Daily Archives: October 3, 2007

NEWS & EDITOR’S COMMENT: North Korea’s proliferation hiccup doesn’t stall deal

Nuclear deal reached with North Korea
By Graham Bowley and Helene Cooper, New York Times, October 4, 2007

North Korea has endorsed an agreement to disable all of its nuclear facilities by the end of the year, according to a joint six-nation statement released by China in Beijing today, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.

The agreement sets out a timetable for North Korea to disclose all its nuclear programs and disable all facilities in return for 950,000 metric tons of fuel oil or its equivalent in economic aid.

Negotiators reached agreement on a draft plan in Beijing on Sunday after four days of six-nation talks. The United States had said on Tuesday that it endorsed the plan but was waiting for approval from other nations involved in the negotiations. [complete article]

Editor’s Comment — Well, you have to hand it to the North Koreans when it comes to multitasking. While busy trying to set up a nuclear program in Syria, they were still able to cut a deal with the Bush administration.

We are informed though that a “senior administration official said the United States has told North Korea that one of the things it must disclose are details of whatever nuclear material it has been supplying to Syria.” Absolutely. And then of course this information can be passed along to Israel’s military censors and then maybe, finally, we’ll get all the details about Israel’s September attack “deep” inside Syria, striking as-yet unidentified targets.

The Bush administration must be applauded for not having allowed this little proliferation escapade to stand in the way of an important agreement.

Then there’s the issue of getting off the list of nations that sponsor terrorism. From what I can tell, this seems to be a bit like cleaning up a bad credit rating. In an exchange this morning, Assistant Secretary Hill made it clear that the United States will try to streamline the process to get the North Koreans back in good standing:

Question:How quickly will you be able to get them off the terrorism list and what have you told Congress about how quickly that’s going to happen?

Hill: Well, first of all, we’re beginning some congressional consultations tomorrow, so I haven’t been up to talk to members yet, but we will be doing that and we will be explaining how we think the terrorism list issue should proceed. First of all, I think any time you can sit down with a country and work out details of why they were on the terrorism list and how to get them off the terrorism list, this is important because it’s in our interest to get countries off the terrorism list because, by definition, countries that are on the terrorism list pose a threat. And so when you take them off, it’s because you believe you’ve diminished this threat. So we think this is in our interest to do this.

As yet, no mention on when they can expect to get removed from the Axis of Evil. Based on the most recent State Department overview of state sponsors of terrorism, it sounds like North Korea might actually have honorary membership on the list by virtue of being a member of the Axis of Evil. This is what the report says:

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) was not known to have sponsored any terrorist acts since the bombing of a Korean Airlines flight in 1987.

That’s a clean record for twenty years and they’re still on the list. Let’s not forget that the United States shot down and killed everyone on board Iran Air Flight 655 in 1988 — an Airbus carrying 290 passengers that the US Navy “mistook” for an F-14 Tomcat — and the US has managed to never even get on the terrorism list. I know — authorship confers its privileges.

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FEATURE: Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty

New revelations in attack on American spy ship
By John Crewdson, Chicago Tribune, October 2, 2007

The Johnson administration did not publicly dispute Israel’s claim that the attack [on June 8, 1967, the fourth day of what would become known as the Six-Day War,] had been nothing more than a disastrous mistake. But internal White House documents obtained from the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library show that the Israelis’ explanation of how the mistake had occurred was not believed.

Except for McNamara, most senior administration officials from Secretary of State Dean Rusk on down privately agreed with Johnson’s intelligence adviser, Clark Clifford, who was quoted in minutes of a National Security Council staff meeting as saying it was “inconceivable” that the attack had been a case of mistaken identity.

The attack “couldn’t be anything else but deliberate,” the NSA’s director, Lt. Gen. Marshall Carter, later told Congress.

“I don’t think you’ll find many people at NSA who believe it was accidental,” Benson Buffham, a former deputy NSA director, said in an interview.

“I just always assumed that the Israeli pilots knew what they were doing,” said Harold Saunders, then a member of the National Security Council staff and later assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs.

“So for me, the question really is who issued the order to do that and why? That’s the really interesting thing.” [complete article]

See also, USS Liberty Memorial.

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OPINION & NEWS: Blackwater’s Prince of Death

The man from Blackwater, shooting from the lip
By Dana Milbank, Washington Post, October 3, 2007

…when [Blackwater CEO Erik] Prince made a rare public appearance before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee yesterday, he acted as if the lawmakers were wasting his time.

How much does Blackwater, recipient of $1 billion in federal contracts, make in profits? “We’re a private company, and there’s a key word there — private,” Prince answered.

What about the 2004 crash of a Blackwater plane in Afghanistan, when federal investigators said the pilots acted unprofessionally? “Accidents happen,” Prince explained.

The lack of prosecution for a drunken Blackwater worker who shot and killed a security guard to an Iraqi vice president? “We can’t flog him,” Prince said. [complete article]

From errand to fatal shot to hail of fire to 17 deaths
By James Glanz and Alissa J. Rubin, New York Times, October 3, 2007

It started out as a family errand: Ahmed Haithem Ahmed was driving his mother, Mohassin, to pick up his father from the hospital where he worked as a pathologist. As they approached Nisour Square at midday on Sept. 16, they did not know that a bomb had gone off nearby or that a convoy of four armored vehicles carrying Blackwater guards armed with automatic rifles was approaching.

Moments later a bullet tore through Mr. Ahmed’s head, he slumped, and the car rolled forward. Then Blackwater guards responded with a barrage of gunfire and explosive weapons, leaving 17 dead and 24 wounded — a higher toll than previously thought, according to Iraqi investigators.

Interviews with 12 Iraqi witnesses, several Iraqi investigators and an American official familiar with an American investigation of the shootings offer new insights into the gravity of the episode in Nisour Square. And they are difficult to square with the explanation offered initially by Blackwater officials that their guards were responding proportionately to an attack on the streets around the square. [complete article]

Guards in Iraq cite frequent shootings
By Steve Fainaru, Washington Post, October , 2007

Most of the more than 100 private security companies in Iraq open fire far more frequently than has been publicly acknowledged and rarely report such incidents to U.S. or Iraqi authorities, according to U.S. officials and current and former private security company employees.

Violence caused by private security guards in Iraq has come under scrutiny since a Sept. 16 shooting in Baghdad involving employees of Blackwater USA. The company’s chairman, Erik Prince, told a congressional committee Tuesday that Blackwater guards opened fire on 195 occasions during more than 16,000 missions in Iraq since 2005.

However, two former Blackwater security guards said they believed employees fired more often than the company has disclosed. One, a former Blackwater guard who spent nearly three years in Iraq, said his 20-man team averaged “four or five” shootings a week, or several times the rate of 1.4 incidents a week reported by the company. The underreporting of shooting incidents was routine in Iraq, according to this former guard. [complete article]

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OPINION & NEWS: The British withdrawal from Iraq

Brown should listen to the military and quit Iraq now
By Jonathan Steele, The Guardian, October 3, 2007

Justice, as the cliche has it, must not only be done, but be seen to be done. By the same token, policy decisions must not just be taken – they must be declared. Otherwise their benefit is reduced or lost. As Gordon Brown visited Iraq yesterday to prepare for Monday’s formal announcement to parliament on Britain’s troop presence, he should ponder these truths. Some 42% of the public want Britain’s involvement in Iraq to end as soon as possible, and another 22% by the end of next year, according to a BBC poll last month. The prime minister talked yesterday of a reduction of a thousand troops by Christmas, but if he says nothing specific about a full withdrawal, he will be disappointing millions of people, as well as the troops themselves.

There is an overwhelming desire among the country’s military commanders for an end to the British adventure in Iraq. However professionally they acted, they were given a mission that was unnecessary and wrongly conceived. Along with the much more decisive role of the United States, this mission has helped to plunge Iraq into political turmoil and the largest human emergency in today’s world. [complete article]

In visit to Iraq, Brown says 1,000 more British troops to be withdrawn by year’s end
AP, October 2, 2007

Iraq will take over security from British troops in Basra province within two months, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told reporters Tuesday after meeting with Britain’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who said 1,000 more British troops would be withdrawn from Iraq by year’s end.

Brown was on an unannounced visit, which also was to include a session with U.S. Commander David Petraeus before the British leader flies to Basra to meet with his forces and military leaders in the oil-rich region in the deep south of Iraq.

“We are prepared to take over security of Basra within two months and we will,” al-Maliki said, after the meeting in his Green Zone office. “Basra will be one of the provinces where Iraqi forces will completely take over security.” [complete article]

Iraqis say Basra quieter after British troop pullout
By Aref Mohammed, Reuters, October 1, 2007

Rresidents of Iraq’s southern city of Basra have begun strolling riverfront streets again after four years of fear, their city much quieter since British troops withdrew from the grand Saddam Hussein-era Basra Palace.

Political assassinations and sectarian violence continue, some city officials say, but on a much smaller scale than at any time since British troops moved into the city after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Mortar rounds, rockets and small arms fire crashed almost daily into the palace, making life hazardous for British and Iraqis alike in Iraq’s second-largest city. To many Basrans the withdrawal of the British a month ago removed a proven target. [complete article]

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FEATURE: Roadside bombs

About left of boom: the fight against roadside bombs
By Rick Atkinson, Washington Post, October , 2007

Rick Atkinson describes the effort by the U.S. military to combat the improvised explosive devices used by insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq from 2002 until now.

The series is drawn from more than 140 interviews over the past six months with military and congressional officials, contractors, scientists and defense analysts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Washington and elsewhere. Most agreed to speak candidly only on the condition of anonymity. Ten senior officers or retired officers, each of them intimately involved in the effort to combat IEDs, were asked to review the findings for accuracy and security considerations.

Part one
Part two
Part three

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OPINION: The occupation that Israel has learned to ignore

Where is the occupation?
Haaretz editorial, October 3, 2007

The occupied territories and the Palestinians living there are slowly becoming virtual realities, distant from the eye and the heart. Palestinian workers have disappeared from our streets. Israelis no longer enter Palestinian towns for shopping. There is a new generation on each side that does not know the other. Even the settlers no longer meet Palestinians because of the different road systems that distinguish between the two populations; one is free and mobile, the other stuck at the roadblocks.

While the politicians argue over dividing the land between two peoples, the public is apathetic. The people feel that the division has already taken place. The disengagement from the Gaza Strip, the evacuation of Gush Katif, the construction of a separation barrier – the problem is solved to our satisfaction. The settlers are conducting a settlement policy of their own, taking over new areas, expanding settlements, anything to prevent a permanent solution. They are also satisfied with the status quo that relies on the Shin Bet security service and the Israel Defense Forces.

The de facto separation is today more similar to political apartheid than an occupation regime because of its constancy. One side – determined by national, not geographic association – includes people who have the right to choose and the freedom to move, and a growing economy. On the other side are people closed behind the walls surrounding their community, who have no right to vote, lack freedom of movement, and have no chance to plan their future. [complete article]

A peace to begin all peace
By Daniel Levy, The Guardian, October 2, 2007

Is there a winner in the siege policy being enacted against Gaza? Some claim that the punishment being meted out on Gaza’s residents will lead them to turn against and throw off the Hamas regime. Others contend that, under the circumstances prevalent in Gaza, the population will likely further turn to religious escapism and blame its obvious adversaries in Israel and the west.

Calibrating the effects of collective punishment is not an exact science. It is though, an utterly vile way to treat human beings. An Israel-Hamas ceasefire, in parallel to negotiations with the Abbas government, must become a priority. [complete article]

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NEWS: Myanmar – crushing the revolution

Burmese junta opens door to talks with Suu Kyi
By Peter Popham, The Independent, October 3, 2007

The UN envoy to Burma, Ibrahim Gambari, finally got to see the regime’s two top generals yesterday, after days of delays and diversions.

He had flown to the country on Saturday as the army threatened overwhelming force to stifle weeks of peaceful protest against the junta and its catastrophic economic policies. He met Senior General Than Shwe and Deputy Senior General Maung Aye together at their hideaway capital of Nay Pyi Daw, 350km (217miles) north of Rangoon.

Nothing leaked out about the content of the meeting. It was expected that the generals would have sought to justify their crackdown on the protesters, which left many dead and thousands in detention, in the name of state security and stability.

But in a surprise coda to the visit, one which raised a flicker of hope, Mr Gambari then flew back to Rangoon for a second, brief meeting with the democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, whom he had met for more than an hour on Sunday. The most optimistic supposition was that he was bringing a message of some sort from the generals to the woman who, as leader of the opposition which won a landslide election victory in 1990, one that was never honoured, has been the principal thorn in their side ever since. [complete article]

Myanmar troops stage nighttime arrests
AP, October 3, 2007

After crushing the democracy uprising with guns, Myanmar’s junta switched tactics Wednesday, sending troops to drag people from their homes in the middle of the night and letting others know they were marked for arrest.

People living near the Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar’s most revered shrine and a flash point of unrest during the protests, reported that police swept through several dozen homes about 3 a.m., dragging away many men for questioning. [complete article]

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