residential areas but the majority of western expats can be found in one of these two areas. Families tend to live in villas, either bungalows or two storey buildings, which are often part of a 'compound'.

Annual rental figures for villas in Jumeirah or Umm Suquiem do not differ wildly though a good hunt through what is available might throw up some 'bargains'! As a very rough guide a three/four bedroom villa in these areas might be between AED100-120K per annum. Bigger villas or villas with their own pools will be more expensive. Furnished or un-furnished apartments are also widely available.

Expats can now buy property in Dubai which also gives them automatic right to a residency permit.

Climate:

Winter sunshine averages eight hours per day, while the summer figure reaches as high as eleven hours a day. The climate of the UAE is, generally, hot and dry.

The summer months, from June to September, are too hot for comfort. Midday temperatures range from 35°C to 42°C, and occasionally top 49°C at the height of summer. From December to March, the climate is considerably more equable with midday temperatures ranging from 25 to 35°C and falling to as low as 9°C at night.

Whilst much is written about the fierce heat of Dubai in the summer (and with good reason!) the fact remains that for eight months of the year the climate of Dubai is extremely pleasant; warm, dry days and clear blue, cloudless skies.

Getting around

As anyone will tell you driving on the roads of Dubai is the biggest danger to life and limb that expatriates face day to day. Dubai has one of the highest motor accident rates in the world per head of population and young male UAE nationals have more chance of being killed in a car accident than a young male has anywhere else in the world.

Motor cars are tax free and as a result relatively inexpensive. Toyota is the country's best selling brand of motor vehicle.

Generally Western expatriates tend to buy 4x4 vehicles as off-roading and camping are two very popular recreational pastimes during the cooler months. There is also the added bonus of the security and safety offered by bigger, heavier cars.

Petrol is very cheap. A litre of unleaded fuel cost approximately eight British pence. Leaded fuel is no longer sold in the UAE. In the UAE we drive on the right hand side of the road (at least most of the drivers do most of the time!) As already mentioned drink driving is a very, very serious offence.

Health

There are a number of private clinics and hospitals in Dubai offering a very high standard of health care. Private health insurance is a must for all expatriates though this is generally offered by employers as part of the employee's benefits package.

The government hospitals are generally of a good standard. Of particular note is the Al Wasl hospital which specialises in Maternity and Paediatrics and which has an excellent reputation.

Entertainment

The social scene in Dubai is excellent; there are many great restaurants, bars and clubs. Certainly something to suit every taste and budget. The best guide to life in Dubai is 'Time Out' which offer a 'warts and all' look at what is on offer every month.

Cinemas here screen the most recent films though any scenes with nudity or sex are cut.

A quick flick through some of the expat guides show that there are clubs and social groups covering almost every interest and sport known and a few new ones (sand skiing anyone?)

Off-roading / dune bashing and camping are popular activities amongst the expats during the cooler months. A 30 min drive out of Dubai will find you in the middle of rolling sand dunes with only the odd camel for company.

Most expats join a 'club' soon after they arrive. These clubs tend to be part of a hotel and offer swimming pools and other sporting facilities. In the hotter months weekends tend to be spent lying around the pools.

Dubai is not a 'dry' Emirate (Sharjah is the only Emirate that is) though the consumption and purchase of alcohol is controlled.

The law states that only hotels or private clubs can serve alcohol though it seems that the interpretation of this law is stretched pretty thin sometimes. Due to this restriction western expat socialising tends to gravitate towards hotels and as a result the cost of alcohol is 'reassuringly expensive'!

There are two companies licensed to sell alcohol for private consumption and their premises tend to be located near the main supermarkets. In order to buy alcohol to consume at home you are required to apply for a permit issued by, for some reason, the CID branch of the Dubai Police department. It is a painless process though the license has to be renewed annually.

Education

There are many English-speaking kindergartens, particularly in the residential areas of Jumeirah and Umm Suquiem.

Full time education is compulsory for all children above the age of five.

Children of British expats tend to go to one of three primary schools: Jumeirah English Speaking School (JESS), Dubai English Speaking School (DESS) or Jumeirah Primary School (JPS). These schools take children from age 5 to 11. All three schools are based on the English school system and curriculum and all schools subscribe to OFSTED and are inspected and reviewed every year by OFSTED inspectors.

The choice for secondary schools is slightly restricted though there are plans to build further secondary schools. Dubai College and Jumeirah College are the two most popular and sought after schools. Again they follow the English school system and they both submit their exam results to the British 'league tables'.

Islam is heavily promoted in Dubai and the teaching of the basic tenets of Islam is compulsory at all schools

Tips

If you are moving to Dubai to live bring lots and lots of passport size photos of you and any family members. Initially Dubai can seem a bureaucratic nightmare with permits and licenses required for absolutely everything to start life and every single application must be accompanied with at least three photos.

Unmarried couples are not permitted to live together by law. Whilst the police tend to turn a blind eye to such behaviour if in the course of investigating a burglary, for example, it becomes apparent to the Police that an unmarried couple are cohabiting quite severe punishments (followed by deportation) can be imposed.

Girls should dress modestly. Whilst it is sometimes easy to forget that we are living in a Muslim country you should remain sensitive to local cultural issues.

There is no requirement for girls to wear an 'abaya' for instance, but for going out and about longish skirts or trousers and tops which cover the shoulders are preferable.

There is no home delivery of post in Dubai and if you are concerned about personal mail being delivered to your place of employment then set up your own post box at one of the Emirates Post offices.

Drink driving is a very serious offence. There is a 'zero' limit for drink driving and offenders are subject to an immediate one month imprisonment with the Court deciding on a fine or further confinement thereafter. Fortunately taxis are very cheap and very easy to come by.

Register with your embassy/consulate as soon as possible.

April 3, 2005 at 11:22 AM in Middle East | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

April 02, 2005

How Macmillan shocked officials

BBC NEWS | UK | Politics | How Macmillan shocked officials

The draft memoirs of former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan shocked and dismayed the senior civil servants asked to vet them, it has emerged.

Newly released archives show officials thought Macmillan had flouted the Official Secrets Act.

The ex-premier wanted to reveal that President Eisenhower secretly promised, in 1957, the US would help if Hong Kong was attacked by Communist China.

The draft memoirs also contained jibes about Eisenhower and his officials.

UN deal

Worries about Macmillan's indiscretions came over the drafts of his fourth volume of memoirs, Riding the Storm 1956-1959, covering some of his time as prime minister.

He wanted to disclose that Britain only supported China getting a United Nations seat when it had American consent.

The Foreign Office also recoiled at remarks about President Eisenhower and his Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles at the time of the Suez crisis.

He referred to "Eisenhower golfing while Dulles flounders" and used descriptions including "inept" and "emotional and vindictive".

Foreign Office officials warned the book could cause offence in friendly capitals across the world.

Senior Foreign Office official Sir Denis Greenhill said he feared the book "will do us, and its author, no good".

He suggested Macmillan "cut down on the pejorative adjectives".

And Cabinet Secretary Sir Burke Trend said it was in "complete disregard" to the Official Secrets Act.

'Outspoken'

Trend was also worried the breaking "confidential relations" could undermine the convention of Cabinet collective responsibility.

Another civil servant says "some pretty outspoken comments about Nasser" should be removed, including the pledge: "We'll get him down sooner or later."

When the concerns were put to Macmillan, he made changes "except in one or two cases which are matters not of security of public interest and where I have preferred to rely on my own judgement of Hammarskjold and Ike's golfing habits".

The document were released by the National Archives at Kew, in London, where they can be seen by members of the public.

April 2, 2005 at 10:19 AM in UK | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Clinton Aide Pleads Guilty to Taking Secret Papers

The New York Times > Washington > Clinton Aide Pleads Guilty to Taking Secret Papers

By ERIC LICHTBLAU
Published: April 2, 2005
WASHINGTON, April 1 - Samuel R. Berger, who as national security adviser to President Bill Clinton had access to the most secret intelligence, pleaded guilty Friday to a misdemeanor charge of intentionally removing classified documents from a government reading room last year and destroying some of them.

"It was a mistake, and it was wrong," Mr. Berger, 59, said outside the United States District Courthouse here after entering his plea before a packed courtroom.

The maximum penalty for the offense is one year in prison and a $100,000 fine. But in a deal reached with prosecutors, Mr. Berger, who agreed to pay a $10,000 fine and give up his top-level security clearance for three years, will serve no prison time. The agreement requires the formal approval of a federal judge, who will sentence him in July.

The plea effectively ends a case that badly damaged Mr. Berger's reputation as a leading foreign policy adviser and caused a brief stir in last year's presidential campaign. After the accusations against him surfaced last July, he was forced to quit as an adviser to Senator John Kerry, the Democratic nominee.

His motives in taking the documents remain something of a mystery.

Mr. Berger was the Clinton administration's liaison to the Sept. 11 commission in reviewing White House documents for the panel. The material he admitted taking included copies of versions of an assessment made in 2000 involving antiterrorism measures taken in the wake of threats preceding the 1999 millennium celebrations. That assessment is still classified.

Some Republican leaders have speculated that he took the documents because he was trying to conceal material that could be damaging to the Clinton administration. But Noel L. Hillman, who leads the Justice Department's public integrity section, said after the hearing on Friday that the department's investigation had found no evidence that Mr. Berger had intended to hide anything from the Sept. 11 commission. Indeed, the commission had access to all the original reports on the 2000 threat assessment, Mr. Hillman pointed out.

Mr. Berger, speaking outside the courthouse, declined to answer any questions regarding his motives. Associates attributed the episode to fatigue and poor judgment, saying he had spent many hours reviewing documents at the National Archives on the two occasions when he took the classified material, in September and October 2003. He removed five versions of the report, they said, because he wanted to compare them side by side in his own office.

The associates acknowledged that he had compounded the mistake by cutting up three of the reports with a pair of scissors at his office and then misleading officials at the National Archives as to what had happened when they confronted him about the missing documents.

Though Mr. Berger maintained after the accusations first arose that he had removed the classified documents by inadvertently mixing them in with his own papers, he admitted as part of the plea agreement that he had taken them intentionally and with full knowledge that doing so was unauthorized.

Asked at Friday's hearing how he wished to plead, Mr. Berger told Magistrate Judge Deborah A. Robinson in a loud, strong voice, "Guilty, your honor."

With his eyes downcast, he then returned to his seat and let out a sigh. After meeting privately with his lawyers, he gave a brief statement to a crowd of reporters outside the courthouse and was whisked away in a Lincoln Town Car.

April 2, 2005 at 10:04 AM in Iraq | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

U.S. flight records back up Arar tale

TheStar.com - U.S. flight records back up Arar tale

Private jet linked to Syrian ordeal
Details match claims in lawsuit

SCOTT SHANE AND STEPHEN GREY
NEW YORK TIMES

WASHINGTON—U.S. aviation records examined by The New York Times appear to corroborate Maher Arar's account of the 2002 flight that transported him from the U.S. to Syria, where he says he was held for 10 months in a dank, tiny cell and beaten with a metal cable.

The treatment of Arar, a 35-year-old engineer who is now back home in Ottawa, is the subject of a year-old Canadian government inquiry. The U.S. government has refused to co-operate, and has also asked a judge to dismiss Arar's lawsuit against the U.S. for allegedly grabbing him as he changed planes in New York in 2002. Allowing the suit to proceed would reveal classified information, the Americans claim.

Federal aviation records show a Gulfstream jet with a tail number N829MG and a flight plan that matches many details of the story told by Arar since his 2003 release from a Syrian prison.

If the plane was used to move Arar, it was the fourth aircraft to be identified publicly that the government apparently used to secretly transport suspected terrorists from one country to be detained in another, a practice known as "rendition."

The U.S. government says Arar was deported to Syria because of secret evidence he was a member of Al Qaeda. Arar's lawyers contend the deportation proceeding amounted to a legal fig leaf for a rendition.

After seeing a photograph of the plane and hearing its flight plan on Oct. 8, 2002, Arar said in a telephone interview: "I think that's it. I think you've found the plane that took me."

Records of the jet's travels show a December 2003 trip to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where the United States holds hundreds of detainees, suggesting it was used by the government on at least one other occasion.

Previous media reports have identified three other planes used in cases of rendition.

One charter jet was used by the Boston Red Sox baseball team manager in between missions apparently carrying detainees and their guards to Guantanamo, The Chicago Tribune reported this month, noting the Red Sox logo was attached to the fuselage.

Court documents in New York show Arar was ordered deported from the U.S. on Oct. 7, 2002, by an immigration official who wrote that secret evidence showed Arar was a potential terrorist. Arar has denied any connection to a terrorist network.

Human rights groups say that since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, rendition has delivered detainees into the hands of foreign torturers.

U.S. President George W. Bush and other officials have said that government policy was neither to engage in torture nor to turn prisoners over to other countries where they were likely to be tortured.

Former intelligence officials say rendition is useful for cases in which secret information has identified a suspected terrorist but cannot be used for a public prosecution in a U.S. court.

Maria LaHood, a lawyer for Arar, said the new information on the jet gave support to the claims in his lawsuit.

"The facts we got from Maher right after he was released are now corroborated by public records," said LaHood, who works for the Center for Constitutional Rights, an advocacy group in New York.

"The more information that comes out, the better for showing that this is an important public issue that can't be kept secret."

She said Arar and his lawyers believed American officials wanted him to undergo a more brutal interrogation than would be permitted in the U.S. in the hope of getting information about Al Qaeda. Charles Miller, a U.S. Justice Department spokesman, had no comment.

Arar has told a consistent story since his release in August 2003 after 10 months in a Syrian prison: He says he was detained at JFK airport in New York on Sept. 26, 2002, while changing planes on the way back to Canada from a family trip to Tunisia.

He was then held for nearly two weeks, awakened at 3 a.m. and taken to an airport in New Jersey, where he was put aboard a small jet.

Shackled in place on the jet's luxurious leather seats, Arar says, he followed the plane's movements on a map displayed on a video screen, watching as it travelled to Dulles airport in Virginia; to a Maine airport he believed was in Portland; to Rome; and finally to Amman, Jordan, where he was blindfolded and driven to Syria.

According to federal aviation flight logs, only one aircraft filed a flight plan to travel from New Jersey to Washington to Maine to Rome on that day, Oct. 8, 2002: the 14-passenger Gulfstream jet, operated by Presidential Aviation, a charter company in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

The jet left Teterboro in New Jersey for Dulles at 5:40 a.m.; proceeded at 7:46 a.m. to Bangor, Maine; and left Bangor for Rome at 9:36 a.m.

The only conflict with Arar's story was that the Maine airport was Bangor, not Portland. And the flight records cover only flights departing American soil, so they document the trip only as far as Rome.

Court records show, however, that immigration officials ordered him deported to Syria.

Nigel England, director of operations for Presidential, said he would not divulge who rented the Gulfstream on that day or discuss any of his clients.

"It's a very select group of people that we fly, from entertainers to foreign heads of state, a whole gambit of customers that we fly and wouldn't discuss one over the other," he said.

The plane flew about 50 flights a month to various destinations in 2002 and 2003, according to federal records. Presidential's website says a similar jet would now rent for about $120,000 (U.S.) for such an itinerary.

Federal records show the plane was owned in 2002 by MJG Aviation, a Florida company that lists its manager as Mark Gordon, an entrepreneur who also owned Presidential at the time. Gordon could not be reached for comment.

As for Arar, he said he felt the identification of the plane helped establish his credibility. "I don't know for sure but probably people had some doubts about what I said," he said. "This goes to prove and corroborate at least part of my story."

April 2, 2005 at 09:59 AM in Middle East | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Ottawa, Arar inquiry end legal spat

TheStar.com - Ottawa, Arar inquiry end legal spat

Dispute over secret evidence defused

Public hearings to resume in early May

MICHELLE SHEPHARD
STAFF REPORTER

The legal battle between the federal government and the commission investigating the Maher Arar case has been called off — for now.

The federal government withdrew an application to the federal court yesterday, after Justice Dennis O'Connor agreed to postpone the inquiry's fight to have secret evidence disclosed.

But both sides yesterday maintained their positions.

What's being disputed is O'Connor's summary of the evidence provided behind closed doors by witnesses with Canada's spy service, which he argued was a "measured" report that should not raise any concerns about national security confidentiality. But the federal government disagreed and went to court to block the release of sections of the report.

After almost three months of negotiations, commission counsel Paul Cavalluzzo said yesterday the decision to drop the fight for disclosure was largely to avoid a costly and time-consuming legal battle.

"We decided the best idea would be to basically continue on with the hearings and release (O'Connor's) report and if there is still a dispute between the parties as to what should be disclosed to the public, then we will have one fight in the courts rather than a series along the way," Cavalluzzo said.

Arar's lawyer Lorne Waldman has accused the government of hiding behind a "cloak of national security" to conceal their involvement in the case.

U.S. authorities detained Arar, a 34-year-old Ottawa software developer, on Sept. 26, 2002, in New York, during a stopover as he tried to return to Canada from a vacation in Tunisia. He was held until Oct. 8 on suspicion of Al Qaeda connections, and then flown to his native Syria, via Jordan, despite his pleas to be returned to Canada.

When he was released and returned to Canada in October 2003, he went public with the details of his detention and allegations of torture at the hands of his Syrian captors.

The public hearings, where Arar is expected to testify as one of the first witnesses, are slated to resume early next month.

April 2, 2005 at 09:57 AM in Middle East | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

66 asylum seekers sent back to Iran

TheStar.com - 66 asylum seekers sent back to Iran

Amnesty urges Ottawa to think twice

Says failed refugees face uncertain fate

BRUCE CAMPION-SMITH
OTTAWA BUREAU

OTTAWA—Canada sent 66 failed refugee claimants back to Iran last year, where human rights activists say they face an uncertain fate in a regime well-known for its abuses and torture

In the wake of new evidence that Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi was horribly tortured before she died while being detained by Iranian security officials, Amnesty International is asking Ottawa to think twice before it sends people back to Iran.

"We would urge that all Iranian refugee cases need to be looked at very carefully," Alex Neve, secretary-general for Amnesty International Canada, said yesterday.

Dr. Shahram Azam, a former Iranian military doctor, revealed on Thursday that Kazemi, 54, suffered a catalogue of injuries while in prison, including a skull fracture, broken fingers, missing fingernails, bruises, evidence of flogging, and signs of a "brutal" rape.

The Iranian-born Montreal woman was arrested after taking pictures outside a prison in Tehran in June 2003. She died about two weeks later.

"What happened to Zahra Kazemi underscores how serious the risk of human rights violations are," Neve said.

He stopped short of asking Ottawa to halt all deportations to Iran. But he said immigration and refugee board officials should take the strained relations between Tehran and Ottawa — and the fact refugee claimants may suffer if returned to Iran — into account when considering the cases.

Iran is now among the top 10 sources of new immigrants to Canada — 6,000 Iranian citizens were accepted as permanent residents last year.

But in fact 66 people who claimed refugee status were returned to Iran last year. The previous year, 57 people were returned to Iran.

The deportations won't stop despite Azam's revelations this week, said Alex Swann, spokesperson for Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan, who oversees the Canada Border Services Agency.

"There has been no decision to lift all deportations to Iran," Swann said. "We would look at relevant information at that time, including information submitted by individuals. Decisions would be made on a case-by-case basis though."

Officials close to the Kazemi case say the fresh evidence of her torture has galvanized the federal government.

Sources say Prime Minister Paul Martin has asked the foreign affairs department to examine "all options" in the case. He used a stop in Kamloops, B.C., yesterday to once again speak out against Iran.

"There's no doubt whether you're talking about international courts or whether you're talking about the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, I would certainly think that the details of what happened to her, now, and the testimony that has been brought has got to make the world aware of just what Iran is all about and that they have got to be held to account."

Moving to blunt criticism that Canada had not moved quickly enough to respond to torture allegations the government first learned about in November, Martin said it was key to get Azam safely out of Iran and to this country so he could tell his story first hand.

"I think what was very important was to have the testimony of the doctor," Martin told reporters in Kamloops, where he participated in a ceremony opening Thompson Rivers University. "I think that was more striking and obviously brought the matter home in a way that a simple statement could not."

For the second day in a row, he struck a stronger tone than Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew, who on Thursday said Azam's findings simply confirmed what Canada has long suspected — that Kazemi's death was no accident.

But Martin rejected suggestions that Pettigrew's statements indicated the government doesn't believe the gruesome details of the alleged torture change the case or increase the need for justice to be done.

"I don't think that's what Mr. Pettigrew meant," Martin said.

Liberal MP Dan McTeague (Pickering-Scarborough East) said Ottawa's next step should be to muster international condemnation of Iran and its "atrocious" record on human rights.

"It's very clear" negotiations with Iran have not been productive, said McTeague, who is parliamentary secretary to Pettigrew and also has responsibility for Canadians abroad.

"We have tried everything, including withdrawing the ambassador and that didn't work," he said. "We now need to examine other options that are available to us in terms of international repudiation."

Canada sent ambassador Gordon Venner to reopen the embassy in Iran in November, four months after Ottawa pulled its envoy to protest a decision to bar Canadian observers from attending the trial of a man accused of killing Kazemi.

The man, a low-level secret police officer, was acquitted in the closed-door trial.

Details of Kazemi's horrendous death have prompted opposition MPs, human rights groups and academics to redouble their calls on Ottawa to take stronger action against Iran.

Canada should drop its "policy of appeasement" with Iran and take strong action, such as recalling the ambassador and sending Iran's top diplomat in Ottawa packing, said Aurel Braun, a professor of political science and international relations at the University of Toronto.

"I don't think we can be very proud of our response to this terrible tragedy," Braun said. "We are behaving in many ways as an insignificant supplicant. It is not only undignified, it is also ineffective."

It's time for Canada to say "enough" and use its considerable heft on the world stage to push for answers, he said

"We're not getting the co-operation we expected. We're not getting the information that we had asked for. We're not seeing a moderating impact on the regime," Braun said.

"We tried our best in terms of constructive engagement, we have to be honest and admit it hasn't worked," Braun said in advocating a tougher approach.

But Gar Pardy, a retired diplomat responsible for consular issues at the foreign affairs department, said there's only so much Ottawa can do, given that Iran has dug in its heels.

"The Iranians have decided that they're not going to deliver any measure of justice," he said. "The options are not great."

And he cautioned that steps like pulling the ambassador from Tehran — while having value as a public relations gesture — could make life "miserable" for Iranian Canadians and their families back in Iran.

And he said economic sanctions aren't likely to have much of an impact, given that Canada does just $264 million in annual trade with Iran.

"Trade sanctions work if you can get a broad international consensus going," Pardy said.

Barring any changes within the Iranian regime, the kind of pressure that Canada can impose on Iran "I don't think would register on any scale."

"That's how bad this is," Pardy said. Still, he urged the federal government not to give up and ensure Kazemi's death is "front and centre" in every dealing with Iran.

With files from Daniel Girard

April 2, 2005 at 09:56 AM in Iran | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Security agencies mushrooming

TheStar.com - Security agencies mushrooming

Hot topic in Ottawa; no current list of spy groups on books

`Obviously more than anyone is aware of,' Arar lawyer says

MICHELLE SHEPHARD
STAFF REPORTER

The acronyms are dizzying.

CSIS, CSE and the RCMP are the big players. But PSEPC is now in the game and don't forget the DND, CBSA or FINTRAC and CATSA.

Together, these federal agencies make up part of Canada's web of security operations. Their roles have been enhanced with little scrutiny over the last three years as various government agencies have beefed up security operations, leading some to now question just who is in the spy game?

"Obviously there are more than anyone is aware of," says Toronto lawyer Lorne Waldman, who represents Maher Arar at the federal inquiry probing the circumstances of his case.

"It has been surprising to discover the extent in which agencies can be involved."

Arar, 33, a Syrian-born Canadian, was detained in the United States in September 2002, deported to Syria and kept for nearly a year before being released.

Waldman said he was alarmed when it was revealed at the inquiry that it wasn't just the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and Canadian Security Intelligence Service who were somehow involved in his client's case, but that information was handled by a low-profile division within the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), called ISI.

Department spokesperson Rodney Moore said ISI is the foreign intelligence division and provides information to the minister, but could not be more specific as to the division's power or responsibilities.

It is also unclear how, or if, the division's responsibilities have changed since 2001.

There is no current list of federal agencies involved in security operations, but the Privy Council Office is in the process of updating their March 2001 list, which was written before the advent of such agencies as Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada and the Canadian Border Security Agency.

In a report to the Arar commission last month, Shirley Heafey, the head of the RCMP's complaints commission, raised the issue of too many agencies and too little oversight.

She stressed the need for a new federal watchdog, powerful enough to make not only the Mounties, but all spy agencies, answerable to the public.

"The existing patchwork approach to civilian review of national security activities poses significant risks for rights and freedoms, since these are the principles that may be compromised when national security activities are permitted to go unchecked," she wrote.

It's a hot topic in Ottawa these days and will be the focus of an international conference next month that's co-organized by CSIS's watchdog agency, the Security Intelligence Review Committee and the Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies.

But there's still much debate and little action, says Wesley Wark, an intelligence specialist at the University of Toronto's Munk Centre for International Studies.

"We are far from the situation in which we can say that the expanded realm of security and intelligence has met and accepted its counterpart — true democratic accountability."

Wark says that within the security and intelligence community there's a running debate over the best model of organization of intelligence agency — those who argue for centralization and those in the de-centralizer camp.

The American model, following the 9/11 commission report that noted tragic gaps in intelligence sharing, is now centralized.

Canada remains still largely de-centralized Wark argues.

"The Canadian model historically tends towards de-centralization, with weak co-ordination at the centre.

"The model remains intact despite the 9/11 earthquake," says Wark.

"My feeling is that co-ordination and central control remain a problem,