The Arab New
SAGIA to Set Up Offices in Cities Abroad
P.K. Abdul Ghafour, Arab News
JEDDAH, 21 November 2005 — The Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA) plans to open offices in China, the United States, Britain, Germany and other countries in its bid to attract investments in infrastructure projects worth billions of riyals.
SAGIA chief Amr Al-Dabbagh said the Kingdom was seeking some $120 billion investments in power generation, transmission and distribution in its bid to double electricity generation capacity to 60,000 megawatts within 20 years.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=73490&d=21&m=11&y=2005
Focus on Empowerment of Women
P.K. Abdul Ghafour, Arab News
King Abdullah meets with top officials of the Ministry of Economy and Planning. (SPA)
JEDDAH, 22 November 2005 — Saudi Arabia’s new five-year plan, which was approved by the Council of Ministers yesterday, focuses on the empowerment of women, privatization of state-owned corporations, setting up of strategic industries, and the development of mining and tourism sectors.
The Cabinet meeting at Al-Yamamah Palace in Riyadh, chaired by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah, also expressed its happiness over the approval given by the WTO General Council to Saudi Arabia’s accession to the organization as its 149th member.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=73518&d=22&m=11&y=2005
Sharon Quits Likud, Seeks Early Poll
Hisham Abu Taha, Arab News
GAZA CITY, 22 November 2005 — Prime Minister Ariel Sharon yesterday asked Israel’s president to dissolve Parliament, pushing for an early election just hours after deciding to leave his hard-line Likud party and to form a new centrist party.
In a big gamble, Sharon said he quit the party he helped found in 1973 because he didn’t want to waste time with political wrangling and didn’t want to squander the opportunities created by the summer’s Gaza pullout, bitterly opposed by Likud hard-liners. Life in Likud had become “insufferable,” Sharon told a news conference.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=73521&d=22&m=11&y=2005
Editorial: Sharon’s Gambit
22 November 2005
Apparent differences over his occupied territories policy have caused Ariel Sharon to break with the right-wing Likud party he founded. However, if this old political fox wins power again with his new National Responsibility party, will it really presage a return to the road map to peace or is he trying to conceal his hard-line Zionism in the guise of centrist politics?
The one thing certain about the political contest Sharon has provoked is that it is anything but the “snap” election referred to by unthinking commentators. It could be over three months before Israelis get to vote. Thereafter, based on past experience, whatever the outcome, it could be weeks longer before the political wheeling and dealing is over and a stable coalition government formed. Thus it could be April or May at the earliest before there is a new Israeli administration with whom the Palestinians can resume negotiations. By then George W. Bush’s Iraqi troubles will have become far worse and his administration weakened. With midterm elections looming in November, the White House may find itself diverted from taking the necessary strong lead to broker a just peace deal.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=73543&d=22&m=11&y=2005
Ship of the Desert
Raid Qusti & Naif Al-Shehri Arab News
Ask anyone what comes to mind when they hear the word “desert” and it is likely to be “camels.” In fact, there is nothing strange about that. One of the most adaptable creatures, the camel can withstand the heat and harsh conditions of the desert. Not for nothing is it known as “the ship of the desert.”
For thousands of years, Arabs depended upon camels as the means to travel from place to place as well as to carry food and merchandise of all kinds by caravan from one end of the Arabian Peninsula to the other in addition to all over the Middle East and North Africa.
Almighty God called upon mankind to learn from the miracles of his creations and has referred to the camel in the Holy Qur’an. “Do they not look at camels, how they are created?” Verse 18, Surat Al-Ghashiya
Almighty God called upon mankind to learn from the miracles of his creations and has referred to the camel in the Holy Qur’an. “Do they not look at camels, how they are created?” Verse 18, Surat Al-Ghashiya
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=21§ion=0&article=73352&d=22&m=11&y=2005
Iraq: Why No Outrage?
Linda Heard, sierra12th@yahoo.co.uk
When as a child I watched movies of World War II, I often felt sick to my stomach at man’s inhumanity to man. But in the cosseted world of childhood and at a time when the world was relatively a peaceful place it was easy to believe that those atrocities were born of a different and more brutal age — one that would never return at least not in the so-called “civilized” West.
Today I am sickened once more at the hurt Western governments force others to endure under the faux banner of democracy and freedom. With horrific stories coming out of Afghanistan and Iraq on almost a daily basis I have come to one conclusion: during the post-World War II and post-Vietnam decades, our politicians and our generals have learned absolutely nothing. And, perhaps even worse, we the public are unwitting conspirators with our culture of acceptance and silence.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=73539&d=22&m=11&y=2005
Muslim Brotherhood Claims Major Gains
Hicham Safieddine & Serene Assir, Arab News
CAIRO, 22 November 2005 — Muslim Brotherhood claimed further gains yesterday in the latest round of Egypt’s parliamentary elections, maintaining their record-breaking first phase momentum despite widespread voter intimidation and violence.
Some 500 Brotherhood supporters were arrested on Sunday in five of the nine provinces where elections were held. There were reports of intervention by security forces in favor of NDP candidates. “Security forces directly attacked Ikhwan members and supporters,” says Nigad El Borai of the National Coalition for Monitoring Elections on Sunday.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=73526&d=22&m=11&y=2005
The Washington Post
Fueling Growth Of a Humble Crop
Biodiesel Energy Industry Sparks Interest in Maryland Soybeans
By Joshua Partlow
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page B01
Larry Jarboe's quest for energy independence began years ago in the mangrove swamps of the Florida Keys, with a 15-foot canoe he bought for $75 at Sears. He installed an electric trolling motor to chase lobsters and realized along the way that "it was a really great way to live and very clean."
After that came the homemade electric riding lawnmower, the solar-powered electric Toyota MR2 with lightning bolt on the side (known as the "Green Hornet"), the electric bicycle and the wood-and-gas-powered sawmill. Now Jarboe, a Republican St. Mary's County commissioner, has laid his hopes on a hard vegetable the size of a pencil eraser grown throughout Southern Maryland: the soybean.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101542.html
Abramoff Partner Pleads Guilty
Scanlon Admits He Conspired to Bribe Lawmaker
By James V. Grimaldi and Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A01
A onetime congressional staffer who became a top partner to lobbyist Jack Abramoff pleaded guilty yesterday to conspiring to bribe a congressman and other public officials and agreed to pay back more than $19 million he fraudulently charged Indian tribal clients.
The plea agreement between prosecutors and Michael Scanlon, a former press secretary to then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), provided fresh detail about the alleged bribes. The document also indicated the nature of testimony Scanlon is prepared to offer against a congressman it calls "Representative #1" -- who has been identified by attorneys in the case as Rep. Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio).
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112100719.html
Bush Administration Grants Leeway on 'No Child' Rules
By Nick Anderson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A01
The Bush administration has begun to ease some key rules for the controversial No Child Left Behind law, opening the door to a new way to rate schools, granting a few urban systems permission to provide federally subsidized tutoring and allowing certain states more time to meet teacher-quality requirements.
The Education Department's actions could signal a new phase for school improvement efforts nearly four years after the law's enactment. Taken together, these actions amount to a major response to critics who have called No Child Left Behind rigid and unworkable. They also help the administration combat efforts to amend the law in Congress.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101732.html
No Way Out for Bush and Co.
By Eugene Robinson
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A29
As visual metaphors go, it was a lavishly gilded lily of an image, a hanging curveball across the plate, a George Tenet-style slam-dunk: A weary President Bush, trying to escape a news conference in Beijing on Sunday, strides away from the microphone to a pair of locked doors, which he pulls and tugs in vain. No exit , the image screamed. No way out. Of course, George Bush will inevitably get out of the mess he has made -- he leaves office in three years and two months, not that anyone's counting. But the rest of us will be left with his handiwork: crushing national debt, rising economic inequality, a poisoned political atmosphere and, oh, yes, the war in Iraq. We're the ones trapped in the dark with no exit sign in sight.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112100970.html
Planned Closings Stun GM Employees
'They're Calling It "Shock and Awe" '
By Amy Joyce
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page D01
Twenty minutes before yesterday's announcement that General Motors Corp. would cut 30,000 jobs and shut down all or part of 12 facilities, Chris "Tiny" Sherwood heard that his beloved Lansing, Mich., plant would be among those closed.
The news had a particular sting for Sherwood. Lansing Metal Center is among the plants he represents as president of United Auto Workers Local 652. It is also the same plant where he started his career in 1967.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101477.html
Planned Closings Stun GM Employees
'They're Calling It "Shock and Awe" '
By Amy Joyce
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page D01
Twenty minutes before yesterday's announcement that General Motors Corp. would cut 30,000 jobs and shut down all or part of 12 facilities, Chris "Tiny" Sherwood heard that his beloved Lansing, Mich., plant would be among those closed.
The news had a particular sting for Sherwood. Lansing Metal Center is among the plants he represents as president of United Auto Workers Local 652. It is also the same plant where he started his career in 1967.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101477.html
Chavez Pushes Petro-Diplomacy
High Oil Profit Leads to Venezuela's Plan to Subsidize Heating in United States
By Justin Blum
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A22
The plea came in a letter from a group of U.S. senators to nine big oil companies: With huge increases in winter heating bills expected, the letter read, we want you to donate some of your record profits to help low-income people cover those costs.
But the lawmakers received only one response. It came from Citgo Petroleum Corp., a company controlled by the Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez, a nettlesome adversary of the United States who has accused the Bush administration of plotting to assassinate him and invade his oil-rich country.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101800.html
In Kosovo, Two Peoples Look Across Bitter Divide
Talks Address Future Of U.N.-Run Region
By Daniel Williams
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A22
PRISTINA, Serbia and Montenegro -- Six years after the end of warfare here, fear and suspicion still enforce a strict separation of Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo, but for the first time both sides are beginning to picture a future in which they might -- just might -- live together.
Talks began Monday in Pristina on the future legal status of an area that has been under the administration of the United Nations since U.S.-led bombing forced out Serbian forces in 1999. Anti-Serb riots in March 2004 stoked fear here and in foreign capitals of new violence between the two populations, and possibly even between Serbia and Kosovo, prompting the U.S. and European governments to endorse the talks.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101717.html
Woodward Talks of Admission, Apology
Author Says He Realized He Would Be 'Dragged Into This'
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A09
Bob Woodward said yesterday that he notified his editor at The Washington Post of his involvement in the CIA leak case because he realized he "was going to be dragged into this."
In an interview with CNN's Larry King, Woodward, a Post assistant managing editor and best-selling author, detailed the events that led him to apologize to Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. for not notifying him earlier that a senior Bush administration official had told him about CIA operative Valerie Plame in June 2003.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101378.html
Shortage of Immigrant Workers Alarms Growers in West
Stricter Border Control, Working Conditions Cited as Fewer Mexicans Cross for Harvest
By Sonya Geis
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A03
CALEXICO, Calif. -- Hours before dawn, Chuck Clunn stood on a street corner in this dusty border town and shook his head, dismayed at the small number of men milling in the dark. Workers usually swarm streets near the border crossing in the early morning hours, but today Clunn and other labor contractors looking for farmworkers found a crowd half the size they had been hoping for.
"This is usually just people everywhere. Last year the whole town was moving," Clunn said. Now, he said, the foremen say, "Hey, man, we have plenty of generals, but there's no Indians."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101357.html
Number of People With HIV Doubled in Past Decade, U.N. Finds
By Craig Timberg
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A24
JOHANNESBURG, Nov. 21 -- The number of people infected with the virus that causes AIDS has doubled in the past decade to 40 million, and there is no end in sight as the pandemic continues to outpace efforts to prevent new infections and treat those already sick, according to a new U.N. report released Monday.
The annual report from UNAIDS noted some hopeful signs, including modest decreases in infection rates in Zimbabwe, Kenya and Burkina Faso and the growing availability of lifesaving antiretroviral drugs, even in some of the world's poorest countries. There are some indications that efforts to curb risky behavior such as multiple sexual partners has succeeded in some countries, U.N. officials said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112100717.html
Kenyans Calmly Vote on New Charter
Quiet Prevails After Tumultuous Campaign; Changes Would Boost President
By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A22
NAIROBI, Nov. 21 -- With the streets of this capital eerily quiet, Kenyans voted peacefully Monday on a new draft constitution after a turbulent month of campaigning divided East Africa's largest nation and split political leaders along tribal lines.
Tens of thousands of Kenyans, some with babies on their backs, stood in long but orderly lines at voting stations. There were few reports of violence, after a stormy campaign in which nine people were killed during rallies by opponents of the constitutional changes.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112100702.html
D.C. School Abandons Charter Bid for Chance at Autonomy
By V. Dion Haynes
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 22, 2005; Page B02
Leaders at Woodrow Wilson Senior High School are dropping their proposal to become a charter school in exchange for an agreement from Superintendent Clifford B. Janey to enter into talks aimed at giving the Northwest Washington school more autonomy, Wilson parents and teachers said yesterday.
The committee of parents and staff that makes key decisions about the school's operations had been considering switching to charter school status for the past year. Members said they were deeply dissatisfied with the central administration, which had been slow to fix Wilson's computer and maintenance problems and had ordered them last year to cut $400,000 from the school's budget because of a systemwide shortfall.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112101426.html
Chick Lit
Sex and the city -- and the boardroom and the 'burbs, for that matter.
By Claudia Deane
Sunday, November 20, 2005; Page BW13
I am not over "Sex and the City," so I was primed for Lipstick Jungle (Hyperion, $24.95), City author Candace Bushnell's new novel. And the lady does not disappoint.
Bushnell is still writing about cozy meals with the girls in Manhattan eateries, the possibility of true love and, of course, boy-cut pants with sequins and other fabulous fashions. But she's also taking her shot at two topics wearily familiar to many Washingtonians: being a powerful woman in a man's world and the elusive work-life balance.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/17/AR2005111701443.html
'War' Marches to DVD
By Jen Chaney
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Monday, November 21, 2005; 11:11 AM
"War of the Worlds: 2-Disc Limited Edition" (List price: $39.99)
Release Date: Nov. 22
The extras on the "War of the Worlds" DVD are all business. Don't expect to hear the name Katie Holmes or see Tom Cruise leaping off the cushions of Oprah Winfrey's comfy couch. If all the TomKat hype often overshadowed last summer's release of the sci-fi remake, this dual-disc set makes sure to keep the focus where director Steven Spielberg undoubtedly always intended: on the film itself.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/21/AR2005112100507.html
The New Zealand Herald
Lakes dry but Commission sure of no blackouts
22.11.05 4.00pm
The Electricity Commission today expressed confidence about no blackouts or brownouts next winter despite low hydro lake levels due to the dry spring.
"Even if we get close to the lowest historical dry spell, we are still not anticipating that we will be in trouble this winter," commission chairman Roy Hemmingway told Radio New Zealand.
"We are predicting that we will not be in that situation, even if we get a quite dry summer."
However, critics say there is insufficient spare capacity to ride out a dry year coinciding with a breakdown at a major power plant.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=3&ObjectID=10356455
Semi-naked models drive motorists to distraction
22.11.05 3.20pm
LONDON - Almost a quarter of motorists admit they have been so distracted by roadside billboards of semi-naked models that they have dangerously veered out of their lane.
In new research, one in five male drivers said their eyes were diverted from the road by posters of scantily clad women - such as the saucy cleavage shots of model Eva Herzigova in her notorious adverts for Wonderbra.
However only one in 10 women were put off by the sight of a semi-dressed male model.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10356453
Iraq, Iran hold historic talks
22.11.05 4.20pm
TEHRAN - Jalal Talabani, the first Iraqi president to visit Iran for nearly four decades, received assurances on Monday that Tehran supported its neighbour's transition to democracy.
Shi'ite Muslim Iran has repeatedly been accused of meddling in post-war Iraq, with Western and Iraqi officials charging Iran with allowing weapons and insurgents to cross its borders.
But Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said such accusations were unfounded and voiced by those who did not want better ties between Baghdad and Tehran, who fought each other to a standstill in a 1980-1988 war.
"Such accusations will definitely not affect the expansion of relations between Iran and Iraq," he told reporters after a meeting with Talabani, the first Iraqi leader to visit Tehran since the late 1960s.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10356454
Leslie says events in Bali turned her life upside down
22.11.05 1.00pm
SYDNEY - Convicted drug user Michelle Leslie has arrived back in Australia, saying the events of the last three months have turned her life upside down.
The Australian model briefly addressed a huge media pack after touching down at Sydney International Airport today from Singapore.
The 24-year-old catwalk beauty was freed from Bali's Kerobokan prison on Saturday after serving three months behind bars following the discovery of two ecstasy tablets in her handbag.
"The events of the last few months have just really turned my life upside," Leslie told reporters.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10356414
UN extends mandate of EU peacekeepers in Bosnia
22.11.05 1.00pm
UNITED NATIONS - The UN Security Council today renewed for an additional year the mandate of the European peacekeeping force in Bosnia.
Renewal through November 20, 2006, came in a resolution adopted unanimously by the 15-nation council on the 10th anniversary of the Dayton accords ending the war in Bosnia.
Nearly 7000 European Union troops took over peacekeeping duties in Bosnia from a Nato-led force last December.
The resolution aims to ensure the continuity of the peace process and of "the generally positive developments" in the region, said Russian Ambassador Andrei Denisov, the council president for November.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10356436
Protesters block nuclear waste shipment
22.11.05 12.20pm
By Tony Paterson
BERLIN - Riot police equipped with water cannons and tear gas removed hundreds of protesters attempting to block the delivery of atomic waste from France to a storage depot near the north German town of Gorleben yesterday.
Police said they had arrested 26 protesters and confiscated 79 farmers' tractors that formed a barricade along the route, delaying delivery of the waste by several hours.
Protest groups said a number of activists had been injured.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10356428
Friars of Assisi lose their independence
22.11.05 1.00pm
By Peter Popham
ROME - The friars of the shrine of St Francis of Assisi, the world-famous centre of inter-religious dialogue and Christian pacifism, have been brought to heel by Pope Benedict XVI.
The mendicant friars, who welcome millions of pilgrims every year to the burial place of St Francis, have at a stroke lost the autonomy that made them one of the boldest and most adventurous institutions in the Catholic Church.
Italian commentators on the right and left have hailed the move or roundly condemned it.
The daily newspaper La Repubblica called it "a shocking initiative".
The friars were granted autonomy by Pope Paul VI in 1969, and the picturesque shrine of the saint in the Umbrian hills has since become renowned for its annual peace marches, drawing thousands of participants, and for two Assisi peace conferences, in 1986 and 2002, which caused outrage among conservative Catholics.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10356433
Woodward rebuked in CIA leak case
21.11.05 1.00pm
By Adam Entous
WASHINGTON - The Washington Post's ombudsman has rebuked journalist Bob Woodward for withholding what he knew about the CIA leak probe from his editor and for making public statements that were dismissive of the investigation without disclosing his own involvement.
One of the best-known investigative reporters in the United States, Woodward revealed last week that he testified under oath to special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that a senior Bush administration official told him in mid-June 2003 about CIA operative Valerie Plame's position at the spy agency.
Fitzgerald announced a few days later in court papers that his two-year criminal investigation into who leaked Plame's identity would be going back before a federal grand jury, a sign he may seek new or revised charges.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10356249
Civilians, including child, killed by US troops
22.11.05 9.20am
BAGHDAD - US troops fearing a car bomb attack fired on a crowded minivan and killed at least three civilians including a child north of Baghdad on Monday.
The US army's 3rd Infantry Division said its troops had opened fire after first trying to wave the minivan to a stop and then firing warning shots.
"These tragedies only happen because Zarqawi and his thugs are out there driving around with car bombs," said Major Steve Warren, a spokesman for US forces in Baquba, in reference to the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Two men and a child were killed and three people were wounded, Warren said. Survivors disputed the military's account, insisting that five family members, including two children, died and four were wounded as bullets tore through the van.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10356406
Chemical trader faces Iraq war crimes trial
22.11.05
AMSTERDAM - A Dutch businessman is to face trial accused of complicity in war crimes and genocide for selling chemicals to Iraq knowing Saddam Hussein would use them for poison gas attacks.
Frans van Anraat, 63, is charged with supplying thousands of tonnes of agents for poison gas that Saddam used against Iran and the Kurdish population of Halabja in the 1980s.
Prosecutor Fred Teeven told a pre-trial hearing at a high-security court in Rotterdam that Van Anraat continued to supply chemicals after the Halabja attack, which killed 5000 people 17 years ago this week.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10356367
'We don't do torture', says CIA
22.11.05 5.20am
CIA interrogators use "unique" methods to obtain "vital" information from prisoners, but obey laws against torture, CIA Director Porter Goss has said.
"This agency does not do torture. Torture does not work," Goss said in USA Today. "We use lawful capabilities to collect vital information."
Vice-President Dick Cheney is working in Congress to exempt the CIA from proposed laws banning cruel and inhuman treatment.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10356355
Unearthing memories from Nazi field
22.11.05
By Kathy Marks
As they sat in a sloping field at the Majdanek death camp in spring 1943, waiting to be selected for work or extermination, the Polish Jews - survivors of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising - took part in one final act of defiance.
Using their hands, they dug deep into the soil, burying their most precious possessions: watches, rings, gold coins, items of sentimental value.
"We knew it was the end of the line," said Adam Frydman, who was transported to Majdanek, aged 20, with his father and brother. "We could see the chimney burning, and we could smell the burning flesh. We thought, 'If we're going to die, why should we give our things to the Germans?"'
An estimated 170,000 people died at Majdanek: Russian prisoners of war and Polish dissidents as well as Jews. For 62 years the empty field at the camp, on the outskirts of Lublin, lay undisturbed. Only those who survived knew what the earth concealed.
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