Haaretz
Israeli Arab charged with giving Hamas explosive material
By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service, and The Associated Press
The Tel Aviv District Court on Thursday indicted an Israeli Arab from the Triangle region for supplying a Hamas agent with material for explosives.
A Hamas agent from the West Bank city of Tul Karm told security forces that Mohammed Halaf, 54, had supplied him with potassium and sulfur, whose sale Israel bans in the West Bank because they can be used to make explosives.
Halaf was charged with assisting the enemy in wartime, making contact with a foreign agent, possessing weapons without a license and conspiracy to commit a crime. He denied all charges.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/636439.html
Jordanian veterinarians to work in Israeli lab to combat avian flu
By Amiram Cohen, Yoav Stern, Ran Reznick and Asaf Oni, Haaretz Correspondents and AP
Officials from Israel's Veterinary Service and their Jordanian counterparts agreed Thursday to collaborate at an Israeli laboratory in Beit Dagan in an effort to combat the avian flu.
Representatives from the two countries, meeting at the Allenby Bridge border crossing Thursday morning, also decided to have another bi-national meeting in three weeks to evaluate their progress.
The meeting was organized at the request of the Jordanians, who want to find out what steps Israel is taking to prepare for a possible outbreak of the virus in the region.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/636091.html
Israel: No new plans to separate Israeli and Palestinian traffic
By Amos Harel, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Staff
Officials in Jerusalem have clarified on Wednesday that Israel has no new plans to separate Israel and Palestinian traffic on the roads of the West Bank. The clarification comes in the wake of harsh U.S. criticism of the restrictions imposed by Israel on Tuesday on Palestinian vehicular traffic in the territories.
The traffic restrictions were put in place following the terrorist attack on Sunday at the Gush Etzion junction and near Eli, in which three Israelis were murdered. Despite the fact that Fatah's military wing claimed responsibility for the attack, there are increasing signs that Hamas gunmen from the Hebron area were the perpetrators.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/636149.html
Chief UN investigator to issue report on Hariri assassination
By The Associated Press
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Chief UN investigator Detlev Mehlis will Thursday present his findings on the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
Lebanon's president and its top military commander sought to reassure jittery Lebanese amid fears the findings of the probe might jeopardize this country's stability.
President Emile Lahoud and Army Commander Gen. Michel Suleiman said in separate statements Wednesday that Lebanon's military and security services have been mobilized to protect public safety and prevent attempts at disturbances.
http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/636155.html
Statistical warning signs
By Avraham Tal
Last week the Central Bureau of Statistics reiterated its announcement from last September, confirming that the initial assessments of the national accounts indicate a growth of 5.1 percent in gross domestic product, based on an increase of 6.4 percent in business sector output.
This announcement does not at first appear to be saying anything new, but the details supplied by the CBS require slightly more fundamental consideration. It turns out that problems requiring attention are hiding behind the cheerful collective statistic.
The accelerated growth in 2005 stemmed in large part from the encouragement of two out of three major causes of growth (or the "engines") in 2004: Growth in private consumption jumped from 0.9 percent in 2003 to 5 percent in 2004, while growth in exports soared from 7.5 percent to 17.4 percent. This impressive trend appears to have halted this year, when private consumption is expected to increase by only 3.5 percent and growth in exports will contract to 6.5 percent.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/636124.html
State: More jail time for man who drove bomber to 2003 attack
By Yuval Yoaz and David Ratner, Haaretz Correspondents
The state prosecution asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to add 53 years to the jail term of an Israeli Arab who drove a suicide bomber to the Maxim restaurant in Haifa, where 21 people were killed in October 2003.
Jamal Mahnaje, a 49-year-old Umm al-Fahm resident, was sentenced in September to 10 years in jail and an additional two years of probation.
During his trial, the prosecution demanded that Mahnaje be jailed for 63 years, calculating three years in jail for every person killed in the restaurant.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/636473.html
The Jerusalem Post
Syria expels Saddam's nephew
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
CAIRO, Egypt
Iraqi security forces have arrested a nephew of Saddam Hussein, described as the top financier of the Sunni-dominated insurgency, after Syrian authorities forced him to return to his native country and told American officials where he was hiding in Baghdad.
Yasir Sabhawi Ibrahim, son of Saddam's half brother Sabhawi Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, was arrested in a Baghdad apartment, several days after Syrian authorities forced him to return to Iraq, security officials told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from Cairo. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to deal with the media. They did not say exactly when the arrest was made.
Syria handed over Yasir Sabhawi Ibrahim's father, No. 36 on the US list of 55 most-wanted Iraqis, along with 29 other former Ba'ath Party officials in late February, after months of denying Iraqi accusations that Damascus was harboring fugitives
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1129540568814&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
Navy to deploy speedboat drone
By ARIEH O'SULLIVAN
The Navy has revealed it is deploying an unmanned speedboat equipped with a remote-controlled machine gun capable of being operated up to a range of 20 kilometers, reportedly the first of its kind in the world
Developed by Rafael, the nine-meter-long, rigid hull, inflatable vessel is being called the "Protector" and has been undergoing sea trials for a number of months. Navy officials said it has "already drawn blood" but declined to elaborate. They stressed that the unmanned boat was an "all-Israeli" assembly.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1129540566580&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
The Boston Globe
Austrians await wedding of crystal heiress
Austria's Finance Minister Karl-Heinz Grasser and Fiona Swarovski pose in Reifnitz, Austria in this Aug. 19, 2005 file photo. Austrians are abuzz over this weekend's wedding of Finance Minister Karl-Heinz Grasser to crystal heiress Fiona Swarovski _ the country's closest thing to a royal couple, complete with scandals and paparazzi in hot pursuit. With the wedding's venue being treated like a state secret, Austrian media speculation centered on Vienna's ornate Liechtenstein Palace, the alpine ski resort of Kitzbuehel, or Duernstein, a quaint village with a powder-blue church on the banks of the River Danube just west of the capital. (AP Photo/Gert Eggenberger)
By William J. Kole, Associated Press Writer October 20, 2005
VIENNA, Austria --He's a tall, dark and handsome politician. She's the beautiful and wealthy daughter of a dynasty. Austrians are abuzz over Saturday's wedding of Finance Minister Karl-Heinz Grasser to crystal heiress Fiona Swarovski -- the country's closest thing to a royal couple, complete with scandals and paparazzi in hot pursuit.
"They fill Austrians' jet set needs," said Wolfgang Bachmayer, a pollster who has been tracking the alpine nation's obsession with the couple. "Grasser and Swarovski are in a completely different league."
After weeks of denial, Grasser's office confirmed the upcoming nuptials, but won't say where the wedding will be held.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/10/20/austrians_await_wedding_of_crystal_heiress/
Avian flu
Further reports of Tamiflu resistance in avian flu virus pending: expert
Helen Branswell
Canadian Press
October 18, 2005
TORONTO (CP) - There is additional, unpublished evidence of resistance to the anti-flu drug Tamiflu in human cases of H5N1 avian influenza, an U.S. expert in antiviral drugs hinted Saturday.
Dr. Frederick Hayden suggested data that have not yet hit scientific literature point to the existence of more cases where H5N1 viruses evaded the drug that countries around the world have been stockpiling as a hedge against a feared pandemic.
http://www.canada.com/health/story.html?id=bd866740-2f4f-42d0-a327-6f7bddbe3227
Avian flu drug: Central panel to decide on patent
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Govt has the right to cancel patents in emergencies
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TOUFIQ RASHID
NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 15: The pharma war between Roche and Cipla over the manufacture of Oseltamivir, the generic version of the avian flu drug, has led the government to set up an expert panel as manufacture of the drug is illegal under the patent law.
“A committee of experts headed by high-level officials in the Health Ministry is being constituted on October 17. We can answer the questions regarding the issue only after it submits its report,” Secretary, Health, P K Hota, said.
http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=80147
EU voices caution over avian flu outbreak in Romania
http://www.chinaview.cn/ 2005-10-11 06:59:22
BRUSSELS, Oct. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union (EU), said on Monday that it was studying the possibility of avian flu outbreak in its candidate country Romania.
Tests are being carried out to check whether the death of a flock of 40 ducks was due to the bird flu virus, said a press release of the Commission.
Results of laboratory tests are due out on October 12, it added.
The results should confirm whether the dreaded H5N1 strain of avian flu - which has decimated 125 million birds and killed 50 people in South East Asia since 2003 - is approaching European borders.
The news comes barely a month after EU Health and Consumer Commissioner Markos Kyprianou urged Romania to get on with implementing EU veterinary and food safety rules during a visit tothe country.
The EU has stepped up surveillance on wild birds and poultry inrecent months amid fears that the H5N1 strain of avian influenza could reach Europe. Enditem
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-10/11/content_3602977.htm
U.S.'s Leavitt Urges Nations to Increase Flu Vaccines (Update1)
Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt urged countries to increase their capacities to manufacture antiviral drugs and vaccines amid fears mutated bird flu may spread globally among humans.
Leavitt, 54, is meeting leaders in Thailand, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia this week to urge fuller international cooperation against an outbreak of the lethal flu that has killed 60 people in Southeast Asia.
The World Health Organization has warned that the risk of a bird-flu pandemic that may kill as many as 7.4 million people is at its highest since a 1968 outbreak in which about 3 million died. WHO Director General Jong Woo Lee said today in Bangkok the organization believes ``there will be'' another human influenza pandemic.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080&sid=aM_rVpQz5GfY&refer=asia
U.S.'s Leavitt Urges Nations to Increase Flu Vaccines (Update1)
Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt urged countries to increase their capacities to manufacture antiviral drugs and vaccines amid fears mutated bird flu may spread globally among humans.
Leavitt, 54, is meeting leaders in Thailand, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia this week to urge fuller international cooperation against an outbreak of the lethal flu that has killed 60 people in Southeast Asia.
The World Health Organization has warned that the risk of a bird-flu pandemic that may kill as many as 7.4 million people is at its highest since a 1968 outbreak in which about 3 million died. WHO Director General Jong Woo Lee said today in Bangkok the organization believes ``there will be'' another human influenza pandemic.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080&sid=aM_rVpQz5GfY&refer=asia
Joint efforts pledged to combat global bird flu threat
http://www.chinaview.cn/ 2005-10-10 22:45:54
BANGKOK, Oct. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- Thailand, the United States and the World Health Organization (WHO) on Monday agreed to joint hands in combating the looming influenza and avian flu outbreak that will raise havoc at a global level, the Thai News Agency reported.
At the meeting on International Partnership on Avian and Pandemic Influenza (IPAPI) here, top public health officials from Thailand, the United States and leading international organizations discussed joint measures to prevent the influenza and bird flu and agreed to form a network to fight the epidemics.
According to the WHO, once the H5N1 virus that causes bird flu mutates, over 1 billion people around the world could be affected, potentially killing up to seven million people. It will also inflict a loss of 30 billion US dollars to the world economy.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-10/10/content_3602601.htm
Thousands of birds culled to stop avian flu.
Ankara -- Turkey and Romania culled thousands of birds and imposed quarantine zones yesterday to try to stop the spread of avian flu as scientists worked to discover whether the outbreaks could be the deadly H5N1 strain. Reports of Turkey's outbreak surfaced only on Saturday night, but nearly 2,000 turkeys had died at the affected farm near the Aegean Sea on Tuesday and Wednesday and hundreds more were culled overnight in the affected area, local media said. Authorities slapped a three-kilometre quarantine ring around the site.
Romania's suspected outbreak was detected in poultry in the Danube delta, on the Black Sea, and the European Commission said the two cases are different but they have raised the spectre of the disease reaching European Union countries.
If the Romanian cases turn out to be the deadly H5N1 virus, they will be the first evidence the strain has spread to Europe from Asia, where it has killed more than 60 people and millions of birds since 2003.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20051010/WORLDREPO10-3/TPInternational/Africa
EU ministers call spread of bird flu 'global threat,' say EU ill-prepared
11:56 AM EDT Oct 20
A veterinarian in protective clothes collects a dead dove from the street in downtown Belgrade. (AP Photo/Srdjan Ilic)
ROBERT WIELAARD
LUXEMBOURG (AP) - The European Union declared Tuesday the spread of bird flu from Asia into the EU a "global threat" requiring international co-operation, saying western Europe was ill prepared to deal with an influenza emergency.
Western European governments scrambled to buy industrial quantities of flu vaccines and face masks to protect citizens from possible infection.
EU Health Commissioner Markos Kyprianou said most of the 25 EU governments lack sufficient stocks of anti-viral drugs designed to boost resistance to the common flu of such risk groups as the elderly, the young, diabetics and others.
http://www.cbc.ca/cp/world/051018/w101870.html
Bird flu vaccine 'may not work'
19oct05
A VACCINE for a mass inoculation against bird flu could be ineffective by the time it comes into production, Health Minister Tony Abbott says.
The Federal Government is considering vaccinating every Australian against bird flu under a national program if trials on a new vaccine are successful.
Tests on the vaccine, being developed by research company CSL, should be finished by the end of the year.
But with the possibility of the bird flu virus mutating quickly, Mr Abbott is warning people not to put too much faith in the possibility or effectiveness of a mass vaccination campaign.
http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,16966897^1702,00.html
Roche promises new plant for bird flu drug
Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., demands the Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Roche, license it's bird flu treatment at a news conference at the Capitol on Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2005 in Washington. Sen. Schumer will call on Roche to license Tamiflu production to five U.S. companies within 30 days, he said in a statement Tuesday. Schumer has said that if Roche does not allow the additional production voluntarily, he will introduce legislation to force the move. (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf)
By Paul Elias, AP Biotechnology Writer October 18, 2005
SAN FRANCISCO --Roche AG says it will build a U.S. plant to make more of its anti-bird flu drug Tamiflu, but that promise failed to tamp growing international pressure on the Swiss drug giant to ease its monopoly grip on the drug.
European Union foreign ministers on Tuesday called bird flu a global threat following the discovery of new cases in Greece, Romania and Turkey in recent days, which led to bans on poultry from those countries.
Meanwhile, demand for Tamiflu is far outstripping Roche's ability to make it.
Some 40 countries are scrambling to create Tamiflu stockpiles to treat millions if a pandemic occurs and there's growing international pressure to ignore Roche's patent rights and manufacturer inexpensive generic versions.
http://www.boston.com/yourlife/health/diseases/articles/2005/10/18/eu_nations_declare_bird_flu_global_threat/
The A to Z of bird flu
STEPHEN McGINTY
A is for Avian flu: First discovered in Italy a century ago, avian flu or bird flu, is a contagious viral disease which has dozens of different strains, some almost harmless and others that can kill infected fowl in a matter of hours. While all bird species are susceptible to the virus - which is loosely connected to human influenza - domestic poultry are particularly vulnerable.
B is for Ban: The European Union has now banned the import of fowl from Turkey, Romania and other nations who have suffered recent outbreaks of avian flu, in an attempt to prevent the spread of infection.
C is for China: The Medical Research Council is working closely with Chinese scientists to develop vaccines for avian flu and other diseases, known as "emerging infections". China is particularly at risk because of the country's large rural population who live close to livestock.
D is for Decontamination suits: This autumn's most desirable look among rural health workers. These puffy white suits, complete with matching hood and face mask are just the thing for sashaying through an infected farm. Let's hope they don't become next season's must-have.
E is for Emergency government powers: Should there be a pandemic, the Government has the power to isolate Britain from the rest of the world by grounding planes, canceling ferries and closing the Channel Tunnel. It is more likely, though that it would cancel large gatherings, such as concerts and football matches, in an attempt to slow the spread of the virus.
http://news.scotsman.com/features.cfm?id=2105012005
Spreading day by day, virus strikes at heart of Russia
LOUISE GRAY
BIRD flu continued its spread across the globe yesterday, appearing for the first time in European Russia and again in rural China.
Preliminary tests on hundreds of birds to the south of Moscow detected the H5N1 flu strain. Russia's agriculture ministry said 220 of 3,000 domestic birds in the village of Yandovka had died. Birds on six affected farms were being destroyed, and local officials had decided to kill all poultry in the village.
It was also reported that some 200,000 people in the region were given standard flu vaccinations, so that if anyone became infected with the bird flu virus, it would hopefully not mix with a human flu strain in the body and create a dangerous hybrid.
China, meanwhile, announced a fresh outbreak of bird flu, saying 2,600 birds had died from the disease in Inner Mongolia.
The deaths, at a farm near the region's capital, Hohhot, were due to the H5N1 strain.
http://news.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=161&id=2115242005
Bird Flu Spreads
Bangkok — A 48-year-old man died of bird flu in Thailand after eating his neighbour's sick chickens, and Taiwan confirmed on Thursday the island nation's first case of the disease in birds smuggled in from China.
In Russia, emergency workers were killing domestic and wild fowl in and near a bird flu-affected village south of Moscow while the World Health Organization said China had destroyed 91,100 birds around a farm in the country's north to stop a bird flu outbreak. The birds were culled after 2,600 chickens and ducks died of the H5N1 strain of the virus in a breeding facility in a village in the Inner Mongolia region.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20051020.wbirdflu1020/BNStory/International/
Nanotech Battles Bird Flu
By Colin C. Haley
Health officials around the world are sounding the alarm about Bird Flu. The virus has killed 60 people in Asia and its discovery in Europe this week has heightened fears of a pandemic.
While the medical community works to eradicate Bird Flu, several nanotech (define) and IT firms say their products could help control it.
"Nanotechnology will undoubtedly be used in some form -- either as a vaccine, a treatment, a delivery method for a drug, or as a means to detect, control or limit the spread of the influenza," Adrian Burden, CEO of Singular ID, told internetnews.com.
Singular ID was founded in December and makes magnetic tags that give a "fingerprint" to objects. The tags are similar to RFID (define) chips, but are smaller, stronger and aren't susceptible to signal interference, Singular ID said.
http://www.internetnews.com/infra/article.php/3556471
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Avian Flu Under the Microscope
Here's key information about the potentially deadly disease that has governments and scientists on high alert, since it may spread around the globe
Suddenly the news is filled with dire warnings about avian flu, a potentially deadly disease that may -- or may not -- sweep the globe in the next few years. Infectious-disease experts have been warning for years that the virus that has killed tens of millions of chickens and waterfowl in Asia since 1997 could mutate into a form that would infect humans. If that happens, it could produce a devastating flu pandemic such as the Spanish flu of 1918 that killed as many as 50 million people worldwide (see BW Online, 10/6/05, "'Eerie' Discoveries about Flu").
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/oct2005/tc20051010_0869_tc024.htm
Meet to be convened on avian flu soon
Special Correspondent
Preparedness against possible attack of epidemic to be reviewed
NEW DELHI: : Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will soon convene a high-level meeting to review the state of preparedness to deal with the bird flu epidemic, in case it hits the country.
The Union Health Ministry has also sought directions from the World Health Organisation to take steps to meet any exigencies, Union Health and Family Welfare Minister Anbumani Ramadoss told reporters here on Monday.
Asking people not to be scared, Dr. Ramadoss said the Ministry had set up a facility to manufacture influenza vaccine and for the production-cum-procurement of anti-viral drugs. "We have been having a series of fruitful meeting with other Ministries on the issue. These are not empty meetings but eventful interactions where issues such as medicine procurement and stockpiling were discussed," he said.
http://www.hindu.com/2005/10/18/stories/2005101805101300.htm
European Union adopts measures to prevent avian flu
Officials try to ease fears after lethal strain found in Turkey
By Emma Ross
Associated Press
LONDON -- Senior veterinary officials from around the European Union agreed Friday on new measures aimed at preventing a lethal strain of bird flu from entering the bloc, a day after it was confirmed on the continent's doorstep in Turkey.
The officials also moved to calm fears on a continent with vivid memories of mad cow disease, saying there was no reason to avoid cooked chicken because bird flu is killed in seconds when the meat is cooked.
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051015/NEWS01/510150464/1012/NEWS06
Culling plan to combat avian flu
Jonathon Carr-Brown, Health Correspondent
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THE government is to respond to criticism that it has failed to act quickly enough to prepare for a potential flu pandemic by bringing in new measures to tackle the threat.
The initiatives come as scientists confirmed yesterday that the Romanian outbreak nine days ago was caused by the deadly avian flu virus H5N1.
Sir Liam Donaldson, the chief medical officer, is expected to announce on Thursday government plans to buy additional H5N1 flu vaccine or possibly more anti-viral drugs. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) is also seeking powers to carry out “firebreak” culls of uninfected birds.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1827842,00.html
From Washington, a Story About a Killer Flu
By GARDINER HARRIS
Published: October 16, 2005
THERE was the killer asteroid scare that spawned two big-budget 1998 movies. Anxiety about SARS in Canada led to a movie-of-the-week last summer. And this week, the Bush administration is expected to release its pandemic flu plan, which could generate its own movie epic.
The New York Times obtained a draft of the plan, dated Sept. 30. No one would confuse the 381-page document with a screenplay, but pages 45 through 47, the section titled "Pandemic Scenario - Origin and Initial Spread," are gripping. They describe a flu epidemic moving from a village in Asia to the United States, where it causes panic and as many as 1.9 million deaths.
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Map: Influenza 1918 (PBS.org)
The plan's writers might have been inspired by John M. Barry's hair-raising history of the 1918 flu epidemic, "The Great Influenza," which President Bush, in an Oct. 5 press conference, said he had recently read. After criticism of his response to Hurricane Katrina, Mr. Bush, who said he was taking the risks of a pandemic "very seriously," has been eager to show that his administration is aggressively preparing for it. Top health officials, including Michael O. Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services, spent last week in Asia discussing avian flu preparations. On Friday, Mr. Leavitt called the newly confirmed spread of the disease to Turkey a "troubling sign." The administration is expected to ask Congress this week for $7.1 billion to respond to the threat.
Is a flu pandemic likely in the next few years? No one knows. The deadly H5N1 strain of avian flu does not currently spread from person to person, but the government's vision of what a pandemic would look like is grimly compelling. Excerpts from the document follow.
Act I: Illness Strikes a Village
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/16/weekinreview/16harris.html
Avian flu strain confirmed in Romania
Officials appeal for calm in Europe
By Colin Nickerson, Globe Staff October 16, 2005
BERLIN -- As lab tests confirmed yesterday that the most lethal strain of bird flu has reached mainland Europe for the first time, people across the continent sought to protect themselves against a disease for which there is no existing vaccine. Officials, meanwhile, urged calm after a week of issuing dire forecasts.
Germans streamed to doctors' offices demanding flu shots; Belgians descended upon pharmacies in search of fast-dwindling stocks of antiflu medication, while Serbians snapped up tens of thousands of surgical face masks.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2005/10/16/avian_flu_strain_confirmed_in_romania/
The Guardian
Thailand confirms 13th bird flu death
James Sturcke and agencies
Thursday October 20, 2005
Authorities in Thailand confirmed today that a 13th person, the first for over a year, had died from bird flu in the country.
Officials initially denied there was any connection with the disease, which has killed over 61 people in Asia, but today the prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, said new lab results confirmed the bird flu diagnosis.
Bang-on Benphat, 48, was admitted to hospital with severe pneumonia on Sunday, about two weeks after he killed, cooked and ate his neighbour's chickens. Officials said the birds had died of abnormal causes but were not tested for bird flu.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/birdflu/story/0,14207,1596753,00.html
Women face pension poverty
Hilary Osborne
Thursday October 20, 2005
Women are failing to adequately save for a pension and millions face poverty in retirement, according a report published today.
Survey pensions provider Scottish Widows found that men of all ages were more likely to put money into a scheme than women, and once children arrived the gap between the sexes widened.
While 52% of men said they were saving for retirement, just 31% of women were doing the same, and one in two women said they had stopped saving when they had children.
As a result, just 15% of mothers with children aged under five were paying into a scheme, compared with 50% of fathers of children the same age.
http://money.guardian.co.uk/pensions/story/0,6453,1596876,00.html
Annan: Aid quake victims before more die
Thursday October 20, 2005
The UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, warned today that a huge shortfall in relief funds after the south Asia earthquake risked causing a "massive second wave of death".
Mr Annan said that with so many people still in need of shelter, food and other aid in Pakistan, the risk to life there was "not over yet".
He appealed for a big increase in international donations, saying that of the funds secured so far only 12% had been given with firm commitments.
He said this sum amounted to only £20m of the UN's appeal for £176m after the October 8 quake, which is estimated to have killed 79,000 people as it devastated Pakistani Kashmir and the surrounding regions.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/naturaldisasters/story/0,7369,1596767,00.html
Guardian journalist abducted in Baghdad
Ewen MacAskill
Thursday October 20, 2005
The Guardian
The Guardian's Iraq correspondent, Rory Carroll, was last night missing after being kidnapped by gunmen in Baghdad. Carroll, 33, an experienced foreign correspondent, had been conducting an interview in the city with a victim of Saddam Hussein's regime. He had been preparing an article for today's paper on the opening of the former dictator's trial yesterday.
Carroll, who was accompanied by two drivers and a translator, was confronted by the gunmen as he left the house where he had been carrying out the interview. He and one of the drivers were bundled into cars. The driver was released about 20 minutes later.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/rorycarroll/story/0,16647,1596820,00.html
Violent crime up 6%
Staff and agencies
Thursday October 20, 2005
The number of violent crimes recorded by police in England and Wales jumped by 6% in the three months to the end of June, Home Office figures revealed today.
The latest rise comes after annual figures in July that showed incidents of violence against the person were up 8% from the previous year.
The Home Office said the latest increase - compared to the same three-month period in 2004 - reflected the improved police recording of crime and more "proactive policing" of violent disorder.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/crime/article/0,2763,1596620,00.html
continued …
Thursday, October 20, 2005
The Incredible Dynamics of "Wilma" (Click on Title. Thank you.)
October 19, 2005.
Okay everyone, I heard the news conference from Florida by Jeb Bush encouraging the public to mobilize to safety.
He's right.
I don't want to hear how anyone is trying to figure this out for themselves.
The supercomputers from The Weather Service have prediction models. All of us paid a whole lot of money for those computers and they and the people at the National Weather Service are working for everyone.
These storms are 'eddies' off vortices and is why they are very powerful. Anyone can see that. That does not make them more predictable or safer than any other storm we have ever witnessed. These storms are more powerful than one can begin to imagine and although we can take pictures of aftermath and feel safe to rebuild or support those that are rebuilding that doesn't make us super people who can live through anything.
My experience with these monster storms is that 24 hours before landfall is not really enough time to safely get to where you need to be safe. The film 'loop' of the title of this picture clearly demonstrates how rapidly 'Wilma' became a very dangerous storm.
Don't mess with this.
We all have eyes and we can all watch and decide about the effectiveness of computer models but we need to listen to authority that we all pay for and rely on. LEAVE as instructed and don't come back until FOR SURE we are all safe !!
(Click on Title Above. Thank you.)
Morning Papers - concluding
Al Jazeera
Kandahar was the last place Omar was known to be.
US to probe torching of Taliban corpses
Thursday 20 October 2005, 12:27 Makka Time, 9:27 GMT
The US military has said it found "repugnant" and would investigate a television report that claimed American soldiers in Afghanistan burned the bodies of two Taliban fighters and then used the action to taunt other fighters.
Afghanistan's government has demanded that those responsible be punished and top Muslim clerics have warned that anti-American demonstrations may break out.
Australia's SBS television network broadcast video footage that purportedly showed US soldiers burning the bodies of the suspected Taliban fighters in the hills outside the southern village of Gonbaz, near the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D43262FF-E131-4954-A772-DA174E2CCBA7.htm
Sudan bans poultry imports
Thursday 20 October 2005, 12:33 Makka Time, 9:33 GMT
Sudan has taken a precautionary measure of halting all poultry imports, totalling 35% of its consumption, to prevent the spread of bird flu after the UN food agency said the disease could move to east Africa.
"This is a precautionary measure and of course it will adversely affect the poultry industry in Sudan," said a senior official on Thursday.
Ahmed Mustafa Hassan, under-secretary at the ministry of animal resources said the risk was serious in Sudan as migratory birds from the north pass through the areas along the Nile, where most of Sudan's population lives.
He added that the price of poultry in Sudan would rise as a result of the ban.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/9624EF12-392A-463D-AAE2-C5DCA9CE97D1.htm
Earthquake toll may go beyond 79,000
Thursday 20 October 2005, 9:55 Makka Time, 6:55 GMT
Helicopters and foot soldiers headed out of the main city in Pakistani Kashmir at daybreak Thursday in a frantic attempt to get medical aid and supplies to remote villages damaged in an earthquake that killed more than 79,000 people.
The death toll in South Asia's 8 October quake jumped dramatically after regional authorities reported new figures based on bodies recovered and information from outlying areas, making it one of the deadliest temblors of the past century.
The Pakistani government's official death toll is lower, still at 47,700, but central figures have lagged behind regional numbers. Those figures, from Pakistan's northwest province and the portion of Kashmir it controls, add up to about 78,000. India has reported 1360 deaths in its part of Kashmir.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D547100C-DBF7-416E-B5DD-2818227E9C57.htm
Indonesia to scan Islamic schools
Thursday 20 October 2005, 8:28 Makka Time, 5:28 GMT
Indonesia will crack down on Islamic boarding schools that are breeding terrorists, the country's vice-president has said, but also emphasised that he thought there were only "one or two" such establishments in the sprawling country.
Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, has vowed to do more to crack down on terrorism following this month's suicide bombings on Bali island - the fourth major attack in the country since 2002.
"Almost all the people behind the last four terror attacks came from a hardline group that studied at certain Islamic boarding schools," Yusuf Kalla told reporters late on Wednesday.
"Out of the 17,000 boarding schools (in Indonesia) there are one or two, I repeat one or two, that are extreme and not in line with the teachings of Islam. We will have to investigate and control (them)."
Moves to monitor Islamic establishments are sensitive in Indonesia.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/BF5AE945-3A76-418D-A5E5-31D2CD6163F1.htm
Spain judge orders US soldiers' arrest
Wednesday 19 October 2005, 19:50 Makka Time, 16:50 GMT
A judge in Spain has issued an international arrest order for three US soldiers whose tank fired at a Baghdad hotel during the war in Iraq, killing a Spanish journalist.
National Court Judge Santiago Pedraz issued the arrest warrant for Sgt. Shawn Gibson, Capt. Philip Wolford and Lt. Col. Philip de Camp, all of the US Army's 3rd Infantry Division, a court official said on Wednesday.
Pedraz had sent two requests to the United States - in April 2004 and June 2005 - to have statements taken from the suspects or to obtain permission for a Spanish delegation to quiz them. Both went unanswered.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/A3718954-5249-4E29-99A4-478370F57DB3.htm
US detainee death probes slammed
Thursday 20 October 2005, 2:33 Makka Time, 23:33 GMT
An analysis by human rights lawyers has found numerous flaws in US military investigations into deaths of prisoners in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Pentagon said about 108 detainees have died in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2002, not counting those killed in insurgent mortar attacks on detention facilities.
A report by the New York-based group Human Rights First, made available on Wednesday, also faulted "scattershot" military record-keeping on prisoner deaths and failures by some commanders to report deaths in a timely way.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/80CC39C7-AF27-4D11-B424-F9D4BF608582.htm
Dozens of Iraqis die in US air strikes
Monday 17 October 2005, 14:40 Makka Time, 11:40 GMT
US warplanes and helicopters have bombed two villages near the city of Ramadi where witnesses say at least 39 civilians have been killed, while the US army says the air strike has killed an estimated 70 fighters.
On Sunday, a group of about two dozen Iraqis gathered around the wreckage of a US vehicle destroyed the previous day by a roadside bomb. The people were hit by the US air strikes, the military and witnesses said.
The air strike hit the crowd which had gathered around to look at the wreckage of the vehicle and to pick pieces off it - as often occurs after an American vehicle is hit. The vehicle was destroyed on election day.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/158E08C0-33D3-4160-9AB5-9E1B6B166560.htm
Irish journalist missing in Iraq
Thursday 20 October 2005, 13:55 Makka Time, 10:55 GMT
The London-based Guardian newspaper says that one of its reporters has disappeared in Iraq and believes he has been kidnapped.
Rory Carroll, 33, who is the Guardian's Baghdad correspondent, was on assignment when he vanished, the paper said in a statement on Wednesday.
"It is believed Mr Carroll may have been taken by a group of armed men," the statement said. "The Guardian is urgently seeking information about Mr Carroll's whereabouts and condition."
Carroll's father, Joe, said The Guardian told him three people had been with his son when he was abducted, "and one of them did get a bit roughed up but he was the only one kidnapped".
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/258AC778-1B5E-4C23-AC7A-BF1451754725.htm
Anti-Intellectualism
Anti-US writer voted top thinker
WASHINGTON, Oct. 18 (UPI) -- Professor Noam Chomsky, a leading critic of United States foreign policy since before the Vietnam War, has been voted the world's top public intellectual in a poll run by two international magazines.
The magazines, Britain's 'Prospect' monthly and the Washington-based 'Foreign Policy' monthly, ran the poll, in which more than 20,000 readers voted. Chomsky was chosen from a list of 100 nominees, who had to be active in their respective fields while also able to communicate ideas to a general audience and influence public debate.
Chomsky, author of "Hegemony or Survival; America's quest for global dominance," was the overwhelming choice for the top spot. He won almost twice as many votes (4,824) as Italian novelist Umberto Eco, who finished second with 2,464 votes. British biologist Richard Dawkins, former Czech Republic President Václav Havel, and U.S.-based British writer Christopher Hitchens round out the top five.
While hailing one of the most prominent critics of America in international debate, observers noted that the vote was not rigged by anti-Americans. Voters were also given the option of a write-in vote for one other name they felt should be included, and Nobel Prize-winning American economist Milton Friedman, the intellectual father of modern monetarism and a prominent conservative, received the most write-in votes.
Friedman was followed by British scientist Stephen Hawking, Indian writer Arundhati Roy, left-wing American historian Howard Zinn, and former U.S. President Bill Clinton.
http://www.upi.com/InternationalIntelligence/view.php?StoryID=20051018-052720-6548r
Conservatives losing patience with Bush
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Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
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(KRT) - The following editorial appeared in the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader on Saturday, October 15:
The most curious criticism from conservatives upset about President Bush's choice for a second Supreme Court seat is that he failed to select a judge with strong intellectual credentials.
But Bush campaigned as an anti-intellectual, against the brainiac images of Al Gore and John Kerry. The president makes clear that he is guided by faith and his guts. He tries to look into people's souls rather than get into their heads.
Bush has shunned experts in many disciplines to heed the advice of his cronies who run the government.
Scientific expertise on issues as far-ranging as the environment and stem-cell research has been ignored. Skilled diplomats and military leaders have been demoted, fired or punished for giving him diverse advice on the Iraq war. Budget experts are ordered not to give the true costs of his proposals.
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/newssentinel/news/editorial/12931257.htm
Men falling behind in a woman's world
12:00 AM CDT on Tuesday, October 18, 2005
David Brooks
Once upon a time, it was a man's world. Men possessed most of the tools one needed for power and success: muscles, connections, control of the crucial social institutions.
But then along came the information age to change all that. In the information age, education is the gateway to success. And that means this is turning into a woman's world because women are better students than men.
From the first days of school, girls outperform boys. The gap is sometimes small, but over time, slight advantages grow larger. In surveys, kindergarten teachers report that girls are more attentive than boys and more persistent at tasks. Through elementary school, girls are less likely to be asked to repeat a grade. They are much less likely to be diagnosed with a learning disability.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-brooks_1018edi.ART.State.Edition1.e6d64e9.html
Children Imprisoned Through Ignorance
Imagine the feeling of impending failure spread over whole days, every day and you will come close to understanding how a child who can't cope with the social and intellectual demands of childhood or adolescence feels. When one commits suicide, takes drugs, joins a gang or steals a car, we wonder why.
(PRWEB) October 19, 2005 -- For some kids, school combines the strict discipline of a prison with the oppression of living in an iron lung. No matter what they do, they have no chance of succeeding.
They're troubles waiting to happen. When one of them commits suicide, robs a store, starts a fight or bad mouths a teacher, we label them delinquents.
Most of us know what it's like to sit down to a classroom test we know we won't do well on. Imagine that feeling of impending failure spread over whole days, almost every school day and most non-school days. Think for a moment about how you would act if you were trapped in this never-ending cycle.
http://www.emediawire.com/releases/2005/10/emw299073.htm
New Zealand Herald
Iran bans UK and S Korea trade over atomic issue
20.10.05 1.00pm
By Paul Hughes and Parisa Hafezi
TEHRAN - Iran is blocking imports from Britain and South Korea as an apparent punishment for their opposition to Iran's nuclear programme, diplomatic and industry sources say.
Iran said last month it could use trade to punish countries that voted for an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution on referring Tehran to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions over its nuclear programme.
"We have received a verbal order from the Commerce Ministry, about a trade ban imposed on South Korean and British companies," an official at a state manufacturing company said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10351216
Quake survivors queue for food
20.10.05 4.00pm
The line dividing Kashmir remained closed today despite dramatic offers by Pakistan and India to allow help for thousands of earthquake victims to flow across their war-scarred, disputed border.
South Asia's old rivals needed time to carry out their plan, underlining the political sensitivity of such a move and the logistical difficulties in a mountainous area where the death toll from the October 8 quake has risen to nearly 50,000.
But they were quick to restore telephone links between the two Kashmirs, India opening lines blocked 16 years ago after the eruption of a rebellion New Delhi accuses Pakistan of backing.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10351223
Customs brave knives, machetes to board boat
20.10.05 9.20am
Customs officers have braved burning poles, knives, machetes and flaming missiles to board an Indonesian boat fishing illegally off the Northern Territory.
An Australian Customs Service patrol boat spotted the Indonesian ice boat yesterday afternoon near the Wessel Islands in the Arafura Sea and fired warning shots.
The boat failed to respond and Customs gave chase.
When Customs and Navy officers tried to board the boat, the crew allegedly used burning anti-boarding poles, as well as knives and machetes, to try to stop them.
When Customs and Navy officers eventually boarded the boat they found a large quantity of shark fin on board, as well as a global-positioning system and a satellite phone.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10351134
The Washington Post
I have to agree. There is a real 'sport,' a bloodsport in thrashing The New York Times about. So much so that it has resorted to cannabalizing it's own to keep from being bashed in the first place. It is a form of Conservative Harassment that has exploded in this society resulting in even Mattel and Girls, Inc. becoming the focus of slander. The Liberal Media is being marginalized and it is never more evident than the scrutinized and at times pablamed journalism of the N Y Times.
Seeing Right Through The Times's Transparency
By Tina Brown
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page C01
The age of the blogosphere has produced a new genre of mainstream journalism: fake transparency. The New York Times has become its foremost practitioner. The paper of record has been arraigned for arrogance so many times in the past three years that it has forgotten how useful arrogance can be. The Gulliver of West 43rd Street has gotten so spooked that now it preemptively lies down, affixes bonds to its wrists and ankles, and invites the Lilliputians of cyberspace to walk all over it.
After reading the 6,000-word takeout in Sunday's Times on the Judith Miller/I. Lewis Libby farrago in the Valerie Plame/CIA leak case, accompanied by Miller's own strangely cryptic narrative of her belated grand jury testimony, I know even less than I thought I knew before. Thinking I knew was actually more satisfying. It meant I could exude a vague insiderly outrage without having to penetrate the clues. For Arianna Huffington, the Miller story has been to her newly birthed blog, the Huffington Post, a miniature version of what O.J. Simpson was to cable news.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101901963.html
Rove Told Jury Libby May Have Been His Source In Leak Case
Top Aides Talked Before Plame's Name Was Public
By Jim VandeHei and Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page A01
White House adviser Karl Rove told the grand jury in the CIA leak case that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, may have told him that CIA operative Valerie Plame worked for the intelligence agency before her identity was revealed, a source familiar with Rove's account said yesterday.
In a talk that took place in the days before Plame's CIA employment was revealed in 2003, Rove and Libby discussed conversations they had had with reporters in which Plame and her marriage to Iraq war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV were raised, the source said. Rove told the grand jury the talk was confined to information the two men heard from reporters, the source said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101902431.html?nav=hcmodule
Miller's Lawyer Says Aide May Face 'Problem' in Probe
Attorney for Reporter Cites Possibility of Conflicting Testimony
By Walter Pincus and Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, October 17, 2005; Page A03
Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, has "a problem" in the investigation of the leak of a CIA operative's identity if his testimony conflicts with information given to the grand jury by New York Times reporter Judith Miller, her lawyer said yesterday.
Robert S. Bennett, speaking on the ABC program "This Week" on the day the Times disclosed new information about three conversations Miller had with Libby about the CIA employment of a White House critic's wife, said that "much would depend upon what Mr. Libby said to the grand jury.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/16/AR2005101601228.html?nav=hcmodule
One cannot send too much to the Faith Based Home front with Republican appeal being as weak as it is.
House GOP Leaders Postpone Vote on Reductions in Spending
By Shailagh Murray and Dan Morgan
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page A06
Scrambling to salvage a tough new spending reduction plan, House Republican leaders delayed a vote on deeper cuts until next week and said they would broaden their list of targets to win the GOP votes needed for passage.
The House and Senate are in the process of slicing $35 billion in mandatory spending over five years, and House GOP leaders had intended to vote today to increase the total to $50 billion. But the proposal ran into problems with conservatives, who did not think it went far enough, as well as moderate Republicans, who objected to further trims in programs such as health care for the poor and elderly, student loans, and food stamps, while discretionary spending was ignored.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101902169.html?nav=hcmodule
The courts are still upholding separation of church and state. Faith Based funding cannot be used for promoting or religious purposes so much as providing social services. The hiring practices of non-discrimination cannot be imposed. So, the Christian Ministries can get monies to promote social reform or otherwise but not carry out religious directives that promote their religion. That has to be done with monies other than government monies. One could literally have an entire nation of Christian Employers hiring nothing but Christians but providing generic services to people without jobs who are not Christian. There is something wrong with this picture.
Bush's Faith Plan Faces Judgment
Courts Assess Mission to Give Federal Funds to Religious Charities
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page A25
Chalk up a big legal victory for President Bush's effort to help religious charities get taxpayer funding. And score a symbolic win, too, for those who think Bush's "faith-based initiative" is just pork-barrel politics in disguise.
Bush's big victory came Sept. 30 in New York, where a federal judge threw out most elements of a religious discrimination lawsuit against the Salvation Army. Eighteen employees claimed they were fired or demoted because they refused to pledge support to the Salvation Army's mission of "proclaiming Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord," disclose what church they attended or name gay co-workers.
U.S. District Judge Sidney H. Stein noted that all the plaintiffs worked for a children's services division of the Salvation Army that gets 95 percent of its $50 million budget from government grants.
But the judge's 48-page opinion upheld the principle that a religious group can hire and fire employees on the basis of their religious beliefs and practices, even if their salaries come from taxpayer funds. That principle is at the heart of the Bush administration's policy.
"It's huge," H. James Towey, head of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, said of the decision. "It's certainly a vindication of what President Bush has been saying from Day One -- that religious groups do not have to sell their soul, compromise their hiring practices, in order to partner with government in providing social services."
On the other hand, critics of the faith-based initiative got a boost last week when the U.S. Department of Education suspended a $435,000 grant for Alaska Christian College, an unaccredited, one-year school run by the Evangelical Covenant Church.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation, a Wisconsin-based group, had filed a lawsuit contending that the grant amounted to an unconstitutional endorsement of religion. After sending an inspector to visit the Alaskan school in July, the Education Department agreed. The inspector's report said the curriculum was "almost entirely religious."
Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, said that over the past two years, Congress earmarked nearly $1 million for the bible school, about $20,000 per student. She called the money "religious pork" brought home by Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), who took credit for this year's $435,000 grant in a November press release.
Gaylor's group agreed to drop its lawsuit following the grant's suspension. In a letter to the Alaska school, the Education Department explained that it can provide funds to schools with religious affiliations, but the money must be used for secular purposes.
Robert Tuttle, a professor at George Washington University Law School, said the two cases provide "a really nice example of where the faith-based initiative is -- and is not -- likely to run up against legal problems."
Tuttle noted that "a lot of the political action and opposition has revolved around discrimination in hiring." But the legal weak point of the administration's effort to dole out more money to religious charities, he said, is "the lack of clarity about what the government may or may not fund."
Another lawsuit on that question is scheduled to go to trial in Iowa on Monday, 2 1/2 years after it was filed by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. It challenges the constitutionality of the InnerChange program, a prison ministry run by Charles Colson's Prison Fellowship.
Iowa prison officials maintain that public funds are not used to pay for the religious elements of the program. But Americans United says it is impossible to separate the religious and secular portions of a program that describes itself as "Christ-centered."
There are lingering questions, too, about the Salvation Army. While the judge in New York dismissed the key claim of religious discrimination, he allowed the employees to pursue other allegations. One is that the Salvation Army's social services division gave 10 percent -- a tithe -- of its revenue to the parent organization. The judge ruled that the plaintiffs can sue as ordinary taxpayers if they have evidence that the charity thereby diverted government funds for religious purposes.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101902122.html
The Australian
Saddam: this court is not fit to judge me
Martin Chulov, Middle East correspondent
October 20, 2005
SADDAM Hussein refused to give his name and challenged the authority of an Iraqi court as he pleaded not guilty to the first of 12 charges of abuse spanning three decades.
Insisting he was still the president, the deposed dictator said he did not respect the authority of the Iraqi Special Tribunal or the presiding judge.
"I don't acknowledge the entity that authorised you, or the aggression that brought me here, because everything is based on falsehoods," Saddam said. "I am the president of Iraq. I am not a collaborator."
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16976028%5E601,00.html
E Timor border at 'flashpoint'
Mark Dodd
October 20, 2005
A MOB backed by Indonesian troops has crossed into East Timor, attacked a border patrol and set fire to buildings, threatening the fragile peace between the two nations.
The incident on Saturday in the Oecussi enclave, detailed in a UN cable seen by The Australian, poses a nightmare scenario for Canberra.
The cable - sent on Monday by UN chief in East Timor Sukehiro Hasegawa to head of peacekeeping operations Jean Marie Guehenno in New York - accuses the Indonesian military (TNI) of provoking multiple border violations in Oecussi.
Mr Hasegawa warns Dili has threatened to pull out of the East Timor-Indonesia Truth and Friendship Commission, following the collapse of tense border takes because of Jakarta's failure to stop incursions by the feared "Okto" militia that started at the beginning of the month.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16976036%5E601,00.html
Crackdown nets illegal fishermen
Amanda Banks and Andrea Mayes
October 20, 2005
MORE than 200 Indonesians are being held in a makeshift detention camp in the northwest port of Broome after a crackdown on illegal fishing.
The alleged poachers were reportedly paid up to $60 a month by Chinese-owned fishing syndicates to fish for sharks in Australian waters.
In the latest encounter between Australian Customs and naval officers and fishermen, the crew of a 25m Indonesian fishing vessel intercepted on Tuesday near the Wessell Islands, off the Northern Territory coast, brandished knives and machetes and hurled burning missiles.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16976038%5E601,00.html
Darfur peace talks suspended
From correspondents in Abuja
October 20, 2005
AFRICAN Union-sponsored peace talks between the Sudanese government and two rebel groups from the war torn region of Darfur are to be suspended Thursday until November 20, AU mediators said.
"We're having a plenary session at midday during which an adjournment will be called," said Boubou Niang, an adviser to AU mediator Salim Ahmed Salim.
"This suspension had been agreed since the start of the talks, because of the end of Ramadan," he said. The delegates from both sides in the conflict are Muslims and want to celebrate the end of their holy month of prayer and fasting.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16985456%5E1702,00.html
US readies to challenge Syria
Correspondents in Washington
October 20, 2005
THE US and France are preparing new UN Security Council resolutions critical of Syria ahead of a UN report that is expected to show Syrian complicity in a political assassination in Lebanon.
The timing of the new resolutions - which officials described on condition of anonymity because negotiations are not final - is also intended to highlight recent claims that Syria is funnelling weapons and stirring up trouble in Palestinian camps in Lebanon.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice discussed Syria and Lebanon during a meeting with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan yesterday.
"It was a good opportunity for her to raise the issues surrounding the calendar," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
Anti-Syrian politicians in Lebanon blame Syria for the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, a charge Damascus denies.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16975620%5E2703,00.html
continued …
Kandahar was the last place Omar was known to be.
US to probe torching of Taliban corpses
Thursday 20 October 2005, 12:27 Makka Time, 9:27 GMT
The US military has said it found "repugnant" and would investigate a television report that claimed American soldiers in Afghanistan burned the bodies of two Taliban fighters and then used the action to taunt other fighters.
Afghanistan's government has demanded that those responsible be punished and top Muslim clerics have warned that anti-American demonstrations may break out.
Australia's SBS television network broadcast video footage that purportedly showed US soldiers burning the bodies of the suspected Taliban fighters in the hills outside the southern village of Gonbaz, near the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D43262FF-E131-4954-A772-DA174E2CCBA7.htm
Sudan bans poultry imports
Thursday 20 October 2005, 12:33 Makka Time, 9:33 GMT
Sudan has taken a precautionary measure of halting all poultry imports, totalling 35% of its consumption, to prevent the spread of bird flu after the UN food agency said the disease could move to east Africa.
"This is a precautionary measure and of course it will adversely affect the poultry industry in Sudan," said a senior official on Thursday.
Ahmed Mustafa Hassan, under-secretary at the ministry of animal resources said the risk was serious in Sudan as migratory birds from the north pass through the areas along the Nile, where most of Sudan's population lives.
He added that the price of poultry in Sudan would rise as a result of the ban.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/9624EF12-392A-463D-AAE2-C5DCA9CE97D1.htm
Earthquake toll may go beyond 79,000
Thursday 20 October 2005, 9:55 Makka Time, 6:55 GMT
Helicopters and foot soldiers headed out of the main city in Pakistani Kashmir at daybreak Thursday in a frantic attempt to get medical aid and supplies to remote villages damaged in an earthquake that killed more than 79,000 people.
The death toll in South Asia's 8 October quake jumped dramatically after regional authorities reported new figures based on bodies recovered and information from outlying areas, making it one of the deadliest temblors of the past century.
The Pakistani government's official death toll is lower, still at 47,700, but central figures have lagged behind regional numbers. Those figures, from Pakistan's northwest province and the portion of Kashmir it controls, add up to about 78,000. India has reported 1360 deaths in its part of Kashmir.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D547100C-DBF7-416E-B5DD-2818227E9C57.htm
Indonesia to scan Islamic schools
Thursday 20 October 2005, 8:28 Makka Time, 5:28 GMT
Indonesia will crack down on Islamic boarding schools that are breeding terrorists, the country's vice-president has said, but also emphasised that he thought there were only "one or two" such establishments in the sprawling country.
Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, has vowed to do more to crack down on terrorism following this month's suicide bombings on Bali island - the fourth major attack in the country since 2002.
"Almost all the people behind the last four terror attacks came from a hardline group that studied at certain Islamic boarding schools," Yusuf Kalla told reporters late on Wednesday.
"Out of the 17,000 boarding schools (in Indonesia) there are one or two, I repeat one or two, that are extreme and not in line with the teachings of Islam. We will have to investigate and control (them)."
Moves to monitor Islamic establishments are sensitive in Indonesia.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/BF5AE945-3A76-418D-A5E5-31D2CD6163F1.htm
Spain judge orders US soldiers' arrest
Wednesday 19 October 2005, 19:50 Makka Time, 16:50 GMT
A judge in Spain has issued an international arrest order for three US soldiers whose tank fired at a Baghdad hotel during the war in Iraq, killing a Spanish journalist.
National Court Judge Santiago Pedraz issued the arrest warrant for Sgt. Shawn Gibson, Capt. Philip Wolford and Lt. Col. Philip de Camp, all of the US Army's 3rd Infantry Division, a court official said on Wednesday.
Pedraz had sent two requests to the United States - in April 2004 and June 2005 - to have statements taken from the suspects or to obtain permission for a Spanish delegation to quiz them. Both went unanswered.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/A3718954-5249-4E29-99A4-478370F57DB3.htm
US detainee death probes slammed
Thursday 20 October 2005, 2:33 Makka Time, 23:33 GMT
An analysis by human rights lawyers has found numerous flaws in US military investigations into deaths of prisoners in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Pentagon said about 108 detainees have died in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2002, not counting those killed in insurgent mortar attacks on detention facilities.
A report by the New York-based group Human Rights First, made available on Wednesday, also faulted "scattershot" military record-keeping on prisoner deaths and failures by some commanders to report deaths in a timely way.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/80CC39C7-AF27-4D11-B424-F9D4BF608582.htm
Dozens of Iraqis die in US air strikes
Monday 17 October 2005, 14:40 Makka Time, 11:40 GMT
US warplanes and helicopters have bombed two villages near the city of Ramadi where witnesses say at least 39 civilians have been killed, while the US army says the air strike has killed an estimated 70 fighters.
On Sunday, a group of about two dozen Iraqis gathered around the wreckage of a US vehicle destroyed the previous day by a roadside bomb. The people were hit by the US air strikes, the military and witnesses said.
The air strike hit the crowd which had gathered around to look at the wreckage of the vehicle and to pick pieces off it - as often occurs after an American vehicle is hit. The vehicle was destroyed on election day.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/158E08C0-33D3-4160-9AB5-9E1B6B166560.htm
Irish journalist missing in Iraq
Thursday 20 October 2005, 13:55 Makka Time, 10:55 GMT
The London-based Guardian newspaper says that one of its reporters has disappeared in Iraq and believes he has been kidnapped.
Rory Carroll, 33, who is the Guardian's Baghdad correspondent, was on assignment when he vanished, the paper said in a statement on Wednesday.
"It is believed Mr Carroll may have been taken by a group of armed men," the statement said. "The Guardian is urgently seeking information about Mr Carroll's whereabouts and condition."
Carroll's father, Joe, said The Guardian told him three people had been with his son when he was abducted, "and one of them did get a bit roughed up but he was the only one kidnapped".
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/258AC778-1B5E-4C23-AC7A-BF1451754725.htm
Anti-Intellectualism
Anti-US writer voted top thinker
WASHINGTON, Oct. 18 (UPI) -- Professor Noam Chomsky, a leading critic of United States foreign policy since before the Vietnam War, has been voted the world's top public intellectual in a poll run by two international magazines.
The magazines, Britain's 'Prospect' monthly and the Washington-based 'Foreign Policy' monthly, ran the poll, in which more than 20,000 readers voted. Chomsky was chosen from a list of 100 nominees, who had to be active in their respective fields while also able to communicate ideas to a general audience and influence public debate.
Chomsky, author of "Hegemony or Survival; America's quest for global dominance," was the overwhelming choice for the top spot. He won almost twice as many votes (4,824) as Italian novelist Umberto Eco, who finished second with 2,464 votes. British biologist Richard Dawkins, former Czech Republic President Václav Havel, and U.S.-based British writer Christopher Hitchens round out the top five.
While hailing one of the most prominent critics of America in international debate, observers noted that the vote was not rigged by anti-Americans. Voters were also given the option of a write-in vote for one other name they felt should be included, and Nobel Prize-winning American economist Milton Friedman, the intellectual father of modern monetarism and a prominent conservative, received the most write-in votes.
Friedman was followed by British scientist Stephen Hawking, Indian writer Arundhati Roy, left-wing American historian Howard Zinn, and former U.S. President Bill Clinton.
http://www.upi.com/InternationalIntelligence/view.php?StoryID=20051018-052720-6548r
Conservatives losing patience with Bush
(image placeholder)
Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
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(KRT) - The following editorial appeared in the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader on Saturday, October 15:
The most curious criticism from conservatives upset about President Bush's choice for a second Supreme Court seat is that he failed to select a judge with strong intellectual credentials.
But Bush campaigned as an anti-intellectual, against the brainiac images of Al Gore and John Kerry. The president makes clear that he is guided by faith and his guts. He tries to look into people's souls rather than get into their heads.
Bush has shunned experts in many disciplines to heed the advice of his cronies who run the government.
Scientific expertise on issues as far-ranging as the environment and stem-cell research has been ignored. Skilled diplomats and military leaders have been demoted, fired or punished for giving him diverse advice on the Iraq war. Budget experts are ordered not to give the true costs of his proposals.
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/newssentinel/news/editorial/12931257.htm
Men falling behind in a woman's world
12:00 AM CDT on Tuesday, October 18, 2005
David Brooks
Once upon a time, it was a man's world. Men possessed most of the tools one needed for power and success: muscles, connections, control of the crucial social institutions.
But then along came the information age to change all that. In the information age, education is the gateway to success. And that means this is turning into a woman's world because women are better students than men.
From the first days of school, girls outperform boys. The gap is sometimes small, but over time, slight advantages grow larger. In surveys, kindergarten teachers report that girls are more attentive than boys and more persistent at tasks. Through elementary school, girls are less likely to be asked to repeat a grade. They are much less likely to be diagnosed with a learning disability.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-brooks_1018edi.ART.State.Edition1.e6d64e9.html
Children Imprisoned Through Ignorance
Imagine the feeling of impending failure spread over whole days, every day and you will come close to understanding how a child who can't cope with the social and intellectual demands of childhood or adolescence feels. When one commits suicide, takes drugs, joins a gang or steals a car, we wonder why.
(PRWEB) October 19, 2005 -- For some kids, school combines the strict discipline of a prison with the oppression of living in an iron lung. No matter what they do, they have no chance of succeeding.
They're troubles waiting to happen. When one of them commits suicide, robs a store, starts a fight or bad mouths a teacher, we label them delinquents.
Most of us know what it's like to sit down to a classroom test we know we won't do well on. Imagine that feeling of impending failure spread over whole days, almost every school day and most non-school days. Think for a moment about how you would act if you were trapped in this never-ending cycle.
http://www.emediawire.com/releases/2005/10/emw299073.htm
New Zealand Herald
Iran bans UK and S Korea trade over atomic issue
20.10.05 1.00pm
By Paul Hughes and Parisa Hafezi
TEHRAN - Iran is blocking imports from Britain and South Korea as an apparent punishment for their opposition to Iran's nuclear programme, diplomatic and industry sources say.
Iran said last month it could use trade to punish countries that voted for an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution on referring Tehran to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions over its nuclear programme.
"We have received a verbal order from the Commerce Ministry, about a trade ban imposed on South Korean and British companies," an official at a state manufacturing company said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10351216
Quake survivors queue for food
20.10.05 4.00pm
The line dividing Kashmir remained closed today despite dramatic offers by Pakistan and India to allow help for thousands of earthquake victims to flow across their war-scarred, disputed border.
South Asia's old rivals needed time to carry out their plan, underlining the political sensitivity of such a move and the logistical difficulties in a mountainous area where the death toll from the October 8 quake has risen to nearly 50,000.
But they were quick to restore telephone links between the two Kashmirs, India opening lines blocked 16 years ago after the eruption of a rebellion New Delhi accuses Pakistan of backing.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10351223
Customs brave knives, machetes to board boat
20.10.05 9.20am
Customs officers have braved burning poles, knives, machetes and flaming missiles to board an Indonesian boat fishing illegally off the Northern Territory.
An Australian Customs Service patrol boat spotted the Indonesian ice boat yesterday afternoon near the Wessel Islands in the Arafura Sea and fired warning shots.
The boat failed to respond and Customs gave chase.
When Customs and Navy officers tried to board the boat, the crew allegedly used burning anti-boarding poles, as well as knives and machetes, to try to stop them.
When Customs and Navy officers eventually boarded the boat they found a large quantity of shark fin on board, as well as a global-positioning system and a satellite phone.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10351134
The Washington Post
I have to agree. There is a real 'sport,' a bloodsport in thrashing The New York Times about. So much so that it has resorted to cannabalizing it's own to keep from being bashed in the first place. It is a form of Conservative Harassment that has exploded in this society resulting in even Mattel and Girls, Inc. becoming the focus of slander. The Liberal Media is being marginalized and it is never more evident than the scrutinized and at times pablamed journalism of the N Y Times.
Seeing Right Through The Times's Transparency
By Tina Brown
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page C01
The age of the blogosphere has produced a new genre of mainstream journalism: fake transparency. The New York Times has become its foremost practitioner. The paper of record has been arraigned for arrogance so many times in the past three years that it has forgotten how useful arrogance can be. The Gulliver of West 43rd Street has gotten so spooked that now it preemptively lies down, affixes bonds to its wrists and ankles, and invites the Lilliputians of cyberspace to walk all over it.
After reading the 6,000-word takeout in Sunday's Times on the Judith Miller/I. Lewis Libby farrago in the Valerie Plame/CIA leak case, accompanied by Miller's own strangely cryptic narrative of her belated grand jury testimony, I know even less than I thought I knew before. Thinking I knew was actually more satisfying. It meant I could exude a vague insiderly outrage without having to penetrate the clues. For Arianna Huffington, the Miller story has been to her newly birthed blog, the Huffington Post, a miniature version of what O.J. Simpson was to cable news.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101901963.html
Rove Told Jury Libby May Have Been His Source In Leak Case
Top Aides Talked Before Plame's Name Was Public
By Jim VandeHei and Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page A01
White House adviser Karl Rove told the grand jury in the CIA leak case that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, may have told him that CIA operative Valerie Plame worked for the intelligence agency before her identity was revealed, a source familiar with Rove's account said yesterday.
In a talk that took place in the days before Plame's CIA employment was revealed in 2003, Rove and Libby discussed conversations they had had with reporters in which Plame and her marriage to Iraq war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV were raised, the source said. Rove told the grand jury the talk was confined to information the two men heard from reporters, the source said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101902431.html?nav=hcmodule
Miller's Lawyer Says Aide May Face 'Problem' in Probe
Attorney for Reporter Cites Possibility of Conflicting Testimony
By Walter Pincus and Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, October 17, 2005; Page A03
Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, has "a problem" in the investigation of the leak of a CIA operative's identity if his testimony conflicts with information given to the grand jury by New York Times reporter Judith Miller, her lawyer said yesterday.
Robert S. Bennett, speaking on the ABC program "This Week" on the day the Times disclosed new information about three conversations Miller had with Libby about the CIA employment of a White House critic's wife, said that "much would depend upon what Mr. Libby said to the grand jury.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/16/AR2005101601228.html?nav=hcmodule
One cannot send too much to the Faith Based Home front with Republican appeal being as weak as it is.
House GOP Leaders Postpone Vote on Reductions in Spending
By Shailagh Murray and Dan Morgan
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page A06
Scrambling to salvage a tough new spending reduction plan, House Republican leaders delayed a vote on deeper cuts until next week and said they would broaden their list of targets to win the GOP votes needed for passage.
The House and Senate are in the process of slicing $35 billion in mandatory spending over five years, and House GOP leaders had intended to vote today to increase the total to $50 billion. But the proposal ran into problems with conservatives, who did not think it went far enough, as well as moderate Republicans, who objected to further trims in programs such as health care for the poor and elderly, student loans, and food stamps, while discretionary spending was ignored.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101902169.html?nav=hcmodule
The courts are still upholding separation of church and state. Faith Based funding cannot be used for promoting or religious purposes so much as providing social services. The hiring practices of non-discrimination cannot be imposed. So, the Christian Ministries can get monies to promote social reform or otherwise but not carry out religious directives that promote their religion. That has to be done with monies other than government monies. One could literally have an entire nation of Christian Employers hiring nothing but Christians but providing generic services to people without jobs who are not Christian. There is something wrong with this picture.
Bush's Faith Plan Faces Judgment
Courts Assess Mission to Give Federal Funds to Religious Charities
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, October 20, 2005; Page A25
Chalk up a big legal victory for President Bush's effort to help religious charities get taxpayer funding. And score a symbolic win, too, for those who think Bush's "faith-based initiative" is just pork-barrel politics in disguise.
Bush's big victory came Sept. 30 in New York, where a federal judge threw out most elements of a religious discrimination lawsuit against the Salvation Army. Eighteen employees claimed they were fired or demoted because they refused to pledge support to the Salvation Army's mission of "proclaiming Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord," disclose what church they attended or name gay co-workers.
U.S. District Judge Sidney H. Stein noted that all the plaintiffs worked for a children's services division of the Salvation Army that gets 95 percent of its $50 million budget from government grants.
But the judge's 48-page opinion upheld the principle that a religious group can hire and fire employees on the basis of their religious beliefs and practices, even if their salaries come from taxpayer funds. That principle is at the heart of the Bush administration's policy.
"It's huge," H. James Towey, head of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, said of the decision. "It's certainly a vindication of what President Bush has been saying from Day One -- that religious groups do not have to sell their soul, compromise their hiring practices, in order to partner with government in providing social services."
On the other hand, critics of the faith-based initiative got a boost last week when the U.S. Department of Education suspended a $435,000 grant for Alaska Christian College, an unaccredited, one-year school run by the Evangelical Covenant Church.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation, a Wisconsin-based group, had filed a lawsuit contending that the grant amounted to an unconstitutional endorsement of religion. After sending an inspector to visit the Alaskan school in July, the Education Department agreed. The inspector's report said the curriculum was "almost entirely religious."
Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, said that over the past two years, Congress earmarked nearly $1 million for the bible school, about $20,000 per student. She called the money "religious pork" brought home by Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), who took credit for this year's $435,000 grant in a November press release.
Gaylor's group agreed to drop its lawsuit following the grant's suspension. In a letter to the Alaska school, the Education Department explained that it can provide funds to schools with religious affiliations, but the money must be used for secular purposes.
Robert Tuttle, a professor at George Washington University Law School, said the two cases provide "a really nice example of where the faith-based initiative is -- and is not -- likely to run up against legal problems."
Tuttle noted that "a lot of the political action and opposition has revolved around discrimination in hiring." But the legal weak point of the administration's effort to dole out more money to religious charities, he said, is "the lack of clarity about what the government may or may not fund."
Another lawsuit on that question is scheduled to go to trial in Iowa on Monday, 2 1/2 years after it was filed by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. It challenges the constitutionality of the InnerChange program, a prison ministry run by Charles Colson's Prison Fellowship.
Iowa prison officials maintain that public funds are not used to pay for the religious elements of the program. But Americans United says it is impossible to separate the religious and secular portions of a program that describes itself as "Christ-centered."
There are lingering questions, too, about the Salvation Army. While the judge in New York dismissed the key claim of religious discrimination, he allowed the employees to pursue other allegations. One is that the Salvation Army's social services division gave 10 percent -- a tithe -- of its revenue to the parent organization. The judge ruled that the plaintiffs can sue as ordinary taxpayers if they have evidence that the charity thereby diverted government funds for religious purposes.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/19/AR2005101902122.html
The Australian
Saddam: this court is not fit to judge me
Martin Chulov, Middle East correspondent
October 20, 2005
SADDAM Hussein refused to give his name and challenged the authority of an Iraqi court as he pleaded not guilty to the first of 12 charges of abuse spanning three decades.
Insisting he was still the president, the deposed dictator said he did not respect the authority of the Iraqi Special Tribunal or the presiding judge.
"I don't acknowledge the entity that authorised you, or the aggression that brought me here, because everything is based on falsehoods," Saddam said. "I am the president of Iraq. I am not a collaborator."
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16976028%5E601,00.html
E Timor border at 'flashpoint'
Mark Dodd
October 20, 2005
A MOB backed by Indonesian troops has crossed into East Timor, attacked a border patrol and set fire to buildings, threatening the fragile peace between the two nations.
The incident on Saturday in the Oecussi enclave, detailed in a UN cable seen by The Australian, poses a nightmare scenario for Canberra.
The cable - sent on Monday by UN chief in East Timor Sukehiro Hasegawa to head of peacekeeping operations Jean Marie Guehenno in New York - accuses the Indonesian military (TNI) of provoking multiple border violations in Oecussi.
Mr Hasegawa warns Dili has threatened to pull out of the East Timor-Indonesia Truth and Friendship Commission, following the collapse of tense border takes because of Jakarta's failure to stop incursions by the feared "Okto" militia that started at the beginning of the month.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16976036%5E601,00.html
Crackdown nets illegal fishermen
Amanda Banks and Andrea Mayes
October 20, 2005
MORE than 200 Indonesians are being held in a makeshift detention camp in the northwest port of Broome after a crackdown on illegal fishing.
The alleged poachers were reportedly paid up to $60 a month by Chinese-owned fishing syndicates to fish for sharks in Australian waters.
In the latest encounter between Australian Customs and naval officers and fishermen, the crew of a 25m Indonesian fishing vessel intercepted on Tuesday near the Wessell Islands, off the Northern Territory coast, brandished knives and machetes and hurled burning missiles.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16976038%5E601,00.html
Darfur peace talks suspended
From correspondents in Abuja
October 20, 2005
AFRICAN Union-sponsored peace talks between the Sudanese government and two rebel groups from the war torn region of Darfur are to be suspended Thursday until November 20, AU mediators said.
"We're having a plenary session at midday during which an adjournment will be called," said Boubou Niang, an adviser to AU mediator Salim Ahmed Salim.
"This suspension had been agreed since the start of the talks, because of the end of Ramadan," he said. The delegates from both sides in the conflict are Muslims and want to celebrate the end of their holy month of prayer and fasting.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16985456%5E1702,00.html
US readies to challenge Syria
Correspondents in Washington
October 20, 2005
THE US and France are preparing new UN Security Council resolutions critical of Syria ahead of a UN report that is expected to show Syrian complicity in a political assassination in Lebanon.
The timing of the new resolutions - which officials described on condition of anonymity because negotiations are not final - is also intended to highlight recent claims that Syria is funnelling weapons and stirring up trouble in Palestinian camps in Lebanon.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice discussed Syria and Lebanon during a meeting with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan yesterday.
"It was a good opportunity for her to raise the issues surrounding the calendar," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
Anti-Syrian politicians in Lebanon blame Syria for the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, a charge Damascus denies.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16975620%5E2703,00.html
continued …
October 13, 2005. This is "Ksmsu." It is Swahili for Quiet Warrior. He is a young male lion. He's beautiful. Look at those eyes. Ever watch a kitten or puppy 'grow into their feet' because they seem so big compared to the rest their body? No different here. This is a juvenile who has a lot of growing to do.
Morning Papers - concluded
The weather in Antarctica (Crystal Ice Chime) is:
Scott Base
Cloudy
-17.0°
Updated Thursday 20 Oct 9:59PM
The weather at Glacier Bay National Park (Crystal Wind Chime) is:
41 °F / 5 °C
MOSTLY CLOUDY SKIES WITH PATCHY FOG RESTRICTING VISIBILITY TO LESSTHAN 1 MILE AT TIMES. LIGHT WINDS WILL CONTINUE THROUGH EARLYMORNING.
Windchill:
38 °F / 3 °C
Humidity:
87%
Dew Point:
37 °F / 3 °C
Wind:
5 mph / 7 km/h from the NNW
Pressure:
30.12 in / 1020 hPa
Visibility:
10.0 miles / 16.1 kilometers
UV:
0 out of 16
Clouds:
Overcast 1100 ft / 335 m
(Above Ground Level)
end
Scott Base
Cloudy
-17.0°
Updated Thursday 20 Oct 9:59PM
The weather at Glacier Bay National Park (Crystal Wind Chime) is:
41 °F / 5 °C
MOSTLY CLOUDY SKIES WITH PATCHY FOG RESTRICTING VISIBILITY TO LESSTHAN 1 MILE AT TIMES. LIGHT WINDS WILL CONTINUE THROUGH EARLYMORNING.
Windchill:
38 °F / 3 °C
Humidity:
87%
Dew Point:
37 °F / 3 °C
Wind:
5 mph / 7 km/h from the NNW
Pressure:
30.12 in / 1020 hPa
Visibility:
10.0 miles / 16.1 kilometers
UV:
0 out of 16
Clouds:
Overcast 1100 ft / 335 m
(Above Ground Level)
end
October 20, 2005. 0815 z. This is a really strange storm. There is now additional turbulence behind it. The 'eddy2' is getting bigger and should I go so far as to say it is developing an eye, possibly a supercell of sorts.. Now, there is a vortex over the midwest NA. The increasing reach of Wilma is really rather interesting. It's pulling in moisture from the Pacific and Southern Atlantic.
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