Hydrablog

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/us/politics/31memo.html
January 31, 2009
Pentagon Memo
After Campaign Push, Obama Cultivates Military
By ELISABETH BUMILLER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [DOD and Pentagon] [yesterday reported disturbing trend of suicide rates for troops in –ir and Afghanistan] [note the 2003 spike then steady increase from decreased 2004 onward] [on same day, Obama made what I think was his first trip to Pentagon as president] [by accounts, he was genuine listener] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — The outreach began more than a year ago when Barack Obama, the antiwar candidate who had never served in the military, turned to a group of young

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/us/politics/31memo.html
January 31, 2009
Pentagon Memo
After Campaign Push, Obama Cultivates Military
By ELISABETH BUMILLER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [DOD and Pentagon] [yesterday reported disturbing trend of suicide rates for troops in –ir and Afghanistan] [note the 2003 spike then steady increase from decreased 2004 onward] [on same day, Obama made what I think was his first trip to Pentagon as president] [by accounts, he was genuine listener] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — The outreach began more than a year ago when Barack Obama, the antiwar candidate who had never served in the military, turned to a group of young officers just out of active duty for a fresh perspective on America’s two wars.

“He asked a lot of questions,” recalled one of the officers, Craig M. Mullaney, a former Army Ranger in Afghanistan who in campaign travels with Mr. Obama told him how his platoon of 35 men had vaccinated camels, worked with tribal elders [***]and been in charge of security for a province the size of Vermont.

That early outreach has since given way to a carefully planned campaign by Mr. Obama to build trust with the military and avoid the mistakes that hobbled Bill Clinton, [indeed, they were so arrogant they disdained military brass] [stupid move] [***] the last Democratic commander in chief. By Thursday, when the president met for the first time with the Joint Chiefs of Staff in “the tank,” the secure Pentagon conference room, the campaign had progressed to the point that participants left “comforted,” as one put it, about Mr. Obama’s willingness to work with them.

Pentagon officials say they have been relieved that Mr. Obama has so far proceeded slowly on two campaign promises: to pull all combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months and to allow gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military.

Mr. Obama’s aides have signaled that they will avoid an early conflagration involving the military and will wait for months before moving to repeal the 16-year-old “don’t ask, don’t tell” [***]policy that requires gay men and lesbians in the services to keep their sexual orientation secret.

“It’s moving prudently,” said Denis McDonough, a top foreign policy aide to Mr. Obama. “I think we’ve seen what happens when you address important policy issues imprudently. It’s not in our interest and it’s not the style of this president.” (Mr. Clinton’s push in 1993 to have gay men and lesbians serve openly created a storm at the Pentagon; “don’t ask, don’t tell” was the compromise.)

Mr. Obama’s cultivation of the military has reached the point that it is already causing unease among some members of his liberal base, who say they will hold him to his promise on troop withdrawals and pressure him to move more quickly on “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

The nation’s largest gay rights lobbying group has called on the president to develop a plan to end “don’t ask, don’t tell” within his first 100 days, and another group is asking that Mr. Obama push for repeal by the end of the year.

“I’d be very concerned if they don’t seize this opportunity in 2009,” said Aubrey Sarvis, the executive director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, an advocacy group that represents gay men and lesbians in the military. “We take the president at his word, and we plan to keep his feet to the fire.”

The military is not a monolith, but it is safe to say that Mr. Obama was not its candidate in the 2008 election. His antiwar comments ignited the left but struck many in the armed services as naïve. His Republican opponent, Senator John McCain, was a war hero.

Late last year, a survey by The Military Times, while not representative of the military as a whole, found much uncertainty and even pessimism about Mr. Obama among 1,900 active-duty respondents. Not only had Mr. Obama never served, he had one of the most liberal voting records in the Senate and a background that seemed culturally at odds with the more conservative traditions of the armed forces.

And although Mr. Obama’s grandfather served in Patton’s Army during World War II — a fact the candidate brought up on the campaign trail — his own exposure to the military was scant. To educate himself and to establish credentials, he reached out during the campaign, as candidates traditionally do, to retired generals, among them President George W. Bush’s first secretary of state, Colin L. Powell, [***]who endorsed him.

But Mr. Obama also embraced a group of younger officers, all veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan, who provided him with on-the-ground accounts of those two wars and helped build his military fluency.

The group included Mr. Mullaney, 30, a former Rhodes scholar and the author of a coming book about Afghanistan, “The Unforgiving Minute,” who worked as an Obama campaign national security aide in Chicago; Matthew Flavin, 29, an Amherst graduate and former Navy intelligence officer who served in Iraq, Afghanistan and Bosnia and who worked as a campaign national security aide in Washington; and Phillip Carter, 33, an Army veteran and adviser to the Iraqi police in Baquba in 2005 and 2006, who was in charge of veterans’ outreach for the Obama campaign.

The three answered to Mr. McDonough, 39, and Mark W. Lippert, 35, a longtime Obama foreign policy adviser and a former intelligence officer for the Navy Seals in Iraq.

The group is now beginning to spread through the new administration. Mr. Lippert is chief of staff of the National Security Council at the White House; Mr. Flavin is a staff assistant on the National Security Council legal team; Mr. Mullaney and Mr. Carter are waiting for jobs. [Gen. James Jones, NSC advisor; Dennis Blair, DNI; O. Brennan as terrorism coordinator at WH and NSC; kept Gen Lute as –ir Czar (inexplicable to me)] [**]

Military officials say that a big step in Mr. Obama’s campaign to build their trust was his retention not only of Mr. Bush’s defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, but also his appointment of three other military men to top positions. Gen. James L. Jones, a retired Marine commandant, is Mr. Obama’s national security adviser; Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, the retired Army chief of staff, is secretary of veterans affairs; and Dennis C. Blair, a retired admiral, is director of national intelligence. [***]

“He has in his cabinet a soldier, sailor and marine,” Gen. James T. Conway, the Marine Corps commandant, told reporters last week. “I find that pretty encouraging.” (Technically, General Jones is not a member of the cabinet.)

Pentagon officials also point to early gestures by Mr. Obama that have been symbolic but important to them. Anyone in the military could tell that Mr. Obama took the time to practice the first, crisp salute that he executed on Jan. 20. That evening the new president spoke by video feed to American troops in Afghanistan at the Commander-in-Chief Ball; the weekend before, he laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery and visited wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

There are, of course, difficult times ahead. Not least, Mr. Obama will have to make tough choices about cuts in the military budget. “The services are going to be told ‘no’ a lot more often,” said Andrew F. Krepinevich Jr., a military expert at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a research group. And the president must make even harder decisions about how to meet his promise to have combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months.

Many at the Pentagon consider the 16-month timetable too risky, but the left expects Mr. Obama to deliver.

“We have no reason to believe that he is backing off of his pledge, and we don’t think that’s incompatible with having a good conversation with the generals,” said Eli Pariser, the executive director of MoveOn.org, a liberal group that opposed the war.
Still, Mr. Pariser said, “he knows that there are millions of Americans who voted for him on his pledge to bring the troops home.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:39 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002770.html
Using the Holocaust to Attack the Jews
By Walter Reich
Sunday, February 1, 2009; B02 [oped] [on new anti Semitism?] [I hate the word as it also includes all Semitic peoples but used only to mean Jews] [nevertheless, we all know what it means and the new tack is real enough] [my former colleague and generally good guy] [***]
Dozens of cities held ceremonies last week to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The good news is that the dead were remembered. The bad news

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002770.html
Using the Holocaust to Attack the Jews
By Walter Reich
Sunday, February 1, 2009; B02 [oped] [on new anti Semitism?] [I hate the word as it also includes all Semitic peoples but used only to mean Jews] [nevertheless, we all know what it means and the new tack is real enough] [my former colleague and generally good guy] [***]
Dozens of cities held ceremonies last week to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The good news is that the dead were remembered. The bad news is that even as the Holocaust is becoming a fixture in the world's memory, it is also being increasingly used as a weapon against the Jews and the Jewish state. [***]

For some, ironically, the acknowledgment of the Holocaust's reality has become a screen behind which anti-Semitism has gathered new force. The hard-core Jew-haters spent decades denying that the best-documented genocide in world history ever took place. That won them such derision that even many anti-Semites have begun to admit the reality of the Holocaust -- and now are hoping that simply by doing so, they can immunize themselves from the charge that they're anti-Semites in the first place. How can you be an anti-Semite, they figure, if you recognize the Holocaust? [what rational person denies the holocaust occurred?] [this marginal movement in the right direction took decades—generations] [sad but true] [***]

But as some people who don't like Jews have found, it's worth acknowledging the Holocaust if you can then turn it into a cudgel against the Jews. And that they've done, in spades. According to this crowd, the Jews today have become Nazis. The Jewish state is now supposedly carrying out a Holocaust against the Palestinians. [***]Jews, the haters say, have always been evil, and their evil is only growing. [overwrought though some certainly do] [my view is Israel’s collective punishment and occasional Moses justice times 10 represents a true PR problem for Israel and a humanitrarian tragedy for some Arabs (Palestinians)] [that Hamas and others use Palestinians as fodder is also clear and surely at fault as well] [***]

Of course, not all criticisms of Israel are the product of such bigoted logic. People of good will around the world are naturally shocked by the tragic and appalling deaths of Palestinian civilians, including those killed in the recent war in the Gaza Strip. [***]Like any country, Israel can be criticized. But the massive and unceasing eruptions of outrage against the Jewish state -- in a world in which other countries and groups have, often provoking barely any outrage, engaged in immensely more destructive and immoral behavior -- can only be explained in a few ways. One is that attacking Israel has become a means of attacking Israel's ally, the United States. Another is that over-the-top attacks on Israel, particularly those invoking Holocaust language, have become a means of once again attacking the Jews.

The Anti-Defamation League has documented the way this weapon was used during the recent war with Hamas. Here are a few of the placards spotted at rallies: In Times Square, the group reported such signs as, "Israel: The Fourth Reich," "Stop Israel's Holocaust," "Holocaust by Holocaust Survivors," "Stop the Nazi Genocide in Gaza" and "Nazi Genocide, Israeli Genocide." In Chicago: "Palestinian Holocaust in Gaza Now." In a Los Angeles demonstration, the Star of David in an Israeli flag was said to have been replaced by a swastika, accompanied by the words, "Upgrade to Holocaust Version 2.0." In San Diego: "Stop the Israeli Holocaust on Gaza." And the league reported that one rally in Washington included an effigy of the Israeli prime minister wearing a swastika armband and holding a dead baby. [to me this is unfortunate hyperbole that truly demeans the horror of the actual holocaust] [I can’t help but think is largely misguided, emotional, frustrated rhetoric] [but who knows?] [qui sabe?] [***]

The Gaza war provoked similar attacks from some world leaders and people of influence. "The Holocaust, that is what is happening right now in Gaza," Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said in televised comments, according to Reuters. The New York Times quoted a Catholic cardinal who argued that Gaza increasingly "resembled a big concentration camp." And according to the Jerusalem Post, a Norwegian diplomat based in Saudi Arabia sent out an e-mail from her Foreign Ministry account in which she wrote, "The grandchildren of Holocaust survivors from World War II are doing to the Palestinians exactly what was done to them by Nazi Germany." She reportedly also attached paired photos designed to suggest that Gaza was equivalent to the Holocaust: Next to the iconic photo of the Jewish child in the Warsaw Ghetto being menaced by a rifle-toting Nazi soldier, the diplomat is said to have placed an "image of an Israeli soldier aiming his weapon at a Palestinian boy."

Are all those who have accused Israel of being a Nazi state anti-Semites? Hardly. There's genuine anger in the Muslim world, as well as in Europe and elsewhere, about Israel's actions in Gaza. The suffering is terrible. So are the images of devastation Israel left behind. And there are also plenty of people who are angry at Israel because it stands for the reviled United States.

But the reality is that much of the vitriol directed at Israel has indeed been spouted by anti-Semites. Not only have they hurled the Nazi canard at Israel, they've expressed clear anti-Semitism -- some of it openly violent or even eliminationist. The pro-Israel but reliable Middle East Media and Research Institute has been documenting anti-Semitism on Palestinian television for years, including calls for the murder of Jews. It reports that, the day before International Holocaust Remembrance Day, one Egyptian cleric admitted on an Islamist TV channel that the Holocaust had happened -- and added that he hoped that one day Muslims would do to the Jews what the Germans had done to them. To demonstrate what he had in mind, according to the institute, he showed footage of heaps of Jewish corpses being bulldozed into pits.

In designating an International Holocaust Remembrance Day back in 2005, the U.N. General Assembly acted with noble intentions, even if parts of the world body still aim to delegitimize Israel. Such commemorations help the world understand that the goal of the Holocaust was the annihilation of an entire people -- and help them appreciate the vast differences between that event and, for example, the war in Gaza. But even as the Holocaust has been increasingly acknowledged and explained, it also has been increasingly used as a cudgel to beat Jews and the Jewish state.
wreich@gwu.edu
Walter Reich, a professor of international affairs at George Washington University, is a former director of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:38 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002726.html
Humbled Masters At Davos
By David Ignatius
Sunday, February 1, 2009; B07 [oped] [columnist] [Ignatius, one of my favorites, got himself in a bit of a pickle hosting both Peres and Erdogan at Davos] [here he ignores and moves on to global financial crisis] [***]
DAVOS, Switzerland -- "How could we have been so stupid?" That was the refrain of several experts at a session of the World Economic Forum last week about "What Went

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002726.html
Humbled Masters At Davos
By David Ignatius
Sunday, February 1, 2009; B07 [oped] [columnist] [Ignatius, one of my favorites, got himself in a bit of a pickle hosting both Peres and Erdogan at Davos] [here he ignores and moves on to global financial crisis] [***]
DAVOS, Switzerland -- "How could we have been so stupid?" That was the refrain of several experts at a session of the World Economic Forum last week about "What Went Wrong" to produce the global financial crisis. Not that they had been wrong, mind you. It being Davos, the chosen commentators had mostly been right in warning several years ago of disaster ahead. But there was at least a note of collective chagrin.

Davos doesn't do humility, normally. These are the masters of the universe, after all, whose gathering each winter has come to symbolize the process of economic globalization. But this year, with the global economy in the tank, there is a kind of corporate self-examination. Beyond the panel discussions, you could hear a collective sigh of "Oops!" and a plaintive "Now what?"

One reason for the tone of self-reflection this year is that U.S. officials, who can't seem to resist being pitchmen at such global gatherings, have mostly stayed away. The Obama administration's absence gave a "post-American" feel to the session, but that's deceiving. Barack-o-mania is as strong among the global titans as it is everywhere else.

The most upbeat presentations here were from the capitalist "newbies," Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Wen said that he saw small signs of "hope" in China's increased bank lending and domestic consumption. Putin talked like a born-again capitalist, saying that Russia had seen the damage caused by too much government control of the economy and that it would never go back to the policies of the Soviet Union. He sounded most enthusiastic when he talked about tax cuts in Russia.

Putin couldn't resist taking a few shots at the United States for creating the "perfect storm" that hit the global economy -- citing the happy talk from U.S. officials at Davos a year ago and the "low quality of management" at U.S. banks. "Such a pyramid of expectations should collapse," said the former communist, now a true believer in free-market discipline. [mild by comparison with what he regularly says in Pravda] [***]

Wen and Putin appeared entirely at home in the Davos CEO club. The Chinese leader, dressed in a dark blue suit, even seemed to have mastered the modern chief executive's vocabulary of warm insincerity, sprinkling his remarks with phrases such as "I just want to tell you frankly" and "from the bottom of my heart." He talked several times of China's "openness and transparency," qualities not often ascribed to the People's Republic.

Putin, dressed in a red tie and a sharply tailored suit, displayed an ex-KGB man's prickliness at questions from business leaders. He blew off a well-meaning offer from Michael Dell to help Russia market its computer skills with a surly: "We are not invalids. . . . Pensioners should be helped. Developing countries should be helped." Putin and Wen talked like men who, if anything, are more confident now than a few years ago that the world is moving their way.

How could the giants of capitalism have been so stupid? That was the question that ran through Davos all week, and the bluntness of the discussions was, in its way, reassuring. [they weren’t; they were consumed with greed] [***] The global economy may have gone to hell, but people haven't lost the ability to think critically about it. One of the most articulate critiques came from Niall Ferguson, a professor of history at Harvard, who repeated an argument he has made in several recent books that the American "debtosaurus" is following Britain down the path of imperial exhaustion and decline.

The rock stars here this year, surrounded by adoring fans, were two economic analysts, Nouriel Roubini and Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who saw the disaster coming before most everyone else.

Roubini argued that the skewed incentives of the old system had almost guaranteed the eventual crackup. Mortgage companies had offered dubious subprime mortgages, for a fee; banks had underwritten them, for a fee; investment banks had turned them into exotic securities, for a fee; rating agencies had given them artificially high marks, for a fee. The system "worked," you might say.

Taleb, a former trader who wrote the book "The Black Swan," argued that Wall Street's models -- supposed to prevent bankers from taking excessive risks -- were actually a big part of the problem, since they created a false sense of confidence about the future. Rather than seeking reassurance in models, he advised anxious traders to go have a drink or take up religion.

"It's easier to say 'God knows' than 'I don't know,' " said Taleb, in what might be a motto for this year's Davos meeting.
The writer is co-host of PostGlobal, an online discussion of international issues. His e-mail address is davidignatius@washpost.com.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:37 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/opinion/31sat2.html
January 31, 2009
Editorial
The Next Step on Warming
[editorial] [gathering consensus on climate change] [use psci350] [****]
It seemed that every chance he got, President Bush ignored or flat out refused to address the problem of climate change. [***]So we were greatly encouraged by

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/opinion/31sat2.html
January 31, 2009
Editorial
The Next Step on Warming
[editorial] [gathering consensus on climate change] [use psci350] [****]
It seemed that every chance he got, President Bush ignored or flat out refused to address the problem of climate change. [***]So we were greatly encouraged by President Obama’s swift announcement that he is likely to approve California’s request to regulate greenhouse gases from vehicles — a request the Bush administration denied.

The logical next step would be for Mr. Obama to quickly address the Supreme Court’s 2007 decision ordering the Environmental Protection Agency to examine the effects of greenhouse gases and to regulate them if necessary. [***]Mr. Bush dodged that one, too.

The court instructed the agency to first determine whether global warming pollution threatened public health and welfare — known as an “endangerment finding” under the Clean Air Act — and, if so, to devise emissions standards [**]for vehicles.

Lisa Jackson, the agency’s new administrator, said in a memo to her employees last week that she intended to honor her “obligation to address climate change under the Clean Air Act.” But there is resistance from some members of Congress and parts of the business community who fear that regulating vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases will lead to economy-wide controls on greenhouse gases from all sources, including industry.

Stephen Johnson, Mr. Bush’s E.P.A. administrator, initially tried to do the right thing. He ordered his staff to write an endangerment finding and craft regulations limiting greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles. In December 2007, he sent the entire package to the White House, which not only chose to ignore the findings but refused to open the e-mail message that contained them.

Mr. Johnson then ordered up a laborious public rule-making process that essentially went nowhere and allowed Mr. Bush to retire to Texas without having done much of anything. Ms. Jackson is eager to get the process back on track.

Nobody, including the administrator, is under any illusions that the E.P.A. alone can solve climate change. Congress will have to take ownership of the issue by authorizing major public investments in clean-energy technologies and by putting a price on greenhouse-gas emissions in order to unlock private investment.

But smart regulation can begin to advance the ball. For starters, it would force industry to look for ways to make cars that are much more fuel-efficient. It would help goad Congress into action. It is also, as the Supreme Court has pointed out, the law.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:36 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002809.html
'Palestine Today Is an Open-Air Prison'
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A15 [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [more on Davos fracas between Erdogan and Peres] [partial transcript] [*****]
Tensions between Israel and Turkey broke into the open at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week when Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan blasted Israel

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013002809.html
'Palestine Today Is an Open-Air Prison'
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A15 [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [more on Davos fracas between Erdogan and Peres] [partial transcript] [*****]
Tensions between Israel and Turkey broke into the open at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week when Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan blasted Israel for its offensive in Gaza. Excerpts from Erdogan's interview with Newsweek-The Post's Lally Weymouth:

Q: You've been so critical of the recent Israeli operation into Gaza. Some say it's because Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert came to Turkey just before the operation started and didn't tell you about it. Why have you pushed the Turkish-Israeli relationship to its limits?

A: [That's] the wrong view.

What is the correct view?

At the request of Syria, we entered a phase of working together with Israel and Syria indirectly to get them to talk with each other. We are mediators in that process. This was an example of how much importance we put on peace in the Middle East. We had done this before with Pakistan and Israel. . . .

During the tenure of [former Pakistani president] Pervez Musharraf, we brought them together in Istanbul: the foreign minister of Israel and the foreign minister of Pakistan.

And what happened?

The meetings took place for two days in secret about two years ago. We also took part in the peace talks between Israel and Palestine.

Between Israel and Fatah or Israel and Hamas?

I'm referring to the Palestinian Authority and President Mahmoud Abbas. On December 23 we had a meeting with Prime Minister Olmert in Ankara. On that day we had the fifth round of the unofficial talks between Syria and Israel. That night . . . I was talking on the phone to Syrian President Bashar Assad, and I was talking to Olmert in person and also to the Syrian foreign minister.

Were you trying to move the process to direct talks between Israel and Syria?

Yes.

And did Bashard Assad agree?

President Assad from the start had a very positive attitude toward these talks. On that night, we were very close to reaching an agreement between the two parties. It was agreed they were going to talk until the end of the week to come to a [positive] outcome.

So you felt you were close to coming to an agreement?

These talks on that night went on for five or six hours. . . . When I was talking with Prime Minister Olmert, I said regarding the Palestine-Israeli talks it would not be correct not to include Hamas in the negotiations. They entered the election in Palestine and won the majority of seats in the parliament. But Prime Minister Olmert said he could not do something like that. Moreover during that talk, I said . . . that I believed I could be successful in freeing the kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

In order to release the Israeli soldier, did you ask the Israelis to do something for Hamas?

I said to Prime Minister Olmert that if you want us to mediate in order to get the Israeli soldier freed, we can do this and we believe we can achieve something. But . . . once the soldier is free, Israel should [release from jail] Hamas's speaker of parliament and its members of parliament.

Why do you have such a close relationship with Hamas, which is an arm of Iran and is run by Khaled Meshal, who lives in Damascus?

First of all, Hamas is not an arm of Iran. Hamas entered the elections as a political party. If the whole world had given them the chance of becoming a political player, maybe they would not be in a situation like this after the elections that they won. The world has not respected the political will of the Palestinian people. On the one hand, we defend democracy and we try our best to keep democracy in the Middle East, but on the other hand we do not respect the outcome of . . . the ballot box. Palestine today is an open-air prison. Hamas, as much as they tried, could not change the situation. Just imagine, you imprison the speaker of a country as well as some ministers of its government and members of its parliament. And then you expect them to sit obediently?

It sounds like you and Prime Minister Olmert were on the eve of an actual breakthrough between Israel and Syria.

I'm sharing my excitement with you.

The Israelis have been frustrated that they couldn't talk directly to the Syrians.

We were trying to be their hope. Olmert's last sentence [as he left] was, "As soon as I get back I will consult with my colleagues and get back to you." As I waited for his response, . . . on December 27, bombs started falling on Gaza. There had not been any casualties in Israel since the cease-fire of June 2008. The Israelis claim that missiles were being sent [from Gaza]. I asked Prime Minister Olmert, how many people died as a result of those missiles? Since December 27 there have been almost 1,300 dead, 6,000 injured, no infrastructure left, no buildings left, everything is damaged, Gaza is a total wreck. It's all closed, under total siege. The United Nations Security Council makes a decision, and Israel announces it does not recognize the decision. I'm not saying that Hamas is a good organization and makes no mistakes. They have made mistakes. But I am evaluating the end result.

Starting now, do you see a role for Turkey? There was a discussion about Turkish troops being part of a peacekeeping force in Gaza.

This is totally out of the question. Only maybe as observers. It would be a major mistake for us to send security forces. There are those who try to claim that my attitude toward Israel's latest attacks on Gaza is because I'm anti-Semitic or against the Jewish people.

And many American Jews are very upset about it.

And I'm very upset at them. Beginning with the Jews who live in my country, they are witnesses to my attitude toward Jews. As an individual, I have always declared that anti-Semitism is a crime against humanity. As a prime minister I have always been against anti-Semitism and my frustration is against the current Israeli government because they did not act fairly toward us.

But I've seen the anti-Semitic signs around Turkey recently. . . .

These are individual attempts.

But they're very extreme. The Israeli Consulate has been picketed. It's been ugly.

There have been democratic demonstrations. . . . There are demonstrations in the United States, even in Israel. Everything we have said is against the current Israeli government, nothing against Jews. In my speeches I have stated very clearly that anyone who even thinks about doing anything against the Jews in Turkey will find me against them. Of course, I'm not going to ask Olmert to write my speeches.

Is your relationship with Israel over?

We have a serious relationship. But the current Israeli government should check itself. They should not exploit this issue for the upcoming elections in Israel.

Do you expect President Barack Obama to play a more even-handed role between the Palestinians and the Israelis?
There is no justice right now. We expect justice from now on.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:35 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013003412.html
Mr. Mitchell in the Mideast
The Obama administration would do well to follow the advice he already offered -- eight years ago.
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A14 [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [yesterday in Jerusalem seeing Perez; today in West Bank seeing Abu Masen] [plenty of challenges to overcome] [followup] [*****]
GEORGE MITCHELL, the Obama administration's new Middle East envoy, encountered a grim landscape on a tour of the region this week. The conflict between Israel and

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013003412.html
Mr. Mitchell in the Mideast
The Obama administration would do well to follow the advice he already offered -- eight years ago.
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A14 [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [yesterday in Jerusalem seeing Perez; today in West Bank seeing Abu Masen] [plenty of challenges to overcome] [followup] [*****]
GEORGE MITCHELL, the Obama administration's new Middle East envoy, encountered a grim landscape on a tour of the region this week. The conflict between Israel and Hamas continues to simmer; no cease-fire has been agreed to. Moderate Palestinian leaders and U.S. allies such as Saudi Arabia and even Turkey are furious about the heavy loss of life and continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza. But Israel is drifting to the right. [***]The leader in polls for next month's election is Binyamin Netanyahu, who favors postponing an Israeli-Palestinian peace settlement indefinitely -- and promises to "finish the work" in Gaza.

President Obama has already recognized that closing an Israeli-Palestinian deal on a two-state settlement is not a realistic aim for now; instead, he has spoken of providing "a space where trust can be built." How can the United States do that? One way is the to promote economic development in the West Bank, something that Mr. Netanyahu supports. Mr. Mitchell could also devote himself to constructing a more durable peace in Gaza.

Even as it builds confidence, though, the Obama administration needs to show that the United States is still committed to a separate Palestinian state, and to countering those on both sides who are working against it. That means trying to break the links between Hamas and Iran while pushing the Islamic movement to reconcile with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and allow negotiations with Israel. It also means checking Israel's continued expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank -- a practice that threatens to make a two-state solution impossible to implement.

A report this week underlined the danger. The Israeli group Peace Now reported that settlement growth in 2008 was 69 percent greater than the previous year -- despite the commitment of outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to a Palestinian state. Nearly 600 of the 1,500 new structures were outside the security barrier Israel has built through the West Bank, and more than 250 were in the approximately 100 "outposts" that the Israeli government has itself declared illegal. [a shame] [spitting in the wind: it will do nothing to change the demographic time bomb that Israel faces] [***] Mr. Olmert and former prime minister Ariel Sharon repeatedly promised the Bush administration that the outposts would be dismantled and new construction limited to areas that Israel would probably annex as part of a final settlement. Not only did those pledges go unfulfilled, but the West Bank settler population has grown by 35,000, to 285,000, during Mr. Olmert's three years in office.

Mr. Mitchell understands the political as well as the practical importance of settlements. Eight years ago, when he headed an international panel to study the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he concluded that the "expansion of settlements undermines Palestinians' confidence in Israel's willingness to negotiate . . . a viable Palestinian state." Mr. Mitchell proposed and the Bush administration endorsed a settlement freeze, but President George W. Bush never attempted to obtain Israel's compliance even with its own commitments. By holding the next Israeli government strictly accountable, the Obama administration could send a powerful message to Palestinians and Arab states about its commitment to an agreement -- and, at the same time, preserve the space for it to happen.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:34 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/world/europe/01russia.html
February 1, 2009
As Economy Sinks, Russians Protest
By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ and CLIFFORD J. LEVY [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [Vlad’s agenda is popular in Russia where Russians sense newly rediscovered respect (fear?)] [use ir text] [more economic constraints on Vlad’s agenda] [*****]
MOSCOW — Protesters held demonstrations throughout Russia on Saturday, offering

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/world/europe/01russia.html
February 1, 2009
As Economy Sinks, Russians Protest
By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ and CLIFFORD J. LEVY [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [Vlad’s agenda is popular in Russia where Russians sense newly rediscovered respect (fear?)] [use ir text] [more economic constraints on Vlad’s agenda] [*****]
MOSCOW — Protesters held demonstrations throughout Russia on Saturday, offering largely subdued, but pointed criticism of the government’s economic policies as the country continues to sink deeper into an economic morass.

Antigovernment protests are rare in Russia, and the latest come amid growing public anger with a government not used to widespread criticism after years of strong economic growth. [but the blames in generally considered a Western thing, not Vlad’s fault] [***] Officials had initially hesitated to publicly acknowledge Russia’s growing economic troubles brought on by a steep drop in oil prices and the worldwide financial downturn.

The government has allocated billions of dollars to bail out troubled banks and companies but has yet to put forward a clear long-term strategy for dealing with mounting unemployment and a rapidly devaluing ruble.

Demonstrations both in support of the government and against it were held in several cities throughout the country, Russian news agencies reported.

About 1,000 people attended a rally organized by the Russian Communist Party in Moscow, calling for a return of the centralized economic policies of the Soviet Union, according to news agencies. The authorities sanctioned the rally, and cordons of riot police officers watched over the march but did not interfere.

In another part of the city, about 200 protesters from opposition groups successfully held an unsanctioned march down several city blocks, having eluded the police in a circuitous jaunt through the city subway system.

The group waved flags and shouted “Down with the police state!” and “Russia without Putin,” referring to Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin.

Col. Viktor Biryukov, a police spokesman, said that 41 people were detained in various small, unsanctioned protests throughout Moscow on Saturday. That group included Eduard Limonov, a writer and leader of the banned National Bolshevik Party, a group that has taken a leading role in organizing street protests throughout the country.

Meanwhile, several thousand people gathered in central Moscow for a demonstration organized by the main pro-Kremlin party, United Russia, in support of the government’s policies, according to the party’s Web site.

An anti-government protest in Vladivostok in Russia’s Far East was also largely peaceful, but was closely watched because the authorities had violently broken up a protest there in December. Tensions have escalated in the region since the government raised tariffs on the import of foreign vehicles in an effort to protect domestic auto manufacturers, which have been badly hurt by the financial crisis.

Used Japanese vehicles are popular in Vladivostok, and many people make their living importing them.

The federal authorities flew in riot police officers from Moscow for the march in December in Vladivostok, a decision that drew heavy publicity, and the officers’ aggressive tactics were widely criticized. This time, local police officers appeared to be overseeing the event and were far more restrained.

About 1,000 participants marched through the center of the city before holding a rally in front of a statue of Lenin, where they demanded the resignation of the Russian government.

“The authorities who don’t listen to the people should resign,” said Vladimir V. Grishukov, the leader of the regional branch of the Communist Party, which helped organize the event. “Only when there are authorities in the Kremlin and here in the maritime region who meet the demands of the people and come under their control, only then will we solve important and crucial problems.”
Michael Schwirtz reported from Moscow, and Clifford J. Levy reported from Vladivostok.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:33 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/europe/31medvedev.html
January 31, 2009
Medvedev Meets Editor of Newspaper Where Slain Journalists Worked
By ELLEN BARRY [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [Vlad’s agenda is popular in Russia where Russians sense newly rediscovered respect (fear?)] [here Vlad’s alter ego Medvedev slummin’ to meet with journalists, some of whom have been slain with almost certain Kremlin acquiescence if not complicity] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW — President Dmitri A. Medvedev of Russia held a surprise meeting on

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/europe/31medvedev.html
January 31, 2009
Medvedev Meets Editor of Newspaper Where Slain Journalists Worked
By ELLEN BARRY [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [Vlad’s agenda is popular in Russia where Russians sense newly rediscovered respect (fear?)] [here Vlad’s alter ego Medvedev slummin’ to meet with journalists, some of whom have been slain with almost certain Kremlin acquiescence if not complicity] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW — President Dmitri A. Medvedev of Russia held a surprise meeting on Thursday with the editor of Novaya Gazeta, an independent newspaper that has established itself as one of the Kremlin’s sharpest critics and that 10 days ago lost a 25-year-old reporter in what apparently was a contract killing.

Mr. Medvedev called the editor of the newspaper, Dmitri A. Muratov, to request a meeting, and during an hourlong conversation expressed his “deepest sorrow and compassion” over the death of the reporter, Anastasia Baburova, who was shot as she walked down a Moscow street with a human rights lawyer, Stanislav Markelov. Mr. Markelov, who was also associated with the newspaper and was thought to be the primary target of the attack, was also shot dead.

To the frustration of human rights advocates, the Kremlin had not previously released any comment about the killings.

Mr. Medvedev’s gesture — which Mr. Muratov described as “absolutely sincere” — comes on the heels of several other unexpected moves by the government in Moscow.

Earlier this week, Mr. Medvedev moved to scale back a bill that would expand the definition of treason, saying he had been influenced by the outcry “in the media and society” against the proposed change. And on Wednesday, to the puzzlement of observers, an anonymous military official told the Interfax news service that the Kremlin had dropped plans to deploy Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad. Official sources would not confirm the statement.

Liberal commentators on Friday were split on whether Mr. Medvedev was signaling a departure from the policies of his predecessor, Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin. Writing on Yezhednevny Zhurnal, an independent online magazine, the journalist Yulia Latynina gave Mr. Medvedev credit for breaking his 10-day silence, [***]noting that “it is psychologically much simpler to make a mistake than it is to admit it.” [a hardly think so] [Vlad gave him a hall pass or this wouldn’t have happened] [***]

But her colleague Viktor Shenderovich said the gesture came too late.

“If Medvedev had said something during the first hours after the killing, the security services would have understood that they would have to really hunt, prick their ears up and hunt,” he wrote. “Now everyone understands this is just P.R.”

Four reporters from Novaya Gazeta have died under mysterious circumstances since 2000. The most prominent of them was Anna Politkovskaya — a fierce critic of the Kremlin’s policy in Chechnya — who in 2006 was shot to death in her apartment building, a crime that sparked worldwide outrage.

At the Thursday meeting, Mr. Medvedev offered his reasoning for keeping silent after the killing. He told Mr. Muratov that, as a Kremlin insider, he knew that any comment he made would be scrutinized and decoded by investigators, and “they might take it as a directive,” Mr. Muratov said.

And when Mr. Muratov confessed that violence against reporters had prompted him to consider closing the newspaper’s doors, Mr. Medvedev’s answer was, “Thank God the newspaper exists,” [god, Vlad, same difference and even rhyme some] [***] Mr. Muratov said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:31 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013003430.html
In Book, Insider Recounts Hunt for Hussein's Weapons
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A09 [[-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [followup] [Saddam continues to preoccupy many –iraqis well after his death] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [more information on Saddam’s too-clever-by-half deception to keep the West on especially Iran convinced that –ir had WMD] [archive in govt too] [****]
UNITED NATIONS -- During his final days in U.S. captivity, Saddam Hussein wrote

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013003430.html
In Book, Insider Recounts Hunt for Hussein's Weapons
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A09 [[-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [followup] [Saddam continues to preoccupy many –iraqis well after his death] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [more information on Saddam’s too-clever-by-half deception to keep the West on especially Iran convinced that –ir had WMD] [archive in govt too] [****]
UNITED NATIONS -- During his final days in U.S. captivity, Saddam Hussein wrote poetry, flirted with American nurses, expressed his desire to restart a nuclear weapons program and asked to be put to death by firing squad like a soldier, not hanged like a common criminal, according to a new book by Charles A. Duelfer, who was the CIA's top weapons investigator in Iraq.

"Hide and Seek: The Search for Truth in Iraq" chronicles Duelfer's decade-long hunt for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, first as a top U.N. weapons inspector in the 1990s and later as head of the CIA-led Iraq Survey Group, which concluded in fall 2004 that Iraq had essentially dismantled its deadliest weapons program years before the U.S. invasion. [why a book when his report released by CIA was some 1,000 pages, 3 volumes, and addendum?] [I think he’s told the story] [I wouldn’t read it] [***]

The book -- which was held up for more than nine months by CIA reviewers -- includes fresh allegations about the Vladimir Putin government's corrupt oil dealings with Iraq and Putin's effort to persuade Hussein to step down to avert a U.S. invasion. It also describes a rudimentary program by Iraqi insurgents after the invasion to develop chemical agents, including ricin, a highly toxic poison derived from castor beans. The operation was shut down by coalition forces, Duelfer says.

Duelfer portrays the United States as a lumbering superpower whose top policymakers, particularly in the White House and the Defense Department, lacked any basic understanding of Iraq's history, motives and leaders. But he says Iraq also routinely misread American intentions and overestimated the capability of U.S. intelligence. He says that according to an Iraqi government account, Hussein once asked his top commanders if Iraq had any hidden weapons he didn't know about. [***]

The book tracks Duelfer's political journey from his days as an obscure State Department official in the Reagan administration who organized arms shipments to Chad during its struggle against Libya.

His 1993 appointment as deputy chairman of the U.N. Special Commission on Iraq placed him at the center of a major international crisis. As a U.N. official, Duelfer gained access to Iraq's top officials and helped arrange a U.S.-backed spying operation that penetrated Hussein's inner circle. The revelations of U.S. spying led to the U.N. commission's ejection from Iraq in 1999.

Duelfer said that on the eve of the 2003 U.S. invasion, he had more direct knowledge of Iraq's weapons programs and leaders than virtually any other top American official. But he had also presided over a U.N. inspection operation that had wrongly assumed that Iraq still possessed weapons of mass destruction. [join the rather sizable and distinguished crowd, all of us hoodwinked by Saddam] [***]

Duelfer describes numerous requests from senior Iraqi officials to start a dialogue with the United States to improve relations. "Each time I passed on such entreaties to Washington, there was never an answer," he said. "If nothing else, they were missed opportunities for Washington to gain more knowledge."

After he left the United Nations in 2000, Duelfer went to a Washington think tank, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, where he began working informally with a unit in the CIA's Near East division, the Iraq Operations Group, which was tasked with regime change.

Duelfer assembled a list of more than 40 high-level officials who could help run Iraq following an invasion. He cultivated old contacts in the oil industry and the Iraqi government, meeting secretly with a top Iraqi official at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. He traveled to Vienna for OPEC meetings that included key Iraqi oil officials. But the plan to put together a team that would form the basis of a future government was shelved.

"Once U.S. forces were in Iraq, they used the lists as targets," he writes. "Those named would find their homes raided, and they would be thrown in jail. . . . We continued to make more enemies."

Duelfer was later selected by then-CIA Director George J. Tenet to head the Iraq Survey Group. Duelfer's hunt for weapons of mass destruction led him to Camp Cropper, a detention facility at Baghdad International Airport that held "high value" detainees, including Hussein and his top lieutenants.

Hussein spent his final months at the facility -- nicknamed the "petting zoo" -- in a solitary cell. His only visitor was a young Lebanese American FBI interrogator named George Piro, whom the former Iraqi leader came to regard as a son.

During sessions with Piro, Hussein said he would seek to reconstitute his nuclear weapons program as long as his regional enemies, Iran and Israel, possessed such arsenals. Hussein also acknowledged that he had sought to persuade the world that he still possessed such weapons in order to show his powerful neighbors that he had not been fatally weakened by a decade of U.N. sanctions. [***]

Duelfer writes that he interrogated Hussein's personal secretary, Abid Hamid Mahmud Tikriti, who described Hussein's meeting in early 2003 with Yevgeny Primakov, the former Russian foreign minister.

Primakov hand-delivered a letter from Putin "asking Saddam Hussein to step out of power and remain as the secretary general of the Baath Party. By this move, he would be able to convince the United States not to attack Iraq. Saddam Hussein walked out of the room."

Duelfer says then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell sought to pressure him not to publicly divulge Russia's activities in his 2004 report, while other State Department officials warned it could harm diplomatic relations with Moscow.

Powell said yesterday that it was only appropriate for him, as secretary of state, to "measure the potential diplomatic fallout with foreign countries" from the report. "It is incorrect to say we tried in any way to stifle his reporting," he said. "To the best of my knowledge, the Duelfer report contained everything related to the behavior of the French, Russians and others."

A spokesman for the Russian mission to the United Nations, Ruslan Bakhtin, declined to comment.

John E. McLaughlin, then the CIA's acting director, said he did not believe that Powell applied "undue pressure" to suppress evidence of foreign corruption. He said Powell rightly wanted to spare the United States embarrassment if the information turned out to be wrong.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:30 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013003829.html
For Prominent Iraqi Cleric, a Test of Influence
Vote Will Indicate Moqtada al-Sadr's Hold on Shiites
By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A08 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [what’s Sadr and his people up to?] [as far as is known, Sadr still guest—under mild house arrest?—in Iran] [ditto NYTs today] [****]
BAGHDAD, Jan. 30 -- Over the past 18 months, Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who has

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/30/AR2009013003829.html
For Prominent Iraqi Cleric, a Test of Influence
Vote Will Indicate Moqtada al-Sadr's Hold on Shiites
By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, January 31, 2009; A08 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [what’s Sadr and his people up to?] [as far as is known, Sadr still guest—under mild house arrest?—in Iran] [ditto NYTs today] [****]
BAGHDAD, Jan. 30 -- Over the past 18 months, Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who has long fought for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, has tried to improve his movement's image and reform his Mahdi Army militia. Saturday's provincial elections will in part be a referendum on his influence over the country's majority Shiites and his professed transformation from guerrilla chieftain to religious leader.

Bassam Abdul Sadiq is the new face of Sadr's ambitions. On Friday, he sat in Sadr's headquarters in his Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City, smiling with confidence: An hour earlier, a Sadrist cleric had ordered more than 20,000 followers to vote for two independent political parties, including Sadiq's, the Free List.

Sadiq, a former insurance company employee in Bahrain and current graduate student in Baghdad, is no independent.

"Everyone knows the direction of the Free List," said Sadiq, 36, who grew up in Sadr City. "Every one of us has a relationship with the Sadr office."

Instead of participating in the elections, Sadr has ordered his followers to vote for independent candidates. It is a tactic he employed successfully to gain political clout in the 2005 elections, wielding street power to back independent candidates while striving to preserve his image as a cleric standing above politics.

Today, top Sadrist officials concede that the strategy is largely one of survival. Since a government offensive against the Mahdi Army in Basra and Sadr City last year, Sadr's political influence has waned as Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's stature has grown. With more than 2 million Shiites in Sadr City, the Sadrists hope to shift the balance of power again, [***]starting from the enclave where Sadr derives his greatest legitimacy.

"We are optimistic," intoned Sadiq, a thin man with a wispy beard. "The movement of Sayed Moqtada Sadr will never become an absentee movement. This is a part of re-energizing their activity."

The quest for votes in Sadr City illuminates how fractured Shiites have become since the 2005 elections, which ushered Shiite religious parties into political power after centuries of Sunni dominance. The outcome of Saturday's elections, in the days and weeks ahead, will provide a look into potential alliances among Shiite parties.

On the walls and storefronts of Sadr City, images of nearly every Shiite candidate are present, scores more than in the previous elections. Over there is cleric Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, Sadr's main rival. Over here is Jawad al-Bolani, Iraq's interior minister, who launched his own party. There are secular Shiites, Shiite Kurds and female candidates in black abayas.

On a white banner next to a building shattered in an American airstrike, Maliki is depicted next to Sadr's white-bearded father, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq Sadr, who was assassinated along with two sons during Saddam Hussein's rule. Between their portraits is a promise from the government, that it will provide Sadr City with solar-powered streetlights.

But most of the posters belong to the Free List and the Integrity and Rebuild List, the two parties Sadr supports. The Free List's poster depicts a cane wrapped in an Iraqi flag breaking ropes slipped around two fists. A large number 284 is painted in blue: the party's number on the voting cards. Underneath are words uttered by the elder Sadr: "I liberated you, so don't let anybody enslave you after me."

"All these other posters are bought with money," declared Ahmed Chalub, a Mahdi Army commander who attended Friday prayers outside the Sadr office. "They give money to hang their posters. But 284, our list? We hang the posters up with our souls and with our blood."

From his pulpit, Mudhafar al-Mussawi urged Sadr's followers to head to the polls Saturday and warned of possible fraud. The action violated election rules designating Friday a "silent" day of no campaigning. But no one seemed to mind.

"If you don't go to vote, your forms will be filled by parties working against you," bellowed Mussawi, who wore a black turban signifying his descent from the prophet Muhammad. "Now, there are rumors being spread that Sayed Moqtada Sadr is against the vote. Be careful. Don't believe this. We are still supporting the two independent lists."

Men began to chant in Arabic: "Aash, aash, aash Sadr" -- "Long live, Long live, Long live Sadr."

"We will always be victorious," they said.

After the sermon, many followers said they would vote for either party -- not just because Sadr had ordered them to do so but because they have seen little progress under Maliki's ruling coalition.

"These people don't help the poor. Nothing has changed since the last elections. There are no paved roads, no good electricity," said Raad Naji, 28, who said he was unemployed. "We are deprived of everything in life."

Mohammed Jalil, 35, said he would never again vote for Shiites who lived in exile while Hussein was in power, referring to Maliki and other top leaders of his Dawa party as well as to Hakim's Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. "We did not expect Dawa to come back and work only for their own interests," Jalil said.

Hassna Daish Alewi, an elderly woman in a black abaya, clutched a pamphlet as she came out of the Sadr office. "They asked me to vote for this man," she said, pointing at the face on the pamphlet.

It was that of Ali Mohammed Muslin, an employee in the Sadr office. He is part of the Free List. On the back of the pamphlet was a picture of Sadr's father, even though electoral laws prohibit the use of religious symbols in the campaign. In the last elections, powerful Shiite clerics strongly encouraged support for the current ruling coalition.

"It is my religious duty," mumbled Alewi, walking away after she was told the voting would take place Saturday.

In 2005, despite boycotting the elections, Sadr-affiliated politicians managed to win 32 parliamentary seats and three seats on Baghdad's provincial council, the equivalent of a U.S. state legislature. Sadr became a kingmaker by propelling Maliki into the leadership of the government.

But in April 2007, Sadr pulled out of the government because Maliki had refused to set a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops. That summer, Sadr imposed a cease-fire on his Mahdi Army in an effort to reform it and position himself as a would-be unifier of Iraq. Since then, his top aides say, he has been in the Iranian city of Qom studying theology to bolster his religious credentials.

Sadr's movement controls a vast network of Shiite mosques in poor urban neighborhoods, including Sadr City, that could generate high voter turnout Saturday. [**]

His Shiite rivals have accused him of deceiving voters fed up with religious parties and the status quo in an effort to regain power.

"They claim they are independents, but this is a Sadrist list," said Khalid Jawad al-Jashamy, a Supreme Council candidate in the Shiite spiritual capital of Najaf. "We know every one of them. They are members of the Mahdi Army and the Sadrist trend," or movement.

The Free List candidates acknowledge having strong ties to the Sadrists but deny there are militia members in their party. But if elected, they say, they will push for Sadrist causes such as a speedy withdrawal of U.S. forces.

"Regarding the security issue, we want this to be in Iraqi hands entirely, without any role for the American forces," said Hussein Aziz Kati Hadrawi, a Free List candidate.

Many Sadr followers are not voting for his two parties. In interviews, they said they preferred former prime minister Ibrahim al-Jafari, who once headed the Dawa party but is now a critic of Maliki.

"Jafari has huge popularity in Sadr City, even from Sadr supporters," said Aqil Chasib Finjan, a Mahdi Army fighter who is a candidate on Jafari's list.

Some predict an alliance between Sadr's loyalists and Jafari after the elections.

Others say the Sadrists might align themselves with Maliki, despite his attacks on their movement, in an effort to weaken the Supreme Council, which the Sadrists view as a greater enemy. Tensions are growing between Maliki and the Supreme Council, whose members fear his growing clout.

Some leaders are playing down their chances of winning seats, predicting that their Shiite rivals who control the nation's security forces will commit fraud and deprive them of seats. "Many of our supporters are in prison or displaced. Or they are afraid to vote," said Salman al-Furaiji, the head of the Sadr office in Sadr City. "What we are going to get on Saturday is a small portion of the Sadr movement."
Special correspondents Saad Sarhan in Najaf and Zaid Sabah in Baghdad contributed to this report.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:30 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/middleeast/31sadr.html
January 31, 2009
Sadr Is Silent, but Backers Work Behind Scenes
By ALISSA J. RUBIN and SAM DAGHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [what’s Sadr and his people up to?] [as far as is known, Sadr still guest—under mild house arrest?—in Iran] [****]
BAGHDAD — One voice largely missing in this election is that of Moktada al-Sadr, the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/middleeast/31sadr.html
January 31, 2009
Sadr Is Silent, but Backers Work Behind Scenes
By ALISSA J. RUBIN and SAM DAGHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [what’s Sadr and his people up to?] [as far as is known, Sadr still guest—under mild house arrest?—in Iran] [****]
BAGHDAD — One voice largely missing in this election is that of Moktada al-Sadr, the anti-American cleric who more than any other Iraqi figure came to symbolize the Shiite insurgency in this country.

Mr. Sadr’s movement has not fielded a list of candidates under the Sadr name, although the movement is backing two parties. Mr. Sadr himself has not been seen publicly in Iraq for months. The conventional wisdom among Iraqis is that he no longer controls his movement. [which may have been Iran’s intention all along] [***]

None of this means that he can be counted out. But his profile and tactics seem far less confrontational than in the past, when his militia was responsible for brutal crimes against thousands of Sunnis.

In the wake of sectarian violence in 2004, 2005 and 2006, Mr. Sadr judged that he was losing more support than he was gaining and called for a cease-fire. Sectarian violence plummeted. But some did not heed his call; these people became known as “special groups” and were widely believed to be controlled by Iran. They continued to attack American soldiers.

Mr. Sadr did not find a substitute for the violent and extortionist activities that previously had bound some of the impoverished youth to him, and while he regained some credibility in the poor Shiite areas where he is popular in Baghdad and Iraq’s south, the movement was diluted.

At the same time his political wing became frustrated and disillusioned. Those who ran ministries — the bloc had six slots, including the powerful Ministry of Health — were pushed out. Some faced charges of corruption and sectarian murders. Then even the special groups began to fracture.

Now Mr. Sadr’s supporters claim that they are recalibrating his movement and looking to a future without the Americans. “Politics will be the dominant work of the movement,” said Liwa Smeism, who heads the movement’s political board, and who spoke at the cleric’s headquarters in Najaf.

“Our strategic goal is to serve the country. Once the occupation leaves, the Sadrists will have an instrumental role.” As he spoke, four candidates from Najaf running on one of the slates endorsed by the movement were anxiously tracking on television and via their cellphones the proceedings of the early voting on Wednesday.

In many ways, it seems the movement is trying to regain its relevance and transform itself into something like the American lobbying group MoveOn — a group that candidates and parties seek out for support, but that is not a party istelf.

Yet the movement wants to be “a kingmaker” in the current political process, said Sheik Salah al-Obeidi, the movement’s spokesman and political strategist. Given its wide appeal among millions of impoverished Iraqis, it has a good shot at doing so. [remember all the charity work it has done over the years] [it’s popular among impoverished Iraqis, so-called unhappy Iraqis] [***]

Mr. Sadr urged his followers earlier this month to vote for two slates, the Integrity and Construction List and the Independent Movement of the Free. Both parties have been heavily influenced by the cleric’s closest associates. They vetted many of the candidates.

Publicly, the cleric’s aides insist that they are not involved in the campaign and that the movement has merely endorsed a group of “independent” candidates. In part that is because the Sadr movement recognizes that the political process in Iraq now has a bad name and is viewed as dysfunctional and corrupt. By distancing itself from any particular political party, the Sadr movement has the flexibility to criticize and throw its weight behind different groups without being blamed for the government’s mistakes. “We have pulled ourselves out of the circle of accusations,” Sheik Obeidi said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:29 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/world/middleeast/01iraq.html
February 1, 2009
Under Tight Security, Elections Are Calm in Iraq
By STEPHEN FARRELL [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [****]
BAGHDAD — Iraqis voted on Saturday for local representatives, on an almost violence-

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/world/middleeast/01iraq.html
February 1, 2009
Under Tight Security, Elections Are Calm in Iraq
By STEPHEN FARRELL [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [but relative calm as voting gets underway] [****]
BAGHDAD — Iraqis voted on Saturday for local representatives, on an almost violence-free election day aimed at creating provincial councils that more closely represent Iraq’s ethnic, sectarian and tribal balance. By nightfall, there were no confirmed deaths, and children played soccer on closed-off streets in a generally joyous atmosphere.

Security was extraordinary. Driving was banned in most of the country to prevent suicide bombers from targeting any of the more than 6,000 polling centers and security checkpoints, often spaced just yards apart. That, plus widespread confusion over where people should vote, appeared to reduce voter turnout, though it was unclear by how much.

Many parts of the country reported fairly light turnout in the morning, in the first voting for provincial candidates in four years. But turnout was high in Anbar Province, an overwhelmingly Sunni area where residents largely boycotted the 2005 national elections [***]because of threats by insurgents and opposition to the American-led invasion. Sunnis’ participation now is considered critical to restoring balance to regional politics and perhaps undercutting a reason for violence.

“I just voted and I’m very happy,” Mukhalad Waleed, 35, said in the city of Ramadi, in Anbar. “We could not do the same thing the last time because of the insurgency.”

Halfway through the day, the government lifted the vehicle ban in some areas to allow voters to travel to polling stations farther afield. It also extended the voting period by an hour, until 6 p.m.

Results are not expected for several days, with politicians anxiously waiting to find out how many councils will change hands, and if widespread dissatisfaction voiced at religious parties will translate into fewer seats for them.

More than 14,000 candidates are competing for 440 seats [3 %?] [***]in 14 of Iraq’s 18 provinces. The seats are for provincial councils that control municipal budgets and have the power to hire and fire people, giving successful candidates a great deal of power and influence in a nation with high unemployment. There was no voting in the semiautonomous Kurdish region, or in the divided city of Kirkuk.

In northern Nineveh Province, where Sunnis also boycotted the last elections, turn out was high in towns along the ethnic divides between Arabs, Kurds and Yazidis. Parties for each vied intensively for votes before the elections and voiced complaints on election day to American and international observers who visited polling sites.

In Qahtaniya, a village southwest of Sinjar that was the site in 2007 of the single worst truck bombing during the war, with as many as 500 people killed, the voting was orderly and even cheerful. No one mentioned the bombing, unless asked. By midday turnout was higher than 60 percent. Khodar Khudaida Rashu, the administrator or mayor of the Qahtaniya subdistrict, predicted that it would exceed 90 percent in most places.

The voting was the largest electoral exercise to be held since the wave of violence peaked in 2006 to 2007. This time, the security environment for the election was notably more peaceful, coming after success with the so-called Sunni Awakening security movement, the surge of American troops in Baghdad and Anbar, and the major Iraqi security operations against Shiite militias in Basra and elsewhere.

As Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki voted in Baghdad’s Green Zone, now under Iraqi control but still heavily fortified, he said: “I am very happy today because all the indications and information indicate a big turnout in the voting centers. This is a victory for all Iraqis.”

In one of the few reported episodes of violence, two people in Baghdad’s Sadr City were shot and wounded by Iraqi security forces as they tried to enter a polling center carrying cameras and recorders, Iraqi officials and witnesses said.

One witness said the two men quarreled with soldiers guarding the voting station, demanding to be allowed to go in through the rear entrance while the soldiers insisted they go through the front door.

In Saddam Hussein’s hometown, Tikrit, the police said that three mortar shells had landed near voting stations without injuring anyone.

There was violence in the period leading up to election day, with at least five candidates and three campaign workers killed during the campaign.

The vote on Saturday, in addition to deciding how local governments are run, is also seen as an important indicator for national elections that are to be held within a year and decide the shape of the central government, including the fate of Mr. Maliki’s Shiite coalition, Dawa.

One of the most powerful Shiite blocs at the national level, the Sadrist movement led by the cleric Moktada al-Sadr is not contesting these provincial polls. It is, however, backing two other parties. [***]

The Sunni parties are expected to make a better showing, especially in the west and north, where they boycotted the last round of polls at the height of sectarian violence in 2005.

In the mostly Shiite southern regions of Iraq, the main rivalry will be between two Islamist parties. These are the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, whose Iranian-trained former militia is now a mainstay of the Iraqi security forces, and Mr. Maliki’s Dawa Party. [****]

Voting was quiet in the southern Shiite city of Basra, where the choice was between Shiite religious parties and the more secular brand of Shiite politics offered by Mr. Maliki’s slate. Police officers, soldiers and Shiite security forces guarded intersections and entrances to polling centers, where men and women were searched.

There seemed much eagerness to vote but also confusion. Some voters showed up at the polling station closest to their home instead of the one they were assigned to because of the ban on driving. Dozens were turned away at the Diyala school in the once violent Five Miles neighborhood of the city because of the complicated process for verifying that they were eligible to vote.

Voter registration is organized around a national system for delivering food rations, a holdover from Saddam Hussein’s era. Voters have to consult two lists to find out if they are registered at a given polling station. First, they have to find the name of their individual ration distributors. Then they must consult a much larger list of all of the families served by that distributor. If their name is missing, they are not permitted to vote at that station.

Some gave up, while others reported going from center to center before finding the one associated with their distributor. Many are voting for relatives or powerful politicians.

One police officer, Haidar Khalaf, 27, said he had chosen the local candidate on the slate of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the head of the Supreme Council. “I just voted for Abdul Hussein,” Mr. Khalaf said. “I only know his first names. I was just told to vote for him.”

Similar complaints of voter list confusion were echoed around the country. Nasreen Yousif, a 54-year-old Christian, visited three polling stations in the New Baghdad district of the capital but could not find her name at any of them.

“Now I am going home,” she said. “Maybe there is a fourth school, but it is too far and I can’t walk any more.”

She added: “It is obviously a mess. If it is not a mess, where is my name.”

Secular parties are hoping that they will be able to capitalize on a protest vote against religious parties amid widespread criticism of their failure to provide jobs, services and utilities since 2005.

Complaints mostly concerned electioneering by the Kurdistan Democratic Party. In at least two instances, supporters were accused of handing out slips bearing the party’s ballot number inside the polling station, a violation of election rules; observers complained the practice was widespread. Kurdish dominance in the region was clear from the abundance of Kurdish posters, flags and party headquarters near the polling sites, even though the Kurds are a minority in Qahtaniya and other towns nearby.

In Nineveh, carefully negotiated agreements dictated where the Kurdish militias, or pesh merga, would be stationed around the polls, along with the local and national Iraqi police and the Army. And still officers and soldiers entered the polling sites with weapons seemingly at will, another violation of the rules.

“It’s not fair,” said Wahid Mundu Hamu, a member of the Yazidi Movement for Reform and Progress. “We had hoped for the best, but that’s what I feel.” He then expressed fear that his people, a small Kurdish minority with its own religion and culture, would be overwhelmed by the larger Sunni and Kurdish parties vying for political control in the region.

“The Yazidis have been oppressed for so long,” he said. “And you’ll see that more and more.”

Reporting was contributed by Sam Dagher from Basra; Timothy Williams, Alissa Rubin, Ian Fisher and Stephen Farrell from Baghdad; Steven Lee Myers from Qahtaniya; and Iraqi employees of The New York Times from Baghdad, Basra, Ramadi, Baquba and Mosul.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:28 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/asia/31nkorea.html
January 31, 2009
South Korea Heightens Military Readiness as North Scraps Pacts
By CHOE SANG-HUN [ROK] [on alert after recent fracas with DPRK unilaterally withdrawing form hard-fought negations over military-tensions diminution] [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [followup] [predictably, DPRK again runs process off rails with scraping of accord negotiated with ROK] [****]
SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea bolstered its military readiness and scrambled to

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/asia/31nkorea.html
January 31, 2009
South Korea Heightens Military Readiness as North Scraps Pacts
By CHOE SANG-HUN [ROK] [on alert after recent fracas with DPRK unilaterally withdrawing form hard-fought negations over military-tensions diminution] [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [followup] [predictably, DPRK again runs process off rails with scraping of accord negotiated with ROK] [****]
SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea bolstered its military readiness and scrambled to figure out North Korea’s intentions on Friday, after the North declared that it was scrapping the agreements both countries had signed to ease military and political tensions on the divided peninsula.

North Korea’s decision followed a recent series of sharp comments and aggressive gestures that officials and analysts in Seoul said were aimed at gaining the attention of the new American administration and concessions from President Lee Myung-bak of South Korea.

“Relations between the North and South have worsened to the point where there is no way or hope of correcting them,” said a statement on Friday from the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea, the North Korean agency in charge of relations with the South. [***]A South Korean Navy destroyer has sailed into waters near the disputed western sea border with North Korea — the scene of naval skirmishes in 1999 and 2002 — to bolster defenses there, the national South Korean news agency Yonhap reported Friday, without citing sources.

“What we can say is that we are beefing up our readiness,” a South Korean military spokesman, who spoke on the customary condition of anonymity, said while declining to confirm the Yonhap report.

Since the 1970s the two Koreas have signed a series of agreements for nonaggression, which the North’s government has flouted repeatedly, rendering the pacts little more than symbolic. Still, this was the first time that North Korea said that it was officially nullifying them.

Mr. Lee, the South Korean president, who has largely ignored the recent North Korean threats, urged the North to reopen dialogue. “Of all the countries in the world, who cares the most sincerely about North Korea? The United States? Japan? China? Russia?” said Mr. Lee in a live television round-table discussion. “North Korea must realize that it’s South Korea.”

Mr. Lee predicted that dialogue with North Korea would resume “before long.” [**]But some analysts said that the chances of North Korea possibly starting a limited border skirmish to prove its points were rising.

North Korea’s hostility toward the South has increased since Mr. Lee took office in Seoul a year ago. He vowed to take a tougher stance on North Korea, a position that effectively reversed 10 years of his liberal predecessors’ efforts to engage the North. Two weeks ago, the North Korean military declared an “all-out confrontational posture” toward the South. Officials in Pyongyang also told a visiting American scholar that it had “weaponized” enough plutonium for four or five nuclear bombs.

Won Tae-jae, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defense in Seoul, said Friday that the South would respond “resolutely” if the North violated its western sea border. “We will see more tension in western waters,” said Lee Byong-chul, a senior fellow at the Institute for Peace and Cooperation, a policy advisory body in Seoul. “It doesn’t appear that it will just end up as empty words from the North.”

He predicted that North Korea would focus on improving ties with the Obama administration, while snubbing the South Korean president. [surely the Obama folk realize this is the gambit?] [***]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:27 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/europe/31turkey.html
January 31, 2009
Hero’s Welcome for Turkish Leader After Davos Walkout
By SEBNEM ARSU [Turkey] [PM Erdogan retuns from Davos] [recall, in Davos, leaders from both Turkey and Israel present] [recall Turkey has brokered relatively “secret” talks between Israel and Syria] [stress of recent Gaza war wearing on nerves] [inevitable clash] [as relatively moderate Muslim state, Turkey probably reflects the broader “Arab” and “Muslim” streets, in spades] [apparently my old friend David Ignatius moderated and gave Peres about twice the time to make Israel’s case than Erdogan to make Turkey’s (and Islam’s)] [Erdogan’s terse remarks and somewhat boorish departure is rewarded in the Muslim street by throngs] [understandable but and indicator of how much work still remains] [use psci469b] [****]
ISTANBUL, Turkey — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey flew home

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/europe/31turkey.html
January 31, 2009
Hero’s Welcome for Turkish Leader After Davos Walkout
By SEBNEM ARSU [Turkey] [PM Erdogan retuns from Davos] [recall, in Davos, leaders from both Turkey and Israel present] [recall Turkey has brokered relatively “secret” talks between Israel and Syria] [stress of recent Gaza war wearing on nerves] [inevitable clash] [as relatively moderate Muslim state, Turkey probably reflects the broader “Arab” and “Muslim” streets, in spades] [apparently my old friend David Ignatius moderated and gave Peres about twice the time to make Israel’s case than Erdogan to make Turkey’s (and Islam’s)] [Erdogan’s terse remarks and somewhat boorish departure is rewarded in the Muslim street by throngs] [understandable but and indicator of how much work still remains] [use psci469b] [****]
ISTANBUL, Turkey — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey flew home Friday to a hero’s welcome from some Turks, and a more muted response from others, after walking off the stage at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, following an angry exchange over the Gaza war with Israeli President Shimon Peres.

Mr. Erdogan’s decision to leave the debate Thursday had all the overtones of a diplomatic incident, ruffling relations between Israel and a Muslim ally that seeks an important role as a mediator in Middle East peace efforts.

In Davos, Mr. Erdogan apparently became incensed during a panel discussion after a moderator curtailed his response to remarks by Mr. Peres on the recent Israeli military campaign in Gaza. “When it comes to killing, you know well how to kill,” he told Mr. Peres before scooping up his papers and leaving the stage. Commentators in Turkey said Mr. Erdogan appeared provoked by the fact that Mr. Peres was pointing his finger at Mr. Erdogan and raising his voice in an unusually aggressive manner as the two men argued.

According to Turkey’s semiofficial Anatolian News Agency, Mr. Peres called Mr. Erdogan by telephone five minutes after the walkout to apologize for any misunderstanding, saying that his remarks about Israel’s Gaza offensive had not been directed at the prime minister personally. In Jerusalem, a spokeswoman for Mr. Peres, Meital Jaslovitz, described the telephone conversation as “positive.” But, she said on Friday, there was no apology from Mr. Peres, contrary to the Turkish news agency report.

Mr. Erdogan did not seem apologetic, either.

“I only know that I’m responsible for protecting the honor of the Turkish Republic, the Turkish nation from A to Z,” Mr. Erdogan said as he returned to Istanbul in the early hours of Friday. “I am not a leader of a tribe. I am the prime minister of the Republic of Turkey . I do whatever I need to, so I did it, and will continue to do so. This is my character. This is my identity.” [very clever politician as his actions over past couple of years defeating political foes from Turkey—importantly including secularists—has demonstrated time and again] [****]

“It was a matter of my country’s respect and prestige. Therefore, my attitude should have been clear,” he said. “I couldn’t have allowed anyone to hurt the prestige and especially the honor of my country.”

Live television footage showed crowds waving Palestinian and Turkish flags at Istanbul’s Ataturk airport while chanting slogans supporting the prime minister. Banners proclaimed Mr. Erdogan the “delegate of the oppressed” and said: “Let the world see a proper prime minister.” The passions reflected widespread anger about the Gaza war in Turkey, a secular nation whose population is mostly Muslim.

While Mr. Erdogan, facing municipal elections in March, seemed to have secured a generally favorable reaction among Turks, some newspaper coverage criticized him for the way he handled his conversation with Mr. Peres at a gathering accustomed to high standards of argument. “The Davos spirit is dead,” said a headline in the mass-circulation Hürriyet newspaper.

Some foreign affairs specialists in Turkey said the dispute in Davos could weaken Turkey’s strong ties with Israel, imperil its neutrality and thus its ability to function as a regional mediator. [****]

Mr. Erdogan has strongly criticized Israel’s Gaza offensive, but his country and Israel have long enjoyed close diplomatic relations. At the same time, Turkey maintains strong ties to the militant group Hamas, which controls Gaza, and Mr. Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party has played a growing role in regional mediation.

Turkey’s military, a powerful arbiter in political affairs that has close ties with Israel, sought to avert a more serious breach in relations, saying the relationship was driven by national interest. “The pursuit of national interests is fundamental in the bilateral military relations that Turkey conducts with all countries,” said Brig. Gen. Metin Gürak, a spokesman for the Turkish General Staff, at a routine briefing for reporters in Ankara.

That conciliatory mood was echoed by Gabby Levy, Israel’s ambassador to Turkey, who was quoted on Turkish television as saying: “There can be difference in opinion between close, friendly countries from time to time, and we, Turkey and Israel, especially have different views on Hamas and Iran.” [***]

“We, however, should consider ourselves lucky that we can agree that we disagree on certain issues while our close friendship continues,” he said. “We have been through difficult times and survived crises also in the past. We will continue working together as we calm down.”

The Davos incident came just days before President Obama’s new Middle East envoy, George J. Mitchell, was to visit Turkey to discuss regional peace efforts as part of a tour of several countries. However, on Friday, a spokesperson for the United States Embassy in Ankara, speaking in return for customary anonymity under diplomatic rules, said the visit had been postponed because of “severe scheduling constraints.” The decision to put off the visit was made before the altercation in Davos, the spokesperson said.

Separately, the Anatolian News Agency said Mahmoud Abbas, the President of the Palestinian Authority, would visit Turkey on Feb. 7. Representatives of the Palestinian Authority criticized the debate at which Mr. Peres and Mr. Erdogan participated because it did not include a Palestinian representative. [shocker] [***]

But Mr. Erdogan’s actions in Davos seemed to have won plaudits from some other Palestinians, particularly in Gaza, and from Iran, The Associated Press reported.
Katrin Bennhold contributed reporting from Davos, Switzerland, Isabel Kershner from Jerusalem, and Alan Cowell from Paris.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:26 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/asia/31nato.html
January 31, 2009
General Says Shoot Dealers in Afghanistan
By JUDY DEMPSEY [Germany] [NATO military commanders] [meeting in Germany] [EU3] [archive govt too] [on Afghanistan] [interesting no-frills potential solutions from uniformed military] [alas, scarcely recognizes the complexities of the opium trade in AfPak] [I repeat: the world has shortage of legitimate opiates for analgesics] [why not figure a way to take Afghan’s illicit market and integrate into the world’s legal and necessary opiate market driving down prices, devising crop-substitution and import substitution mechanisms, and rendering illicit market forces to legitimate market forces with elastic demand?] [wouldn’t happen overnight but the eradicate-opium alternatives promises years of frustration and peasants who see no alternatives] [use psci469b] [use psci355, 455] [****]
BERLIN — NATO’s senior military commander has proposed that the alliance’s soldiers

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/asia/31nato.html
January 31, 2009
General Says Shoot Dealers in Afghanistan
By JUDY DEMPSEY [Germany] [NATO military commanders] [meeting in Germany] [EU3] [archive govt too] [on Afghanistan] [interesting no-frills potential solutions from uniformed military] [alas, scarcely recognizes the complexities of the opium trade in AfPak] [I repeat: the world has shortage of legitimate opiates for analgesics] [why not figure a way to take Afghan’s illicit market and integrate into the world’s legal and necessary opiate market driving down prices, devising crop-substitution and import substitution mechanisms, and rendering illicit market forces to legitimate market forces with elastic demand?] [wouldn’t happen overnight but the eradicate-opium alternatives promises years of frustration and peasants who see no alternatives] [use psci469b] [use psci355, 455] [****]
BERLIN — NATO’s senior military commander has proposed that the alliance’s soldiers in Afghanistan shoot drug traffickers without waiting for proof of their involvement with the Taliban insurgency, [***] [has the advantage of being expeditious but little else positive] [create insurgents from peasant farmers?] [***]according to a report in the online edition of Der Spiegel magazine.

The commander, Gen. John Craddock of the United States, floated the idea in a confidential letter on Jan. 5 to Gen. Egon Ramms, a German officer who heads the NATO command center responsible for Afghanistan, [where do we get these nitwits?] [has he no idea of the political-economic dynamics involved?] [yes, opium funds the insurgency] [it also funds dirt-poor peasants] [what of the latter?] [***] Spiegel Online reported Thursday.

General Craddock wrote that “it was no longer necessary to produce intelligence or other evidence that each particular drug trafficker or narcotics facility in Afghanistan meets the criteria of being a military objective,” the news magazine reported. A NATO official, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed the wording of the letter, and several NATO officials said publicly on Friday that no such orders had ever been given to NATO troops.

Still, the proposal was widely criticized, with politicians here saying that it would flout international law and alter NATO’s mission in Afghanistan. Such an order, they said, would signal a major shift in how the alliance intended to deal with the Afghan insurgency, [***]along with the opium trade that finances the Taliban and other militant groups.

Gen. David D. McKiernen, the American commander in charge of the NATO forces in Afghanistan, also objected to the proposal, Spiegel Online reported.

NATO officials declined to comment specifically on Friday about General Craddock’s proposal or General Ramms’s response. “We will not comment on the substance,” said a NATO spokesman, James Appathurai. “What I will say is that General Craddock never issued final orders,” he added.

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, NATO’s secretary general, has ordered an investigation into how the general’s letter was obtained by Spiegel Online. [***] [yes, by all means, launch a witch-hunt into leaks instead of begin important discussions of what must be done] [JHC, what’s wrong with these nitwits?] [***] He also said in a statement announcing the investigation that “no illegal orders were given.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:26 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/world/africa/01somalia.html
February 1, 2009
Somalis Cheer Moderate President
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN and MOHAMED IBRAHIM [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [a turn for the better or a feign?] [followup] [****]
NAIROBI, Kenya — Pumped-up mobs poured into the scarred streets of Mogadishu,

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/world/africa/01somalia.html
February 1, 2009
Somalis Cheer Moderate President
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN and MOHAMED IBRAHIM [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [a turn for the better or a feign?] [followup] [****]
NAIROBI, Kenya — Pumped-up mobs poured into the scarred streets of Mogadishu, Somalia’s capital, once again on Saturday, but this time, they were demonstrating in support of the government, not against it. [****]

Thousands of cheerful Somalis sang, whistled and hoisted up posters of Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed, the moderate Islamist cleric who was just selected as the beleaguered country’s new president. There was even a pro-government rally at a Mogadishu soccer stadium.

“It’s good to give a chance to the Islamists,” said Mohamed Wehlie, a teacher in Mogadishu. Sheik Sharif, he said, “is the sort of man who can make a change, and we really need a change.”

To many Somalis who have survived relentless cycles of rebellion, displacement, famine and war, Sheik Sharif’s victory was the best news they had heard in years. Although the government he leads is locked in a battle against hard-line Islamist militias, which still control large parts of the country, many Somalis seized on the news as a window of hope, [***]a possible path out of the violence.

The exit in December of the transitional president, Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, an unreformed warlord widely reviled for his warlike ways, and the selection of Sheik Sharif, 45, a cleric who is generally respected as being scholarly and temperate, [***]are seen as an opportunity to bring together Somalia’s warring factions and end 18 years of chaos.

The Somali Parliament, after an all-night session in neighboring Djibouti, voted overwhelmingly for Sheik Sharif early Saturday morning. [in Djibouti where most of them fled last week] [***]

Several moderate Islamist militias, who control different parts of the country, including some neighborhoods in Mogadishu, have indicated that they will throw their military muscle behind Sheik Sharif and will fight to keep him in power.

Despite the flicker of optimism, huge challenges remain. Somalia is a land of blown opportunities; 13 previous attempts at forming an effective transitional government have all failed.

The government controls only a few city blocks in Somalia, a country almost as big as Texas. Last week, the Shabab, one of the most fearsome Islamist militias, took over Baidoa, [and imposed Sharia] [***] the central Somali town where the transitional Parliament used to meet. Masked Shabab fighters soon began imposing a harsh brand of Islamic law, which in the past has included stoning to death a teenage girl who had been raped.

With the selection of Sheik Sharif, Somalia has come nearly full circle to where it was in the summer of 2006, when an Islamist alliance seized control of Mogadishu and pacified it for the first and only time since the country’s central government imploded in 1991. [**] Sheik Sharif was one of the leaders of that alliance, which was a mix of moderate and hard-line elements, including the Shabab.

Many people still credit Sheik Sharif for those days of peace, which proved cruelly short.

“That peace was like a daylight dream that will never come true,” said Mohamed Ghedi Awale, an engineer in Mogadishu who said he fully supported Sheik Sharif.

The Islamist experiment came to a violent end when Ethiopian troops, with American backing, stormed into Somalia in the winter of 2006 and drove the Islamists underground. That set the stage for a bitter guerrilla war which has killed thousands of civilians. [***]

The Ethiopians recently pulled out, partly because of a deal that Sheik Sharif helped broker, and various Islamist factions rushed to fill the power gap. Sheik Sharif has cultivated the loyalty of some of the more moderate militia leaders and important businessmen who bankroll them. But the question is whether that will be enough to repel the advances of themore radical groups.

Clan politics are yet another minefield, and Sheik Sharif’s first order of business is picking a new prime minister, presumably from a clan different from his own, [***]the Hawiye.
Jeffrey Gettleman reported from Nairobi, and Mohamed Ibrahim from Mogadishu, Somalia.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/30spy.html
January 30, 2009
Jailed C.I.A. Mole Kept Spying for Russia, via Son, U.S. Says
By ERIC LICHTBLAU [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [holdover from previous administrations] [successfully prosecuted US spy for Soviets has continued from prison apparently recruiting his son to act as interlocutor] [bizarre] [****]
WASHINGTON — Since 1997, Harold Nicholson has been locked in a federal prison in Oregon, the highest-ranking officer of the Central Intelligence Agency ever convicted of

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/30spy.html
January 30, 2009
Jailed C.I.A. Mole Kept Spying for Russia, via Son, U.S. Says
By ERIC LICHTBLAU [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [holdover from previous administrations] [successfully prosecuted US spy for Soviets has continued from prison apparently recruiting his son to act as interlocutor] [bizarre] [****]
WASHINGTON — Since 1997, Harold Nicholson has been locked in a federal prison in Oregon, the highest-ranking officer of the Central Intelligence Agency ever convicted of espionage.

But even as federal inmate No. 49535-083, Mr. Nicholson never really retired as a Russian spy, federal prosecutors say. In an indictment unsealed Thursday, Mr. Nicholson and his 24-year-old son, Nathan, were charged with using jailhouse visits, coded letters and clandestine overseas meetings to sell more secrets to the Russians over the last three years, in a scheme Mr. Nicholson hatched from his prison cell.

“You have been brave enough to step into this new unseen world that is sometimes dangerous but always fascinating,” Harold Nicholson wrote to his son last July, the indictment says, in what was apparently an reference to the scheme.

The Nicholsons pleaded not guilty on Thursday in federal court in Portland, Ore., and the public defender’s office was appointed to represent them.

The elder Mr. Nicholson pleaded guilty in 1997 to selling the Russians identities of fellow C.I.A. officers. Prosecutors said he “trained and tasked” his son in spycraft from his cell beginning in 2006, and helped the son meet Russian handlers in Mexico, Peru and Cyprus to pass on information intended to help Russian agents evade detection, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors said Nathan Nicholson, a former Army paratrooper, had returned from his visits with the Russians with at least $35,000 in cash, some of it in a PlayStation video game case. [***]The money was intended in part to settle a “pension” that Harold Nicholson said was owed him from his days as a C.I.A. spy for the Russians before his arrest in 1996, the prosecutors said.

The charges offered a compelling reminder, officials said, that the spy wars between Moscow and Washington did not come to a close with the end of the cold war and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

“The beat goes on, and the Russians have been as aggressive as ever, perhaps more so, since the end of the cold war,” said John L. Martin, a former official in the Justice Department who ran the counterespionage unit and oversaw the Nicholson prosecution in 1997. The new charges that Mr. Nicholson was able to continue espionage work from a prison cell “are really unprecedented,” Mr. Martin added. [***]

The affidavit shows that the Federal Bureau of Investigation received information in 2002 that Mr. Nicholson might be trying to get back in touch with his Russian handlers. But while the F.B.I. was pursuing that lead, Mr. Nicholson was able to use his son as a conduit, passing information to him during jailhouse meetings as investigators monitored their contacts. The documents do not say whether lax security at the prison might have contributed to the success of the scheme.

Mr. Nicholson admitted in 1997 that he had received $300,000 from the Russians for the names, identities and missions of numerous C.I.A. employees. He was the C.I.A.’s deputy station chief in Malaysia before returning to agency headquarters in 1994 in a senior counterterrorism post.

In pleading guilty, Mr. Nicholson avoided a possible life sentence and was given 23 years in federal prison. At his sentencing, he told the judge that he had become a Russian spy for the financial benefit of his three children.

Mr. Nicholson’s three children, including his youngest child, Nathan, then 12, went to live with their grandparents in Eugene, Ore., after their father’s imprisonment. Mr. Nicholson asked to be housed near his family and was placed at the medium-security facility in Sheridan, Ore.

Mr. Nicholson’s mail was heavily monitored, and initially, officials said, he sought to use inmates to pass messages to the Russians through their outside mailings. In February 2002, the F.B.I. learned from someone who had been in contact with another prisoner that Mr. Nicholson was trying to use fellow inmates to contact the Russians, [***]according to an affidavit filed in federal court in Oregon by Jared J. Garth, an F.B.I. agent.

That led the F.B.I. to interview a cellmate, who said Mr. Nicholson had confided to him a concern that the C.I.A. information he had would become “stale” and “no longer have value to a foreign government.” He also reportedly said he had a “pension” awaiting him in Russia and planned to repatriate there after he was freed.

Mr. Nicholson’s efforts to pass information through inmates apparently went nowhere. So in late 2006, the authorities said, he turned to his son.

The F.B.I.’s investigation showed that letters between the father and son became more frequent in the fall of 2006, the affidavit said. Sometimes, the father cited biblical verses: “Do not gloat over me my enemies! For though I fall, I will rise again.” [***]

Critical evidence, federal officials said, was a notebook that Nathan Nicholson kept, including contact information in foreign countries and methods of communicating with his Russian handlers. It also contained what federal officials said were questions the Russians had for his father, including some about the events leading to his arrest.

“The Russians clearly were interested in finding out how he got caught,” said a government official who described the questions as attempts to learn how Russian agents might avoid detection in the future. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to provide details on the case.

The charges made public on Thursday do not say the information was classified, but the official cautioned, “We don’t necessarily know at this point everything that was passed.”

But an intelligence official who also spoke on the condition of anonymity played down the threat, noting that Mr. Nicholson had not been in the C.I.A. since 1996. “This just shows that the Russians are either sentimental or stupid,” the official said.

Russian officials declined to comment. “We never give comments on such issues — that’s just our policy,” said Yevgeniy Khorishko, spokesman for the Russian Embassy in Washington.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30blackwater.html
January 30, 2009
U.S. Looks for Blackwater Replacement in Iraq
By JAMES RISEN and TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [complications with Obama’s plans to withdraw from –ir in timely way?] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — As Iraq moved to force Blackwater Worldwide out of the country, the State Department asked two other American companies how quickly they could take over the company’s contract to provide personal security for American diplomats in

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30blackwater.html
January 30, 2009
U.S. Looks for Blackwater Replacement in Iraq
By JAMES RISEN and TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [complications with Obama’s plans to withdraw from –ir in timely way?] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — As Iraq moved to force Blackwater Worldwide out of the country, the State Department asked two other American companies how quickly they could take over the company’s contract to provide personal security for American diplomats in Baghdad, several American officials said Thursday.

Iraqi government officials announced this week that they had refused to give a license to operate to Blackwater, whose guards were involved in shootings that left 17 Iraqi civilians dead in Baghdad in September 2007.

The State Department responded Thursday by saying that it would comply with Iraq’s order, though a spokesman said no decision had yet been made on how the department would replace Blackwater.

But last month, State Department officials met with representatives from Blackwater and two other security contractors, Dyncorp International and Triple Canopy, said participants in the meeting, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the subject.

Under the State Department’s current contract, the companies divided diplomatic security work along regional lines in Iraq. Blackwater holds the largest contract because it handles security in central Iraq, including Baghdad and the American Embassy.

At the meeting, State Department officials asked all three companies to submit proposals explaining how they would handle security in Iraq. Participants in the meeting said it was clear that the officials wanted to be prepared if the Iraqi government moved against Blackwater.

Security industry officials said the Iraqi government had made it clear that it would allow former Blackwater employees to work for either Dyncorp or Triple Canopy, as long as they were not personally involved in any controversies while at Blackwater.

Both Dyncorp, based in Falls Church, Va., and Triple Canopy, based in Herndon, Va., have submitted new contract proposals, according to several people familiar with the matter.

Last month, five Blackwater guards were charged in the United States with manslaughter in connection with the shootings in 2007. They have pleaded not guilty. A sixth guard, who pleaded guilty to manslaughter, is cooperating with prosecutors.

The shootings in Baghdad were the bloodiest in a series of violent episodes involving Blackwater and other American security contractors over several years that had stoked anger and resentment among Iraqis. In the immediate aftermath of the 2007 shootings, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki demanded Blackwater’s ouster, but the Bush administration refused, and last spring it renewed the company’s contract for another year.

Angered by the Bush administration’s refusal to budge on the issue, the Iraqi government instead made Blackwater and the legal status of security contractors a central issue in the negotiations over the status-of-forces agreement that governs the presence of American troops in Iraq.

In the negotiations, the Iraqi government won a provision that eliminated the immunity from Iraqi law previously granted American contractors. The agreement strengthened the Iraqi government’s hand to enforce its decision to not allow Blackwater to operate.

Blackwater has worked for years in Iraq without an operating license but had recently applied for one. The Iraqi government used Blackwater’s license application as a chance to force the company out.

“They presented their request, and we rejected it,” said Alaa Al-Taia, an Interior Ministry official. “There are many marks against this company, specifically that they have a bad history and have been involved in the killing of so many civilians.”

The decision was first reported in The Washington Post.

Anne Tyrrell, a spokeswoman for Blackwater, which is based in Moyock, N.C., said in a statement on Thursday that the company had “followed the proper procedures” to apply for an operating license. She added that “we have received no official communications from the government of Iraq or our customer on the status of those applications or the future of our work in Iraq.”
James Risen reported from Washington, and Timothy Williams from Baghdad.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/30suicide.html
January 30, 2009
Suicides of Soldiers Reach High of Nearly 3 Decades
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [DOD and Pentagon] [disturbing trend of suicide rates for troops in –ir and Afghanistan] [note the 2003 spike then steady increase from decreased 2004 onward] [use psci355, 455] [****]
Suicides among soldiers in 2008 rose for the fourth year in a row, reaching the highest level in nearly three decades, Army officials said Thursday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/30suicide.html
January 30, 2009
Suicides of Soldiers Reach High of Nearly 3 Decades
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [DOD and Pentagon] [disturbing trend of suicide rates for troops in –ir and Afghanistan] [note the 2003 spike then steady increase from decreased 2004 onward] [use psci355, 455] [****]
Suicides among soldiers in 2008 rose for the fourth year in a row, reaching the highest level in nearly three decades, Army officials said Thursday.

At least 128 soldiers killed themselves last year, and the Army suicide rate surpassed that for civilians for the first time since the Vietnam War, [***]according to Army statistics. The suicide count, which includes soldiers in the Army Reserve and the National Guard, is expected to grow; 15 deaths are still being investigated, and the vast majority of them are expected to be ruled suicides, Army officials said.

Including the deaths being investigated, roughly 20.2 of every 100,000 soldiers killed themselves. The civilian rate for 2006, the most recent figure available, was 19.2 when adjusted to match the demographics.

“This is not business as usual,” said Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, the vice chief of staff of the Army, who is leading suicide-prevention efforts. “We need to move quickly to do everything we can to reverse the very disturbing number of suicides we have in the U.S. Army.”

The Army did not identify a specific reason for the increase, but officials said 15-month deployments to war zones played a role. These deployments, which have allowed for little time away from the battlefield, have contributed to post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, alcohol abuse and family problems. Seven suicides took place in Afghanistan and 31 in Iraq.

The most common factors in suicides were financial, personal and legal problems, as well as job-related difficulties, officials said.

Thirty percent of the suicides in the last four years took place during a deployment. Thirty-five percent took place after a deployment. The remaining 35 percent of those who killed themselves had never deployed. [***]

“We all come to the table believing that stress is a factor,” General Chiarelli said.

In 2007, 115 soldiers killed themselves, compared with 106 in 2006.

At a news briefing, the secretary of the Army, Pete Geren, said the Army wanted to bolster its efforts to prevent suicide and was prepared to allocate the resources, “human and financial,” to do so. The Army had stepped up its efforts in the last two years as the numbers had begun to climb.

But, Mr. Geren cautioned, there are no easy answers. “Is there a silver bullet out there?” he said. “I’m confident there isn’t.”

The Army said that in the last year it had hired more general practitioners, often the first health care providers to come into contact with soldiers in distress. It also hired 250 more providers of mental health care, and wants to hire an additional 50.

“We are hiring, and we need your help,” said Col. Elspeth Ritchie, a psychiatric consultant to the surgeon general of the Army.

The Army announced it would conduct a “stand-down,” a day dedicated to recognizing signs of suicidal behavior and ensuring that soldiers get help, even if that means escorting the person to a clinic. The training day will be reinforced by a teaching program that extends from the top ranks to enlisted men and women, with an emphasis on seeking treatment. The Army is also introducing efforts to have chaplains become involved in suicide prevention programs.

Last October, the Army announced it would collaborate with researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health in a landmark five-year project to identify the causes of suicide. The study is expected to probe deeply into the role of combat, long deployments, family stress and other factors. Eighty-five of those who committed suicide last year were married.

Veterans’ and mental health advocates have been critical of the Army, saying it has been too slow to recognize and treat the tide of soldiers struggling with mental health problems after returning from Iraq or Afghanistan.

Despite some progress, problems remain widespread, the advocates say. There are still far too few providers of mental health and substance abuse services, the Army is often reluctant to send soldiers to civilian therapists off bases, and mental health screening remains perfunctory, they say. At the same time, a warrior culture that discourages treatment persists.

“The suicide numbers released today come as no surprise to veterans who have experienced firsthand the psychological toll of war,” said Paul Rieckhoff, the executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for veterans. “Since the Iraq war began, suicide rates and other signs of psychological injury, like marital strain and substance abuse, have been increasing every year.” [***]

As they prepare to shift more troops to Afghanistan this year, Army officials say they are focusing on how to improve mental health there. The challenges are greater because the fighting takes place in more remote places and it is difficult for mental health therapists to reach soldiers.

“We want to make sure we get ahead of it,” Colonel Ritchie said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/30gitmo.html
January 30, 2009
Judge Refuses to Delay a Case at Guantánamo
By WILLIAM GLABERSON [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [another blow against Bush administration’s detention policies and designation as illegal enemy combatants] [nonetheless, whatever one thinks of the Bush administration’s mess, it’s now become Obama’s mess] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration hit an unexpected rough patch on

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/us/30gitmo.html
January 30, 2009
Judge Refuses to Delay a Case at Guantánamo
By WILLIAM GLABERSON [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [another blow against Bush administration’s detention policies and designation as illegal enemy combatants] [nonetheless, whatever one thinks of the Bush administration’s mess, it’s now become Obama’s mess] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration hit an unexpected rough patch on Thursday in its plan to give itself time to decide how to prosecute Guantánamo detainees.

A military judge in the case of one of the best-known terrorism suspects declined an administration request to delay an arraignment scheduled for Feb. 9. The decision differed from rulings by two other military judges in the war crimes system at the prison [***] in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, who last week granted requests filed by military prosecutors for four-month delays so the new administration could study detainees’ files and its legal options.

The unexpected move brought confusion at the White House and the Pentagon, and added a new legal tangle to the already confounding challenges of the Obama administration’s effort to move in sharply new directions on detainee issues. [***]The decision came in the death penalty case of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, a Saudi charged as the chief planner of the attack on the Navy destroyer Cole in 2000, [***] which killed 17 American sailors.

In the ruling on Thursday, the judge in Mr. Nashiri’s case, Col. James L. Pohl of the Army, said “the request to delay the arraignment is not reasonable.” At times, Colonel Pohl, the chief judge in Guantánamo, took a contentious tone that seemed to challenge the Obama administration.

His decision included language about the independence of judges in the military commission system, and he wrote that he found the prosecutors’ arguments, including the assertion that the Obama administration needed time to review its options, to “be an unpersuasive basis to delay the arraignment.”

At the White House, the press secretary, Robert Gibbs, said the administration had learned of the ruling and was “working to get some consultation on that.” He noted that the other judges at Guantánamo had delayed cases, saying those stays “give us what we need to evaluate who is at Gitmo and make the decisions” about how to proceed.

As a candidate, Barack Obama was critical of the military commission system that was a centerpiece of the Bush administration’s strategy in dealing with terrorism. But the new administration has not made clear whether it will restrict prosecutions to existing American courts or, perhaps, use the military commissions for some cases.

The effect of Colonel Pohl’s decision could be reversed by the chief Pentagon official for the military commission system, Susan J. Crawford. Lawyers said Thursday that she could dismiss the charges against Mr. Nashiri “without prejudice,” which would effectively remove the case from the judge, while clearing the way for prosecutors to file new charges in the future. [***]

A military official said he expected such a decision from Ms. Crawford, who has broad powers over commission cases. But some military officials said it was difficult to predict what she would do. This month, she surprised Pentagon officials by telling The Washington Post that she had decided that a detainee who had been charged as the would-be “20th hijacker” in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, could not be prosecuted because she concluded he had been tortured at Guantánamo.

Pentagon officials appeared confused by Thursday’s development because many thought the system was essentially paused after Mr. Obama issued an executive order on Jan. 22 that directed immediate steps to assure that military commission cases “are halted.”

A Pentagon spokesman, Cmdr. Jeffrey D. Gordon, issued a statement that officials were reviewing Colonel Pohl’s decision. But the statement added, “We will be in compliance with the president’s orders regarding Guantánamo.”

Even so, some critics of the military commission system said the decision appeared to express the views of military officers who would like to complicate the Obama administration’s efforts to close Guantánamo and, possibly, abandon the military commission system.

Anthony D. Romero, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, who has praised President Obama’s early actions on Guantánamo, said the ruling in the Nashiri case had raised questions about whether the Pentagon would resist the administration’s efforts.

“It is clear,” Mr. Romero said, “that there are conflicting currents in the Department of Defense under the Obama administration.”

Some of those who have criticized the president’s decision to turn sharply away from the Bush administration’s detention policies called Colonel Pohl’s decision encouraging. Kirk S. Lippold, the retired commander of the Cole, issued a statement saying that Mr. Obama’s order to close Guantánamo within a year had not considered the impact on the victims of terrorism.

“Today’s decision,” the statement continued, “is a victory for the 17 families of the sailors who lost their lives on the U.S.S. Cole over eight years ago.”
David Stout contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/29/AR2009012903732.html
Writings Offer Look at Administration Debate on Iran
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 30, 2009; A12 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [Obama grapples with the Iran conundrum: illicit nuke program almost certain; casual support of various terrotist groups including some jihadis] [complexity of Iranian factionalism] [use psci355, 455] [****]
President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in the past week have sent repeated signals to Iran that the door is now wide open for direct talks between the

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/29/AR2009012903732.html
Writings Offer Look at Administration Debate on Iran
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 30, 2009; A12 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [Obama grapples with the Iran conundrum: illicit nuke program almost certain; casual support of various terrotist groups including some jihadis] [complexity of Iranian factionalism] [use psci355, 455] [****]
President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in the past week have sent repeated signals to Iran that the door is now wide open for direct talks between the two countries three decades after the Iranian revolution, but U.S. officials say the method, the pace and the tenor of that diplomacy still remain to be settled.

But while officials say a plan will not be in place for several months, key players in the discussions have outlined their views in papers they wrote before joining the administration, giving a unique window into the administration's debate.

Obama, during a private discussion with Jewish leaders a year ago, also provided a road map to his thinking. "The time, I believe, has come to talk directly to the Iranians and to lay out our clear terms: their end of pursuit of nuclear weapons, an end of their support of terrorism and an end of their threat to Israel and other countries in the region," Obama said, according to a transcript. Bigger "carrots," he said, will give the United States more leverage to win support for sanctions if Iran rebuffs the approach.

One complicating factor is that Iran will hold a presidential election in June. American officials want to avoid taking steps that might bolster the stature of the current president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose anti-Semitic rants and hostile attitude toward the West make him a potentially difficult interlocutor for diplomatic outreach.

Another complicating factor is that the United States and five other powers have demanded that Iran suspend its uranium enrichment program before substantive talks can begin on its nuclear program. Any sudden change in that approach may alarm allies.

Finally, the government in Iran is so opaque that officials want to be sure they are communicating with the right power centers. "It is unclear who exactly that dialogue would be with in Iran," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said yesterday.

Dennis Ross, the former Middle East envoy who will be Clinton's senior adviser on Iran, has recommended that the initial approach to Iran take place through a "direct, secret back channel," which would be one way to avoid empowering Ahmadinejad or publicly undercutting the ongoing nuclear negotiations.

"Keeping it completely private would protect each side from premature exposure and would not require either side to publicly explain such a move before it was ready," Ross wrote in a lengthy paper, titled "Diplomatic Strategies for Dealing With Iran," published by the Center for a New American Security in September. "It would strike the Iranians as more significant and dramatic than either working through the Europeans or non-officials -- something that is quite familiar."

Ross said the United States should ask the Iranian representative during the private talks to explain how his government sees U.S. goals toward Iran and how Iran thinks the United States perceives Iranian goals. The purpose of this dialogue, he wrote, is to "find a way to show the Iranians that we are prepared to listen and to try to understand Iranian concerns and respond to them, but ultimately no progress can be made if our concerns cannot also be understood and addressed."

Ross conceded that it may be difficult "to set up such a direct channel that is also authoritative," because in the Iranian system, the president has much less power than the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Another top Obama adviser, Gary Samore of the Council on Foreign Relations, argued for a more public approach, without requiring Iran to suspend its enrichment activities: direct bilateral talks, preferably with a representative of the supreme leader, that would cover a range of issues, including the nuclear program, U.S.-Iranian relations, Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. Samore, who will be the top nonproliferation official at the White House National Security Council, co-authored with Bruce Riedel of the Brookings Institution a paper published last month that outlined this concept.

The Bush administration had some secret contacts with Iranian officials before the Iraq war and held ambassador-to-ambassador meetings in Iraq and Afghanistan. But it never attempted a broad dialogue, despite an apparent effort by some Iranian officials to reach out after Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003. Samore recommended that the administration proceed "cautiously" and develop its negotiating strategy through "high-level bilateral and multilateral consultations" with the governments seeking to negotiate with Iran -- Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China -- and with Middle Eastern allies.

It was important, Samore said, that the United States not be seen as abandoning the larger framework for nuclear talks; in fact, "opening a bilateral channel with Iran may help invigorate the multilateral process."

A top State Department official, Undersecretary William J. Burns, will begin such consultations when he meets with representatives to the Iran negotiating group in Europe next week. A senior European diplomat said yesterday that European leaders would welcome a U.S.-Iranian dialogue but that it must be handled carefully. "The possibility of a dialogue with the U.S. is a very important card in our game" with Iran, he said. "We don't have many cards left."

A more provocative approach was advocated by John O. Brennan, [***]Obama's White House director for counterterrorism, in a paper published in July. Brennan pressed for toning down rhetorical jabs at Iran and ignoring anti-American comments from Iranian officials, and also stressed the need for a presidential envoy to handle negotiations with Iran. In order to smooth the path for dialogue, he also argued for the "political courage" to admit that Iran has significantly scaled back its use of terrorism in the past decade. "It would not be foolhardy" to encourage greater assimilation of Hezbollah -- the armed political movement backed by Syria and Iran -- in the Lebanese political system, even though Washington officially considers Hezbollah a terrorist organization, Brennan wrote.

Another important policymaker, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, pressed for a carefully focused dialogue when he co-led a Council on Foreign Relations task force on Iran in 2004. "A 'grand bargain' that would settle comprehensively the outstanding conflicts between Iran and the United States is not realistic," the task force concluded. Instead, the United States should selectively engage Iran on issues where U.S. and Iranian interests converge and build on incremental progress.

Gates, a holdover from the Bush administration, felt it was important such discussions begin before the nuclear concerns were resolved -- a position that puts him firmly in sync with Obama's approach.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/washington/30diplo.html
January 30, 2009
Obama Taps a General as the Envoy to Kabul
By ERIC SCHMITT [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [Obama and NSC principals continue to grapple with AfPak] [Obama selects Gen Eikenberry for ambassador to Afghanistan] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has picked Lt. Gen. Karl W. Eikenberry, a former top military commander in Afghanistan, to be the next United States ambassador

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/washington/30diplo.html
January 30, 2009
Obama Taps a General as the Envoy to Kabul
By ERIC SCHMITT [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [Obama and NSC principals continue to grapple with AfPak] [Obama selects Gen Eikenberry for ambassador to Afghanistan] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has picked Lt. Gen. Karl W. Eikenberry, a former top military commander in Afghanistan, to be the next United States ambassador to Kabul, [***]an administration official said Thursday.

Tapping a career Army officer who will soon retire from the service to fill one of the country’s most sensitive diplomatic jobs is a highly unusual choice.

But Afghanistan specialists say that General Eikenberry, who served in Afghanistan twice, including an 18-month command tour that ended in 2007, knows the players and issues there well. That is a valuable commodity in a year when the United States will send thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan and the country will hold presidential elections. [***]

The administration official spoke anonymously because the appointment had not been made public.

General Eikenberry has a track record for spotting problems in Afghanistan early. He sounded some of the first alarms about a resurgent Taliban and the need to keep the country from backsliding into anarchy.

He was also an early and vigorous champion of building up the Afghan Army to combat the Taliban, a top priority for the Obama administration. And the general repeatedly warned that the United States could not prevail in Afghanistan and defeat global terrorism without addressing the havens that fighters with Al Qaeda had established in neighboring Pakistan. [***]

The appointment indicates that General Eikenberry has the backing of Richard C. Holbrooke, President Obama’s special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan.

General Eikenberry not only has good relations with Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, [I’m not sure how good that is] [***] but in his current job as deputy chairman of NATO’s military committee in Brussels, he has also developed close ties with European allies that could be useful in coaxing them to offer more support for the Afghan mission.

NATO has not met its pledges for combat troops, transport helicopters, military trainers and other support personnel in Afghanistan, and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has openly criticized the allies for not fulfilling their promises.

If the Senate approves General Eikenberry, it would mean that four of the new administration’s most influential voices on Afghanistan policy will be active-duty or retired generals, fueling the concerns of some critics that the Pentagon has too much sway over America’s foreign policy.

Gen. David H. Petraeus, the head of the Central Command; Gen. David D. McKiernan, the top commander in Afghanistan; and Gen. James L. Jones, a retired Marine Corps officer who is Mr. Obama’s national security adviser, are all expected to play important roles in carrying out Afghanistan policy.

General Eikenberry, a West Point graduate with master’s degrees from Harvard and Stanford, would replace William B. Wood, who is finishing a two-year tour as America’s chief diplomat in Kabul.
Mark Landler contributed reporting from Washington, and Carlotta Gall from Kabul, Afghanistan.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/opinion/30buruma.html
January 30, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Totally Tolerant, Up to a Point
By IAN BURUMA [oped] [Islam] [Theo Van Gough’s death in Netherlands a few years ago?] [****]
IF it were not for his hatred of Islam, Geert Wilders would have remained a provincial Dutch parliamentarian of little note.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/opinion/30buruma.html
January 30, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Totally Tolerant, Up to a Point
By IAN BURUMA [oped] [Islam] [Theo Van Gough’s death in Netherlands a few years ago?] [****]
IF it were not for his hatred of Islam, Geert Wilders would have remained a provincial Dutch parliamentarian of little note.

He is now world-famous, mainly for wanting the Koran to be banned in his country, “like Mein Kampf is banned,” and for making a crude short film that depicted Islam as a terrorist faith — or, as he puts it, “that sick ideology of Allah and Muhammad.”

Last year the Dutch government decided that such views, though coarse, were an acceptable contribution to political debate. Yet last week an Amsterdam court decided that Mr. Wilders should be prosecuted for “insulting” and “spreading hatred” against Muslims. [***]Dutch criminal law can be invoked against anyone who “deliberately insults people on the grounds of their race, religion, beliefs or sexual orientation.”

Whether Mr. Wilders has deliberately insulted Muslim people is for the judges to decide. But for a man who calls for a ban on the Koran to act as the champion of free speech is a bit rich. [***]When the British Parliament refused to screen Mr. Wilders’s film at Westminster this week, he cited this as “yet more proof that Europe is losing its freedom.” His defenders, by no means all right-wingers, also claim to be standing up for freedom. [***]A Dutch law professor said he found it “strange” that a man should be prosecuted for “criticizing a book.”

This seems a trifle obtuse. Comparing a book that billions hold sacred to Hitler’s murderous tract is more than an exercise in literary criticism; it suggests that those who believe in the Koran are like Nazis, [***] and an all-out war against them would be justified. This kind of thinking, presumably, is what the Dutch law court is seeking to check.

One of the misconceptions that muddle the West’s debate over Islam and free speech is the idea that people should be totally free to insult. Free speech is never that absolute. [***] Even — or perhaps especially — in America, where citizens are protected by the First Amendment, there are certain words and opinions that no civilized person would utter, and others that open the speaker to civil charges. [classic example: fire in a theater] [***]

This does not mean that religious beliefs should be above criticism. And sometimes criticism will be taken as an insult where none is intended. In that case the critic should get the benefit of the doubt. Likening the Koran to “Mein Kampf” would not seem to fall into that category.

If Mr. Wilders were to confine his remarks to those Muslims who do harm freedom of speech by using violence against critics and apostates, he would have a valid point. [***] This is indeed a serious problem, not just in the West, but especially in countries where Muslims are in the majority. Mr. Wilders, however, refuses to make such fine distinctions. He believes that there is no such thing as a moderate Muslim. His aim is to stop “the Islamic invasion of Holland.” [***]

There are others who share this fear and speak of “Islamicization,” as though not just Holland but all Europe were in danger of being engulfed by fascism once again. [***]Since Muslims still constitute a relatively small minority, and most are not extremists, this seems an exaggerated fear, even though the danger of Islamist violence must be taken seriously.

However, a closer look at the rhetoric of Mr. Wilders and his defenders shows that Muslims are not the only enemies in their sights. Equally dangerous are the people whom Mr. Wilders and others refer to obsessively as “the cultural elite.”

What they mean are liberals who are so concerned about Western racism that they find it hard to tolerate any criticism of non-Western people or non-Western faiths. There are such people, to be sure, but even among my fellow Dutch citizens political correctitude of this kind is becoming increasingly rare. [***]

In the past, it is true, legitimate debates about cultural and religious tensions arising from the poor integration of ethnic minorities were often stifled by an excess of liberal zeal. Doubts about the official drive toward pan-European unity and over liberal policies over guest workers and refugees were too often dismissed as ultra-nationalism or worse.

In a bewildering world of global economics, multinational institutions and mass migration, many people are anxious about losing their sense of place; they feel abandoned by their own elites. Right-wing populists like Geert Wilders are tapping into these fears.

Since raw nativism is out of fashion in the Netherlands, Mr. Wilders does not speak of race, but of freedom. His method is to expose the intolerance of Muslims by provoking them. If they react to his insults, he can claim that they are a threat to our native liberties. And if anyone should point out that deliberately giving offense to Muslims is neither the best way to lower social tensions nor to protect our freedoms, Mr. Wilders will denounce him as a typical cultural elitist collaborating with “Islamo-fascism.” [***]

The lawsuit against Mr. Wilders has been hailed in the Netherlands as a good thing for democracy. I am not so sure. It makes him look more important than he should be. In fact, the response of Dutch Muslims to his film last year was exemplary: most said nothing at all. And when a small Dutch Muslim TV station offered to broadcast the film, after all other stations had refused, the grand champion of free speech resolutely turned the offer down. [***]
Ian Buruma is the author of “Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/africa/31zimbabwe.html
January 31, 2009
Zimbabwe Opposition to Join Government
By CELIA W. DUGGER [Africa] [south-central] [south of horn; landlocked] [Zimbabwe] [south-central Africa, east coast] [former Rhodesia] [white rule and apartheid during colonial days] [since 1970s or so, momentum for majority rule, not unlike neighboring South Africa] [retrun of opposition winner and recent progress] [not much but south africa’s president finally brokered small steps] [whether it will last is yet to be seen] [followup] [a modus Vivendi?] [********]
JOHANNESBURG — After months of resisting intense pressure from leaders across southern Africa, Zimbabwe’s opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, announced Friday

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/africa/31zimbabwe.html
January 31, 2009
Zimbabwe Opposition to Join Government
By CELIA W. DUGGER [Africa] [south-central] [south of horn; landlocked] [Zimbabwe] [south-central Africa, east coast] [former Rhodesia] [white rule and apartheid during colonial days] [since 1970s or so, momentum for majority rule, not unlike neighboring South Africa] [retrun of opposition winner and recent progress] [not much but south africa’s president finally brokered small steps] [whether it will last is yet to be seen] [followup] [a modus Vivendi?] [********]
JOHANNESBURG — After months of resisting intense pressure from leaders across southern Africa, Zimbabwe’s opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, announced Friday that he would do as they have insisted and join a power-sharing government as prime minister with his longtime nemesis, President Robert Mugabe.

The opposition party’s decision to join the government was made unanimously at a meeting of its leadership in Harare, Zimbabwe’s capital. It will usher in a new phase in the opposition’s decade-long struggle against 84-year-old Mr. Mugabe and his almost 30-year grip on power — a grip he tightened after claiming victory in a bloody, discredited presidential run-off election against Mr. Tsvangirai in June.

“There was jubilation and ululation, singing and dancing,” said party spokeswoman Thabitha Khumalo, describing the reaction of party leaders to the decision to join the government.

Mr. Tsvangirai now faces the daunting job of reviving Zimbabwe’s moribund economy and rescuing an increasingly famished, sick and impoverished population with a partner, Mr. Mugabe, whose security forces have viciously beaten Mr. Tsvangirai and thousands of his supporters over the past two years and abducted and allegedly tortured dozens more in just the last few months.

But after more than four months of deadlock and uncertainty following Mr. Tsvangirai’s signing of a power-sharing deal with Mr. Mugabe, his followers reacted with hope that he might be able to stop the country’s accelerating downward spiral.

He climbed on the hood of a car outside Harvest House, headquarters of the opposition party, Movement for Democratic Change, and told a cheering throng who had jammed the street of the party’s decision.

The challenges are monumental, and the distrust of Mr. Mugabe is so deep that it is uncertain whether the United States and European nations will lift sanctions and infuse substantial new aid for the reconstruction of Zimbabwe until they have solid evidence that he will agree to sweeping changes in the country’s disastrous economic policies, the restoration of the rule of law and democracy.

The suffering in Zimbabwe worsens by the day. The World Health Organization announced Friday that a rampant cholera epidemic, far from under control, has infected more than 60,000 people and killed more than 3,100 since August.

And the United Nations World Food Program announced Thursday that the economic crisis has worsened so suddenly and sharply that the number of people needing food aid in the next two months has risen to 7 million from 5 million of the country’s 12 million people. The United Nations agency is cutting its monthly rations — already insufficient — in half to 5 kilograms of corn per person, hoping the hungry can scavenge enough in wild fruits and other foods to survive until the next harvest.

“People will certainly be more malnourished and vulnerable to disease than if they were getting a full ration,” said a spokesman Richard Lee.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30mideast.html
January 30, 2009
Israeli Elections and Gaza Violence Complicate New U.S. Envoy’s Peace Mission
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israel] [domestic politics intersects with foreign policy] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [as did 2006 war, fall 2008 seems to have strengthened Bebe Netanyahu and similar hawks] [*****]
JERUSALEM — President Obama’s special Middle East envoy told Palestinian leaders in the West Bank on Thursday that he had a mandate to actively pursue the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, according to a Palestinian official, despite a pall of

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30mideast.html
January 30, 2009
Israeli Elections and Gaza Violence Complicate New U.S. Envoy’s Peace Mission
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israel] [domestic politics intersects with foreign policy] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [as did 2006 war, fall 2008 seems to have strengthened Bebe Netanyahu and similar hawks] [*****]
JERUSALEM — President Obama’s special Middle East envoy told Palestinian leaders in the West Bank on Thursday that he had a mandate to actively pursue the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, according to a Palestinian official, despite a pall of uncertainty over the future of negotiations pending the outcome of Israeli elections on Feb. 10.

The envoy, George J. Mitchell, on his first trip to the region in his new role, traveled to Ramallah, the West Bank headquarters of the Western-backed Palestinian Authority, and met with President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah and other Palestinian leaders. Only the Palestinian Authority officially speaks for Palestinians in the talks with Israel.

“Lasting peace is our objective,” Mr. Mitchell told reporters after the meeting. “The United States will sustain an active commitment to two states living side by side in peace, stability and security.”

Saeb Erekat, a senior Abbas aide who attended the meeting, said by telephone that Mr. Mitchell mainly “listened for 90 minutes” to the Palestinian president. Mr. Erekat said that Mr. Abbas touched on the situation in Gaza, where Fatah’s rival, the Islamic militant group Hamas, holds sway; on attempts for reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas, whose 18-month-old split has further complicated prospects for a Palestinian state; and on the issue of reconstruction after Israel’s punishing offensive against Hamas in Gaza.

Mr. Abbas briefed the American envoy on the details of his negotiations with Israel over the past year and reiterated his commitment to the two-state vision, while underscoring the “devastating effect” of Israel’s continued settlement activity in the West Bank, Mr. Erekat said.

The negotiations, aimed at establishing an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel, began at an American-sponsored peace conference in Annapolis, Md., in late 2007. No agreement was reached by the target date of the end of 2008.

In a meeting with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel on Wednesday, Mr. Mitchell heard what Israel had offered the Palestinians in the talks. According to the newspaper Yediot Aharonot, the offer included the evacuation of 60,000 Israelis from outlying Jewish settlements in the West Bank and land exchanges to compensate the Palestinians for the settlement blocs that Israel intends to keep. Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem were to be given over to the Palestinian control, and the holy sites were to come under international supervision.

But opinion polls indicate that Benjamin Netanyahu, the leader of Likud, the right-wing opposition party, is likely to prevail in the Israeli elections and form the next governing coalition, creating doubts about the continuation of the process in its current format.

Mr. Erekat, a senior Palestinian negotiator, noted that Mr. Netanyahu had never expressed support for the two-state solution and possibly “never will.”

Mr. Mitchell’s brief remarks also focused on the importance of shoring up the fragile Gaza truce. “To be successful in preventing the illicit traffic of arms into Gaza,” he said, “there must be a mechanism to allow the flow of legal goods” through the Gaza border crossings with the participation of the Palestinian Authority.

Earlier on Thursday, Mr. Mitchell met with the Israeli army chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, to discuss security issues.

Israel and Hamas began separate cease-fires on Jan. 18, and Egypt is trying to broker a more sustainable truce. But Israeli officials have said they are in no hurry to reach agreements with Hamas. They are adamant that Hamas should not benefit in any way in the aftermath of the military offensive, which Israel says was intended to stop Hamas from firing rockets into Israel.

The tenuous calm was broken again early Thursday when a rocket was fired from Gaza into Israel, the second in 12 hours. It landed in an open area and caused no injuries.

Hours later, Israel carried out an airstrike in the southern Gaza town of Khan Yunis against a member of a squad the military said was responsible for a bombing on Tuesday that killed an Israeli soldier patrolling the Israeli side of the border.

Israel said the target was a former Hamas operative who split from the group to join an organization called Global Jihad.

News reports from Gaza described the militant, who was wounded, as a Hamas policeman on a motorcycle and said several civilians, including schoolchildren, were wounded in the strike.

Mr. Netanyahu, the Israeli opposition leader, said that he would encourage rapid economic development for the Palestinians in the West Bank but that he would take a harsh line on Hamas. He suggested Thursday that the Gaza campaign had not achieved its goals. “It is clear Hamas is rearming,” he told Israel Radio. “Of course it is attacking us.”

“The next government will have no choice but to finish the work,” he said.

U.N. Chief Urges Gaza Aid

In Davos, Switzerland, the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, on Thursday made an appeal for $613 million in emergency aid for Palestinians in Gaza, saying, “Help is needed urgently.”

Mr. Ban visited Gaza after both sides declared unilateral cease-fires almost two weeks ago. He is the highest-ranking international figure to have visited Gaza since the war. He was speaking to reporters covering the World Economic Forum in Davos.

The new United States ambassador to the United Nations, Susan E. Rice, also spoke about Gaza on Thursday as she made her first official appearance at the Security Council. In a closed session about the protection of civilians, she noted “the loss of Palestinian and Israeli life in recent weeks and the tragic suffering of Palestinian civilians, who require urgent humanitarian and reconstruction assistance.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30rafah.html
January 30, 2009
Rafah Journal
Where the Still Flourishing Underground Economy Is the Only Economy
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [flourishing black economy] [****]
RAFAH, Egypt — From the rooftops you can see tall buildings, and trucks pulling through streets teeming with people. You can hear generators humming, and the rumble

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30rafah.html
January 30, 2009
Rafah Journal
Where the Still Flourishing Underground Economy Is the Only Economy
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [flourishing black economy] [****]
RAFAH, Egypt — From the rooftops you can see tall buildings, and trucks pulling through streets teeming with people. You can hear generators humming, and the rumble of construction gear. From the rooftops, you can see Gaza.

But down below on the streets here, it is quiet, the kind of quiet that says people have been driven out. Stores were long ago abandoned. The street is buckled in places, and litter is piled along the curb. Residents have fled the war over the border, the heavy pressure from Egyptian security, the emptiness of life in Rafah.

“All we have,” said Muhammad Sha’er, as he looked from a rooftop into Gaza, “are the tunnels.”

Early Wednesday morning, Israel again bombed the tunnels that stretch under the border from Gaza into Egypt. The bombings followed a 22-day Israeli offensive to stop Hamas’s rocket fire, which was followed by international negotiations aimed at ending smuggling into Gaza.

But here in Rafah, people were still trying to smuggle goods through tunnels, hours before and hours after the bombing Wednesday morning. Rafah is a bleak, rutted, dusty town that bears more than passing resemblance to Baghdad after years of international sanctions.

“On the other side, they want to eat,” said Ayed el-Sayah, a furniture maker in town, referring to Gaza. “Here we want to eat, too. That’s why we have the tunnels.”

These are tense days in this shattered town of about 50,000 in the northeastern corner of Sinai. It has become the focus of an intense effort to stop smuggling activities, but the focus has been exclusively on security. Checkpoints have been set up, and the police often stop young men in cars and demand to see identification. The center of the town feels as if it is occupied.

But with every Israeli bomb just over the border, and with every increase in Egyptian security, there is less and less room for any kind of normal life. The streets are filled with idle young men, children and old men, all with nowhere to go and little to do. Women stay at home.

“We only wish we didn’t have to do this, that we had another job or a project, something else we can do,” said a 22-year-old, who asked not to be identified for fear of being imprisoned for his work as a smuggler.

The young man graduated with a degree in commerce from the equivalent here of a junior college. He said he began working a tunnel only recently because there was nothing else for him to do to make a living, or to occupy his time.

He and a cousin, 19, who also is a smuggler, were huddled together in a new imported car, one of the fruits of the trade, parked outside a friend’s house. It was a chilly desert night, the sky shocked with stars, and the young men were wired and nervous, smoking one cigarette after another.

The broad outlines of the tunnels are well known from the Gaza side. They are about 6 feet high and 3 feet wide. They are typically 65 feet or so below the surface, have pulley systems and lighting and ventilation. The Hamas government charges for the electricity used.

Little discussed is how the tunnels work on the Egyptian side, and why state security has been so unsuccessful in finding them. They are begun in Gaza in full view of Egypt’s border guards, after all, and nearly everyone here admits to either working in the tunnels or being related to someone who is.

The young men say that most people no longer have the tunnels come up inside their homes, because if they are caught they have no room for denial, and the whole family could be imprisoned. The openings are lined with tarps and filled with sand. When the tunnel owner in Gaza wants to make a run, he phones and the young men assemble a small group of trusted partners. They then dig out the sand, pull out the plastic tarps and pass through food, clothing or whatever has been ordered.

“It is a family affair, but not everyone knows where the hole is,” said the 19-year-old. “There are only a very few people you can trust and rely on. You make a deal with four or five other guys and that’s it, it stays between you.”

The young men said that most tunnels also have a pipe running through, a couple of inches in diameter. They said the pipes were used to funnel fuel, mostly diesel, to Gaza. Even when Israeli bombs managed to damage the tunnel entrances, or cause a collapse, the pipes were often undamaged and the fuel smuggling went on uninterrupted. They said they did not know anyone who smuggled weapons — only food, fuel and clothing.

There was a time, more than a year ago, when smuggling was extremely lucrative, people here said. One bag of clothing could bring $200. But when the borders were closed after Hamas took control, the number of tunnels exploded from about 30 to between 200 and 300, according to residents here. With that, prices dropped, and that same bag of clothing came down to $80.

With the recent conflict, prices have risen again, because many tunnels are inoperable and because of the increased risk of getting caught or injured. Driving through Rafah at night, a friend of the smugglers, Ahmed, pointed to a convoy of white pickup trucks, all loaded with cans of fuel. “They are for the tunnels,” he said, “all headed to Gaza.”

How Ahmed — whose identity also is being hidden to protect him from arrest — could know that the trucks were smuggling fuel when security officials did not was not immediately clear. Ahmed introduced another friend, a smuggler, whose towering new home rose from the desert near Rafah, a mansion by local standards, and an absolute advertisement for his line of work.

On Thursday, the Obama administration’s new Middle East envoy, George J. Mitchell, said that opening Gaza to commercial goods would help stamp out smuggling, of arms as well as goods. But Ahmed and his friends said that the authorities were reluctant to take measures to end the smuggling, of commodities at least.

How else, they asked, is anyone here going to make a decent living?

From the rooftop, Mr. Sha’er pointed to where Israeli planes bombed Gaza early Wednesday morning, flattening buildings, churning up huge mounds of sand. A few hours after the bombs fell, the people of Gaza were back at it, he said, trying to restore the tunnel openings. In Rafah many people said they were waiting for the call telling them their tunnel was working again and it was time to make another delivery.
“We are farmers,” Mr. Sha’er said. “But we live off the tunnels.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/europe/30clash.html
January 30, 2009
Leaders of Turkey and Israel Clash at Davos Panel
By KATRIN BENNHOLD [Switzerland] [Davos summit] [leaders from both Turkey and Israel present] [recall Turkey has brokered relatively “secret” talks between Israel and Syria] [stress of recent Gaza war wearing on nerves] [nearly inevitable clash] [as relatively moderate Muslim state, Turkey probably reflects the broader “Arab” and “Muslim” streets, in spades] [****]
DAVOS, Switzerland — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey walked off the stage after an angry exchange with the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, during a panel

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/europe/30clash.html
January 30, 2009
Leaders of Turkey and Israel Clash at Davos Panel
By KATRIN BENNHOLD [Switzerland] [Davos summit] [leaders from both Turkey and Israel present] [recall Turkey has brokered relatively “secret” talks between Israel and Syria] [stress of recent Gaza war wearing on nerves] [nearly inevitable clash] [as relatively moderate Muslim state, Turkey probably reflects the broader “Arab” and “Muslim” streets, in spades] [****]
DAVOS, Switzerland — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey walked off the stage after an angry exchange with the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, during a panel discussion on Gaza at the World Economic Forum on Thursday, vowing never to return to the annual gathering. [***]

Mr. Erdogan apparently became incensed after the moderator curtailed his response to remarks by Mr. Peres on the recent Israeli military campaign. The panel was running late, and Mr. Peres was to have had the last word, participants said.

Panel discussions at Davos are restricted to one hour, but Mr. Erdogan insisted on responding to Mr. Peres. Red-faced, and with one hand grasping the arm of the moderator, the columnist David Ignatius of The Washington Post, [***]Mr. Erdogan turned to the Israeli president.

“Mr. Peres, you are older than me,” he said. “Your voice comes out in a very high tone. And the high tone of your voice has to do with a guilty conscience. My voice, however, will not come out in the same tone.”

Resisting efforts by Mr. Ignatius to end the session, Mr. Erdogan continued, saying to Mr. Peres, “When it comes to killing, you know well how to kill.” [***]

Eventually, the prime minister gathered up his papers and departed, saying, “And so Davos is over for me from now on.”

Mr. Peres pointed at the departing Mr. Erdogan and said Turkey would have reacted the same way had rockets been falling on Istanbul, participants said.

Mr. Peres called Mr. Erdogan five minutes later to apologize for any misunderstanding, saying that his words had not been directed at the prime minister personally, the semiofficial Anatolian News Agency reported.

In a news conference immediately after the panel discussion, Mr. Erdogan said he was particularly upset with Mr. Ignatius, who he said had failed to direct a balanced and impartial panel. [***]

By all accounts, the discussion of the Gaza offensive was lively, with Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of the United Nations and Amr Moussa, the Arab League’s secretary general, joining Mr. Peres and Mr. Erdogan. Participants said Mr. Peres was mostly alone in defending Israel’s role in Gaza, and for that reason he was given the final 25 minutes to speak. [***]Earlier, Mr. Erdogan spoke for 12 minutes about the Palestinians’ sufferings.[***]

Although Mr. Erdogan has strongly criticized Israel’s Gaza offensive, his country and Israel have long enjoyed close diplomatic relations. With its strong relations with the militant group Hamas, which controls Gaza, Mr. Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party has played a growing role mediating among Israel, Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinians.
Sebnem Arsu contributed reporting from Istanbul.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30iraq.html
January 30, 2009
Three Candidates Are Killed in Iraq
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [****]
BAGHDAD — Three Sunni candidates were assassinated Thursday, just two days

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30iraq.html
January 30, 2009
Three Candidates Are Killed in Iraq
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [as Saturday’s election nears, violent uptick, doubling deaths of candidates] [****]
BAGHDAD — Three Sunni candidates were assassinated Thursday, just two days before provincial elections. They came from three different blocs and all three were shot to death — one in Mosul, one in Diyala and one in Baghdad.

The deaths bring to six the number of candidates who have been killed.

The candidates in Mosul and Baghdad were killed near their homes; the one in Diyala, northeast of Baghdad, was pasting his election posters to a wall when he was killed with his brother and another relative.

That candidate, Abbas Farhan al-Azzawi, was a colonel in the former Iraqi Army and a member of the Reform and Development Party, a predominantly Sunni group. The party includes members of the former security forces and members of the Awakening movement, which has many insurgents who decided to change sides and work with the Americans against extremists.

The candidate killed in the Amiriya neighborhood of western Baghdad was Omar Farouk al-Ani of the Iraqi Islamic Party.

The candidate killed in Mosul, Hazim Salim Ahmed, was a tribal figure from the National Unity List. He was personally close to Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki and accompanied him during his visit there on Thursday.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30mosul.htm
January 30, 2009
Iraqi Elections Face Crucial Test in Violent Mosul
By IAN FISHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [persistent violence in northern around Kirkuk and Mosul] [****]
MOSUL, Iraq — The thud of the car bomb was familiar, if in this case close, rattling the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30mosul.htm
January 30, 2009
Iraqi Elections Face Crucial Test in Violent Mosul
By IAN FISHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [persistent violence in northern around Kirkuk and Mosul] [****]
MOSUL, Iraq — The thud of the car bomb was familiar, if in this case close, rattling the windows and puffing out the drapes.

“This is our fate,” Mohammed Shakir, 67, the top candidate running for the local council with the Iraqi Islamic Party, said post-boom a few days before the provincial elections here. “There is no politics when there is chaos and car bombing.”

Around a largely quiet Iraq, the elections on Saturday — considered crucial as the first widely contested balloting since the American invasion in 2003 — will take place in something like normality.

But in Mosul, the chief city in the north, long torn between Arabs and Kurds, the violence has not ended. A civilian died in this car bombing. A day later a bomb exploded down the street from the Kurdish Democratic Party headquarters, killing four Iraqi soldiers.

This is the test of the provincial elections in Mosul, a last bastion of the Sunni and jihadi insurgency: whether a political system that more closely reflects local ethnic and sectarian splits will be a first step toward stability. The issue is the same in places around Iraq where calm is still fragile: whether democracy can trump violence.

There are some encouraging signs here in Mosul, even if many people fear the elections are simply another means for Arabs and Kurds to continue their bloody struggle over land, oil and sovereignty. Certainly there is no progress on the more threatening issue of Kirkuk, a city to the southeast so full of oil and ethnic tension that elections there were postponed.

But politics are changing here. In the last provincial elections, in 2005, most Arabs boycotted. As a result, Kurdish groups, who make up at most a third of the city, hold 31 out of 41 seats on the provincial council in Mosul and surrounding Nineveh Province. The provinces have broad local authority to spend and govern.

Now the council has 37 seats, and Arabs, represented by two main parties, are expected to win, and Kurds largely accept that — one reason, many here say, that the violence, while still much higher than in most of Iraq, has not flared more. On Thursday night, however, a candidate who is an adviser on tribal affairs to Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki was assassinated outside his house in Mosul. But even if it is too dangerous for candidates to shake hands in the streets, where wild dogs rove over rubble and garbage, 55 voter registration stations survived the campaign unscathed.

“People think these elections will be different,” said Maj. Gen. Hassan Kareem Khidir, commander of Iraqi Army operations in Nineveh, who has much to gain from the calm. Outside his fortified office a plaque lists the names of 523 security officers killed just since May. “The major factor in Nineveh is not security or military — it’s political,” he said.

But the full picture is more clouded and complex, a backdrop for the long-running tensions between Kurds and Arabs that many fear may intensify after the elections.

One major struggle is local control, embodied in these elections and which the Kurds advocate, versus the strong central state that Saddam Hussein long used to keep in line Iraq’s Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds and other groups.

After the Kurds ruled the city for four years — a time of extreme violence, with the latest killings last fall forcing thousands of Christians to flee Mosul — Kurdish groups readily concede that Arabs should control the city itself.

“Of course the Arabs have the majority here,” said Kisro Goran, 48, the deputy governor, who despite his second-rank title is the most powerful politician in Mosul and is overseeing the campaign for the largely Kurdish grouping Brotherly Nineveh. “We will not collect more than what we are. We are only one-third so we won’t get more than that.”

But he is equally frank that their real goal is winning rural areas outside the city — places where Kurds say they have a majority and that, they argue, should ultimately belong to the nearby autonomous enclave of Kurdistan. The Kurds have long been frustrated by the failure of international promises for a census and referendum to settle Kurdish claims, particularly in Kirkuk.

So Mr. Goran said the elections would serve as their own census, he hoped, to further the Kurds’ agenda.

“We are looking not only to know our political size but our ethnic size,” he said. “How can we know the truth? By democratic means. We don’t want to force any identity on anyone. Voters will choose what identity they want.”

Talk like this infuriates Arabs, who accuse the Kurds of using the elections not for the unity of Iraq but its dissolution. The issues run from impossibly complex — should Yazidis, a non-Muslim Kurdish-speaking minority, count as Kurds? — to explosive.

Atheel al-Nujaifi, leader of the list al-Hudba, a largely Sunni Arab slate that seems set to win the most votes, said that Kurds were using the election to solidify control over areas around the Mosul dam, strategic for water supply and near an oil pipeline. In theory, Arab gains in this election would be a force against what they see as Kurdish expansion — another possible source of conflict. “In these areas they have militias,” said Mr. Nujaifi, 51, a businessman who owns a satellite channel and breeds horses that were favored by Saddam Hussein’s sons. “I am worried the votes won’t be fair.”

“We think the elections are for political parties,” he added. “It’s not for nationalities to decide their final fate.”

And thus these elections are studded with contradictions: On one side, the prospect for fairer representation and less violence in the city. Most parties, Arab and Kurdish alike, are pledging to work together in a possible coalition government after the elections (Mr. Goran, however, has ruled out working with the candidates on the slate from al-Hudba.) On the other side, there appears to be rising suspicion between Arabs and Kurds, worsened by the widening gap, in safety and prosperity, between Iraq proper and Kurdistan.

More and more, the roads out of Mosul feel like an international boundary, with checkpoints and virtual customs stops before the Kurdish cities of Dohuk and Erbil. While Mosul is battened down and tense, Kurdistan is safe and lively, full of construction, car dealerships and nice Turkish washing machines for sale. Arabs say that, despite their holding Iraqi passports, Kurdish pesh merga troops harass them and admit them only grudgingly.

“I went to Erbil the other day and they wouldn’t let me in without somebody guaranteeing me,” said Haithem Abdul-Wahab, 44, as he stretched a huge campaign poster for the Iraqi Islamic Party on an iron frame. “I had an Iraqi flag in my car and they tore it.”

A nearby security guard, Abdullah Wa’ad, 30, shouted out, “We don’t want Kurds in Mosul!”

The feeling is much the same in a disputed village north of Mosul, a few miles from the dam, populated by 21 Kurdish families. The village’s name in Kurdish is Ghani Shireen, but it was given an Arab name, Ain Hilwa, after eight Arab families were forced to move there in 1991 as part of Saddam Hussein’s effort to “Arabize” the area and dilute Kurdish control. The Arab families left after the Americans, allied with the Kurds, arrived in 2003.

Now many worry what it will mean for them with Arabs likely to be in control of the provincial council. Saddiq Abdullah, 48, bitter at having been thrown off his land when the Arabs arrived, said it would be good if these elections helped inch Kurdistan closer to his village.

“Kurdistan is a stable and safe country,” he said. “We would sleep there without bombs or worries.”

But for all the ethnic and sectarian politics, there is a small voice — rising in Mosul and elsewhere in Iraq — that is looking for competence first.

Firas Jamil, 25, a Kurd who owns an electronics shop in Mosul’s barricaded downtown, listed his priorities: better electricity and water; unblocked streets; more jobs; and of course greater safety.

For that, he is turning to al-Hudba, perhaps Arab but in his mind more capable.

“Here we vote for the political party that would serve the interests of the city,” he said, “regardless of ethnic identification.”
Riyadh Mohammed contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/asia/31nkorea.html
January 31, 2009
N. Korea Scraps Accords With South
By CHOE SANG-HUN [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [then begins again] [followup] [DPRK again runs process off rails with scraping of accord negotiated with ROK] [******]
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea unilaterally declared on Friday that it was scrapping agreements it had signed with South Korea to ease military tension on the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/31/world/asia/31nkorea.html
January 31, 2009
N. Korea Scraps Accords With South
By CHOE SANG-HUN [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [then begins again] [followup] [DPRK again runs process off rails with scraping of accord negotiated with ROK] [******]
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea unilaterally declared on Friday that it was scrapping agreements it had signed with South Korea to ease military tension on the divided Korean Peninsula. [**]

The announcement followed a series of recent saber-rattling gestures from North Korea that officials and analysts in Seoul have said were aimed at raising tension to gain attention from the new administration of President Barack Obama [***]and to win concessions from President Lee Myung-bak of South Korea.

“Relations between the north and south have worsened to the point where there is no way or hope of correcting them,” said a statement from the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea, the North Korean agency in charge of relations with the South. “They have reached the extreme point where the clash of fire against fire, steel against steel, has become inevitable.” [***]
.
It said the accords to be nullified included a 1991 agreement on reconciliation and non-aggression, as well as North Korea’s promise, contained in the agreement’s appendix, that it would honor the western sea border claimed by South Korea. North Korea has flouted these agreements by developing nuclear weapons and sparking naval clashes on the disputed sea border in 1999 and 2002. After the 1999 clash, it unilaterally redrew the sea border.

Government analysts in Seoul scrambled on Friday to figure out the North’s intentions. For one thing, they said, it remained unclear whether the North was also nullifying the agreements its supreme leader, Kim Jong-il, signed with President Lee’s two predecessors in 2000 and 2007 during rare inter-Korean summits.

Those two agreements have been the basis of a decadelong softening of relations on the peninsula. During the “sunshine” period, billions of dollars of trade and economic aid — as well as millions of South Koreans on tour or for family reunions — crossed the heavily armed border.

North Korea has even called the oldest and primary agreement for peace — the 1953 armistice that ended the three-year Korean War — a “useless piece of paper.”

A South Korean destroyer has sailed into waters near the disputed western sea border with North Korea — the scene of naval skirmishes in 1999 and 2002 — to beef up the defense, the national news agency Yonhap reported on Friday, without citing sources.

“We can neither conform nor deny the report,” a South Korean military spokesman said, speaking on the customary condition of anonymity. “What we can say is that we are beefing up our readiness.”

Although South Korea has reported no unusual movement by the North’s 1.1 million-member military and called for calm among its citizens and dialogue with Pyongyang, there was growing unease among analysts in Seoul that North Korea may attempt an armed skirmish as a way of increase the pressure on Seoul to soften its hard-line stance.

Won Tae Jae, a spokesman of the Defense Ministry in Seoul, said Friday at a news briefing that the South would respond “resolutely” if North violated its western sea border again.

“We will see more tension in western waters,” said Lee Byong-chul, senior fellow at the Institute for Peace and Cooperation, a nonpartisan policy advisory body based in Seoul. “It doesn’t appear that it will just end up as empty words from the North.” [***]

He predicted that North Korea would focus on improving ties with the Obama administration while snubbing President Lee. Driving a wedge between the allies has been a favorite tactic in North Korean diplomacy.

The North Korean committee said it was scrapping the agreements because Mr. Lee had violated them first with his “reckless confrontational rackets against our republic.” [fairly typical] [***]

Some government analysts in Seoul warned against reading too much into the North Korean announcement, which did not mention any “economic” agreements.

Although North Korea has recently cut off all official dialogue and sharply curtailed private border crossings, it still allows a joint industrial park in the North Korean city of Gaeseong — one of the few sources of foreign currency for the impoverished regime — to operate.

North Korea’s rhetoric against the South has increased in intensity since Mr. Lee took office a year ago with a vow to take a tougher stance on North Korea, reversing 10 years of his liberal predecessors’ efforts to engage the North with substantial economic aid.

Two weeks ago, the North Korean military declared an “all-out confrontational posture” with the South.

North Korean officials also told a visiting American scholar that the country had “weaponized” enough plutonium for four or five atomic bombs.

Threats from North Korea, which has at various points vowed to turn South Korea into a “sea of fire” and a “heap of ashes,” are a recurring feature of postwar relations between the two countries. They seldom raise an alarm among South Koreans.

Since the 1970s, the two Koreas have signed a series of agreements for non-aggression and cooperation, which the North has flouted repeatedly, rendering them little more than symbolic. Still, this was the first time North Korea has said that it was officially nullifying them.

“We hope the North will realize that spawning and raising tensions between South and North Korea is not appropriate for peace not only on the Korean peninsula but also in Northeast Asia and the rest of the world,” said Kim Ho-nyeon, the South Korean government’s main spokesman in inter-Korean relations.

Mr. Kim said the government was dealing with the North Korean blustering “with calm.” But some analysts said that the chances of North Korea launching a limited border skirmish to prove its points were rising.

Still, the South Korean military heightened security along the border in the recent weeks. So far, it has reported no unusual movement by the North Korean army. [***]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/29/AR2009012903737.html
U.S. Removes Kashmir From Envoy's Mandate; India Exults
By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 30, 2009; A09 [India] [Mumbai Massacres] [SAsia] [by almost all accounts, the Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [here Pakistan denies what Indians take as granted] [at least some of the jihadis came from Pakistan but it’s extremely difficult to know how much if any cooperation comes from Pakistan’s military and/or ISI elements] [followup] [use psci469b] [new envoy, Richard Holbrooke, one of Obama’s most seasoned vets gets outmaneuvered by India’s govt] [apparently, Kashmir will not be in Hollbrooke’s portfolio?] [****]
NEW DELHI, Jan. 29 -- Inside a chandeliered ballroom Thursday, Indian diplomats and

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/29/AR2009012903737.html
U.S. Removes Kashmir From Envoy's Mandate; India Exults
By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, January 30, 2009; A09 [India] [Mumbai Massacres] [SAsia] [by almost all accounts, the Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [here Pakistan denies what Indians take as granted] [at least some of the jihadis came from Pakistan but it’s extremely difficult to know how much if any cooperation comes from Pakistan’s military and/or ISI elements] [followup] [use psci469b] [new envoy, Richard Holbrooke, one of Obama’s most seasoned vets gets outmaneuvered by India’s govt] [apparently, Kashmir will not be in Hollbrooke’s portfolio?] [****]
NEW DELHI, Jan. 29 -- Inside a chandeliered ballroom Thursday, Indian diplomats and business leaders and American officials held forth about a new "Cooperation Triangle" for the United States, China and India. But little mention was made at the Asia Foundation's conference on Indo-U.S. relations of the Indian government's recent diplomatic slam-dunk. [***]

India managed to prune the portfolio of the Obama administration's top envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard C. Holbrooke -- basically eliminating the contested region of Kashmir [***]from his job description. The deletion is seen as a significant diplomatic concession to India that reflects increasingly warm ties between the country and the United States, according to South Asia analysts.

Indian diplomats, worried about Holbrooke's tough-as-nails reputation, didn't want him meddling in Kashmir, according to several Indian officials and Indian news media reports. [***]Holbrooke is nicknamed "the Bulldozer" for arm-twisting warring leaders to the negotiating table as he hammered out the 1995 Dayton peace accords that ended the war in Bosnia, a peace that has stuck.

"I think it is time for us -- having fobbed off Holbrooke -- to sit quietly and ask where are we and how do we manage the situation," said C. Raja Mohan, an Indian strategic analyst who served on India's national security advisory board in 2006. [indeed] [without Kashmir there’s no chance of negotiating India-Pakistan rapprochement] [***]

Mohan's comments captured the public glee many Indians feel over their country's latest diplomatic success. It follows the government's victory in securing a deal with the United States that gives India access to civilian nuclear technology, even though it is a not a party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

India and Pakistan have made slow but steady progress on Kashmir over the past four years, but relations quickly chilled after the November attacks in Mumbai; [***]India accused Pakistan of aiding in the three-day assault.

Few places represent the region’s complexities more than Kashmir, a territory that has been disputed since the 1947 partition of India and Pakistan. The nuclear-armed nations have fought two wars over Kashmir, and the United States stepped in to head off a third one in 2001. Both countries claim Kashmir and both control parts of it, with the United Nations monitoring a cease-fire line between them.

“No matter what government is in place, India is not going to relinquish control of Jammu and Kashmir,” Brajesh Mishra, India’s former national security adviser, said in reference to the territory’s Indian-administered sector. “That is written in stone and cannot be changed.” [nor is Paksitan going to stop “meddling”] [***]

During the U.S. presidential campaign, Obama said the Kashmir issue was central to any stability in the region.

But India is suspicious of third-party intervention in the dispute. Kashmir is an internal issue and shouldn't be a part of any outsider's mandate, many Indian officials here say.

The country's Outlook magazine ran a cover story this week showing Obama dancing with his wife at an inaugural ball with the headline: "Should India fear him? What India must do to ensure Kashmir won't get caught in the crosshairs."

Last week, Mohan warned Holbrooke against "any high-profile intervention" in Kashmir. The topic is so politically sensitive here that it is referred to as the "K-word."

At a news briefing Tuesday, State Department spokesman Robert A. Wood said Kashmir was not part of Holbrooke's mandate.

"His mandate is to go out and try to help bring stability to Afghanistan, working closely with Pakistan," Wood said. "India has some very clear views as to what it wants to do vis-a-vis dealing with the Kashmir issue, as well as the Pakistanis."

When asked whether Holbrooke would play a role if there were heightened tensions again over the Mumbai attacks, Wood said, "I don't want to speculate in terms of what he may or may not do, but his brief is focused solely on, as I said, Afghanistan-Pakistan."

Holbrooke was originally tasked as the special envoy for Afghanistan, Pakistan "and related matters," code for India and Kashmir, according to a U.S. official in Washington who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the person is not authorized to speak publicly. But on the morning Holbrooke's posting was announced, "related matters" had been deleted from the description.

Wood said at a briefing Thursday that Holbrooke would stop at the Munich Conference on Security Policy on Tuesday before heading to Pakistan and Afghanistan, where the border region is a haven for Taliban fighters and where Osama bin Laden is believed to be hiding.

Pakistan and Afghanistan have yet to comment on the Kashmir decision. But other South Asia experts say that taking Kashmir out of Holbrooke's hands may upset Pakistan and that there may be back-channel negotiations anyway. [***] [doubtless]

"Intellectually, it is impossible to disentangle these problems from each other," said Daniel Markey, a South Asia expert at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. "The smartest thing is to work on this behind the scenes."
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803472.html
U.S. Can Continue Yemeni's Detention
By Del Quentin Wilber
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 29, 2009; A04 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [another blow against Bush administration’s detention policies and designation as illegal enemy combatants] [nonetheless, whatever one thinks of the Bush administration’s mess, it’s now become Obama’s mess] [use psci355, 455] [****]
A federal judge ruled yesterday that the government may continue to detain a 29-year-

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803472.html
U.S. Can Continue Yemeni's Detention
By Del Quentin Wilber
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 29, 2009; A04 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [federal judiciary] [another blow against Bush administration’s detention policies and designation as illegal enemy combatants] [nonetheless, whatever one thinks of the Bush administration’s mess, it’s now become Obama’s mess] [use psci355, 455] [****]
A federal judge ruled yesterday that the government may continue to detain a 29-year-old Yemeni at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon said the government had met its burden in alleging that Ghaleb al-Bihani was an enemy combatant who supported al-Qaeda and Taliban forces in Afghanistan. [***]The government said that Bihani stayed at Taliban and al-Qaeda guesthouses, trained at al-Qaeda-affiliated camps and "supported" the Taliban as a member of an Arab Brigade fighting unit.

Bihani's attorneys argued that their client was only a cook for the Taliban and never fired a weapon at U.S. forces. But Leon said that "helping prepare the meals" for Taliban forces was enough to justify Bihani's continued detention. Quoting from Napoleon, Leon said, "An army marches on its stomach."

Shereen J. Charlick and Reuben Camper Cahn, federal public defenders in California who represented Bihani, said they would appeal the ruling. "He's been locked up for seven-plus years on allegations of being a cook," Cahn said. [***] [not exactly true] [only potentially true]

Judges in U.S. District Court in Washington are presiding over about 200 lawsuits brought by detainees challenging their confinement under the legal doctrine of habeas corpus.

Leon was the first judge to have moved ahead with hearings in the cases. Since November, Leon has ordered six detainees to be freed and ruled that the government may detain four others.

The cases before other judges have proceeded more slowly, and none has been scheduled for hearings on the government's evidence. The government has recently been granted delays in several cases that were nearing critical legal rulings so Justice Department lawyers could have more time to assess matters. The government requested the delays within hours of President Obama being sworn in.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803900.html
Middle East Envoy Urges 'Lasting Peace'
Arms Smuggling Must Halt, Mitchell Says
By Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, January 29, 2009; A14 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [as reported here previously, Obama administration and SecState Clinton have wisely selected a seasoned negotiator for special envoy to Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [and envoy has dived in head first] [tough slogging ahead] [use psci355, 455] [****]
JERUSALEM, Jan. 28 -- Arriving in Israel for his first visit as the Obama administration's

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803900.html
Middle East Envoy Urges 'Lasting Peace'
Arms Smuggling Must Halt, Mitchell Says
By Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, January 29, 2009; A14 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [as reported here previously, Obama administration and SecState Clinton have wisely selected a seasoned negotiator for special envoy to Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [and envoy has dived in head first] [tough slogging ahead] [use psci355, 455] [****]
JERUSALEM, Jan. 28 -- Arriving in Israel for his first visit as the Obama administration's Middle East envoy, former senator George J. Mitchell on Wednesday pushed for a more durable truce in the Gaza Strip, calling for a halt to weapons smuggling and for the territory's border crossings to be opened.

Speaking after a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Mitchell said the United States is "committed to vigorously pursuing lasting peace and stability in the region."

But his visit came as the relative calm of the past week and a half was being tested by violence that threatened to reignite the 22-day war in Gaza. An Israeli soldier was killed by an explosion as he patrolled on Israel's side of the boundary with Gaza on Tuesday, an attack praised by Hamas. Israel responded with an airstrike on a Hamas fighter, wounding him. On Wednesday, Israeli jets bombed several smugglers' tunnels.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak canceled a planned visit to Washington and said in a statement Wednesday that he had told Mitchell that Israel would not tolerate attacks on its citizens. Israeli military officials did not rule out more strikes in Gaza. "If Hamas escalates, we are ready to respond in a harsh manner. We don't want to return to where we were a month ago," said Maj. Avital Leibovich, an Israel Defense Forces spokeswoman.

Egypt is attempting to mediate between Israel and Hamas, seeking a truce of a year or more. Mitchell was in Cairo on Wednesday morning meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and said afterward that it is "of critical importance that the cease-fire be extended and consolidated, and we support Egypt's continuing efforts in that regard."

The United States has been working with Egypt to hammer out a system for halting the smuggling of weapons across the Egypt-Gaza border, and Mitchell said Wednesday that an end to smuggling will be essential for any cease-fire. He also said that the border crossings, the lifeline to the outside world for 1.5 million Palestinians, need to be opened. Israel has largely kept its crossings with Gaza shut since Hamas took control of the coastal territory in June 2007.

Mitchell, who is best known for his work to resolve the conflict in Northern Ireland, is scheduled to meet with officials of the U.S.-backed Palestinian Authority in the West Bank on Thursday and to visit Jordan and Saudi Arabia later in his trip. He was not scheduled to meet with Hamas or visit Gaza.

Hamas foreign affairs adviser Ahmed Yousef called that a mistake, although he struck a conciliatory tone toward Mitchell and said he hoped that the Obama administration would be willing to engage with Hamas. [***]

"I hope that with Mitchell's experience, his decency and his integrity, and with the desire of Mr. Obama to have a change in the region, we will be able to move things in a different direction," Yousef said, speaking in Gaza.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/us/politics/29prexy.html
January 29, 2009
Obama Seeks Accord With Military on Iraq
By PETER BAKER and ALISSA J. RUBIN [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive orders] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [the new administration finally begins to grapple with the dicey situations in –ir and AfPak] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — As President Obama moves to redefine the nation’s mission in Iraq, he faces a difficult choice: Is he willing to abandon a campaign promise or risk a rupture

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/us/politics/29prexy.html
January 29, 2009
Obama Seeks Accord With Military on Iraq
By PETER BAKER and ALISSA J. RUBIN [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive orders] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [the new administration finally begins to grapple with the dicey situations in –ir and AfPak] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — As President Obama moves to redefine the nation’s mission in Iraq, he faces a difficult choice: Is he willing to abandon a campaign promise or risk a rupture with the military? Or can he finesse the difference?

Since taking office last week, Mr. Obama has recommitted to ending the war in Iraq but not to his specific campaign pledge to pull out roughly one combat brigade a month for the first 16 months of his presidency. His top commander in Iraq has proposed a slower start to the withdrawal, warning of the dangers of drawing down too quickly.

On Wednesday, Mr. Obama visited the Pentagon for the first time since becoming president, and he seemed to be looking for an option that would let him stay true to his campaign promise, at least in theory, without alienating the generals. [***]The White House indicated that Mr. Obama was open to alternatives to his 16-month time frame and emphasized that security was an important factor in his decision.

“We’re no longer involved in a debate about whether, but how and when,” Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, said about a withdrawal from Iraq. “That’s a process the president wants to take seriously.”

He added: “He wants to ensure the safety of our troops as we remove our combat brigades; wants to, as I’ve said repeatedly, provide the responsibility and the opportunity for the Iraqis to do more in governing their own country; and, as I said, to do this in a way that seeks the consultation of all those leaders.”

Among those consulted by the president was Gen. Ray Odierno, the top commander in Iraq, who has developed a plan that would move slower than Mr. Obama’s [***]campaign timetable, by pulling out two brigades over the next six months. In an interview in Iraq on Wednesday, General Odierno suggested that it might take the rest of the year to determine exactly when United States forces could be drawn down significantly. [Odierno is a good guy but he’s so vested in –ir success that he may not see the forest from the trees] [as I’ve written in these pages many times, my own view is the time is ripe for US to declare victory and blow that pop stand] [-iraqis have an election this Saturday and they repeatedly say they are prepared to take over most of their own security] [don’t stand in their way!] [make a virtue out of necessity] [[****]

“I believe that if we can get through the next year peacefully, with incidents about what they are today or better, I think we’re getting close to enduring stability, which enables us to really reduce,” General Odierno said as he inspected a polling center south of Baghdad in advance of provincial elections on Saturday.

General Odierno said the period between this weekend’s elections and the national elections to be held about a year from now would be critical to determining the future of Iraq. While some American forces could be withdrawn before then, he suggested that the bulk of any pullout would probably come after that.

“We are going to reduce forces this year,” the general said. “It’s the right time to reduce our forces here. I believe that Iraqis are making progress. It’s time for us in some places to step back and give them more control.” He added, “What we want to do is to slowly shift our mission from one that’s focused on counterinsurgency to one that’s more focused on stability operations.”

After a session at the White House last week, with General Odierno participating via secure video, Mr. Obama traveled to the Pentagon on Wednesday to meet with the service chiefs. The discussion ranged beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, covering a variety of challenges confronting the armed forces. [***]“It was a very elevated conversation about the situation worldwide and the threats that we face and the risks that exist around the globe,” said Geoff Morrell, the Defense Department spokesman.

Speaking with reporters afterward, Mr. Obama expressed concern about the “enormous pressure on our military to carry out a whole set of missions” and promised to advance “all aspects of American power to make sure that they’re not carrying the full load.” He indicated that he had not decided on his approach to Iraq. “We’re going to have some difficult decisions that we’re going to have to make surrounding Iraq and Afghanistan, most immediately,” Mr. Obama said.

J. D. Crouch II, who was President Bush’s deputy national security adviser and a leading architect of the “surge” strategy, said Mr. Obama and his team would be wise to heed the military. “They don’t want Iraq to go bad because they have too many other important things to do,” he said. “They don’t want to alienate the military. And there’s something to be said that the guy who got things under control over there, Ray Odierno, probably has a good idea of what he needs.” [in theory] [on other hand, Odierno by definition is vested in how –ir is perceived by world, Americans, and Pentagon] [***]

Yet Mr. Obama faces pressure from his political base to stick to his 16-month timetable. “We voted for him because he’s going to get us out of Iraq,” said Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Code Pink, an antiwar group. “If there are some military people who feel we should stay there, they’re entitled to their opinion, but that shouldn’t be our policy.”

Eli Pariser, executive director of MoveOn.org, another organization that opposes the war, said, “We have no reason to think Obama’s backed off his campaign promises on a timeline to end the war.” Representative William D. Delahunt, a Democrat from Massachusetts and member of the Out of Iraq Caucus, said that the withdrawal should happen even faster than 16 months and that military commanders knew it could. “When they say it concerns them, there’s a certain ‘cover myself’ ” at work, he said.

Others said the timetable was less important than the goal. “It helps for him to aim for it,” said Representative Ike Skelton, Democrat of Missouri and chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. “If you can draw your troops down to within the ballpark and they’re safe, that’s what counts.”

In Jisr Diyala, south of Baghdad, General Odierno traveled in an armored vehicle on Wednesday to inspect preparations for Saturday’s voting. He said his focus now was on “drivers of instability” that could halt Iraq’s security gains, including Arab-Kurdish friction in northern Iraq and tension between Shiite political parties over the division of power elsewhere in the country.

General Odierno said he envisioned a shift in the American mission that would occur in “five or six nodes,” where Iraqis and Americans would both have forces working with provincial reconstruction teams, other American Embassy personnel and nongovernmental organizations to help Iraqis mature as a fighting force and gain skills in civilian projects. [that’s reasonable and modeled on Patraeus’ successes] [***]

Eventually, he said, only about one-third of the current 140,000 troops now in Iraq will be needed, but when that will happen has yet to be decided. “That’s the decision we have to make is when that happens; when do we go to that level,” he said.

Under the security agreement approved by Baghdad and Washington before Mr. Obama took office, all United States forces are supposed to leave by the end of 2011 unless requested to stay by the Iraqis — a date confirmed by General Odierno, who said, “By 2011 we’ll be zero.”

“We’re making progress every day,” General Odierno said. “But I still see some issues that could cause problems that I worry about. Political issues that could turn into security issues. But the longer we go, if we get through the elections, we get closer and closer to not being able to backslide.”

Peter Baker reported from Washington, and Alissa J. Rubin from Baghdad. Thom Shanker contributed reporting from Washington.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:47 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012802953.html
The Pakistan Puzzle
By David Ignatius
Friday, January 30, 2009; [oped] [columnist] [on Pakistan] [Ignatius is one of my favorite columnists] [his sources are top drawer] [****]
Of all the problems confronting the Obama administration, none is trickier than Pakistan -- a nuclear power that has a war in Afghanistan on its western border, a tense confrontation with India on its eastern border and a deadly insurgency at home from Muslim militants who want to topple the pro-American government. [***]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012802953.html
The Pakistan Puzzle
By David Ignatius
Friday, January 30, 2009; [oped] [columnist] [on Pakistan] [Ignatius is one of my favorite columnists] [his sources are top drawer] [****]
Of all the problems confronting the Obama administration, none is trickier than Pakistan -- a nuclear power that has a war in Afghanistan on its western border, a tense confrontation with India on its eastern border and a deadly insurgency at home from Muslim militants who want to topple the pro-American government. [***]

At the crux of all three conflicts are the Pakistani army and its intelligence service, known as the ISI. The army's pervasive power is summed up in a Pakistani joke: "All countries have armies, but here, an army has a country." [****] [sad but true]

The challenge for Pakistan and its neighbors was dramatized by the Nov. 26 terrorist attack on the Indian metropolis of Mumbai. The assault on two luxury hotels, a train station and a Jewish cultural center left 165 dead and 304 injured, according to the official Indian count. The attackers were highly trained and used sophisticated GPS navigation devices to find their targets.

"This was a conspiracy launched from Pakistan," argues a detailed dossier prepared by the Indian government and distributed to officials in Washington and other capitals. It makes chilling reading -- page after page of communications intercepts, interrogation records and forensic evidence. The dossier argues that the 10 terrorists were trained in Pakistan by a militant group, Lashkar-i-Taiba, that Indian officials believe was originally created by the ISI. [as was the Taliban] [***]

Between the lines of the dossier, but not stated explicitly, is the Indian government's belief that some officers of the Pakistani army and the ISI were aware of the Mumbai attacks. Try to get your mind around that one -- the Pakistani army, with its stockpile of nuclear weapons, may include officers linked to a terrorist attack on the country's neighbor.

The American official who monitors Pakistan most closely is Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He has formed a close working relationship with Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, the chief of staff of the Pakistani army, and has traveled to Pakistan seven times over the past year to meet with him and Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, whom Kiyani installed last year to head the ISI. [Mullen has been great but the CJCS can only do so much] [with new president everyone is waiting to see if Obama listens to him] [**]

I talked with Mullen this week about the situation in Pakistan. I began by asking about Indian suspicions that elements of the Pakistani army were involved in the Mumbai attacks.

"I've tried . . . really hard to understand Pakistan over the last year-plus, and it's much more opaque than it is transparent," Mullen answered. [refreshingly honest] [****] Part of that opacity, Pentagon sources explain, results from the Pakistani military's culture of delegating authority, so that top commanders don't always know about contacts by lower-ranking officers. As one official puts it, "it can sometimes be difficult to figure out who did what to whom."

Mullen said that Kiyani and his intelligence chief, Pasha, "have committed very specifically to change the culture in ISI. . . . They recognize that they've got to get out of where they've been, which is in support of these . . . militants, to try to make deals, and that they've got to move beyond that. But that's not going to happen overnight." [sadly, they have made such sweeping commitment previously with poor results] [****]

The U.S. commander said he measures Kiyani by whether he "does . . . what he tells me he's going to do." And he said Kiyani has delivered.

Mullen noted, for example, that Kiyani has ordered Pakistani troops to combat Taliban insurgents in the western frontier region of Bajaur, where they had been reluctant to fight before. Kiyani also has doubled the pay of the Frontier Corps, the constabulary force that operates along the Afghanistan border. And he has picked a charismatic Pashtun officer as the new commander for the Frontier Corps. [****]

"All of those things . . . are very positive," Mullen said. "And the Frontier Corps has had what I would argue is incredible success in a very short period of time."

"In my ideal world," Mullen said, India and Pakistan would work together to fight terrorists and "figure out a way to solve Kashmir," a Himalayan region claimed by both countries. But Kashmir, he cautioned, would be "a pretty big bite in the apple right now."

Mullen said he wouldn't discuss Afghanistan in detail until President Obama has made decisions about strategy there. [politically savvy] [***] Although more U.S. troops may be needed in the short run, he said, the key to lasting security will be better governance and economic development.

“I don’t have enough troops in the United States military to make the difference that needs to be made” in Afghanistan, Mullen warned. “Afghans have got to lead this. It has got to have an Afghan face.” [see today’s WP editorial] [editors might have read their own columnist whereupon they presumably would have had a better sense of why top people in Obama’s administration are walking back somewhat] [***]
The writer is co-host of PostGlobal, an online discussion of international issues. His e-mail address is davidignatius@washpost.com.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:46 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803267.html
The Afghan Challenge
Democrats have long called it 'the central front.' Will they retreat from it?
Thursday, January 29, 2009; A18 [editorial] [AfPak] [the mess Obama has inherited and now what?] [on SecDef Gates recent testimony] [****]
FOR YEARS, Democrats excoriated the Bush administration for not devoting sufficient resources to Afghanistan. But now that Barack Obama has taken office, some seem to be having second thoughts. "Our original goal was to go in there and take on al-Qaeda. . . . It was not to adopt the 51st state of the United States," said Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), the new chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. [what an ass]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/28/AR2009012803267.html
The Afghan Challenge
Democrats have long called it 'the central front.' Will they retreat from it?
Thursday, January 29, 2009; A18 [editorial] [AfPak] [the mess Obama has inherited and now what?] [on SecDef Gates recent testimony] [****]
FOR YEARS, Democrats excoriated the Bush administration for not devoting sufficient resources to Afghanistan. But now that Barack Obama has taken office, some seem to be having second thoughts. "Our original goal was to go in there and take on al-Qaeda. . . . It was not to adopt the 51st state of the United States," said Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), the new chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. [what an ass] [***] Mr. Kerry pioneered the Democratic argument to send more troops during his own presidential campaign in 2004. Now he says "the parallels" to Vietnam "just really keep leaping out in so many different ways."

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates seconded that skepticism at a congressional hearing on Tuesday. "If we set ourselves the objective of creating some sort of Central Asian Valhalla over there, we will lose," he said, "because nobody in the world has that kind of time, patience and money, to be honest." [that’s hardly the same as suggesting Afghanistan is being prepped for 51st-state status] [***]

We're happy to agree that Afghanistan should not become the 51st state, or Valhalla -- but we're not sure who or what Mr. Kerry and Mr. Gates have in mind. So far as we know, the American objective in Afghanistan since 2002 has been pretty much what Mr. Gates says it should be: "an Afghan people who do not provide a safe haven for al-Qaeda, who reject the rule of the Taliban and support the legitimate government they have elected and in which they have a stake."

The problem, as Mr. Gates acknowledged, is that meeting that aim necessitates such tasks as stabilizing western Pakistan, rooting out the opium trade, vastly expanding the Afghan army and constructing a workable legal system. That, in turn, will require more money, more troops, many more years of commitment -- and higher American casualties.

"Bottom line is, it's going to be tough, it's going to be difficult, in many ways harder than Iraq," Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) put it to Mr. Gates. "Do you agree with that?" "Yes," the secretary responded. [much harder] [much more fragmented into sub tribes] [much more difficult terrain] [a state in search of a government of effective goverance] [whereas Pakistan is a government in search of a state] [consequently, AfPak is FUBAR] [****]

So why make it sound as if the Obama administration is scaling back U.S. ambitions? Part of this may be pure politics, to assure the antiwar left -- not to mention other Americans -- that the United States is not about to follow Russia and Britain into an Afghan quagmire. [***]Yet the new administration, and supporters such as Mr. Kerry, ought to recognize a greater political need, which is to make clear to the country that the war against terrorism -- whatever it is now called -- did not end on Jan. 20 and that Afghanistan in particular will require years more patience and sacrifice to get right.

The way to avoid a quagmire is not to hold back on U.S. military reinforcements or development aid but to assemble a national civil-military plan that integrates war-fighting with reconstruction and political reconciliation. As Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) points out, such a plan was the foundation of the U.S. recovery in Iraq, but the model has never been applied in Afghanistan. That's largely because the United States must share authority with some 40 allies, many of which place strict limits on what their troops may do, insist on managing their own development programs, or both. The Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai, mired in corruption and increasingly at odds with U.S. commanders, is also not on board.

Afghanistan doesn't need to become the 51st state, but it does need a single, coherent, integrated plan to become a state strong enough to resist the Taliban and al-Qaeda. [***]Creating one will require some aggressive diplomacy and maybe a little political china-breaking. That's something for which the State Department's new envoy to the region, Richard C. Holbrooke, is known. But low-balling the scale of the challenge, or the costs it may incur, won't help.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:45 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/europe/29pope.html
January 29, 2009
Pope, Expressing Solidarity With Jews, Reacts to Uproar Over a Holocaust Denier
By RACHEL DONADIO [Rome] [Vatican] [Pope Benedict 16 burnishes his holocaust cred] [he’s been notably reticent on same in past] [or when he’s spoken he’s too often said precisely the wrong thing] [in fairness, he’s also slammed Islam] [apparently, an equal-opportunity slimmer] [****]
ROME — Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday addressed for the first time the uproar over his decision to rehabilitate a Holocaust-denying bishop, expressing solidarity with

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/europe/29pope.html
January 29, 2009
Pope, Expressing Solidarity With Jews, Reacts to Uproar Over a Holocaust Denier
By RACHEL DONADIO [Rome] [Vatican] [Pope Benedict 16 burnishes his holocaust cred] [he’s been notably reticent on same in past] [or when he’s spoken he’s too often said precisely the wrong thing] [in fairness, he’s also slammed Islam] [apparently, an equal-opportunity slimmer] [****]
ROME — Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday addressed for the first time the uproar over his decision to rehabilitate a Holocaust-denying bishop, expressing solidarity with Jews and strongly condemning Holocaust denial.

In his weekly audience with the public on Wednesday, Benedict said he “renewed with love” his “full and indisputable solidarity” with Jews, whom he called “our brothers of the first covenant.”

He added that he had repeatedly visited Auschwitz, the location of the “brutal massacre of millions of Jews, innocent victims of blind racial and religious hatred,” and said that the Holocaust “should be a warning for everyone against forgetting, denying or diminishing its significance.” [good for him] [or is it Him?] [***]

But tensions remained, a day after Israel’s highest religious body sent a letter to the Vatican asking to postpone an annual bilateral meeting and voicing “sorrow and pain” at the pope’s decision to welcome the bishop back into the fold.

On Saturday, the pope revoked the excommunication of four schismatic bishops from a traditionalist sect, including Bishop Richard Williamson, who in an interview broadcast in Sweden last week and widely available online said he believed that no more than 300,000 Jews perished during World War II, none of them in gas chambers.

Oded Wiener, the director general of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, praised the pope’s comments on Wednesday as “a giant step forward” and “an extremely important statement, not only for the Jewish people, but also for all the world.”

But on Tuesday, the annual Holocaust Remembrance Day, Mr. Wiener sent a letter to the Vatican saying that unless the bishop issued a public apology and recanted his “deplorable statements,” it would be “very difficult for the Chief Rabbinate of Israel to continue its dialogue with the Vatican as before.”

The letter said it would be wiser to postpone an annual meeting between the rabbinate and a small group of Vatican officials, scheduled to be held in Rome in early March.

The rabbinate’s letter was addressed to Cardinal Walter Kasper, the president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and the president of the Commission for Religious Relations With Jews, who said in an earlier interview that he had not been consulted about the pope’s decision to revoke the excommunications of the four bishops.

On Wednesday, the secretary of the commission, the Rev. Norbert Hofmann, said that “no definite decision” had been made about the scheduled meeting. He said Cardinal Kasper had conveyed the message to the highest authorities at the Vatican.

Mr. Wiener said the rabbinate was awaiting a response from Cardinal Kasper before determining how to proceed with the scheduled meeting.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said he hoped that “the difficulties expressed” by the rabbinate could lead to “further and deeper reflection.”

He added that he believed that the pope’s message should be “more than sufficient” in answering concerns about the pope’s and the Vatican’s position on the Holocaust.

In his remarks, the pope said that the Holocaust should teach “new generations” that “only the difficult path of listening and dialogue, love and pardon” can lead to “fraternity and peace in truth.”

The Israeli ambassador to the Vatican, Mordechay Lewy, said he welcomed the pope’s remarks about the Holocaust and called them “instrumental in shaping the parameters of the existing and future relations between Jews and Catholics.”

He said the current controversy did not affect relations between Israel and the Vatican, nor did he think they would affect discussions under way for the pope to visit Israel and the Palestinian territories this spring.

Beyond the global controversy, the pope’s overtures to the four bishops raise significant doctrinal questions.

The four are members of the traditionalist St. Pius X Society, founded in 1970 by a French archbishop, Marcel Lefebvre, in opposition to the modernizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council.

The bishops were excommunicated by Pope John Paul II in 1988 after Archbishop Lefebvre, who died in 1991, ordained them without Vatican permission.

The society has not said whether it will accept the reforms of Vatican II, and the Vatican has not yet determined the bishops’ future standing within the church. On Tuesday, the society apologized to the pope for the outcry caused by Bishop Williamson’s remarks and said they did not represent its views.

In his message on Wednesday, the pope said he had reached out to the four in an “act of compassion” aimed at relieving their “suffering” for being left out of the church.

He added that he hoped that his gesture would be met “by a commitment on their part to fulfill the further steps necessary to realize full communion with the church,” including “recognizing the majesty and authority of the pope and of the Second Vatican Council.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:40 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/asia/30lanka.html
January 30, 2009
U.N. Leads Evacuation From Sri Lanka
By SOMINI SENGUPTA [sri lanka] [south asia] [ongoing war between Tamil Tigers and Sinhalese govt—past 30 years or so] [recent flareup has seen some new lows in attacks] [Westerners have tended to be hands off] [a case of usually out-of-sight, out-of-mind] [post-CW intensification of nationalism loosely defined] [in truth, I have rarely archived articles on this horrible mess] [since December the Sinhalese military has become much more aggressive] [now UN forced to step in due to refugees and potential hostages] [*****]
CALCUTTA — Amid mounting international criticism of Sri Lankan government forces

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/asia/30lanka.html
January 30, 2009
U.N. Leads Evacuation From Sri Lanka
By SOMINI SENGUPTA [sri lanka] [south asia] [ongoing war between Tamil Tigers and Sinhalese govt—past 30 years or so] [recent flareup has seen some new lows in attacks] [Westerners have tended to be hands off] [a case of usually out-of-sight, out-of-mind] [post-CW intensification of nationalism loosely defined] [in truth, I have rarely archived articles on this horrible mess] [since December the Sinhalese military has become much more aggressive] [now UN forced to step in due to refugees and potential hostages] [*****]
CALCUTTA — Amid mounting international criticism of Sri Lankan government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels, a United Nations convoy carrying more than 200 wounded civilians crossed into safety Thursday, the United Nations announced.

The International Committee for the Red Cross confirmed the evacuation and said the convoy was carrying 226 civilians, including children, who had been injured in intense fighting over the last 10 days in and around Mullaittivu, the last rebel stronghold along the northeastern coast of Sri Lanka.

Their injuries may have stemmed from government shelling, though it was impossible to verify because journalists and aid workers have been barred from the combat zone. For three days, the convoy was prevented from crossing the front line by the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, also called the Tamil Tigers.

The breakthrough came Thursday, after aid agencies, human rights groups and the United Nations, which has been unable to evacuate some of its staff and their dependents, issued unusually strong statements criticizing the warring parties. [***]

The Geneva-based International Committee for the Red Cross, which rarely comments publicly in these kinds of situations, estimated that “hundreds of people had been killed” and scores wounded in the latest fighting, and it urged both sides to respect international humanitarian law by allowing aid workers to reach displaced people and permitting trapped civilians to leave the war zone.

Sri Lanka on Thursday rejected the Red Cross statement, saying that the rebels were to blame for firing from near civilian areas and then blocking ambulances trying to evacuate the wounded.

“The fact that Geneva seems oblivious to all this suggests either willful ignorance or naivete,” said Rajiva Wijesinha, a senior government official, writing on the Sri Lankan Ministry of Defense Web site. “It is true that the I.C.R.C. code of operation demands neutrality. Neutrality, however, demands objectivity in analysis and reporting, not generalizations that portray the government in a negative light.”

For several weeks, fighting has intensified between government troops and the Tamil Tigers. The battles have pushed civilians living in rebel-held areas into an ever-shrinking corner of northeastern Sri Lanka. [***]

Mullaittivu fell on Sunday, the government announced earlier this week, insisting that in its battles with the Tamil Tigers it has carefully spared civilians. But information emerging from behind the front line challenges that claim, even as it signals that the Tamil Tigers are using civilians as shields.

In Asia’s longest-running war, the rebels have fought for 25 years to carve out a separate homeland for the ethnic Tamil minority, relying on conventional ground, sea and air forces and their trademark cadre of suicide bombers.

The government has maintained that its assault on the Tamil Tigers has caused no civilian deaths and angrily rejected any criticism of its war efforts. Several prominent Sri Lankan journalists have fled the country.

An estimated 250,000 people are trapped in a 100-square-mile area, [***]the Red Cross said. They have been pushed farther into a shrinking wedge held by the rebels on the island’s northeastern coast.

The Red Cross added that supplies at its emergency hospital in a village called Puthukkudiyiruppu were running out and that it was unable to cope with the 350 patients there.

On Thursday, Amnesty International said in a statement that reports from the war zone “suggest” that both sides are committing war crimes. Human Rights Watch also urged both the government and the Tamil Tigers “to abide by the laws of war, including taking all feasible precautions to minimize harm to civilians during military operations and ensuring that civilians have access to humanitarian assistance.”

Even when civilians manage to trickle out of the rebel-held zone, they are detained in army-guarded camps. The military also closely guards patients at the main government-run hospital in Vavuniya, where the U.N. convoy of wounded are to be treated.

The government ordered all aid agencies except the Red Cross out of rebel-held areas last September although the United Nations is allowed to take food supplies to the displaced.

Artillery shells landed next to its makeshift compound late Saturday night and Sunday, killing civilians who took shelter nearby in what the government had declared a no-fire zone. The rebels had prevented at least two United Nations staff members from leaving their area.
Somini Sengupta reported from Calcutta, and Mark McDonald from Hong Kong.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:39 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/europe/29putin.html
January 29, 2009
Putin’s Grasp of Energy Drives Russian Agenda
By ANDREW E. KRAMER [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [Vlad’s agenda is popular in Russia where Russians sense newly rediscovered respect (fear?)] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW — The titans of Russia’s energy industry gathered around an enormous map showing the route of a proposed new pipeline in Siberia. It would cost billions and had

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/europe/29putin.html
January 29, 2009
Putin’s Grasp of Energy Drives Russian Agenda
By ANDREW E. KRAMER [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [Vlad’s agenda is popular in Russia where Russians sense newly rediscovered respect (fear?)] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW — The titans of Russia’s energy industry gathered around an enormous map showing the route of a proposed new pipeline in Siberia. It would cost billions and had been years in the planning. After listening to their presentation, President Vladimir V. Putin frowned, got up from his chair, whipped out a felt pen and redrew the map right in front of the embarrassed executives, who quickly agreed to his alternative. [don’t they mean PM Putin?] [or was this when he was president?] [****]

The performance, which was carried on state television in 2006, [***]was obviously stage managed, but there was nothing artificial about its point. It was a typical performance for a leader who has shown an uncanny mastery of the economics, politics and even technical details of the energy business that goes well beyond a politician taking an interest in an important national industry.

“I would describe it as very much his personal project,” said Clifford G. Gaddy, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington and an expert in Russia’s energy policy. “It is the heart of what he has done from the very beginning.”

Indeed, from his earliest days in power in 2000, Mr. Putin, who left the presidency in 2008 and became prime minister, decided natural resource exports and energy in particular would not only finance the country’s economic rebirth but also help restore Russia’s lost greatness after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Just this month, Mr. Putin’s personal immersion in the topic was on full display as he ordered natural gas shut off to Ukraine, in the process cutting supplies to Europe. It was portrayed by the Kremlin as a protracted commercial dispute with Ukraine. But the hundreds of thousands of shivering gas customers in the Balkans and Eastern Europe sent an unmistakable message about the Continent’s reliance on Russian supplies — and Mr. Putin’s willingness to wield energy as a political weapon. [indeed] [the message was not subtle] [and it was received as intended] [****]

When talking about energy, he often rattles off obscure statistics not often heard outside a Houston boardroom, like average daily production of fields and throughput capacity of pipelines.

Mr. Putin “clearly knows as much about BP’s business in Russia as I do,” Anthony B. Hayward, BP’s chief executive, once said after a meeting with him.

In fact, the standoff in Ukraine was just one part of a far larger Russian playbook on natural gas policy under Mr. Putin. In the past year, Russia has formed a cartel-like group with Middle Eastern nations with the goal of dampening global competition in natural gas, sewn up sources of supply in Central Asia and North Africa with long-term contracts to thwart competitors and used its military to occupy an important pipeline route in Georgia. [****] [with oil around $50 per barrel, Russia’s recent expansionist tendencies are perforce curbed] [****]

And this broader struggle extends over a dozen countries from Azerbaijan to Austria. [***]In its sprawl and slow pace, it is often compared to the 19th-century struggle for colonial possession in Central Asia known as the Great Game. In the modern variant, Mr. Putin, a master strategist, has proved far more effective than his European counterparts.

“He has been thinking for some time, ‘What are the means and tools at Russia’s disposal, to make Russia great?’ ” said Lilia Shevtsova, a researcher at the Carnegie Moscow Center. In the post-Soviet world, she said, Mr. Putin concluded that “military power would no longer be sufficient.”

A spokesman for Mr. Putin, Dmitri S. Peskov, said that the energy market “was, is and will remain a strategic sphere for Russia” and that government leaders in Moscow should be versed in the topic. Mr. Peskov denied the Kremlin used exports for political purposes. Of Mr. Putin’s deep personal knowledge of the business, he said the prime minister showed a similar attention to detail in other matters, too.

In this contest, Russia’s overarching goal is to prevent the West from breaking a monopoly on natural gas pipelines from Asia to Europe. Boris E. Nemtsov, a former Russian first deputy prime minister who is now in the opposition, said: “It is the typical behavior of the monopolist. The monopolist fears competition.”

As they did two years ago after a similar supply disruption, European officials have promised in the wake of the Ukraine dispute to take steps to diversify the Continent’s sources of gas to end its reliance on Russia, which supplies nearly 30 percent of the total. European dependence is expected to grow as North Sea gas fields decline.

At a conference in Budapest on Tuesday, Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek of the Czech Republic called for a renewed effort to build the long-delayed Nabucco pipeline to bring Central Asian gas to Europe without passing through Russian territory.

But there is a reason the project has never gotten off the ground: as determined as Europe is to end its reliance on Russian gas, Mr. Putin is equally adamant about extending it.

The Nabucco pipeline was proposed in 2002 by executives from European energy companies with the express intent of undercutting Russia’s gas monopoly. It would pass through Turkey and Georgia to the Caspian Sea.

Under the best of circumstances, building an international pipeline is an intricate and arduous process, technically, financially and politically. However, Nabucco’s planners rapidly discovered that their biggest obstacle was not a mountain chain or a corrupt local politician, but Mr. Putin himself. When OMV, the Austrian energy company, formally created a consortium for Nabucco in 2005, he responded with a competing idea: a pipeline called South Stream that would terminate at the same gas storage site in Austria, but originate in Russia and bypass Ukraine by traveling under the Black Sea.

In a contest often compared to chess, this Russian countermove, like all good chess moves, was both offensive and defensive.

To pay the hefty upfront construction costs, a pipeline needs both an assured source of supply and a market for the gas it transports. The South Stream pipeline would flood the gas market in southeastern Europe, locking up the customers the bankers behind Nabucco were counting on to finance the project.

At the same time it would undermine Ukraine’s domination of gas lines headed west, one of the biggest obstacles to Russian domination of the European gas market.

But Mr. Putin did not stop there. Leaving nothing to chance, he also took steps to choke off potential sources of upstream gas supplies deep in Central Asia.

The race to secure these rich sources of natural gas unexpectedly accelerated in 2006 with the death of the eccentric and isolationist dictator of Turkmenistan, Saparmurat Niyazov. While energy executives around the world rushed to Ashgabat, the Turkmen capital, to meet the new leader, Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, a former dentist, Mr. Putin was the first to cut a big deal.

Smiling and holding shovels at a televised ceremony to mark the start of construction, Mr. Putin and Mr. Berdymukhammedov agreed in 2007 to build a pipeline north, to Russia, depriving Nabucco of potential supply. It was not until 2008 that European Union officials got to Ashgabat with a memorandum of understanding for a trans-Caspian pipeline that could link to Nabucco. It has yet to be acted upon.

Farther west, it was the same story.

In February 2008, Mr. Putin signed an agreement with Bulgaria — over the objections of the United States and in spite of Bulgaria’s status as a new NATO member — making it a partner in the South Stream pipeline.

And in April 2008, Mr. Putin was in Athens, cutting a deal for a spur of South Stream. In this flurry of diplomacy he again beat his Western opponents. The United States State Department’s point man on Eurasian pipelines, Matthew J. Bryza, in Athens the next day, could only rue the signed deal. Mr. Bryza was left explaining to the Greeks: “If you have only one supplier of feta, you’re in a vulnerable position. The same for gas.”

The West still had an important pipeline partner in Georgia, a critical geographical link. But that all but evaporated in the brief war last summer.

By 2007, a pipeline section had been laid across Georgia, the Baku-Erzurum pipeline, which is now used for local distribution but will become a part of the Nabucco pipeline, if it is ever built. This brought the struggle for Nabucco to a pivotal stage, for it was now playing out along a storied trade route in the petroleum business, and one highly sensitive to the Russians.

In the 19th century the Rothschild banking family and the Nobel brothers of Sweden had built a railroad and pipeline across Georgia to sell Baku oil, undercutting the near monopoly in the business, Standard Oil of the United States, which was supplying Europe with kerosene produced in America.

After the breakup of the Soviet Union, the revival of this pre-Bolshevik energy corridor became a major foreign policy goal of the United States, intended to strengthen the economic independence of former Soviet states and diversify world oil supplies away from the Middle East. At a narrow point, the pipeline route passes just south of the Russian-controlled enclave of South Ossetia and north of another Russian ally, Armenia.

The August war sent a chill through boardrooms in the West when, for example, Russian tanks scurried back and forth over one of the buried pipelines and one crew occupied a pumping station. [***]Russia, said Svante Cornell, a specialist on Central Asia and the Caucasus at the School for Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, sent a simple message: “We can blow this up at any time.”

While his track record is very strong, Mr. Putin is not infallible. Last summer he made a rare mistake by locking in long-term contracts for Central Asian gas at close to the height of the market — $340 for 1,000 cubic meters in 2009. While Mr. Putin achieved his goal of depriving Nabucco of more potential sources, Russia is now selling that gas in a down market to Ukraine for an average of less than $240 per 1,000 cubic meters — one possible reason, energy experts have said, that Mr. Putin tried to force Ukraine to pay more for gas this winter.

Despite its best intentions, Europe is likely to remain dependent on Russian energy supplies for the foreseeable future and, perhaps, indefinitely if Mr. Putin has his way. And that reflects his long-held beliefs.

As far back as 1997, while serving as deputy mayor of St. Petersburg, Mr. Putin earned a graduate degree in economics, writing his thesis on the economics of natural resources.

Later, when scholars at the Brookings Institution analyzed the text, they found 16 pages had been copied without attribution from a 1978 American business school textbook called “Strategic Planning and Policy,” by David I. Cleland and William R. King of the University of Pittsburgh. Mr. Putin has declined to comment on the allegation.

Tellingly, the passages they say were plagiarized relate to the indispensable role of a chief executive in planning within a corporation — the need for one man to have strategic vision and control.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:38 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/africa/29pirates.html
January 29, 2009
Japan Says It Will Send Anti-Piracy Force to Somalia’s Coast
By NORIMITSU ONISHI and MARK MCDONALD [Japan] [NEAsia] [[Afghanistan] [hydra] [Japan’s military contribution to the coalition of the willing in AfPak] [note: Afghanistan is landlocked] [through in fairness, the US has a substantial Naval presence in region and around Karachi] [Japan venturing farther afield than previously] [some 80-plus % of Japan’s energy comes from Gulf so not too surprising with the tanker captured a couple months back] [followup Dec 13] [use ir text] [****]
TOKYO — Japan said Wednesday that it would deploy its Maritime Self-Defense Force to protect Japanese commercial ships off the coast of Somalia. Yasukazu Hamada, the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/africa/29pirates.html
January 29, 2009
Japan Says It Will Send Anti-Piracy Force to Somalia’s Coast
By NORIMITSU ONISHI and MARK MCDONALD [Japan] [NEAsia] [[Afghanistan] [hydra] [Japan’s military contribution to the coalition of the willing in AfPak] [note: Afghanistan is landlocked] [through in fairness, the US has a substantial Naval presence in region and around Karachi] [Japan venturing farther afield than previously] [some 80-plus % of Japan’s energy comes from Gulf so not too surprising with the tanker captured a couple months back] [followup Dec 13] [use ir text] [****]
TOKYO — Japan said Wednesday that it would deploy its Maritime Self-Defense Force to protect Japanese commercial ships off the coast of Somalia. Yasukazu Hamada, the minister of defense, said he had ordered the force to prepare for deployment, possibly as early as March. Japan is expected to restrict its naval efforts, at least initially, to protecting Japanese-owned ships or vessels carrying Japanese goods or crew.

“The pirates in the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Somalia pose threats to Japan and the international community and are an issue that should be dealt with swiftly,” Mr. Hamada said, according to Kyodo News. The deployment, which would be considered a police action, is not expected to be as politically sensitive as other missions in recent years. Japan sent ground troops to Iraq as part of a humanitarian mission and its naval forces to the Indian Ocean on refueling duties as part of the war in Afghanistan. [***]

The country’s pacifist Constitution restricts the activities of its military. Mr. Hamada said that a new law would have to be passed to authorize the maritime force to pursue the anti-piracy mission off Somalia. He did not offer details about the size of the mission. [****]

Mr. Hamada did not indicate whether the Japanese would coordinate with other nations already operating in the Gulf of Aden. About 20 countries have sent ships to the gulf to escort commercial vessels and fend off the increasingly brazen pirates who operate from safe havens in Somalia.

The United States announced plans two weeks ago for a multinational anti-piracy coalition, and a flotilla from the European Union began patrols in the gulf last month.

China, in its first modern deployment of battle-ready warships beyond the Asia-Pacific region, sent two destroyers to escort Chinese merchant ships through the gulf last month. [another reason for Japan?] [almost certainly] [***] The naval vessels are carrying combat teams, missiles and helicopters.

South Korea, Malaysia, Australia and New Zealand are among the Asia-Pacific nations that have also sent ships.

The International Maritime Bureau said 111 ships were attacked in 2008 off the eastern coast of Somalia and in the gulf. Forty-two vessels were hijacked and a dozen are still being held for ransom.

“Successful attacks were carried out at greater distances from land than in previous years,” the bureau said in its annual report this month. Somali pirates boarding the vessels, it said, were also “better armed than in previous years and prepared to assault and injure the crew.”

One of the more spectacular hijackings came in November, when Somali pirates seized the Sirius Star, a Saudi supertanker loaded with oil and bound for the United States. The ship was released Jan. 9, after a ransom was paid.

About 90 percent of Japan’s crude oil imports come from the Middle East, [***] according to the International Energy Agency, and Japan is the world’s second largest net importer of oil, after the United States.
Norimitsu Onishi reported from Tokyo, and Mark McDonald from Hong Kong.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:37 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30mideast.html
January 30, 2009
Gaza Violence Complicates Mitchell Mission
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [yesterday in Jerusalem seeing Perez; today in West Bank seeing Abu Masen] [*****]
JERUSALEM — A day after President Obama’s special Middle East envoy called for a consolidation of the fragile Gaza cease-fire, the truce came under new strain Thursday

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30mideast.html
January 30, 2009
Gaza Violence Complicates Mitchell Mission
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [yesterday in Jerusalem seeing Perez; today in West Bank seeing Abu Masen] [*****]
JERUSALEM — A day after President Obama’s special Middle East envoy called for a consolidation of the fragile Gaza cease-fire, the truce came under new strain Thursday when the Israeli military said Palestinians fired a rocket into Israel at dawn and Israel launched an air attack into southern Gaza.

On his first visit to the region in his new role, the envoy, George J. Mitchell, traveled to the West Bank to meet with Palestinian leaders on Thursday after discussions with Israel’s prime minister, Ehud Olmert on Wednesday. In those talks, Mr. Mitchell said, he spoke of “the critical importance” of consolidating the cease-fire that ended Israel’s three-week offensive against Hamas.

As Mr. Mitchell prepared to travel to Ramallah, Israel said it launched an air attack in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis against a “known terrorist” accused by an Israeli military spokesman of being part of a squad responsible for a roadside bombing on Tuesday that killed an Israeli soldier on the Israeli side of the border.

News reports from Gaza described the target of the attack as a Hamas policeman on a motorcycle who was injured along with several civilians, including schoolchildren.

But the Israeli military spokesman, who spoke in return for customary anonymity, said the man was a member of a group called Global Jihad. The spokesman said the man had once been a supporter of Hamas, the Palestinian militant group which controls Gaza, and which Israel holds responsible for all attacks from the coastal strip.

“As the sole authority in the Gaza Strip, Hamas bears full responsibility for all terrorist activity originating from Gaza,” an Israeli military statement said on Thursday.

Global Jihad, a small and shadowy group that broke from Hamas, took responsibility for Tuesday’s roadside bombing. Israel retaliated with an air strike that wounded a militant and a raid that killed a man whose family said he was a farmer.

On Wednesday, the Israeli military said a rocket, the first since the fighting ended on Jan. 18, was fired from Gaza hours after Mr. Mitchell arrived in Israel from Cairo. It landed in an open area in Israel, causing no injuries. Israel carried out a retaliatory air strike against what the military said was a weapons manufacturing plant in southern Gaza. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Mr. Mitchell told reporters after the meeting with Mr. Olmert that a broadening of the truce should include a cessation of hostilities, an end to weapons smuggling into Gaza and “the reopening of the crossings” based on agreements reached in 2005. [****]

Those agreements, brokered by the United States, called for Palestinian Authority forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah, a Hamas rival, to secure the Palestinian side of the crossings. But Hamas took control of Gaza in 2007, routing the Palestinian Authority forces there. Israel has since imposed a strict economic embargo on Gaza, letting in only humanitarian aid and basic supplies.

An Olmert aide said the prime minister told Mr. Mitchell that the crossings would “not be permanently opened” until the case of a captured Israeli soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit, was resolved. [***]Corporal Shalit was seized in a cross-border raid in 2006 and taken into Gaza. Hamas is demanding that Israel release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including many convicted of major terrorist acts, in exchange for his release.

Hamas has rejected any linkage between the reopening of the passages and the case of Corporal Shalit, and it insists on the reopening as a prerequisite to a lasting cease-fire. In a statement issued in Syria on Wednesday, the exiled leaders of Hamas and seven other Palestinian militant groups said the “factions of the resistance reject the signing of a truce agreement before the opening of all crossing points, the lifting of the blockade and the arrival of supplies.”

Mr. Mitchell planned to meet Mr. Abbas and other Palestinian Authority leaders on Thursday. Mr. Mitchell had no plans to meet with any representatives of Hamas, which the United States, like Israel and the European Union, classifies as a terrorist organization.

In Davos, Switzerland, meanwhile, the United Nations Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, launched an appeal for $613 million in emergency aid for Palestinians in Gaza, saying: “Help is needed urgently,” [***]news reports said.

Mr. Ban visited Gaza after both sides declared unilateral cease-fires almost two weeks ago. He is the highest-ranking international figure to have visited Gaza since the war. Mr. Ban was speaking to reporters covering the World Economic Forum in Davos.
Isabel Kershner reported from Jerusalem. Ethan Bronner and Taghreed El-Khodary contributed reporting from Gaza, Myra Noveck from Jerusalem, and Alan Cowell from Paris.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30blackwater.html
January 30, 2009
Iraq Won’t Grant Blackwater a License
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [private contractor, blackwater, takes a licking] [****]
BAGHDAD -- Blackwater Worldwide, the security firm whose guards killed 17 civilians on a crowded Baghdad street in 2007, will not have its operating license granted by the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/middleeast/30blackwater.html
January 30, 2009
Iraq Won’t Grant Blackwater a License
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [private contractor, blackwater, takes a licking] [****]
BAGHDAD -- Blackwater Worldwide, the security firm whose guards killed 17 civilians on a crowded Baghdad street in 2007, will not have its operating license granted by the Iraqi government, a decision that will likely force American diplomats here to make new arrangements for their personal protection, [***]officials said Thursday.

It is unclear how soon Blackwater will leave Iraq, but it is likely that it will remain at least until spring, when a joint Iraqi-American committee is scheduled to complete guidelines for private contractors operating in Iraq, officials said.

The Iraqi government has sought in the past to expel Blackwater, but American officials in Iraq who rely on the company’s heavily armed guards for security have said they had no alternative but to continue using the North Carolina-based security contractor.

Unlike many security contractors in Iraq, Blackwater has been operating without an Iraqi government license, although it had recently applied for one.

The request was turned down during the past few weeks by the Iraqi government, officials said.

“They presented their request, and we rejected it,” said Ala’a Al-Taia, an official with Iraq’s Interior Ministry. “There is no longer the necessity to renew their contract because our security forces can handle their mission. There are many marks against this company, specifically that they have a bad history and have been involved in the killing of so many civilians.” [***]

An official at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad said Thursday that the decision, which was first reported in The Washington Post, was being studied.

“We have been informed that Blackwater’s private security company operating license will not be granted,” the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because she lacked permission to discuss the topic to a reporter. “We don’t have specifics about dates. We are working with the government of Iraq and our contractors to address the implications of this decision.” Security contractors working in Iraq lost their immunity from prosecution under Iraqi law on December 31 as part of the Status of Forces Agreement signed between the United States and Iraq. The agreement also strengthens the Iraqi government’s hand with United States officials to enforce its decision to not allow Blackwater to operate.

The immunity issue had been a priority for the Iraqi government since the September 16, 2007, shooting in Baghdad’s Nisoor Square. Blackwater’s guards, riding in a convoy through the square, opened fire on Iraqi civilians. The guards apparently believed they were being fired on. [***]

Last month, five Blackwater guards were charged in the United States with manslaughter in the connection to the Nissor Square shooting. They pleaded not guilty. A sixth guard is cooperating with prosecutors.

Anne Tyrrell, a spokeswoman for Blackwater Worldwide, said Thursday that the company had not yet received official notification that its Iraqi license would not be granted.

“If that is the case,” she said, “we will respect the laws of Iraq and follow the direction of our U.S. government customers to insure that we are compliant with our contractual obligations as well as the rules of Iraq.”

Blackwater provides personal security to American State Department employees in Iraq, including the U.S. Ambassador. [they also enrage US troops who don’t get paid nearly what the ex military folk who staff blackwater get paid] [they are also seen in pejorative terms for most part] [***] Iraq’s decision to ban the firm did not come without warning. In 2008, the State Department’s inspector general warned in a report that there was a “real possibility” that Blackwater might not be licensed by the Iraqi government to continue to protect American diplomats in Baghdad in 2009.
Suadad al-Salhy contributed reporting from Iraq, and Sharon Otterman contributed from New York.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:35 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/middleeast/29election.html
January 29, 2009
Iraqi Women Vie for Votes and Taste of Power
By SAM DAGHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [-ir women growing constituency?] [****]
BAGHDAD — Amal Kibash, a candidate for the Baghdad provincial council, is running a bold and even feverish campaign by most standards. With elections coming on

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/middleeast/29election.html
January 29, 2009
Iraqi Women Vie for Votes and Taste of Power
By SAM DAGHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [-ir women growing constituency?] [****]
BAGHDAD — Amal Kibash, a candidate for the Baghdad provincial council, is running a bold and even feverish campaign by most standards. With elections coming on Saturday, she is trolling for every vote she can muster.

“You are going to vote for me, right?” she quizzed passers-by on a stroll recently through her neighborhood of Sadr City, which was until May a battleground for Shiite militias. Giant posters of her veil-framed face were draped on several buildings, some of which still bore the marks of recent fighting.

In Basra, where until a year ago banners warned women that they would be shot if they wore too much makeup or ventured out of their homes without a veil, another female candidate, Ibtihal Abdul-Rahman, put up posters of herself last month. Encouraged by security improvements throughout the country, thousands of women are running for council seats in the provincial elections. [***]

Of the estimated 14,400 candidates, close to 4,000 are women. [***] [27%] Some female candidates have had their posters splattered with mud, defaced with beards or torn up, but most have been spared the violence that has claimed the lives of two male candidates and a coalition leader since the start of the year. But on Wednesday, a woman working for the Iraqi Islamic Party was killed when gunmen burst into her house in Baghdad and shot her 10 times in the chest, according to an Interior Ministry official.

For many of the female candidates, the elections offer a chance to inject some much needed fresh air into councils that are plagued by deep corruption and dominated by men and big political parties that are often ultraconservative.

But even if they win, they face numerous hurdles, particularly the entrenched attitudes of most Iraqi men, who view women as either sex objects or child bearers who have no place in the rough-and-tumble arena of politics. “This is the mentality,” said Safia Taleb al-Suhail, a member of Parliament and the daughter of a prominent Shiite tribal leader assassinated by Saddam Hussein’s henchmen in Lebanon in 1994. “We have to change it. How can we change it? By fighting.”

She is leading a group of female Parliament members who are lobbying to make sure that the same constitutional provision that mandates that 25 percent of all seats in Parliament go to women is applied to provincial councils as well. [***]Currently, it is not.

While Iraq in the 1950s was the first Arab country to name a female minister and adopt a progressive family law, the leadership aspirations of women were mostly quashed under Mr. Hussein’s macho government. The situation became further complicated for women after 2003, with the ascendance of religious parties. [***]

Ms. Suhail and others were instrumental in lobbying Iraq’s American administrator at the time, L. Paul Bremer III, to include the quota for women in the country’s first transitional constitution. It was preserved in the current Constitution because many felt that it was the only way to ensure the participation of women in a male-dominated culture.

When it was published in October, the law regulating the provincial elections omitted the quota for women; it remains unclear whether the omission was deliberate or just an oversight. The electoral commission has ruled that the law as written is acceptable, saying that women are ensured of adequate representation by the requirement that a woman be chosen after every three men in any winning slate.

But Ms. Suhail said that many of the candidate slates did not have enough women in them to meet that requirement, while other slates were made up of fewer than four candidates, all of whom are male.

Mahdiya Abed-Hassan al-Lami, a women’s rights advocate, and candidate in Baghdad running on the slate of a former prime minister, Ibrahim Jaafari, said that while she supported the quota system, it has been manipulated by the major political parties, both secular and religious, to marginalize women. Most of the women chosen for the large candidate slates are there for their family and tribal connections and loyalty to the sect or party, she said, rather than for their qualifications.

“If women are simply followers they cannot fulfill their roles properly,” said Ms. Lami, who is a teacher and a practicing Shiite. Her campaign has focused on reaching out to her network of women, particularly in some of the most destitute slums of Baghdad.

Ms. Kibash, another female candidate who is running on Mr. Jaafari’s list, is currently a member of the Sadr City municipal council, but she and other women on the council are prevented by the men from sitting on the crucial and financially important Services Committee. She said the council was mired in corruption.

Despite the recent gains in security, some women continue to face threats, while others say the whole thing is a charade and not worth the effort.

Liza Hido sat on a municipal council but was forced to quit in 2006 after receiving threatening e-mail and text messages on her cellphone.

She is running again this year but, still concerned for her safety, she is keeping her campaigning discreet, putting up no posters and making no public appearances. Instead, she restricts herself to private gatherings.

Her friend Bushra al-Obeidi, a law professor at Baghdad University, has rebuffed all efforts to persuade her to become a candidate. She feels the odds are stacked against women, starting with laws she views as discriminatory and derogatory toward women — one allows a rapist to largely escape punishment if he marries his victim. Ms. Obeidi also has little faith in the commitment to gender equality among the current political leadership, which is dominated by religious parties.

“I assure you,” she said, “they are against women. They are lying to us.”
Ms. Suhail, the lawmaker, admitted that Iraqi women had failed so far to break into the top levels of the political power structure but said that this was no reason to give up.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:35 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/asia/30afghan.html
January 30, 2009
Afghan Presidential Election Delayed
By DEXTER FILKINS [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [shocker: Afghan elections delayed] [whether or not Karzai has any connection, the whiff of impropriety] [use psci469b] [****]
KABUL — Afghan officials said Thursday they had decided to postpone the country’s presidential election until August, saying they needed more time to prepare. But opposition figures said that the decision, which appeared to contravene Afghanistan’s constitution, raised doubts about the legitimacy of what could be President Hamid Karzai’s final months in office. [***]

Azizullah Ludin, the chairman of the Independent Election Commission, said that his office had decided to put off the voting until August 20, which would give election

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/30/world/asia/30afghan.html
January 30, 2009
Afghan Presidential Election Delayed
By DEXTER FILKINS [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [shocker: Afghan elections delayed] [whether or not Karzai has any connection, the whiff of impropriety] [use psci469b] [****]
KABUL — Afghan officials said Thursday they had decided to postpone the country’s presidential election until August, saying they needed more time to prepare. But opposition figures said that the decision, which appeared to contravene Afghanistan’s constitution, raised doubts about the legitimacy of what could be President Hamid Karzai’s final months in office. [***]

Azizullah Ludin, the chairman of the Independent Election Commission, said that his office had decided to put off the voting until August 20, which would give election workers more time to register candidates and set up voting machinery, and soldiers more time to bring dozens of chaotic districts under control. Mr. Ludin said the new date would allow the presidential election to take place under more favorable summer weather.

But the decision appeared to contravene Afghanistan’s constitution, which states that the president’s term expires on the Roman calendar’s equivalent of May 22. Fresh presidential elections, the constitution says, must be held within thirty to sixty days before the end of that term. [***]

Referring to the constitution, leaders of the parliamentary opposition to President Karzai said they would stop recognizing his authority after May 22. They called on the United Nations and Western governments to help them appoint a temporary president after Mr. Karzai’s term formally expires. [***] [not bloody likely]

“After May 22, Karzai’s continuation will not be legitimate for either us or the Afghan people,” said Aqa Fazil Sancharki, a spokesman for the United Front, whose members control about a third of the 241 seats in the lower house of parliament.

A spokesman for President Karzai said he would respect the commission’s decision to delay the vote. President Karzai, who was elected to a five-year term in 2004, has led the country since the ouster of the Taliban in Nov. 2001. He has declared his intention to seek reelection, and while a number of prominent Afghans have said they may also run, only three lesser-known candidates have declared so far.

The election this year will come at an especially difficult time, with the Taliban insurgency challenging the government’s writ in many areas.

A United Nations spokesman said the organization had reconciled itself to the delay, given that there did not appear to be enough time to have everything in place by late May. [***]“At this point, it has become a pragmatic necessity,” Adrian Edwards, a United Nations spokesman in Kabul, said.

Mr. Ludin, the chairman of the election commission, acknowledged that delaying the election was not ideal. But he said he didn’t have a choice, given the challenges of the country’s harsh environment and the Taliban insurgency. Of the 364 districts around the country, 84 of them are not safe enough to hold an election, he said.

“We are not in a normal situation in Afghanistan,” Mr. Ludin said.

Anticipating the delay, American and NATO commanders here have set as one of their main goals for 2009 the securing of the country for peaceful elections. About 70,000 foreign troops are now in Afghanistan, nearly half of them American. The Obama administration has promised to send up to 30,000 more troops over the next 18 months.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/27/AR2009012703321.html
Intelligence Pick Fields Panel's Questions
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 28, 2009; A13 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [DNI Blair answers questions after recent testimony [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
Retired Adm. Dennis C. Blair, whose nomination to be director of national intelligence is scheduled for a vote today before the Senate intelligence committee, dealt with some

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/27/AR2009012703321.html
Intelligence Pick Fields Panel's Questions
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 28, 2009; A13 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [DNI Blair answers questions after recent testimony [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
Retired Adm. Dennis C. Blair, whose nomination to be director of national intelligence is scheduled for a vote today before the Senate intelligence committee, dealt with some critical issues in a written response to panel members' questions, indicating support for disclosing the annual national intelligence budget figure, opposition to the creation of a domestic intelligence agency separate from the FBI and support for informing Congress when the Pentagon conducts covert intelligence activities. [***]

After Blair's hearing last Thursday, members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence had additional questions. The arrival of his answers set the stage for today's expected favorable vote. The committee also scheduled Leon E. Panetta's hearing on his nomination as CIA director for next Tuesday.

Under one law, the CIA and other government intelligence agencies must report covert operations to Congress, but the Pentagon at times has said that such activities come under a different law.

Blair said that different laws governing covert activities were written during the Cold War and "currently slow and degrade the conduct of operations in the field." He said that some CIA covert activities need military support and that other military actions need intelligence agency cooperation. "There is often not a bright line between these operations," he said, but they "must be carefully considered and approved by appropriate authorities." [****] [not really] [there was a stray paragraph that has been used to justify all manner of covert sins] [that the president directs from time to time] [***]

He also said he favors some changes to the White House national security apparatus as recommended by the Project on National Security Reform, of which he was deputy executive director. Two changes he mentioned were the creation of an integrated national security budget that would cover all departments and intelligence agencies, and the creation of interagency teams and crisis task forces under the Executive Office of the President to oversee interagency execution of policy for situations such as those in Afghanistan and Iran.

Asked about reducing the staff of the Office of Director of National Intelligence, a longtime concern of the committee, Blair said he would make it a "priority to assess this issue," adding: "I believe that large staffs can sometimes interfere in the effective management of a large organization."

Blair's financial statement, released by the committee yesterday, shows that he collected substantial sums as a director of several companies doing defense business. As a member of the board of Tyco International, he was paid $80,000 in fees and had stock awards totaling $120,000. Two years ago, the Pentagon inspector general reported that Blair had violated conflict of interest rules when, as head of the Institute for Defense Analyses, he did not disqualify himself totally from a study that involved the F-22 aircraft at a time when he was on the board of two subcontractors, one of which was Tyco.

At his hearing last week, Blair said that was a mistake, and in his written answers he said he would consult with the DNI general counsel if potential conflicts or the appearance of conflict arose after he was confirmed.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:27 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/washington/28military.html
January 28, 2009
Gates Seeks to Improve Battlefield Trauma Care in Afghanistan
By THOM SHANKER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [SecDef Gates begins articulating plans for AfPak] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
WASHINGTON — In Iraq, wounded American troops are treated at a well-equipped field hospital within one hour, regardless of where they were fighting or how bad the battle.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/washington/28military.html
January 28, 2009
Gates Seeks to Improve Battlefield Trauma Care in Afghanistan
By THOM SHANKER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [SecDef Gates begins articulating plans for AfPak] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
WASHINGTON — In Iraq, wounded American troops are treated at a well-equipped field hospital within one hour, regardless of where they were fighting or how bad the battle.

In Afghanistan, with its rugged terrain, their comrades are not so fortunate. Some wounded troops there do not receive advanced trauma care for almost two hours, greatly lessening the chances of survival and rapid recovery.

Now, Robert M. Gates, the defense secretary, is trying to address the imbalance, directing the military to send more helicopters to Afghanistan and to set up a fourth field hospital there to guarantee that wounded Americans are treated within what the military calls “the golden hour.”

The order is Mr. Gates’s latest foray into a Pentagon bureaucracy that he has complained is sometimes too slow to respond to the needs of the troops. It comes as the Obama administration is preparing to double American forces in Afghanistan as part of a plan to battle Al Qaeda and the Taliban more effectively. [***]

“In Iraq, our goal is to have a wounded soldier in a hospital in an hour,” Mr. Gates told Congress on Tuesday. “It’s closer to two hours in Afghanistan. And so what we’ve been working on the last few weeks is, how do we get that medevac standard in Afghanistan down to that ‘golden hour’ in Iraq?”

Mr. Gates has directed that the number of helicopters assigned to medical evacuation in Afghanistan be increased by about 25 percent. They will be drawn from Army, Air Force and Navy equipment, officials said. The exact number remains classified. Some medical evacuation helicopters will be assigned to forward bases, closer to where troops may come into contact with adversaries, the officials said. [***]

Mr. Gates has also directed that some helicopters set aside for search-and-rescue missions for downed pilots in Afghanistan be reconfigured and reassigned to medical evacuation. That is a departure from military doctrine that calls for certain numbers of combat search-and-rescue teams to be on 24-hour call, but it was seen by Mr. Gates and his advisers as an acceptable tradeoff.

“The question is, can you take a little risk there especially as we are going to have more and more forces sent to Afghanistan?” said Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary, who cited military statistics that no American jets or bombers had been shot down in Afghanistan in seven years.

As those new rules have been put in effect over recent weeks, the officials said, the average medical evacuation time in Afghanistan already has dropped to 71 minutes from nearly two hours last year.

Mr. Gates had previously ordered the military to spend billions for mine-resistant troop vehicles and to spend millions more to increase combat surveillance flights in battle. In his testimony on Tuesday, he made it clear that he was dissatisfied with the response across the Pentagon’s civilian and military bureaucracy.

“Efforts to put the bureaucracy on a war footing have, in my view, revealed underlying flaws in the institutional priorities, cultural preferences and reward structures of America’s defense establishment, a set of institutions largely arranged to plan for future wars, to prepare for a short war, but not to wage a protracted war,” [you go Gates] [***] Mr. Gates said.

Pentagon officials said the medical evacuation initiative did not even require purchasing new equipment or hiring additional personnel — just shifting priorities and changing assignments accordingly.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/27/AR2009012700472.html
Gates Predicts 'Slog' in Afghanistan
U.S. Military Can Achieve Limited Goals in Conflict, Defense Secretary Testifies
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 28, 2009; A06 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [SecDef Gates begins articulating plans for AfPak] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates yesterday signaled sharply lower expectations for

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/27/AR2009012700472.html
Gates Predicts 'Slog' in Afghanistan
U.S. Military Can Achieve Limited Goals in Conflict, Defense Secretary Testifies
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 28, 2009; A06 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [SecDef Gates begins articulating plans for AfPak] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates yesterday signaled sharply lower expectations for the war in Afghanistan, warning the conflict will be "a long slog" and that U.S. and allied military forces, [***]even at higher levels, can achieve limited goals.

Gates said the U.S. military expects to be able to send three additional combat brigades -- between 10,000 and 12,000 troops [but said not inclinded to send more] [***]-- to Afghanistan between late spring and midsummer to address a security vacuum "that increasingly has been filled by the Taliban."

Still, he warned that he would be "deeply skeptical" of any further U.S. troop increases, [***] saying that Afghan soldiers and police must take the lead, in part so that the Afghan public does not turn against U.S. forces as it has against foreign troops throughout history. The U.S. force in Afghanistan numbers about 36,000, and commanders there have asked for as many as 30,000 more combat and support troops.

"There is little doubt that our greatest military challenge right now is Afghanistan," Gates said, marking the formal shift in priorities away from Iraq in his first congressional testimony as Pentagon chief under President Obama. Still, Gates said, U.S. goals in Afghanistan must be "modest" and "realistic."

"This is going to be a long slog, and frankly, my view is that we need to be very careful about the nature of the goals we set for ourselves in Afghanistan," he said. "If we set ourselves the objective of creating some sort of central Asian Valhalla over there, we will lose, because nobody in the world has that kind of time, patience and money," Gates testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee. [***](Valhalla is used as a synonym for heaven, but in Norse mythology it is a great hall where heroes slain in battle are received.)

Civilian casualties resulting from U.S. combat and airstrikes have been particularly harmful to progress in Afghanistan and must be avoided, Gates stressed. "My worry is that the Afghans come to see us as part of their problem rather than part of their solution, and then we are lost," he said.

Moreover, the U.S. military must immediately voice regret for any civilian casualties, rather than waiting to investigate the details, Gates said in separate testimony before the House Armed Services Committee yesterday afternoon.

Gates said this is necessary to counter Taliban insurgents, who he said hide among the population and then report civilian deaths in coalition military operations quickly and widely on the Internet. "The instant we believe there may have been civilian casualties, we have to be out there" expressing condolences, rather than arguing over the numbers, he said.

Gates also warned of Iranian interference in Afghanistan, pointing to a slightly increased flow of weapons including components of lethal munitions known as "explosively formed projectiles." [***]He said Iran wants to "have it both ways," seeking economic and diplomatic benefits of relations with Kabul while still attempting to impose "the highest possible costs" on U.S. and coalition troops.

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Michael Mullen said at a news conference late yesterday that roadside bomb and suicide attacks in Afghanistan have increased an estimated 40 percent over last year.

Iranian activities have been troubling in other parts of the world, Gates said, including Latin America, where Iran is setting up "a lot of offices and a lot of fronts."

On Iraq, Gates said Pentagon and military leaders are working on several timetables for U.S. troops to move from a combat to an advisory role beginning as early as 16 months from now and extending until the end of 2011. The options for and risks of withdrawing the 142,000 U.S. troops now in Iraq are being presented to Obama, who will meet with the Joint Chiefs at the Pentagon today, Gates said.

At the Pentagon, Gates made it clear that in a time of financial austerity his priority will be to reform the Pentagon's cumbersome acquisition process while crafting "a unified defense strategy that determines our budget priorities."

"The spigot of defense spending that opened on 9/11 is closing. With two major campaigns ongoing, the economic crisis and resulting budget pressures will force hard choices on this department," he said.

In particular, he criticized "entrenched attitudes throughout the government" that he said "are particularly pronounced in the area of acquisition: a risk-averse culture, a litigious process, parochial interests, excessive and changing requirements, budget churn and instability, and sometimes adversarial relationships" between the Pentagon and other parts of government.

Gates gave few details about the upcoming defense budget but offered a glimpse of how he will approach his pledge to take a hard look at Pentagon spending on weapons systems. New weapons systems should be able to address a "hybrid" threat from enemies who combine high technology with insurgent tactics.

"I want us to look for systems that have the maximum possible flexibility across the broadest possible range of conflict," he said in the House testimony.

On detainees, Gates said he agrees with the deadline of closing the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within a year. He said about 70 detainees can return home for rehabilitation, while others will face trial in military courts or military commissions. The "toughest issue" will be dealing with "the relatively small number" who "cannot be brought to trial and yet are quite open about saying that if they're released, they will find ways to kill Americans," he said.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/washington/28diplo.html
January 28, 2009
Clinton Sees an Opportunity for Iran to Return to Diplomacy
By MARK LANDLER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [Sec State Clinton on Iran] [see today’s external for Ahmadinejad] [use psci355, 455] [individual-role too] [****]
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Tuesday that Iran had a “clear opportunity” to engage with the international community, amplifying the conciliatory tone struck a day earlier by President Obama toward Iran and the rest of the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/washington/28diplo.html
January 28, 2009
Clinton Sees an Opportunity for Iran to Return to Diplomacy
By MARK LANDLER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [Sec State Clinton on Iran] [see today’s external for Ahmadinejad] [use psci355, 455] [individual-role too] [****]
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Tuesday that Iran had a “clear opportunity” to engage with the international community, amplifying the conciliatory tone struck a day earlier by President Obama toward Iran and the rest of the Muslim world.

Sketching out an ambitious diplomatic agenda, Mrs. Clinton also suggested that there could be some form of direct communication between the United States and North Korea. And she said relations with China had been excessively influenced by economic issues during the Bush administration.

Mrs. Clinton, in her first remarks to reporters since becoming the nation’s chief diplomat, said, “There is a clear opportunity for the Iranians, as the president expressed in his interview, to demonstrate some willingness to engage meaningfully with the international community.”

Speaking Monday to an Arabic-language news channel, Al Arabiya, Mr. Obama reiterated his determination that the United States explore ways to engage directly with Iran, even as he said Tehran’s suspected pursuit of a nuclear weapon and its support for terrorist groups were destabilizing.

Less than a week into her job, Mrs. Clinton seemed energized. She traveled to the White House on Monday to help send off the administration’s special envoy to the Middle East, George J. Mitchell, and she has racked up a list of calls to nearly 40 foreign leaders or foreign ministers.

The world, Mrs. Clinton asserted, was yearning for a new American foreign policy.

“There is a great exhalation of breath going on around the world,” she said. “We’ve got a lot of damage to repair.”

Mrs. Clinton did not disclose the options under consideration for reaching out to Iran, beyond mentioning the existing multilateral talks involving Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China. But she indicated that she and Mr. Obama were thinking broadly.

The multilateral group is scheduled to meet next week in Germany, and European diplomats said they hoped that the meeting would provide the first clues about the administration’s strategy.

The administration is expected to name Dennis B. Ross, a longtime Middle East peace negotiator, to a senior post handling Iran, according to State Department officials. That Mr. Ross was not at the same meeting as Mr. Mitchell surprised some people who follow Iranian issues, given how long his appointment had been rumored. But officials said Mr. Ross was at the State Department on Monday.

Analysts said the timing for an American overture to Iran was better now than it had been for a long time.

“The Iranian regime is in a truly desperate situation,” said Abbas Milani, the director of Iranian studies at Stanford University. “The regime is in a much more amenable mood because the economy is in a shambles. They’re also dealing with someone whose name is Barack Hussein Obama.”

As for North Korea, Mrs. Clinton said the administration was committed to existing multilateral talks over its nuclear program. But she noted that in the past, there had been bilateral talks within the current six-nation arrangement. “We’re going to pursue steps that we think are effective,” she said.

On China, Mrs. Clinton said that the United States needed “a more comprehensive approach” and that the strategic dialogue of the Bush administration “turned into an economic dialogue.”

“The economy will always be a centerpiece of our relationship, but we want it to be part of a broader agenda,” Mrs. Clinton said. She did not specify what other issues the United States would put on the table.

Last week, Timothy F. Geithner, who was sworn in Monday as Treasury secretary, signaled a potentially more confrontational stance toward China, saying in written testimony to the Senate that China manipulated its currency.

During the Bush administration, the Treasury Department, particularly under Henry M. Paulson Jr., played a lead role in coordinating policy toward China. Mrs. Clinton has pushed for the State Department to increase its profile on economic affairs, which suggests a stronger role on China.

Mrs. Clinton declined to be drawn out on details about changes in policy toward Iran or another thorny challenge, Afghanistan. Both, she said, were the subject of policy reviews.

She also said little about Mr. Mitchell’s first mission, except to note that the United States was focused for now on talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians. She did not address Syria’s role.

Mrs. Clinton brushed off suggestions that the appointment of Mr. Mitchell and another emissary — Richard C. Holbrooke, who will be special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan — could lead to conflict or rivalries in policy making.

“Oh, no, no,” she said. “I think we have already established a collegial, effective working relationship.”
Helene Cooper contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/us/politics/28policy.html
January 28, 2009
Aides Say Obama’s Afghan Aims Elevate War
By HELENE COOPER and THOM SHANKER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [Obama and cabinet begin articulating plans for AfPak] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
WASHINGTON — President Obama intends to adopt a tougher line toward Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, as part of a new American approach to Afghanistan that will put more emphasis on waging war than on development, senior administration

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/us/politics/28policy.html
January 28, 2009
Aides Say Obama’s Afghan Aims Elevate War
By HELENE COOPER and THOM SHANKER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabiya] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [Obama and cabinet begin articulating plans for AfPak] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
WASHINGTON — President Obama intends to adopt a tougher line toward Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, as part of a new American approach to Afghanistan that will put more emphasis on waging war than on development, senior administration officials said Tuesday.

Mr. Karzai is now seen as a potential impediment to American goals in Afghanistan, the officials said, because corruption [***]has become rampant in his government, contributing to a flourishing drug trade and the resurgence of the Taliban.

Among those pressing for Mr. Karzai to do more, the officials said, are Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Richard C. Holbrooke, Mr. Obama’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The officials portrayed the approach as a departure from that of President Bush, who held videoconferences with Mr. Karzai every two weeks and sought to emphasize the American role in rebuilding Afghanistan and its civil institutions. [***]

They said that the Obama administration would work with provincial leaders as an alternative to the central government, and that it would leave economic development and nation-building increasingly to European allies, so that American forces could focus on the fight against insurgents.

“If we set ourselves the objective of creating some sort of Central Asian Valhalla over there, we will lose,” Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who served under Mr. Bush and is staying on under Mr. Obama, told Congress on Tuesday. He said there was not enough “time, patience or money” to pursue overly ambitious goals in Afghanistan, and he called the war there “our greatest military challenge.”

Mr. Gates said last week that previous American goals for Afghanistan had been “too broad and too far into the future,” language that differed from Mr. Bush’s policies.

NATO has not met its pledges for combat troops, transport helicopters, military trainers and other support personnel in Afghanistan, and Mr. Gates has openly criticized the United States’ NATO allies for not fulfilling their promises.

Mr. Holbrooke is preparing to travel to the region, and administration officials said he would ask more of Mr. Karzai, particularly on fighting corruption, aides said, as part of what they described as a “more for more” approach. [how about to step aside and let Giani or somebody with credibility win] [***]

Mr. Karzai is facing re-election this year, and it is not clear whether Mr. Obama and his aides intend to support his candidacy. The administration will be watching, aides said, to see if Mr. Karzai responds to demands from the United States and its NATO allies that he arrest associates, including his half-brother, whom Western officials have accused of smuggling drugs in Kandahar.

Shortly before taking office as vice president last week, Mr. Biden traveled to Afghanistan in his role as the departing chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He met with Mr. Karzai and warned him that the Obama administration would expect more of him than Mr. Bush did, administration officials said. He told Mr. Karzai that Mr. Obama would be discontinuing the video calls that Mr. Karzai enjoyed with Mr. Bush, said a senior official, who added that Mr. Obama expected Mr. Karzai to do more to crack down on corruption.

After his return from Afghanistan, Mr. Biden, who has had a contentious relationship with Mr. Karzai, described the situation there as “a real mess.”

An election is scheduled to be held no later than the fall, under Afghanistan’s Constitution. Zalmay Khalilzad, an Afghan-American who is a former United States ambassador to the United Nations and is viewed as a possible challenger to Mr. Karzai, warned that the Obama administration must tread carefully as it recalibrated its Afghanistan policy. [***]

“If it looks like we’re abandoning the central government and focusing just on the local areas, we will run afoul of Afghan politics,” Mr. Khalilzad said. “Some will regard it as an effort to break up the Afghan state, which would be regarded as hostile policy.”

Mr. Obama is preparing to increase the number of American troops in Afghanistan over the next two years, perhaps to more than 60,000 from about 34,000 now. But Mr. Gates indicated Tuesday that the administration would move slowly, at least for now. He outlined plans for an increase of about 12,000 troops by midsummer but cautioned that any decision on more troops beyond that might have to wait until late 2009, given the need for barracks and other infrastructure.

With the forces of the Taliban and Al Qaeda mounting more aggressive operations in eastern and southern Afghanistan, administration officials said they saw little option but to focus on the military campaign. They said Europeans would be asked to pick up more of the work on reconstruction, police training and cooperation with the Afghan government. They also said much of the international effort might shift to helping local governments and institutions, and away from the government in Kabul.

“It’s not about dumping reconstruction at all,” said a senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the diplomatic delicacy of the subject. “What we’re trying to do is to focus on the Al Qaeda problem. That has to be our first priority.”

Mr. Gates said Tuesday that under the redefined Afghan strategy, it would be vital for NATO allies to “provide more civilian support.” In particular, he said, the allies should be more responsible for building civil society institutions in Afghanistan, [***]a task that had been falling to American forces. He also demanded that allies “step up to the plate” and defray costs of expanding the Afghan Army, an emerging power center, whose leaders could emerge as rivals to Mr. Karzai.

Mr. Gates added that the United States should focus on limited goals. “My own personal view is that our primary goal is to prevent Afghanistan from being used as a base for terrorists and extremists to attack the United States and our allies, and whatever else we need to do flows from that objective,” he said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:24 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/27/AR2009012702675.html
Partnering With Pakistan
By Asif Ali Zardari
Wednesday, January 28, 2009; A15 [oped] [Zardari] [never one to miss a sensed opportunity] [Mr. 10% makes his money demands explicit for new Obama admin] [**]
ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan looks forward to a new beginning in its bilateral relationship with the United States. First, we congratulate Barack Obama and the country that had

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/27/AR2009012702675.html
Partnering With Pakistan
By Asif Ali Zardari
Wednesday, January 28, 2009; A15 [oped] [Zardari] [never one to miss a sensed opportunity] [Mr. 10% makes his money demands explicit for new Obama admin] [**]
ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan looks forward to a new beginning in its bilateral relationship with the United States. First, we congratulate Barack Obama and the country that had the character to elect him, and we welcome his decision to name a special envoy to Southwest Asia. Appointing the seasoned diplomat Richard Holbrooke says much about the president's worldview and his understanding of the complexities of peace and stability and the threats of extremism and terrorism. Simply put, we must move beyond rhetoric and tackle the hard problems.

Pakistan has repeatedly been identified as the most critical external problem facing the new administration. The situation in Pakistan, Afghanistan and India is indeed critical, but its severity actually presents an opportunity [***]for aggressive and innovative action. Since the end of the Musharraf dictatorship, Pakistan has worked to confront the challenges of a young democracy facing an active insurgency, within the context of an international economic crisis. Ambassador Holbrooke will soon discover that Pakistan is far more than a rhetorical partner in the fight against extremism. Unlike in the 1980s, we are surrogates for no one. With all due respect, we need no lectures on our commitment. This is our war. It is our children and wives who are dying.

Ambassador Holbrooke will encounter a region of interrelated issues crossing borders -- old problems that have been left to fester, new realities in an era of active terrorism, and the residual consequences of past Western support for dictatorships and disregard for economic and social development. Let's delineate them.

For almost 60 years the relationship between Pakistan and America has been based on quid pro quo policies with short-term goals and no long-term strategy. Frankly, the abandonment of Afghanistan and Pakistan after the defeat of the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s set the stage for the era of terrorism that we are enduring. U.S. support for the priorities of dictatorship back then, and again at the start of the new millennium, neglected the social and economic development of our nation, the priorities of the people. [***]We must do better.

President Obama understands that for Pakistan to defeat the extremists, it must be stable. For democracy to succeed, Pakistan must be economically viable. Assistance to Pakistan is not charity; rather, the creation of a politically stable and economically viable Pakistan is in the long-term, strategic interest of the United States.

The Obama administration should immediately encourage Congress to pass the Enhanced Partnership with Pakistan Act. The multiyear, $1.5 billion annual commitment to social progress here would signal to our people that this is no longer a relationship of political convenience but, rather, of shared values and goals. Strengthening our democracy and helping us to improve education, housing and health care is the greatest tool we could wield against extremism. Indeed, such policy is the fanatics' worst fear.

The designation of regional opportunity zones to build a viable economy in Northwest Pakistan and in Afghanistan would give residents an economic and political stake in the success of their democratic governments. Legislation introduced last year by Rep. Chris Van Hollen and Sen. Maria Cantwell should be quickly revisited; it would signal to our region that the United States understands the correlation between a healthy economy, a satisfied people and a stable government.

Over the past several months, remarkable progress has been made in our battle against the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Measures include repeated airstrikes by our F-16s and targeted ground assaults. We are willing to act to save our nation. To the extent that we are unable to fully execute battle plans, we urge the United States to give us necessary resources -- upgrading our equipment and providing the newest technology -- so that we can fight the terrorists proactively on our terms, not reactively on their terms. Give us the tools, and we will get the job done.

With his experience, Ambassador Holbrooke surely understands that peace in our region can be secured only by addressing long-term and neglected problems. Much as the Palestinian issue remains the core obstacle to peace in the Middle East, the question of Kashmir must be addressed in some meaningful way to bring stability to this region. We hope that the special envoy will work with India and Pakistan not only to bring a just and reasonable resolution to the issues of Kashmir and Jammu but also to address critical economic and environmental concerns.

The water crisis in Pakistan is directly linked to relations with India. Resolution could prevent an environmental catastrophe in South Asia, but failure to do so could fuel the fires of discontent that lead to extremism and terrorism. We applaud the president's desire to engage our nation and India to defuse the tensions between us.

Pakistan and the United States have much in common and should be partners in peace. This moment of crisis is an opportunity to recast our relationship. We are extending our hand in friendship. Indeed, Pakistan's new democracy has pried open the clenched fists of the extremists, to use a metaphor from President Obama's inaugural address. Let it not be said by future generations that our nations missed an extraordinary opportunity to build lasting peace in South Asia.
The writer is president of Pakistan.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:23 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/opinion/28friedman.html
January 28, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Abdullah II: The 5-State Solution
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN [oped] [on King Abudullah’s (Saudi) plan] [Tom likes it basically] [***]
In February 2002, I traveled to Saudi Arabia and interviewed the then crown prince, now king, Abdullah, at his Riyadh horse farm. I asked him why the next Arab summit

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/opinion/28friedman.html
January 28, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Abdullah II: The 5-State Solution
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN [oped] [on King Abudullah’s (Saudi) plan] [Tom likes it basically] [***]
In February 2002, I traveled to Saudi Arabia and interviewed the then crown prince, now king, Abdullah, at his Riyadh horse farm. I asked him why the next Arab summit wouldn’t just propose to Israel full peace and normalization of relations, by all 22 Arab states, for full withdrawal from all occupied lands and creation of a Palestinian state. Abdullah said that I had read his mind (“Have you broken into my desk?” he asked me) and that he was about to propose just that, which he later did, giving birth to the “Abdullah peace plan.”

Unfortunately, neither the Bush team nor Israel ever built upon the Abdullah plan. And the Saudi leader always stopped short of presenting his ideas directly to the Israeli people. Since then, everything has deteriorated. [***]

So, I’ve wondered lately what King Abdullah would propose if asked to update his plan. I’ve even probed whether he’d like to do another interview, but he is apparently reticent. Not one to be deterred, I’ve decided to do the next best thing: read his mind again. Here is my guess at the memo King Abdullah has in his drawer for President Obama. I’d call it: “Abdullah II: The Five-State Solution for Arab-Israeli peace.” [****]

Dear President Obama,

Congratulations on your inauguration and for quickly dispatching your new envoy, George Mitchell, a good man, to the Middle East. I wish Mitchell could resume where he left off eight years ago, but the death of Arafat, the decline of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, the 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war in Lebanon, the 2009 Hamas-Israel war in Gaza, the continued expansion of colonial Israeli settlements and the deepening involvement of Iran with Hamas and Hezbollah have all created a new reality.

Specifically, the Palestinian Authority is in no position today to assume control of the West Bank, Hamas is incapable of managing Gaza and the introduction of rockets provided by Iran to Hamas has created a situation whereby Israel won’t turn over the West Bank to any Palestinians now because it fears Hamas would use it to launch rockets on Israel’s international airport. But if we do nothing, Zionist settlers would devour the rest of the West Bank and holy Jerusalem. What can be done?

I am proposing what I would call a five-state solution:

1. Israel agrees in principle to withdraw from every inch of the West Bank and Arab districts of East Jerusalem, as it has from Gaza. Any territories Israel might retain in the West Bank for its settlers would have to be swapped — inch for inch — with land from Israel proper. [most of this has already been negotiated] [***]

2. The Palestinians — Hamas and Fatah — agree to form a national unity government. This government then agrees to accept a limited number of Egyptian troops and police to help Palestinians secure Gaza and monitor its borders, as well as Jordanian troops and police to do the same in the West Bank. The Palestinian Authority would agree to five-year “security assistance programs” with Egypt in Gaza and with Jordan in the West Bank.

With Egypt and Jordan helping to maintain order, Palestinians could focus on building their own credible security and political institutions to support their full independence at the end of five years.

3. Israel would engage in a phased withdrawal over these five years from all of its settlements in the West Bank and Arab Jerusalem — except those agreed to be granted to Israel as part of land swaps — at the same pace that the Palestinians meet the security and governance metrics agreed to in advance by all the parties. The U.S. would be the sole arbiter of whether the metrics have been met by both sides.

4. Saudi Arabia would pay all the costs of the Egyptian and Jordanian trustees, plus a $1 billion a year service fee to each country — as well as all the budgetary needs of the Palestinian Authority. The entire plan would be based on U.N. Resolutions 242 and 338 and blessed by the U.N. Security Council.

The virtues of this five-state solution — Palestine, Egypt, Jordan, Israel and Saudi Arabia — are numerous: Egypt and Jordan, the Arab states that have peace treaties with Israel, would act as transition guarantors that any Israeli withdrawal would not leave a security vacuum in the West Bank, Gaza or Arab Jerusalem that could threaten Israel. [***]Israel would have time for a phased withdrawal of its settlements, and Palestinians would have the chance to do nation-building in an orderly manner. This would be an Arab solution that would put a stop to Iran’s attempts to Persianize the Palestinian issue.

President Obama, too much has been broken to go straight back to the two-state solution. It would be like trying to build a house with bricks but no cement. There’s no trust and no framework to build it. Israelis and Palestinians need the kind of cement that only Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan can provide. It would give Israelis security and Palestinians a clear pathway to an independent state.

I hope you will give careful consideration to the five-state solution.

Peace be upon you,
Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:22 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/01/28/world/russia-usa-shield.html
January 28, 2009
Russia Said to Offer Missile Concession
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:28 a.m. ET [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW, Jan 28 (Reuters) - Russia has halted plans to deploy missiles near the Polish border, [***]a Russian news agency quoted the military as saying on Wednesday, in the clearest sign yet Moscow is seeking better ties with the new U.S. administration. [***]

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/01/28/world/russia-usa-shield.html
January 28, 2009
Russia Said to Offer Missile Concession
By REUTERS
Filed at 8:28 a.m. ET [Russia] [former USSR] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW, Jan 28 (Reuters) - Russia has halted plans to deploy missiles near the Polish border, [***]a Russian news agency quoted the military as saying on Wednesday, in the clearest sign yet Moscow is seeking better ties with the new U.S. administration. [***]

Moscow had threatened to deploy the missiles to counter a missile shield proposed by former President George W. Bush for eastern Europe. President Barack Obama has not reversed Bush's decision but has said he would consider it on its merits.

Analysts said if confirmed the Russian move -- which follows a phone conversation this week between Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev -- could open the way for renewed dialogue on other issues that divide their countries.

"The earlier Russian announcement that they were going to deploy missiles ... and point them at NATO allies was unwelcome. If that decision has now been rescinded, it is a good step," said NATO spokesman James Appathurai.

The U.S. envoy to NATO had earlier said that, if confirmed, the Russian move would be a "positive step."

Medvedev said a day after Obama's election victory he was ordering the deployment of Iskander missile systems to Russia's Western outpost of Kaliningrad, which borders European Union members Poland and Lithuania.

"The implementation of these plans has been halted in connection with the fact that the new U.S. administration is not rushing through plans to deploy" elements of its missile defence shield in eastern Europe, Interfax quoted an unnamed official in the Russian military's general staff as saying.

It was not clear though if the report represented a firm shift in policy. There was no confirmation from the Russian military that the Iskander deployment was being suspended and a Kremlin official said he could not offer immediate comment.

The threat of deploying the Iskander missiles was largely symbolic because, military analysts said, Russia does not have enough operational missile systems to station in Kaliningrad.

The missile issue is likely to be on the agenda if, as expected, Medvedev and Obama meet on April 2 on the sidelines of a Group of 20 summit in London. [***]

"It (the suspension of missile deployment) is a signal to Obama of Moscow's goodwill," Yevgeny Volk, an analyst in Moscow with the Heritage Foundation think tank, told Reuters.

"In response they want a decision not to deploy the missile defence shield in eastern Europe."

Obama also faces a series of other challenges in dealing with Russia, including bridging differences over Iran, NATO expansion and strategic arms control. For a factbox, click on.

Some observers believe the Kremlin may be softening its assertive foreign policy style because the economic slowdown -- which has seen the rouble lose about a quarter of its value since July -- has dented its confidence.
U.S. POLICY SHIFT?
The administration of former U.S. President George W. Bush angered the Kremlin with its push to deploy interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic.

It said the system was needed to protect from potential missile strikes by what it called "rogue states" -- specifically Iran and North Korea.

The White House has not announced any change of policy on the missile shield, but a nominee for a top Pentagon post in the Obama administration said this month the plan would be reviewed as part of a regular broad look at policy.

Russia has argued that the proposed system would threaten its own national security and was further evidence -- along with the eastward expansion of the NATO alliance -- of Western military influence encroaching near its borders.

The row over the shield has helped drive diplomatic ties between Moscow and Washington to their lowest level since the end of the Cold War.

But Russian officials have said they are encouraged by early signals from the Obama administration and hopeful of a fresh start in their relations.
Copyright 2009 Reuters Ltd.

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:22 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/middleeast/29mideast.html
January 29, 2009
U.S. Envoy Urges Cease-Fire After Gaza Violence
By ISABEL KERSHNER and ETHAN BRONNER [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/middleeast/29mideast.html
January 29, 2009
U.S. Envoy Urges Cease-Fire After Gaza Violence
By ISABEL KERSHNER and ETHAN BRONNER [Israeli-Palestinian conflict] [apparently some settlers not so keen to stay in Palestinian state] [others, of course, militantly intend to stay even with Palestinians all round them] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [new Obama administration appointed former Senator George Mitchell special envoy] [there now he’s calling for immediate ceasefire] [*****]
JERUSALEM — President Obama’s special Middle East envoy arrived in Jerusalem on Wednesday after urging a “consolidated” cease-fire following renewed Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip overnight.

Hours before George J. Mitchell arrived from Egypt, the Israeli military said its warplanes bombed smuggling tunnels on Egypt’s border with Gaza in reprisal for the death of an Israeli soldier in a roadside bomb attack on Tuesday on Israeli soil close to the Gaza-Israel border.

After 10 days of relative calm following the cease-fires that halted the Gaza war, violence flared on Tuesday after the Israeli soldier died and Israeli troops mounted incursions into Gaza that killed one Palestinian and wounded another. The violence represented the first serious confrontations between Hamas and Israel since they declared separate cease-fires on Jan. 18. [**]

The violence underlined the urgency of Mr. Mitchell’s mission. He met on Wednesday with President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and also scheduled discussions with the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

Speaking in Cairo following talks with President Hosni Mubarak, Mr. Mitchell said it was “of critical importance that the cease-fire be extended and consolidated.”

He said he would report his findings “in just a few days” to Mr. Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton after talks in Jordan, Saudi Arabia, France and Britain following his discussions in Egypt and Israel.

Mr. Mitchell indicated that he planned to return “to the region in the very near future to continue this effort,” suggesting that his first discussions were preliminary.

Mr. Obama said in an interview broadcast Tuesday on Dubai-based Al Arabiya satellite television that he had instructed Mr. Mitchell to “start by listening, because all too often the United States starts by dictating.”

On Wednesday, a military spokesman in Tel Aviv, who spoke in return for customary anonymity, said three tunnels along the Egypt-Gaza border had been bombed overnight as part of Israel’s effort to prevent Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza, from assembling and firing missiles into Israel.

Hamas seemed eager to play down what had happened on Tuesday, saying it was not clear who was responsible for the explosive device, which had been planted inside Israel, apparently under cover of fog in the early morning, and set off by remote control when an Israeli military vehicle was nearby. But Israeli officials interpreted the attack, which wounded three other soldiers, as an ominous sign that Hamas was testing them.

Later, a Hamas militant on a motorcycle in the town of Khan Yunis, in southern Gaza, was hit by a missile from an Israeli drone but was not killed, witnesses said. Palestinian witnesses said that Israeli military vehicles had entered Khan Yunis, but that they had left within hours.

The Palestinian who was killed Tuesday was identified by family members as Anwar Zaid Sammor, a farmer. He was killed during a limited Israeli incursion into the town of Deir al-Balah, near the site of the explosion directed at the Israeli military. The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the Palestinian’s death, which witnesses said occurred during heavy gunfire.

Israel also closed the crossings into Gaza on Tuesday where some 185 trucks with humanitarian goods were to enter, to help Palestinians here resume their lives after the war, which Israeli leaders said was aimed at stopping rocket fire into Israel and at weakening Hamas. [***]

In an announcement that seemed aimed at speeding up reconstruction, the Hamas government said it would not insist on collecting reconstruction money expected to be donated from around the world. Israel, along with many Western and some Arab countries, is trying to isolate Hamas and wants the Palestinian Authority of the West Bank and international aid groups to control the aid, so that Hamas does not get credit for the rebuilding.

“The government here will make it easy for whoever wants to reconstruct Gaza,” Ismail Haniya, the Hamas prime minister, said in a written statement distributed to reporters. “We do not insist on collecting the reconstruction money ourselves. Our intention is to supervise and to make sure that the money will end the misery of the homeless.”

Mr. Haniya remains in hiding, but Ahmed Yousef, a political adviser to the prime minister, said in an interview that Hamas had decided to let all donated money flow through different avenues based on the various alliances.

“Iran and Qatar will give money into Hamas pockets,” he said, while others, like the Saudis and the West, will funnel it through the Palestinian Authority and the United Nations. But he did say that the Hamas government here expected to administer the aid, since that was its responsibility. Others are likely to object to that.

Mr. Yousef added that Israel’s willingness to open the border only for humanitarian aid was unacceptable, since Gaza needed many more things to rebuild its economy and produce relief for those who suffered in the war, which medical officials here say killed more than 1,300 Palestinians. The cease-fire is contingent on a full border opening, Mr. Yousef said.

In Cairo, Hamas and representatives of its rival, the Fatah Party, a more moderate and pro-Western group that dominates the Palestinian Authority, met in an effort to come up with a mechanism that would allow them both to play a role in the rebuilding. About 4,000 homes have been destroyed and 20,000 damaged, along with mosques, factories, schools, roads and water and sewage systems.

Mr. Yousef said he was pleased about the election of President Obama and respected Mr. Mitchell but was disappointed that the envoy had chosen not to hold discussions with Hamas.

“You have to engage with Hamas,” he said. “The new administration says it wants to engage with Iran. I am hoping to hear the same thing about Hamas.”

The United States and its allies in the so-called quartet — the European Union, Russia and the United Nations — have demanded of Hamas that it agree to three conditions: respect agreements reached between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, renounce violence and recognize Israel.

Mr. Yousef said the first two could well be fulfilled through an extended cease-fire that Hamas hoped to negotiate with Israel via Egypt. He said Hamas was not prepared to recognize Israel but hoped that with two of the three demands met, attitudes toward Hamas might shift.

Isabel Kershner reported from Jerusalem, and Ethan Bronner from Gaza. Taghreed El-Khodary contributed reporting from Gaza, Myra Noveck from Jerusalem, and Alan Cowell from Paris.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:21 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/middleeast/28iraq.html
January 28, 2009
Shiites’ Absence May Affect Iraq Vote
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS and SUADAD AL-SALHY [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [who scheduled elections on a Shi’ia holiday?] [****]
BAGHDAD — The annual Shiite pilgrimage to Karbala, the burial place of Imam

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/middleeast/28iraq.html
January 28, 2009
Shiites’ Absence May Affect Iraq Vote
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS and SUADAD AL-SALHY [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [who scheduled elections on a Shi’ia holiday?] [****]
BAGHDAD — The annual Shiite pilgrimage to Karbala, the burial place of Imam Hussein, one of the sect’s most important figures, [**]has run into a scheduling conflict of a contemporary sort: Saturday’s provincial elections.

Every year, Shiite pilgrims travel hundreds of miles, sometimes on foot, to honor Imam Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. Concerned that the marchers might not make it home in time to vote, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s most revered Shiite cleric, has instructed his followers to delay the start of their processions until after the balloting. [***]

But many pilgrims, including thousands from the southern city of Basra, began walking Tuesday anyway. They said that otherwise they might not reach the shrine in Karbala by early February, the end of the traditional 40-day mourning period for Imam Hussein.

“We started early because it’s a long way from Faw to Karbala,” said a marcher who identified himself as Achmed, referring to his hometown near Basra. “We need 17 days to get there.”

Candidates in Basra, one of the centers for oil production in Iraq, said Tuesday that they were concerned that people who chose the procession over voting could skew the vote.

“There are thousands of people leaving the city on their way to Karbala, which means the percentage of voters will be reduced,” said Hakim al-Mayahi, an independent candidate. “We will lose the voices of many voters.”

He added that this would be particularly hard on independent candidates, because they were not as well organized as the Shiite religious parties that dominated politics in southern Iraq.

Hassan Kadhim, a candidate representing the Islamic Supreme Council for Iraq, one of the leading Shiite parties, dismissed concerns about the political impact of the march, saying that the overwhelming majority of the pilgrims would be back in their home districts in time to vote.

“We are not worried, because they will all return before curfew on Friday,” he said.

On Tuesday, pilgrims said they had been offered rides by strangers to polling stations for Saturday’s elections — as well as a ride back to where they had left off walking — as long as they voted for the Islamic Supreme Council’s candidates.

“They said, ‘We will bring you back on one condition — that you vote for us,’ ” Achmed said. “We refused.”

A member of the Independent High Electoral Commission, which is overseeing the election, said Tuesday that the dates of the balloting and the procession were a coincidence. “Everyone is free to vote and participate in his religion,” said Karim al-Tamimi, the commission member.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims make their way each year to the shrine in Karbala in memory of Imam Hussein, whose small force was surrounded by a vastly superior army and massacred in the city during the seventh century. [***]Shiites have been making the annual trip to Karbala for years, although just how long is unclear. The processions were regularly banned during Saddam Hussein’s rule, but have since become a key element of Shiite identity in Iraq.

Pilgrims on Tuesday said they were also concerned about a curfew imposed by the Iraqi government to prevent election-related violence. Under those restrictions, which will begin Friday evening and end on Sunday, airports will be closed and people will be prohibited from crossing provincial borders.

Walking from Basra to Karbala requires crossing at least three provincial borders.

A spokesman for the Iraqi Army in Basra said Tuesday that the military had been given no specific instructions regarding the pilgrims.

“We haven’t received any orders to prevent people from walking, and we cannot force them to vote,” he said.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:20 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/middleeast/28journalists.html
January 28, 2009
For Iraqi Journalists, Free Press vs. Free Land
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [****]
BAGHDAD — At a recent meeting with the Iraqi journalists’ union, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki made a pledge that would have scandalized the Iraqis’ American

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/middleeast/28journalists.html
January 28, 2009
For Iraqi Journalists, Free Press vs. Free Land
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections on Saturday] [****]
BAGHDAD — At a recent meeting with the Iraqi journalists’ union, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki made a pledge that would have scandalized the Iraqis’ American counterparts: the government would give plots of land to thousands of journalists, for a nominal price or possibly even free. [***]

His timing, a month before provincial elections, as well as his admonition to journalists to focus on stories of progress and reconstruction, might be seen as an attempt to buy favorable news coverage. [***]

But if it was, there were few objections from the journalists, who have been demanding the land giveaway for years. [***]

“The resolution of distributing lands to journalists is part of several rights that the journalists should have,” said Moaid Allami, the president of the union. “These are social and legal rights to the citizen, to the journalist citizen.”

More than just free elections, policy analysts often say, democracy requires democratic civil institutions like a free press. But the popularity of the land-for-journalists program illustrates the challenges newfound democratic principles face when they clash with entitlements and cozy relationships that no one ever questioned before.

The government has been pledging to give land to journalists for years, and there are doubts as to when or whether it will really happen. Yassin Majeed, a government spokesman, said that the process was going forward and that the current plan was to offer plots all over the country to as many journalists in the union as possible.

But there are few doubts among journalists that they deserve it.

Mr. Allami, whose union represents 10,000 employees of state, party and independently owned media, said journalists were entitled to the state’s support given the hardships they faced in the line of duty. For six years running, Iraq has been declared the most dangerous place in the world for journalists by the Committee to Protect Journalists. [**] Since the American-led invasion in 2003, 114 Iraqi journalists have been killed, the organization reports, victims of cross-fire, bombings or assassination.

Local press organizations say the number is much higher.

Shihab al-Tamimi, the former president of the union, was shot and killed in his car last February, and Mr. Allami was wounded in a bomb blast outside the union’s headquarters in September.

Before the American invasion, all journalists worked for the government and, like other government-employed professionals, including doctors and teachers, they were well paid and had secure jobs, pensions and other benefits.

But since then, the media have been largely privatized, and those benefits have disappeared. The vast majority of Iraqi reporters are paid salaries too low for them to accrue any savings. And unlike state employees, they have little job security and no health insurance, life insurance or pensions.

The journalists’ union has sought compensation in another program from the era of Saddam Hussein’s government: land patronage. For decades, land was given to soldiers, officers and favored government employees. The union has also asked for pensions, as well as reduced fares for journalists on the state-owned airline.

“Support from the government is not a right, but it’s a necessity,” said Maher Faisal, the managing editor of the independent newspaper Addustour. “The media and journalists have been marginalized in this country.”

Mr. Faisal said he hoped that the deal was not politically motivated. “But,” he said, “journalists need to eat.”

A few journalists, however, are worried about a different kind of survival — that of Iraq’s nascent free press.

Hadi Jalow Merei, a writer for the newspaper Azzaman, said the land distribution plan “would open the door to government interference.”

Ziad al-Ajili, the manager of a Baghdad-based advocacy group, Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, said of the land giveaway: “I would not take it even if I have to live in a tent. As soon as you do, it will be the end of Iraq’s independent journalism.”

He acknowledges the difficulties Iraqi journalists face; his organization keeps a tally of arrests, killings and beatings of journalists, as well as government violations of press freedoms. But the best way to address these problems, he said, is through more journalism, not government handouts.

“They’re not thinking about the future,” he said of his colleagues. “If they think about the future as independent journalists, we can do lots of things.”

Under Mr. Hussein, journalists walked a fine line. Those who went too far in their reporting were often arrested and tortured. But Mr. Hussein, whose son Uday was president of the journalists’ union, knew how to use the carrot, too.

Reporters who worked during those years said they were granted leeway to criticize government officials as long as Saddam Hussein, his sons and his special interests were left untouched. Those favored by Mr. Hussein were showered with money, cars and land.

Since his government was toppled in 2003, private news outlets have proliferated, some independent and many affiliated with political parties. A free press was enshrined in Iraq’s new Constitution, which guarantees the right “as long as it does not violate public order and morality.” Laws criminalizing certain types of speech have curtailed that right somewhat.

But the new authorities sometimes acted like the old ones. An American public relations firm hired by the Pentagon paid Iraqi journalists for favorable coverage. Both the American-led coalition and the Iraqi government have closed news outlets and arrested journalists, often without charge or on vague accusations of supporting terrorism.

Last year, Iraq ranked 158th out of 173 countries in the Press Freedom Index compiled by Reporters Without Borders, a media watchdog group.

But the old habits die hard for journalists, too.

“The union is still begging from the powerful and working hard to satisfy the government,” said Sadiq al-Moussaoui, who runs the Waael news agency. “When the politicians start becoming afraid of us, that will mean we are real journalists.”

But Mr. Majeed, the government spokesman, insisted that a simple benefit program did not mean that the government expected anything in return. Nor was Mr. Allami, the union president, concerned that the program could appear to compromise journalists’ integrity.

“I’m not afraid about the credibility of the journalism in Iraq after these resolutions,” he said. “On the contrary, I’m afraid of the government if we say something or write something honest against them in the future. They may take away our rights if we criticize them at some point. But once we get the lands and those lands are registered in our names, they aren’t going to be able to take them away.”
Reporting was contributed by Mudhafer al-Husaini, Suadad al-Salhy, Atheer Kakan and Tareq Maher.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:19 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/europe/28briefs-ORDERISSUEDO_BRF.html
January 28, 2009
World Briefing | Europe
Britain: Order Issued on Cabinet’s Iraq Deliberations
By JOHN F. BURNS [UK] [London] [independent commission rules that meetings with Bush administration in early 2003—the setting policy around agenda notes—be released] [watch for Gordon Brown’s response] [*****]
An independent tribunal established under Britain’s Freedom of Information Act ordered the government to publish the minutes of two cabinet meetings held on the eve of the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/europe/28briefs-ORDERISSUEDO_BRF.html
January 28, 2009
World Briefing | Europe
Britain: Order Issued on Cabinet’s Iraq Deliberations
By JOHN F. BURNS [UK] [London] [independent commission rules that meetings with Bush administration in early 2003—the setting policy around agenda notes—be released] [watch for Gordon Brown’s response] [*****]
An independent tribunal established under Britain’s Freedom of Information Act ordered the government to publish the minutes of two cabinet meetings held on the eve of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The tribunal ruled that an exception to the practice of keeping such records secret for 30 years was justified by the public’s need to know how the decision to join the American invasion was made. The meetings focused on whether the invasion would be legal under international law. The government has 28 days to appeal the ruling or issue an executive order overruling it.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:18 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/middleeast/29iran.html
January 29, 2009
Iranian Leader Demands U.S. Apology
By NAZILA FATHI and ALAN COWELL [iran] [domestic politics intersect foreign policy] [more factionalism] [response to Obama’s interview on al Arabiya] [feigned outrage?] [taking opportunity to ask Obama to apologize for past 60 years of USFP!] [***]
TEHRAN — A day after President Obama struck a conciliatory tone toward Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad urged Washington on Wednesday to apologize for its actions toward his country for the past 60 years and said it was unclear whether the new American administration was merely shifting tactics or wanted real change. [**]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/29/world/middleeast/29iran.html
January 29, 2009
Iranian Leader Demands U.S. Apology
By NAZILA FATHI and ALAN COWELL [iran] [domestic politics intersect foreign policy] [more factionalism] [response to Obama’s interview on al Arabiya] [feigned outrage?] [taking opportunity to ask Obama to apologize for past 60 years of USFP!] [***]
TEHRAN — A day after President Obama struck a conciliatory tone toward Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad urged Washington on Wednesday to apologize for its actions toward his country for the past 60 years and said it was unclear whether the new American administration was merely shifting tactics or wanted real change. [**]

But, in a speech in the western city of Kermanshah, he did not explicitly rebuff the American president’s gesture. “We are waiting patiently,” he said, referring to the policies of the new administration in Washington. “We will listen to the statements closely, we will carefully study their actions and if there are real changes, we will welcome it.”

Mr. Obama, in his first television interview at the White House since taking office, said that it was important to be willing to talk to the Iranians, both to express differences and to explore “where there are potential avenues for progress.”

“And as I said during my inauguration speech, if countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us,” Mr. Obama said in the interview with Al Arabiya television that was broadcast on Tuesday.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also said Tuesday that Iran had a “clear opportunity” to engage with the international community.

Mr. Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday that the “slogan of change was good, but it could be of two kinds — a fundamental change or a tactical one,” [**]the official IRNA news agency said. It would soon become clear, IRNA quoted the Iranian leader as saying, whether Mr. Obama’s comments were “just a change in tone.”

“Change means that they should apologize to the Iranian nation and try to make up for their dark background and the crimes they have committed against the Iranian nation,” he said in the speech broadcast live on Iranian television.

The catalog of crimes, Mr. Ahmadinejad said, stretched back decades, beginning with American support for the 1953 coup that ousted the democratically elected government of Mohammed Mossadegh and installed Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who ruled until he was ousted in the 1979 Islamic revolution.

The list included the downing of an Iran Air Airbus A300, which was shot down by the U.S. Navy’s missile cruiser Vincennes over the Persian Gulf in 1988, killing 290. American military commanders said at the time that the passenger plane had been mistaken for an F-14 fighter jet, and defended the warship’s actions. America’s efforts to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions were also listed.

Mr. Ahmadinejad also questioned the United States deployment of forces in many places around the world, apparently demanding that the forces be withdrawn. “Who has asked them to come and interfere in the affairs of nations?” he asked, according to Reuters.

It was not immediately clear whether Mr. Ahmadinejad’s speech was Tehran’s definitive response to the Obama administration’s offers to open a dialogue. [it may become] [but for now it’s Ahmadinejad attempting to set the agenda to see who follows] [watch for Khomenei’s eventual response] [***]

Along with other governments, Washington is locked in a high-stakes dispute with Tehran over Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Iran insists that its nuclear program is for peaceful, civilian purposes, but countries including the United States say Tehran is trying to make nuclear weapons that would upset the regional power balance and threaten Israel. American officials have routinely refused to exclude military action against Iranian nuclear sites.

America has also consulted with a multilateral group of nations dealing with Iran’s nuclear issue including Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China. The group is scheduled to meet next week in Germany, and European diplomats said they hoped that the meeting would provide the first clues about the Obama administration’s Iran strategy.

Nazila Fathi reported from Tehran, and Alan Cowell from Paris. Sharon Otterman contributed reporting from New York.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:18 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/asia/28briefs-PAYMENTSMADE_BRF.html
January 28, 2009
World Briefing | Asia
Afghanistan: Payments Made for Victims of U.S. Raid
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [finally US pays off those families who were “inconvenienced by deaths”] [see Gates of AfPak in today’s govt] [use psci469b] [****]
American officers distributed $40,000 on Tuesday to relatives of 15 people killed Jan. 19 in a United States raid. American forces raided the village of Inzeri, north of Kabul,

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/asia/28briefs-PAYMENTSMADE_BRF.html
January 28, 2009
World Briefing | Asia
Afghanistan: Payments Made for Victims of U.S. Raid
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [finally US pays off those families who were “inconvenienced by deaths”] [see Gates of AfPak in today’s govt] [use psci469b] [****]
American officers distributed $40,000 on Tuesday to relatives of 15 people killed Jan. 19 in a United States raid. American forces raided the village of Inzeri, north of Kabul, killing a militant commander and 14 people the villagers say were civilians. Col. Greg Julian, a spokesman for the American military, told the villagers the soldiers had not fired until they were fired on. “If there was collateral damage, I’m very sorry about that,” he said. American officials paid $2,500 each to representatives of the 15 people killed, $500 each for two wounded men and $1,500 for village repairs. A military lawyer said the payments were not an admission that innocents had been killed. Gul Akbar, 24, who said his father died in the raid, thanked Colonel Julian and said, “I’m just very sad someone gave the other soldiers the wrong information.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:17 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/africa/28somalia.html
January 28, 2009
Site of Somali Government Is Put Under Islamic Law
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [Ethiopia withdraws/Islamists surge] [followup Jan 27] [****]
MOGADISHU, Somalia — The radical Islamist insurgents who have seized the provisional capital moved Tuesday to consolidate their control of the town and

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/africa/28somalia.html
January 28, 2009
Site of Somali Government Is Put Under Islamic Law
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [Ethiopia withdraws/Islamists surge] [followup Jan 27] [****]
MOGADISHU, Somalia — The radical Islamist insurgents who have seized the provisional capital moved Tuesday to consolidate their control of the town and announced that they were imposing Islamic law there.

The Shabab, one of the most militant Islamist militias fighting for control of the country, captured the town, Baidoa, [***]on Monday, hours after the withdrawal of the Ethiopian troops who had been protecting it.

Speaking to thousands of spectators at a soccer stadium in the northeastern part of town, the Shabab spokesman, Sheik Muktar Robow, urged calm and ordered an end to the looting that took place on Monday. [***]

“I want you to be calm,” said Sheik Muktar, also known as Abu Monsur. “From today on, Islamic Shariah law will be the rule of this town. If anyone opposes the Shariah, appropriate steps will be taken.” [***]

In addition to Baidoa, a market town that has served as the seat of Somalia’s transitional government, [***]the Shabab controls most of Mogadishu, the main city and official capital, and much of the southern part of the country. The Shabab, listed by the United States as a terrorist organization, seeks to turn Somalia into an Islamic state under its particularly strict brand of Islamic law.

Sheik Muktar, whose speech on Tuesday was broadcast on the radio in Mogadishu, also ordered Baidoa residents to turn over any looted property to the Shabab or face unspecified consequences. The offices of the transitional government were looted and ransacked Monday after the Ethiopian troops left, a witness said.

The weak transitional government had been defended by Ethiopian troops since 2006 and supported by other countries in an effort to prop up an effective central government in a country that had not had one in 18 years.

But by the time the Shabab arrived in Baidoa, there was little government left. The president resigned last month. Most members of Parliament departed over the weekend for Djibouti, where they are taking part in United Nations-brokered peace talks and what now amounts to a shadow Somali government.

Once the Ethiopian military abandoned the town on Monday, the insurgents were able to take it without firing a shot.

The transitional government now controls only a few blocks in Mogadishu, although parts of Somalia are under moderate Islamist militias that support the government.

Several moderate factions have sent delegations to Djibouti, where they are working with the Parliament to establish a unity government based on a power-sharing deal made in October.

That process moved forward on Monday when the Parliament voted to expand its membership to add 200 legislators from the ranks of the moderate Islamists. The new members are to be sworn in on Wednesday, bringing the total number of seats to 550.

The Parliament also hopes to elect a new president within five days, according to local radio reports, to replace Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, a former warlord who was widely accused of trying to thwart peace negotiations and who resigned as president in December.

Around 3,000 African Union peacekeepers are in Somalia, trying to protect the few government enclaves. They have increasingly come under attack by the Shabab and other militias. [***]

The Bush administration had pressed for a larger international force for Somalia, which it feared could become a base for Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations. But the proposal met with little international support.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 08:16 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601584.html
Moussaoui's Attorneys Call Guilty Plea Invalid
By Jerry Markon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A08 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [now prosecution of jihadis and others falls on Obama’s justice department] [what demonstrable changes, if any?] [Moussaoui was a flunky who al Qaeda seemed to string along just in case they all else failed] [use psci469b] [****]
RICHMOND, Jan. 26 -- The case of convicted Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui returned to the federal courts Monday, with his attorneys arguing that his conviction

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601584.html
Moussaoui's Attorneys Call Guilty Plea Invalid
By Jerry Markon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A08 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [now prosecution of jihadis and others falls on Obama’s justice department] [what demonstrable changes, if any?] [Moussaoui was a flunky who al Qaeda seemed to string along just in case they all else failed] [use psci469b] [****]
RICHMOND, Jan. 26 -- The case of convicted Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui returned to the federal courts Monday, with his attorneys arguing that his conviction should be overturned because he was deprived of his constitutional rights.

The attorneys told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit that Moussaoui's guilty plea was invalid because he was confused about the charges and didn't know that other al-Qaeda members had given information to interrogators that could have cleared him. Moussaoui pleaded guilty in 2005 to an al-Qaeda conspiracy to crash planes into U.S. buildings that led to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. After a two-month sentencing trial in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, he was sentenced to life in prison.

"Moussaoui's plea was un-counseled, unknowing and unintelligent,'' said attorney Justin S. Antonipillai, who argued that Moussaoui should get a new trial or be resentenced if the plea stands. Moussaoui is the only person convicted in the United States in connection with the hijackings.

Legal experts said appellate courts rarely overturn guilty pleas, and the 4th Circuit's chief judge, Karen Williams, was openly skeptical of Moussaoui's argument. She pointed out that he testified in open court that al-Qaeda had instructed him to fly a fifth hijacked plane into the White House.

"Isn't it a little disingenuous for you to claim that there was no factual basis for the plea?" asked Williams, part of a three-judge panel that will decide the appeal.

"I don't mean to be disingenuous," responded Antonipillai, who acknowledged that the lower court judge, Leonie M. Brinkema, "did the best she could" to manage "an extraordinarily difficult case."

Justice Department attorney Kevin Gingras said the guilty plea and sentence should be upheld. "The judge was careful and cautious in this case and literally bent over backwards for Mr. Moussaoui," he said.

The dry legal arguments marked a departure from the often theatrical hearings in the case of Moussaoui, who was arrested more than three weeks before Sept. 11 after his behavior aroused suspicion at a Minnesota flight school. He became known for his frequent outbursts in court. There were empty seats in the wood-paneled, green-carpeted courtroom, and only a few of the Sept. 11 family members who attended the sentencing trial showed up for the hearing.

Moussaoui, who is serving his sentence at a highly secure federal prison in Colorado known as the "supermax," was not in court; defendants usually aren't during appellate hearings. His attorneys would not comment on his views about the appeal or his conditions of confinement.

Phyllis Rodriguez, whose son, Gregory, died in the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, said she attended the hearing because she felt that Moussaoui might not have gotten a fair trial and because there was no evidence that he was involved in the attacks. "In honor of my son and in his name, I would like to trust justice to be done,'' she said, "not something to feed the anger and vengeance of the public."
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:11 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/us/27liberty.html
January 27, 2009
After 2 Mistrials, Prosecutors Try Again to Prove Jihad Plot
By DAMIEN CAVE [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [now prosecution of jihadis and others falls on Obama’s justice department] [what demonstrable changes, if any?] [use psci469b] [****]
MIAMI — A group of Miami men accused of planning to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago as part of an Islamic jihad will return to federal court this week as prosecutors try for a third time to win convictions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/us/27liberty.html
January 27, 2009
After 2 Mistrials, Prosecutors Try Again to Prove Jihad Plot
By DAMIEN CAVE [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [now prosecution of jihadis and others falls on Obama’s justice department] [what demonstrable changes, if any?] [use psci469b] [****]
MIAMI — A group of Miami men accused of planning to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago as part of an Islamic jihad will return to federal court this week as prosecutors try for a third time to win convictions.

The government’s first two efforts ended in mistrials. And legal analysts say the prosecutors face an even greater challenge this time because, nearly three years after the men were arrested, the public mind-set has changed.

“The fear card was what they were playing,” said Bruce Winick, a University of Miami law professor. “If it didn’t work the first two times with the juries that were selected, I think it’s less likely that it will work right now because that fear of terrorism is a little more distant in our minds.” [***]

Former jurors in the first two cases have said they could not agree in part because of disputes over what some considered a lack of evidence.

Prosecutors tried to prove that the original seven defendants, a group of laborers from the tough Liberty City neighborhood, provided “material support” to a terrorist organization, and planned to destroy buildings. But they relied mostly on the men’s words, citing their loyalty oath to Al Qaeda and aggressive comments made to two F.B.I. informants.

More concrete evidence did not emerge. Testimony showed that a search by the Federal Bureau of Investigation of what it called the group’s headquarters did not yield guns, explosives or blueprints for an attack. Besides a samurai sword, no weapons were found. [****]

“There was really nothing that indicated that this was a real threat,” said Jeffrey Agron, a lawyer who served as the foreman at the first trial in 2007. “Another thing was the credibility of the confidential informants. The first informant, in the minds of most jurors, had no credibility, and with the second informant, a lot of the jurors felt he was trying to lead these guys on.”

The first trial ended in December 2007 with an acquittal for one of the seven, Lyglenson Lemorin, and a mistrial for the other six: Narseal Batiste, accused of being the ringleader; Patrick Abraham; Burson Augustine; Rotschild Augustine; Naudimar Herrera; and Stanley G. Phanor.

The second trial followed a similar path. Each side laid out many of the same arguments, and another jury deadlocked. On April 16, Judge Joan A. Lenard of Federal District Court ordered a mistrial for the second time. About a week later, prosecutors said they would try again.

Assistant United States Attorney Richard Gregorie, at a hearing where the decision was announced, said another trial was necessary to “safeguard the community.” Mr. Gregorie cited some of the violent comments allegedly made by Mr. Batiste, including a threat to “kill all the devils.”

Mr. Winick said that no new evidence was expected, and that this would probably be the last trial for a case that he, some former jurors and other legal scholars have seen as politically driven. The timing in particular has attracted scrutiny because the arrests came just a few months before the 2006 elections, and they were widely publicized by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, who outlined the most sensational evidence at a news conference. [***]

Mr. Winick said that by that point, “The plot, to the extent there was a plot at that point, was falling apart,” suggesting that it would have made more sense to continue observing the group, rather than making arrests.

Winning a conviction at this point, he and others said, will be difficult.

“I don’t see it ending any differently than before,” said Mr. Agron, the former juror.

Mr. Winick agreed. “It’s a case where a government informant got a bunch of guys together to swear a loyalty oath to Al Qaeda,” he said. “It’s a B movie really, more than a criminal case.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:10 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/washington/28diplo.html
January 28, 2009
Obama Sends Special Envoy to Mideast
By MARK LANDLER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [last week’s appointment of Mitchell for Israel-Palestinian conflict] [followed up with Mitchell’s first trip to region as envoy] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — President Obama has dispatched his special envoy, George J. Mitchell, to the Middle East, kicking off a diplomatic initiative that Mr. Obama pledged would be vigorous and sustained, but would start off primarily as a listening tour.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/washington/28diplo.html
January 28, 2009
Obama Sends Special Envoy to Mideast
By MARK LANDLER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [last week’s appointment of Mitchell for Israel-Palestinian conflict] [followed up with Mitchell’s first trip to region as envoy] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — President Obama has dispatched his special envoy, George J. Mitchell, to the Middle East, kicking off a diplomatic initiative that Mr. Obama pledged would be vigorous and sustained, but would start off primarily as a listening tour.

Mr. Obama met with Mr. Mitchell and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton at the White House, just before Mr. Mitchell, a former Senate majority leader, left for an eight-day trip to the Middle East and Europe. He arrived in Cairo Tuesday.

“The charge that Senator Mitchell has is to engage vigorously and consistently in order for us to achieve genuine progress,” Mr. Obama said in the Cabinet Room of the White House, according to The Associated Press. “And when I say progress, not just photo ops, but progress that is concrete.”

Mr. Obama has moved swiftly to engage in the Middle East, phoning Arab and Israeli leaders on his first full day in office and announcing Mr. Mitchell’s appointment the next day.

Mr. Mitchell, a seasoned negotiator, helped broker a peace agreement in Northern Ireland and led a commission investigating the causes of violence between Israelis and Palestinians.

On Monday, Mr. Obama taped his first television interview in the White House, choosing Al Arabiya, an Arabic-language news channel based in Dubai. The interview was broadcast on Tuesday.

Mr. Obama reined in expectations for Mr. Mitchell’s maiden trip, saying it was intended mainly as a listening and learning exercise. But Mr. Mitchell will also work with the Egyptians, Israelis and Palestinians to fortify the truce in Gaza, which has held for more than a week.

The United States has pledged to help Israel crack down on tunnels through which Hamas militants smuggle rocket parts into Gaza. It also promised to interdict ships carrying arms in the Mediterranean.

Mr. Obama said Mr. Mitchell would seek “to ensure that Palestinians in Gaza are able to get the basic necessities they need and that they can see a pathway towards long-term development.”

Mr. Mitchell will make a stop in the West Bank, a State Department spokesman said, though he will not venture into Gaza or meet with Hamas officials.

With Israel scheduled to hold an election on Feb. 10, analysts said the political climate in the Middle East was too fluid for the United States to present any major initiatives.

“Until we know who the next Israeli prime minister is, the political work will have to wait,” said Robert Malley, a Middle East expert at the International Crisis Group who worked in the Clinton administration. “It’s a blessing in disguise because we can take some time to review the policy.”
Helene Cooper contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:09 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/middleeast/28arabiya.html
January 28, 2009
Obama Signals New Tone in Relations With Islamic World
By ALAN COWELL [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabia] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
PARIS — In one of his first interviews since taking office, President Barack Obama struck a conciliatory tone toward the Islamic world, saying he wanted to persuade Muslims that “the Americans are not your enemy” and adding that “the moment is ripe

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/28/world/middleeast/28arabiya.html
January 28, 2009
Obama Signals New Tone in Relations With Islamic World
By ALAN COWELL [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Obama’s first sit-down interview was with al Arabia] [symbolic though perhaps somewhat naïve] [his words should resonate with some Arab intellectuals and others] [use psci469] [use psci355, 455] [individual too] [****]
PARIS — In one of his first interviews since taking office, President Barack Obama struck a conciliatory tone toward the Islamic world, saying he wanted to persuade Muslims that “the Americans are not your enemy” and adding that “the moment is ripe for both sides” to negotiate in the Middle East.

His remarks, recorded in Washington on Monday night, signaled a shift — in style and manner at least — from the Bush administration, offering a dialogue with Iran and what he depicted as a new readiness to listen rather than dictate.

Mr. Obama spoke as his special Middle East envoy, George J. Mitchell, arrived in Egypt to begin an eight-day tour that will include Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, France and Britain. Mr. Mitchell planned to meet President Hosni Mubarak.

In a transcript published on Al Arabiya’s English language Web site, Mr. Obama said he believed “the most important thing is for the United States to get engaged right away” and that he had told his envoy to “start by listening, because all too often the United States starts by dictating.”

“Ultimately, we cannot tell either the Israelis or the Palestinians what’s best for them. They’re going to have to make some decisions,” Mr. Obama said. “But I do believe that the moment is ripe for both sides to realize that the path that they are on is not going to result in prosperity and security for their people. And that, instead, it’s time to return to the negotiating table.”

Shortly after the interview was broadcast, an explosion on the Israel-Gaza border on Tuesday killed an Israeli soldier. A Palestinian farmer was shot dead, according to Palestinian witnesses, in retaliatory gunfire. The incidents were the first known fatal incidents since the Gaza fighting ended 10 days ago.

Mr. Obama said Israel “will not stop being a strong ally of the United States and I will continue to believe that Israel’s security is paramount. But I also believe that there are Israelis who recognize that it is important to achieve peace. They will be willing to make sacrifices if the time is appropriate and if there is serious partnership on the other side.”

He also said he believed it was “possible for us to see a Palestinian state — I’m not going to put a time frame on it — that is contiguous, that allows freedom of movement for its people, that allows for trade with other countries, that allows the creation of businesses and commerce so that people have a better life.”

But he also said the Israel-Palestine conflict should not be seen in isolation. “I do think it is impossible for us to think only in terms of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and not think in terms of what’s happening with Syria or Iran or Lebanon or Afghanistan and Pakistan,” Mr. Obama said.

He spoke at length about America’s future relationship with the Muslim world, saying his “job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives.”

“My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect. But if you look at the track record, as you say, America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there’s no reason why we can’t restore that. And that I think is going to be an important task,” he said.

He drew a distinction between “extremist organizations” committed to violence and “people who may disagree with my administration and certain actions, or may have a particular viewpoint in terms of how their countries should develop.”

“We can have legitimate disagreements but still be respectful. I cannot respect terrorist organizations that would kill innocent civilians and we will hunt them down,” he said. “But to the broader Muslim world what we are going to be offering is a hand of friendship.”

He also said it was “important for us to be willing to talk to Iran, to express very clearly where our differences are, but where there are potential avenues for progress.”

He echoed his inaugural address last week when he said, “If countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us.”

He was not asked whether he would continue the policy of former President George Bush in refusing to exclude military action in the dispute over Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:08 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/25/AR2009012502105.html
DNI Nominee Blair Talks Of Opportunities for Statecraft
By Walter Pincus
Monday, January 26, 2009; A09 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [DNI Dennis C. Blair] [McConnel’s replacement and 3rd DNI after Negroponte was 1st] [continuity in USFP?] [use psci355, 455] [talks a good game but does it auger well for US intelligence efforts?] [also archive in individual-role] [****]
Take a close look at the statement for the record by retired Navy Adm. Dennis C. Blair, President Obama's nominee to be director of national intelligence, and you will get an unclassified glimpse at sophisticated activities whose roots go back to the Cold War.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/25/AR2009012502105.html
DNI Nominee Blair Talks Of Opportunities for Statecraft
By Walter Pincus
Monday, January 26, 2009; A09 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [DNI Dennis C. Blair] [McConnel’s replacement and 3rd DNI after Negroponte was 1st] [continuity in USFP?] [use psci355, 455] [talks a good game but does it auger well for US intelligence efforts?] [also archive in individual-role] [****]
Take a close look at the statement for the record by retired Navy Adm. Dennis C. Blair, President Obama's nominee to be director of national intelligence, and you will get an unclassified glimpse at sophisticated activities whose roots go back to the Cold War.

On Thursday, Blair described techniques for "identifying opportunities" to policymakers as well as providing warnings about threats they must heed in six of the main global areas of concern. "Identifying these opportunities for American policy and statecraft is as important as predicting hostile threats," Blair said in his confirmation hearing before the Senate intelligence committee.

After World War II, as communist doctrine and party personnel made inroads in the governments of allied Western European nations such as France, Greece and Italy, U.S. intelligence elements found and funded politicians, parties, union leaders and intellectuals who saw and talked about the danger Moscow posed. Blair, in his statement, suggested when "traditional friends of the United States disagree with individual American policies on specific countries and issues" (read Iraq or Afghanistan), "the intelligence community can . . . identify the many government leaders and influential private leaders -- in Europe, in Asia and elsewhere -- who share American ambitions for the future and are willing to work together for the common good." [***] [role]

When it comes to today's greatest threat, Blair said the United States must "hunt down those terrorists who are seeking to do us harm." But he also said that the intelligence community must help identify and work with "Arab and Muslim leaders who are striving for a progressive and peaceful future for their religion and their countries." As during the Cold War, such activities must be clandestine so that they do not show the U.S. sponsorship that would undercut the very people and groups America is trying to help. [***]

In the 1950s and 1960s, the CIA had clandestine programs that gave officers access to foreign institutions, including universities, unions and youth groups. The U.S. military for years has provided training at American military schools for up-and-coming officers of foreign armies. Such programs create relationships between American and foreign political leaders and military officers that can become useful when some of them rise to power in their own countries.

Blair also talked about using intelligence capabilities to find individuals to work with in China and Russia. While the United States continues to use traditional spying methods to find out military plans, strengths and weaknesses in those countries, Blair talked about searching for Chinese leaders "who believe that Asia is big enough for both of us." [***]

He also spoke of getting policymakers to understand "the dynamics of European security issues including the actions of our allies and friends" when it comes to Moscow's "ambitions in what it calls its 'near abroad.' " That is code for how Russia feels and acts when it comes to Georgia and Ukraine.

While U.S. intelligence focuses on the need for worldwide surveillance of the longer-term threat from pandemic diseases, Blair said U.S. intelligence can identify governments and organizations willing to work "on behalf of our common interest."

Some programs that support exiled or opposition groups in Iran, for example, are already well known. Blair said there are "other leaders and political forces" there with whom "it is possible to work toward a future in both our interests."

There are no guarantees that opposition parties and potential leaders that the CIA and others in the U.S. intelligence community assist will turn out to be the right choices. The past is littered with people this country helped, by putting or keeping them in power, but who did not benefit their own country or the United States.

In Iran, for example, the CIA in 1953 helped orchestrate the overthrow of the then-popular prime minister, Mohammed Mossadeq. That solidified the rule of the ultimately unpopular ruler, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. That action has continued to cause resentment.

Iraq's Ahmed Chalabi is a more recent example. When it came to opposing then-President Saddam Hussein, the CIA, the State Department and the Bush Defense Department provided covert and then open support to Chalabi. He then lobbied Congress and Bush administration officials, becoming an influential public and private voice in support of the U.S. invasion to overthrow the dictator.
National security and intelligence reporter Walter Pincus pores over the speeches, reports, transcripts and other documents that flood Washington and uncovers the fine print that rarely makes headlines -- but should. If you have any items that fit the bill, please send them to fineprint@washpost.com.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:07 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601851.html
Torture? Prosecute Us, Too
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A17 [oped] [columnist] [on why Obama is correct to look forward and not backward on “torture”] [****]
"The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there." So goes an aphorism that needs to be applied to the current debate over whether those who authorized and used torture should be prosecuted. In the very different country called Sept. 11, 2001, the answer would be a resounding no.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601851.html
Torture? Prosecute Us, Too
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A17 [oped] [columnist] [on why Obama is correct to look forward and not backward on “torture”] [****]
"The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there." So goes an aphorism that needs to be applied to the current debate over whether those who authorized and used torture should be prosecuted. In the very different country called Sept. 11, 2001, the answer would be a resounding no.

Back then, a Post poll gave George W. Bush an approval rating of 92 percent, which meant that almost no one thought he was on the wrong course. At the same time, questions about the viability of torture were very much in the air. Alan Dershowitz was suggesting the creation of torture warrants -- permission from a court to, in effect, break some bones. [***] [I well remember] [and Cohen is right] [we all bare responsibility for not holding our representatives accountable] [***]

Dershowitz, mind you, was not in favor of torture but argued that if torture was going to be done, it was best that it be done legally. In a similar vein, the thoughtful Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter mulled the legality, the morality and the efficacy of torture. In the end, Alter ruled it out -- although not sodium pentothal (truth serum) or offshoring terrorism suspects "to our less squeamish allies." In fact, the government was already sending suspects abroad to be interrogated.

Alter's essay created quite a stir -- and to his considerable surprise, a lot of whispered support from liberals. Around the same time, historian Jay Winik wrote about the usefulness of torture, how Philippine agents in 1995 got a certain Abdul Hakim Murad to reveal a plot to blow up 11 American airliners over the Pacific and send yet another plane, this one loaded with nerve gas, into CIA headquarters in Langley. After being beaten nearly to death, Murad was finally broken by the hollow threat to turn him over to Israel's Mossad. [well that hardly indicates torture worked] [***]

The Philippine example was widely mentioned at the time, even by those who opposed the use of torture. The conventional wisdom that torture never works -- so counterintuitive as to be an absurdity -- was not yet doctrine. Neither for that matter was the belief that the coming war in Iraq was a moral and practical absurdity. Congress overwhelmingly voted for war and the American people overwhelmingly supported it.

That, though, was the other country called the Past. In the country called the Present, certain people are demanding that the torturers and their enablers be dragged across the time border and brought to justice. There are many practical difficulties involved, but the impetus is understandable: A nation that once posed to the world as lawful and civil turned out to be brutish and indifferent to international law. We tortured. [**]So says the incoming attorney general, Eric Holder. We tortured. So says the person in charge of deciding such matters at Guantanamo. That question has been answered. Now comes another: What are we going to do about it?

President Obama's inclination, it seems, is to not do anything much. "I don't believe anybody is above the law," he recently said. "On the other hand, I also have a belief that we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards."

This is a nifty formulation that ignores reality; to look forward, you need to know where you've been. In other words, if we do not find out precisely how our government came to waterboard at least three suspects and abuse others, we will not know how to ensure that the future doesn't wind up looking much like the past. [***]

At the same time, we have to be respectful of those who were in that Sept. 11 frame of mind, who thought they were saving lives -- and maybe were -- and who, in any case, were doing what the nation and its leaders wanted. It is imperative that our intelligence agents not have to fear that a sincere effort will result in their being hauled before some congressional committee or a grand jury. We want the finest people in these jobs -- not time-stampers who take no chances.

The best suggestion for how to proceed comes from David Cole of Georgetown Law School. Writing in the Jan. 15 New York Review of Books, he proposed that either the president or Congress appoint a blue-ribbon commission, arm it with subpoena power, and turn it loose to find out what went wrong, what (if anything) went right and to report not only to Congress but to us. We were the ones, remember, who just wanted to be kept safe. [***]So, it is important, as well as fair, not to punish those who did what we wanted done -- back when we lived, scared to death, in a place called the Past.
cohenr@washpost.com
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:06 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601874.html
The CIA Vs. the Mullahs
By Reuel Marc Gerecht
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A17 [oped] [former CIA guy who was on the New American Foundation panel on al Qaeda a few years back] [****]
How good is American intelligence on Iran? With the clerical regime intimately involved in Gaza, Lebanon, Afghanistan and Iraq, with the mullahs quite probably on the verge of enriching sufficient uranium to make a bomb, and President Obama promising to use more diplomacy and sanctions to stop them, it's a fairly pressing question. [clearly] [***]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601874.html
The CIA Vs. the Mullahs
By Reuel Marc Gerecht
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A17 [oped] [former CIA guy who was on the New American Foundation panel on al Qaeda a few years back] [****]
How good is American intelligence on Iran? With the clerical regime intimately involved in Gaza, Lebanon, Afghanistan and Iraq, with the mullahs quite probably on the verge of enriching sufficient uranium to make a bomb, and President Obama promising to use more diplomacy and sanctions to stop them, it's a fairly pressing question. [clearly] [***]

Yet this query has rarely been raised seriously in Washington. I am not aware of one instance since 1978, when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini started to preach revolution from France, that an American president requested a thorough assessment of the clandestine service's collection efforts against the mullahs. Congress has been only a little better. Even after the Iraq war made outsiders more attentive to the deficiencies in the Central Intelligence Agency's operations against "hard target" countries, congressional interest in knowing more about the efforts to collect intelligence against Tehran has been thin. Field officers who have seen gross incompetence in Iran operations over the years have wondered more often about Langley's abilities than have its civilian overseers. [*****]

CIA Director-designate Leon Panetta should consider a bipartisan review of intelligence collection concerning Tehran. Since the Obama administration is reviewing policy options toward the Islamic republic, it would seem sensible to know what Langley's actions have produced. [***]Policy built on weak intelligence and analysis obviously isn't a good idea.

Iran operations have always consumed a lot of CIA manpower. Is there a correlation between the number of officers deployed and the quantity and quality of intelligence collected? Does the manner of their deployment -- the balance between headquarters-based and field officers, and the nature of the cover that these officers operationally use -- make much sense? How many operatives and analysts who work on the target could competently read, let alone digest, the sermons and books of dissident clerics or probe a laptop with nuclear plans buried in it? In the 1990s, I saw a case officer who barely spoke Farsi debrief a potentially high-value Iranian official who barely spoke English. [**] The meeting produced "disseminable" intelligence. Sadly, this type of exchange was not uncommon. Agency analysts, who often have little real idea of agents and their case officers, can give weight to field intelligence that really should be dismissed.

Iran is perhaps the best and the most important barometer we have for judging how well the CIA can perform against a hostile Middle Eastern state with a terrorist track record [**] that includes, according to the Sept. 11 commission report, abetting al-Qaeda. It is also probably the "easiest" hard target that Langley has. Unlike in Iraq under Saddam Hussein or North Korea today, the CIA can reach inside the Islamic republic if it really tries. Iran is an authoritarian theocratic state that believes in its civilizing mission to the Muslim world. Its borders are hardly porous, but a range of people -- Muslims, non-Muslims, business executives, academics, students, religious pilgrims and tourists -- travel there regularly.

More important, Iranian VIPs travel abroad. Members of the Revolutionary Guard Corps frequently receive scholarships for foreign study, usually in the West. Iranian scientists and engineers also go abroad. [***]Iranian mullahs are not uncommon in foreign lands, where prolonged contact with them is possible. Although Iran's progressive intellectuals -- the people to whom Western journalists and scholars usually talk -- rarely have much influence and insight into the clerical regime, sometimes they matter, and sometimes they can be reached. The key is whether Langley has developed patient but aggressive measures that make it more likely that its operatives cross paths with interesting Iranians. [***]

Accessibility is never a guarantee of operational success. But the clerical regime is now 30 years old. Disaffection and anger are not uncommon among once-proud revolutionaries. We have not yet seen the defections from the ruling religious elite -- the clergy and the lay hard core who see themselves as Allah's chosen soldiers -- that we began to see among Russian communists after three decades of Soviet rule. The faithful's devotion to God appears to be more tenacious than man's commitment to Marx. But this could change. As we have seen with some of al-Qaeda's most devoted supporters, religious inspiration can evolve or fade, turning comrades into enemies.

It is likely that Obama's diplomacy-and-sanctions effort to stop the clerical regime's quest for nuclear weapons will fail. If it does, the administration will inevitably default to some kind of containment strategy. Covert-action programs, which will oblige Langley to become more intimate with Iran's internal dynamics, will probably be a part of the administration's efforts to check the mullahs' designs in the Middle East. [***]If we are serious about what we are doing (and Langley has a history of approaching covert action haphazardly), the White House and Congress ought to know whether the CIA has been able to perform its primary mission. Human-source intelligence and covert action use the same skill set.

Whatever Panetta does, he would be wise to trust, but verify, what the CIA's senior management tells him. Langley's "professionals" have a way of arrogating to themselves the details that allow outsiders to see whether the agency is actually doing its job.
The writer is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and was a CIA case officer from 1985 to 1994.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:06 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601994.html
Iraq's Next Vote
How elections can work in an unstable country
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A16 [editorial] [-ir] [this weekend’s elections] [***]
PRESIDENT OBAMA has suggested that elections may not be constructive in countries where there is no "freedom from fear" or where the rule of law and civil society are undeveloped. Iraq may be about to prove him wrong. Though security is fragile, the constitution is still disputed and institutions such as courts and a free media remain works in progress, the country's third national election since 2005 is scheduled for Saturday -- and it is looking like another important step toward stabilization. [well, we

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/26/AR2009012601994.html
Iraq's Next Vote
How elections can work in an unstable country
Tuesday, January 27, 2009; A16 [editorial] [-ir] [this weekend’s elections] [***]
PRESIDENT OBAMA has suggested that elections may not be constructive in countries where there is no "freedom from fear" or where the rule of law and civil society are undeveloped. Iraq may be about to prove him wrong. Though security is fragile, the constitution is still disputed and institutions such as courts and a free media remain works in progress, the country's third national election since 2005 is scheduled for Saturday -- and it is looking like another important step toward stabilization. [well, we certainly hope so] [***]

The campaign for positions in 14 provinces so far has been a major improvement over the previous Iraqi elections -- not to mention the rigged or tightly limited ballots staged by most other Arab countries. Some 14,400 candidates are competing for 440 seats; in contrast to the last provincial vote, in January 2005, candidates are identified by name rather than being presented anonymously on a party slate. Thousands are openly competing in Iraqi cities and towns once paralyzed by violence or controlled by al-Qaeda. Blast walls have been papered with posters, and much of the debate is focused on improving government services. Violence, which spiked four years ago, so far has been a minor factor: Two candidates have been reported killed, and U.S. and Iraqi casualties this month are among the lowest since the war began. [***]

In 2005, voters mostly chose among sectarian coalitions, and most Sunnis boycotted the vote. This month, Sunni parties are actively competing, and though religious parties remain important, the major Shiite and Sunni factions are jockeying among themselves. This means that Sunni politicians will be far better represented in local government and that the leaders themselves will be more popular, secular and diverse. In southern Iraq, an important debate over whether Shiites should support a strong national government or a Shiite-dominated federal region is being fought out by the Dawa party of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, which controls many provincial councils.

Mr. Maliki has gravitated toward a secular nationalism: His coalition is called State of Law. Once dismissed as hopelessly weak, the prime minister has grown so strong that some accuse him of plotting to construct a new Iraqi autocracy. For the moment, that seems unlikely, given the balances built into Iraq's new political system. [***]But Mr. Maliki's platform does augur an Iraq that will be relatively secular, that will assert its independence from Iran and that will remain allied with the United States in the fight against al-Qaeda. If that prospect is advanced this weekend, Iraqis -- and their American partners -- will have elections to thank.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:05 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/opinion/27schaub.html
January 27, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Really Soft Power
By GARY SCHAUB
Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.
GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS, not Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, will shape American engagement with the Middle East for years to come. While Mrs. Clinton prepares to put together the State Department, the military is already reconsidering American policy in critical regions. The politically savvy General Petraeus has both a plan and the resources to see it through.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/opinion/27schaub.html
January 27, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Really Soft Power
By GARY SCHAUB
Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.
GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS, not Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, will shape American engagement with the Middle East for years to come. While Mrs. Clinton prepares to put together the State Department, the military is already reconsidering American policy in critical regions. The politically savvy General Petraeus has both a plan and the resources to see it through.

Unfortunately, Mrs. Clinton can’t say the same. The State Department is supposed to direct American foreign policy, but it lacks the human and financial resources to fulfill its mission. R. Nicholas Burns, a foreign service veteran, may have summed up the problem best when he said that we have more musicians in the Pentagon than we have diplomats in the State Department. The department’s budget for 2009 is $39 billion — [***]less than 8 percent of the amount allotted to the Defense Department. [I’m not sure where he takes his numbers but DOD’s 2008 FY budget was $612 billion minus supplemental!] [****]

Not surprisingly, the State Department has trouble pulling its weight — and the Defense Department fills the void. Regional commanders like General Petraeus — or Gens. H. Norman Schwartzkopf and Anthony Zinni before him — have amassed great power and influence in the United States government and abroad since the 1991 Persian Gulf war.

General Petraeus oversees Central Command — America’s military presence in the Middle East — and has assembled a task force to develop a strategy for the area that stretches from Egypt to Pakistan. This task force will not develop a traditional military strategy with a focus on offensive and defensive operations. Centcom will aim to help nations in the region govern effectively, build their economies and provide security to their people. It will also try to communicate America’s foreign policy intentions clearly. [***]

Regional commanders oversee policy in their regions because no one else can. They have staffs of thousands, forces numbering in the tens of thousands and vast financial resources. These generals tower over civilians who share responsibility for securing American interests abroad: ambassadors, regional desk officers and assistant secretaries of state.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates recognizes the imbalance and has called for increasing the State Department’s budget. But this is a long-term proposition. As he rebuilds his team in a new administration, Mr. Gates should see to it that every command has civilian officials to work alongside their military counterparts. He could, for instance, designate regional deputy defense secretaries to work with the regional commanders, just as Ambassador Ryan Crocker worked with General Petraeus on the successful surge strategy in Iraq. [agreed] [however, how is the civilian DOD rep supposed to compete with the uniformed DOD rep in terms of influence?] [***]

As it stands, Defense Department civilians simply don’t have the authority to hold their own with the regional commanders. They are ranked as deputy assistant secretaries of defense and are fourth-tier civilians within the secretary’s office. They reside in small offices in the Pentagon and have even smaller staffs. Rarely do they engage with regional commanders.

Mr. Gates could promote these officials, give their staffs bigger budgets and more support, and coordinate their activities with the regional commanders so that they would have increased awareness and influence over American policy.

Reorganization of the Defense Secretary’s office along these lines would not solve the structural problem of a weak State Department. But it would be a necessary first step toward more effective oversight of foreign policy, and it would put a civilian face on American engagement with the world.
Gary Schaub is an assistant professor of strategy at the Air War College.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:04 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/europe/27britain.html
January 27, 2009
BBC Assailed for Refusing to Carry Gaza Appeal
By JOHN F. BURNS [UK] [London] [BBC refuses to air Gaza charity appeal] [hell to pay from activist in Britain] [****]
LONDON — In more than 80 years as a publicly financed broadcaster with an audience of millions at home and around the world, the BBC has rarely been buffeted as severely

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/europe/27britain.html
January 27, 2009
BBC Assailed for Refusing to Carry Gaza Appeal
By JOHN F. BURNS [UK] [London] [BBC refuses to air Gaza charity appeal] [hell to pay from activist in Britain] [****]
LONDON — In more than 80 years as a publicly financed broadcaster with an audience of millions at home and around the world, the BBC has rarely been buffeted as severely as it has in recent days over its decision not to broadcast a television appeal by aid agencies for victims of Israel’s recent military actions in Gaza.

BBC executives made the decision late last week and defiantly reaffirmed it on Monday, citing their concern with protecting the corporation’s impartiality in the Arab-Israeli dispute.

The dispute stirs high passions here, and the BBC, like other news organizations, has struggled uneasily for years to strike a balance, even as some critics claim it has tilted heavily toward Israel and others claim it has favored the Palestinians.

The three-week Israeli campaign in Gaza that ended nine days ago had already elicited a fresh barrage of complaints about BBC bias, for and against Israel. But the decision to block the aid appeal had the effect of magnifying the protests, and their virulence.

The decision has met with angry criticism from Church of England archbishops, editorial writers and senior British government ministers, as well as sit-ins at the BBC’s London headquarters and its broadcast center in Glasgow.

News planning sessions at the BBC have featured heated exchanges among editors and reporters, and BBC officials said Monday that they had received more than 11,000 complaints in the past three days.

A strong undercurrent in many of the protests has been that the BBC gave in to pressure from Israel or Jewish groups, which the BBC has vehemently denied.

A more common view has been that BBC executives, already wary because of a recent series of embarrassments unrelated to Middle East coverage, became so averse to controversy that they made an awkward extension of the concept of impartiality to a purely humanitarian issue.

But the BBC’s director general, Mark Thompson, denied Monday to reporters that he had been subjected to “arm-twisting” by pro-Israeli groups and said that the corporation had a duty to cover the Gaza dispute in a “balanced, objective way.”

“Of course, everyone is struck by the human consequence of what has happened,” he said. “And we will, I promise you, continue to report that as fully and compassionately as we can. But we are going to do that in a way where we can hold it up to scrutiny. It’s our job as journalists.”

The three-minute video, which was shown on several other channels in Britain on Monday night, was prepared by the Disasters Emergency Committee, an organization representing 11 relief agencies. Among them are many of Britain’s best-known charities, including the Red Cross, Oxfam, Save the Children, Help the Aged, Christian Aid and World Vision.

The committee has said the money it raises will buy food, medical supplies, tents, blankets and other necessities for those suffering in Gaza in the wake of the Israeli offensive and the military actions of Hamas, the militant Palestinian group that governs Gaza.

It asked broadcasters to show the appeal as a public service.

The BBC does not accept advertising but has shown humanitarian appeals on other issues, including the conflicts in Rwanda, Congo and Darfur. But to broadcast the appeal for aid to Gaza, BBC executives said, might compromise the impartiality of its Middle East coverage.

“We worry about being seen to endorse something which could give people the impression that we were backing one side,” Mr. Thompson said on the BBC’s Web site.

Some of the sharpest criticism of the BBC’s decision on the Gaza appeal came from within its own ranks, from unions representing its newsroom staff and from retired editors and reporters.

Sir John Tusa, a former head of the BBC World Service, said the scenes of distressed children and families in Gaza captured in the video appeal were a matter of “common humanity.”

“Nobody, surely, in their right mind, can say that is being partial towards the victims, as if somehow they deserved the fate they got,” he said in a BBC radio interview.

“The thing that worries me,” he added, “is that there is now an overcomplication of regulation and compliance and policy, and that in the course of that, common sense, and, I regret to say, humanity, seem to have been left behind.”

The BBC was joined in its refusal to carry the appeal by Sky News, an independent broadcaster with a widely watched news channel. But three other broadcasters — the publicly owned Channel 4 and two private broadcasters, ITV and Channel 5 — accepted the appeal. As shown on Monday night, the video focused heavily on the plight of Palestinian children — small boys and girls wounded and sobbing, being rushed into hospital emergency wards and, at one point, a parent clutching a tiny white shroud. Other scenes were of apartment blocks collapsed into piles of twisted steel and rubble.

“The children of Gaza are suffering,” the narrator said. “Many are struggling to survive, homeless or in need of food and water.”

Then, as if answering the view that the video amounted to anti-Israeli propaganda, he said: “Today, this is not about the rights and wrongs of the conflict. These people simply need your help.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:03 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27mideast.html
January 27, 2009
Gaza War Gives Bigger Lift to Israel’s Right Than to Those in Power
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israel] [domestic politics intersects with foreign policy] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [as did 2006 war, fall 2008 seems to have strengthened Bebe Netanyahu and similar hawks] [*****]
JERUSALEM — With two weeks to go before the Israeli elections, the politicians who seem to have benefited the most from the military offensive against Hamas in Gaza are

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27mideast.html
January 27, 2009
Gaza War Gives Bigger Lift to Israel’s Right Than to Those in Power
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israel] [domestic politics intersects with foreign policy] [never-ending cycle of violence] [followup] [this latest Gaza explosion began while I was in hospital] [as did 2006 war, fall 2008 seems to have strengthened Bebe Netanyahu and similar hawks] [*****]
JERUSALEM — With two weeks to go before the Israeli elections, the politicians who seem to have benefited the most from the military offensive against Hamas in Gaza are those who were not involved in planning or carrying out the war.

That is not because Israelis have regrets or have become faint-hearted about the casualties and destruction in Gaza. To the contrary, there appears to have been a shift further to the right, reflecting a feeling among many voters that an even tougher approach may now be required.

Recent polls indicate that Likud, Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing opposition party, has retained and even increased its lead. The other party that appears to have gained the most ground is the nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu, led by Avigdor Lieberman.

A hawkish legislator and former minister, Mr. Lieberman pulled his party out of the governing coalition a year ago when Israel began negotiations over Palestinian statehood with the Palestinian leadership in the West Bank, which is viewed as more moderate and pragmatic than Hamas.

President Obama said on his second day in office that his administration would “actively and aggressively seek” an Israeli-Palestinian peace. In Israel, though, the popular discourse is less about peace than realpolitik and security as the Feb. 10 elections draw near.

“The mood in the country” fits Mr. Netanyahu’s “line,” said Asher Arian of the Israel Democracy Institute, an independent research institute in Jerusalem.

The Likud leader is presenting himself first as a champion of security, and then as a good steward of the economy. Mr. Netanyahu also talks of advancing practical arrangements with the Palestinians and says that if elected he will try to form as broad a governing coalition as possible, partly to appeal to the Israeli mainstream and partly to allay international fears about the upheavals a far-right-wing government could bring.

The three-week war against Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls Gaza, won broader public support here than almost any other Israeli military campaign.

Yet two of its main protagonists lag behind Mr. Netanyahu in the polls. Tzipi Livni, the foreign minister and leader of the centrist Kadima Party, which won the last elections in 2006, remains in second place. But the gap between her and Mr. Netanyahu has grown.

Ehud Barak, the defense minister and Labor Party leader, has long been unpopular. While the Gaza campaign gave him a boost, he is still trailing badly.

Under the electoral system, the leader of the party that wins the most votes gets the chance to form a governing coalition and to become prime minister. Israelis say they generally prefer Mr. Barak as defense minister.

Mr. Netanyahu was the front-runner even before the Gaza offensive. Since the war, Mr. Lieberman’s star has begun to rise. His party holds 11 seats in the 120-seat Parliament. Four opinion polls in the past week have given Yisrael Beiteinu 16 seats, with the party edging ahead of the center-left Labor Party in three polls and tying with it in the fourth.

In 1978, when he was 20, Mr. Lieberman immigrated to Israel from Moldova, then a Soviet republic, and he lives in a Jewish settlement in the West Bank. Popular with the country’s so-called Russian vote, he is vocal about the threat from Iran and advocates swapping areas of Israel that are heavily populated by Arab citizens for parts of the West Bank that are populated by Israeli Jews.

Some of the rising popularity of Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Lieberman may be a result of the frustration among those Israelis who believe that the war in Gaza did not go far enough.

Although the government was clear in setting limited goals for the war — stopping Palestinian militants from launching rockets against Israel — part of the public seemed to have “its own expectations,” like, for example, the collapse of Hamas, said Yehuda Ben Meir, a public opinion expert at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

Ms. Livni is campaigning on a platform of continuing negotiations with the Palestinians for a two-state solution, and contends that any Israeli government that fails to do so will quickly find itself in conflict with the new administration in the United States.

But Ms. Livni came out of the war seeming “a bit wishy-washy,” said Gadi Wolfsfeld, a political science professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Though she took a hard line on Hamas, Ms. Livni did not gain much credit for the nation’s display of military might. In Washington to sign the memorandum of understanding on preventing weapons smuggling into Gaza, she was absent when Israel declared a cease-fire, damaging her image of relevancy.

Many here believe that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is not going out of his way to root for his successor in Kadima, still smarting over the fact that Ms. Livni, along with Mr. Barak, had pressed for him to resign over corruption allegations.

In a final twist, the police on Sunday detained seven associates of Mr. Lieberman for questioning, including his daughter, who has since been released to house arrest, as part of a longstanding investigation into his finances. The police suspect Mr. Lieberman of money laundering, fraud and breach of trust, although he has never been charged. But many commentators here say the police attention will only help Mr. Lieberman, a perennial suspect.

“Just look at the Russian-language Internet sites,” wrote Lily Galili in the newspaper Haaretz on Monday, “where Lieberman has once again become the persecuted Russian immigrant, the representative of all such immigrants ever victimized by the police.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 11:02 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27briefs-PENALTIESFOR_BRF.html
January 27, 2009
World Briefing | Middle East
Iran: Penalties for a Mixed Game
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [iran] [domestic politics intersect foreign policy] [more factionalism] [the people of Iran trying to push the envelope] [****]
The first soccer game involving both sexes since the 1979 Islamic Revolution led to punishment on Monday, as a soccer club said it had suspended three officials involved and handed out fines. Iran’s Islamic rules ban physical contact between unrelated men and women, and Iranian women are barred from attending soccer games when men

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27briefs-PENALTIESFOR_BRF.html
January 27, 2009
World Briefing | Middle East
Iran: Penalties for a Mixed Game
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [iran] [domestic politics intersect foreign policy] [more factionalism] [the people of Iran trying to push the envelope] [****]
The first soccer game involving both sexes since the 1979 Islamic Revolution led to punishment on Monday, as a soccer club said it had suspended three officials involved and handed out fines. Iran’s Islamic rules ban physical contact between unrelated men and women, and Iranian women are barred from attending soccer games when men play. The officials, a coach and two managers, first denied the game took place, but cellphone videos of the game were used as evidence against them, the newspaper Vatan-e-Emrooz reported. The game was last Tuesday in Tehran between the club’s women’s team and its boys’ team. The boys won, 7 to 0.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27diyala.html
January 27, 2009
Divisions Threaten Fair Election in Iraqi Province
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections?] [****]
BAQUBA, Iraq — The provincial elections in four days [***]have brought a certain excitement to the gray days of January — at least in most places. Campaign posters,

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27diyala.html
January 27, 2009
Divisions Threaten Fair Election in Iraqi Province
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections?] [****]
BAQUBA, Iraq — The provincial elections in four days [***]have brought a certain excitement to the gray days of January — at least in most places. Campaign posters, with the candidates’ gleaming faces and party names emblazoned in red or black Arabic calligraphy, seem to shout at you from nearly every blast wall and lamppost.

Not so in Diyala Province. Cross the border there and the election signs thin out, a signal of the anger still simmering beneath the surface.

Riven by sectarian violence that has lasted longer than in almost any other province in Iraq, Diyala is often described as a microcosm of the country: Shiites and Sunnis, Kurds and Arabs, farmers and professors. All live in lethally close proximity. [***]

In Diyala, resentments fast become hatreds, murder is often more readily resorted to than discussion, sectarian killings more than reconciliation. The violence has diminished of late, in the face of nearly continuous security operations, but the tensions remain palpable.

“We have many closed neighborhoods in Baquba,” said Saja Khadori, a member of the Diyala Provincial Council’s security committee.

“Most neighborhoods are still closed. So for Shiite neighborhoods, that means you can only find posters for Shiite candidates, because Sunnis cannot enter, and in the closed Sunni neighborhoods you find only posters for Sunni candidates.”

This is just one of the many problems in Diyala that make holding a fair election almost impossible. “We tried to postpone the voting, because we are worried about the integrity of the election, but we failed,” Ms. Khadori said.

Ms. Khadori, who is running for re-election on the ticket of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s State of Law coalition, and Ibrahim Bachilan, Diyala’s Provincial Council chairman, a Kurd who is not running again, rattled off discouraging statistics.

“About 30 percent of the province is still under the influence of Al Qaeda,” [***]Mr. Bachilan said as he waited for a Provincial Council meeting to start. And in those villages and neighborhoods, he said, Shiites and Kurds could not campaign at all.

Another problem is that 10 percent of the province’s population has fled, he said, and most of those people have not yet returned. In some neighborhoods, Mr. Bachilan and provincial law enforcement officials said, intimidation was taking place ahead of the elections.

In the Ghatoon neighborhood of Baquba, the provincial capital, where Al Qaeda fought house-to-house battles with Iraqi and American soldiers in 2006 and 2007, three families who recently returned to reclaim their homes were murdered last week, [***]strongly discouraging other refugees from returning anytime soon, a law enforcement official said.

Ms. Khadori and Mr. Bachilan said that some people who were running — about 10 to 15 — are suspected of having ties to the Islamic State of Iraq, the most violent wing of the insurgency, responsible for numerous kidnappings, beheadings and forced expulsions. It has ties to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a homegrown extremist group whose leadership is foreign, according to American intelligence.

No candidates are wearing Islamic State of Iraq buttons as they campaign, and their affiliation is hard to verify. However, a number of candidates from onetime Qaeda-held areas express sentiments that could easily be espoused by insurgents.

And that is not too surprising. In some of these places, Ms. Khadori said, no one could safely run without at least the tacit approval of the remaining Qaeda cells.

Sheik Abdul Rahman Jassam al-Mujalmi is a candidate with the Reform and Development Party, also known as the Solution Party, a Sunni organization, that is strong in areas of Diyala once held by the Islamic State of Iraq.

Mr. Mujalmi is a member of the Awakening Council in the area, one of the American-backed groups that pushed out Al Qaeda, but he has little patience for the American presence in Iraq, which, like the insurgents, he terms “the occupation.” [***]

He has a warning for President Obama: “I call on the new American president to think about withdrawal of forces seriously, because maybe there will be a day when we will witness a revolution against their forces and there will be battles in the streets. So I advise him to withdraw his soldiers.”

Despite the president’s stated intention to withdraw most forces within 16 months, Mr. Mujalmi remained skeptical. “I doubt that they will withdraw,” he said. “They said they would offer democracy and freedom, but where is democracy, where is freedom? And they said they would build, but what have they built? They have brought only destruction.

“When an American tank passes me I feel it is driving over my heart,” he said.

His party seems to have local enemies. While he was talking, a bomb exploded outside the party headquarters a few blocks away. It had been planted under the car of the party’s spokesman. He was unharmed, but two civilians were wounded.

Nonetheless his party is likely to garner at least 3 seats on the 29-member Provincial Council.

A few streets away, over a shop that sells cheap furniture, is the headquarters of the secular National Meeting Party. Run on a shoestring, the party is a mix of professionals, former military officers and government workers. In the last election it ran as part of the Iraqiya Party, led by a former prime minister, Ayad Allawi, a secular figure.

“The previous election was built on the religious parties; it wasn’t a fair election,” said Salim Zaidi, the National Meeting Party’s standard-bearer in the province.

Secular parties cannot campaign in closed Sunni or Shiite neighborhoods, and also face problems raising money. Incumbent parties can give patronage jobs, award contracts and make use of government employee networks. Religious parties have financing from followers who fill the coffers at mosques, and from groups outside the country. In Ghatoon, one of the closed Sunni neighborhoods, it is hard to tell that the election will take place this week. The streets are nearly empty and there are few campaign signs. Some looked faded and some were torn. [***]

On the city’s outskirts lie dilapidated subdivisions that look almost deserted. In one, Al Muradiya, the Sunni Tawaffuk and Reform Party had unfurled a huge banner from a building that appeared to be empty.

Samir Zaidan, a cousin of Mr. Mujalmi, the Sunni tribal sheik, was standing outside a shuttered shop.

Mr. Zaidan was asked about people’s mood toward the election. “In this place 40 young men were killed,” he said.

A pickup truck carrying wood drove by. The driver had a large beard and wore traditional tribal dress; next to him was a similarly bearded companion — indicators that they were likely to be religious.

Mr. Zaidan looked at the receding pickup truck. “It was an Al Qaeda-held place.”
And maybe it still is.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/washington/27bagram.html
January 27, 2009
Afghan Prison Poses Problem in Overhaul of Detainee Policy
By ERIC SCHMITT [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [Bagram as complication to gitmo and other Obama initiatives] [use psci469b] [****]
WASHINGTON — For months, a national debate has raged over the fate of the 245 detainees at the United States military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

But what may be an equally difficult problem now confronts the Obama administration in the 600 prisoners packed into a cavernous, makeshift prison on the American air base at Bagram in Afghanistan. [***]

Military personnel who know Bagram and Guantánamo describe the Afghan site as tougher and more spartan. The prisoners have fewer privileges and virtually no access to lawyers. The Bush administration never allowed journalists or human rights advocates inside.

Problems have also developed with efforts to rehabilitate former jihadists, some of whom had been imprisoned at Guantánamo. Nine graduates of a Saudi program have been arrested for rejoining terrorist groups, Saudi officials said Monday.

President Obama must now decide whether and how to continue holding the men at Bagram, most of them suspected of being Taliban fighters. Under the laws of war, they are being held indefinitely and without charge. He must also determine whether to go forward with the construction of a $60 million prison complex at Bagram that, while offering better conditions for the detainees, would also signal a longer-term commitment to the American detention mission. [***]

Mr. Obama tried last week to buy some time in addressing the challenges Bagram poses even as he ordered Guantánamo closed. By a separate executive order, Mr. Obama directed a task force led by the attorney general and the defense secretary to study the government’s overall policy on detainees and to report to him in six months.

But human rights advocates and former government officials say that several factors — including expanding combat operations against the Taliban, the scheduled opening of the new prison at Bagram in the fall and a recent federal court order — will probably force the administration to deal with the vexing choices much sooner.

“How the Obama administration plans to deal with detention in Afghanistan is an open question,” said Tina M. Foster, executive director of the International Justice Network, a human rights organization in New York. “How will this administration differ from the Bush administration in its conduct of detention in Afghanistan?”

The population at Bagram has increased nearly sixfold over the past four years, driven not just by the deepening conflict in Afghanistan but also by the fact that the Bush administration in September 2004 largely halted the movement of prisoners to Guantánamo, leaving Bagram as the preferred alternative to detain terrorism suspects.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/washington/27bagram.html
January 27, 2009
Afghan Prison Poses Problem in Overhaul of Detainee Policy
By ERIC SCHMITT [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [Bagram as complication to gitmo and other Obama initiatives] [use psci469b] [****]
WASHINGTON — For months, a national debate has raged over the fate of the 245 detainees at the United States military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

But what may be an equally difficult problem now confronts the Obama administration in the 600 prisoners packed into a cavernous, makeshift prison on the American air base at Bagram in Afghanistan. [***]

Military personnel who know Bagram and Guantánamo describe the Afghan site as tougher and more spartan. The prisoners have fewer privileges and virtually no access to lawyers. The Bush administration never allowed journalists or human rights advocates inside.

Problems have also developed with efforts to rehabilitate former jihadists, some of whom had been imprisoned at Guantánamo. Nine graduates of a Saudi program have been arrested for rejoining terrorist groups, Saudi officials said Monday.

President Obama must now decide whether and how to continue holding the men at Bagram, most of them suspected of being Taliban fighters. Under the laws of war, they are being held indefinitely and without charge. He must also determine whether to go forward with the construction of a $60 million prison complex at Bagram that, while offering better conditions for the detainees, would also signal a longer-term commitment to the American detention mission. [***]

Mr. Obama tried last week to buy some time in addressing the challenges Bagram poses even as he ordered Guantánamo closed. By a separate executive order, Mr. Obama directed a task force led by the attorney general and the defense secretary to study the government’s overall policy on detainees and to report to him in six months.

But human rights advocates and former government officials say that several factors — including expanding combat operations against the Taliban, the scheduled opening of the new prison at Bagram in the fall and a recent federal court order — will probably force the administration to deal with the vexing choices much sooner.

“How the Obama administration plans to deal with detention in Afghanistan is an open question,” said Tina M. Foster, executive director of the International Justice Network, a human rights organization in New York. “How will this administration differ from the Bush administration in its conduct of detention in Afghanistan?”

The population at Bagram has increased nearly sixfold over the past four years, driven not just by the deepening conflict in Afghanistan but also by the fact that the Bush administration in September 2004 largely halted the movement of prisoners to Guantánamo, leaving Bagram as the preferred alternative to detain terrorism suspects.

Bush administration lawyers argued this month that the Bagram detainees were different from those at Guantánamo. Virtually all of the Bagram prisoners were captured on the battlefield and were being held in a war zone, the lawyers contended, and they could pose a security threat if released. On Thursday, Judge John D. Bates of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia gave the Obama administration until Feb. 20 to “refine” the government’s legal position with respect to four men who are seeking to challenge their detention at Bagram under habeas corpus, a right that the Supreme Court has granted for detainees at Guantánamo.

The four plaintiffs were taken to Bagram from outside Afghanistan and have been imprisoned there without access to any legal process, many of them for over six years, said Ms. Foster, who is representing the detainees.

Judge Bates issued his order after Mr. Obama signed his directives on Thursday, and the judge cited the presidential orders as “indicating significant changes to the government’s approach to the detention, and review of detention, of individuals currently held at Guantánamo Bay.” He noted that “a different approach could impact the court’s analysis of certain issues central to the resolution” of the Bagram cases as well.

At a White House briefing about the executive orders last Thursday, a senior administration official was asked whether terrorism suspects captured by American authorities would continue to be sent to Bagram. The official said not to expect any changes to existing policies in Afghanistan for at least six months, pending the completion of the task force’s review. [***]

A Justice Department spokesman, Dean Boyd, declined to comment on Judge Bates’s order, saying that government lawyers were studying it.

The challenges confronting the Obama administration at Bagram do not extend to the much larger American detention operations in Iraq, where the United States now holds about 15,000 prisoners. Under a security agreement with the Iraqi government, the United States will begin next month to release up to 1,500 detainees a month. Fighters captured and imprisoned in Iraq are afforded legal protections under the Geneva Conventions.

Human rights advocates are already pressing the administration to revamp the review process for releasing or transferring the Bagram detainees, all but about 30 of whom are Afghans. This process, which the military calls “unlawful enemy combatant review boards,” involves reviews of the status of each prisoner every six months. Human rights lawyers criticize the process as a sham and have called for a return to the longstanding battlefield reviews called for by the Geneva Conventions.

More broadly, Mr. Obama’s move away from the Bush administration’s aggressive detention policies will have to be reconciled with his plans to increase combat operations in Afghanistan, a step that will almost inevitably generate new waves of detainees.

“The decisions about detention in and around Afghanistan are linked to strategic decisions Obama needs to make on the Afghanistan war,” said Matthew Waxman, a professor at Columbia Law School who served in the Department of Defense overseeing detainee policies under the Bush administration. “Does a proposed ‘surge’ in Afghanistan, for example, include an expanded detention mission? How does detention fit within a counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan?”

Mr. Waxman said one approach the Obama administration might consider is whether it can defend a narrower definition of enemy combatant than the broad one asserted by the Bush administration.

In 2005, the Bush administration began trying to scale back American involvement in detention operations in Afghanistan, mainly by transferring Bagram prisoners to an American-financed high-security prison outside of Kabul guarded by American-trained Afghan soldiers.

The American military has handed over about 20 to 30 detainees a month since 2007, or more than 500 detainees in all, [***]according to Lt. Col. Mark Wright, a Defense Department spokesman.

But United States officials conceded more than a year ago that the new Afghan prison could not absorb all the Bagram prisoners. The officials have also acknowledged serious problems in the security-court system in Afghanistan in which the transferred detainees are being tried.

Another question confronting the Obama administration is whether to go ahead with the construction of a 40-acre detention complex to replace the existing prison. After the prison was created in early 2002, it became a primary screening site for prisoners captured in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere.

Harsh interrogation methods and sleep deprivation were used routinely, and two Afghan detainees died there in December 2002 after being beaten by American soldiers and hung by their arms from the ceiling of isolation cells.

Conditions and treatment have improved markedly since then, but there are still only minimal areas for the prisoners to exercise. The new detention center at Bagram is supposed to incorporate some of the lessons learned by the United States in Iraq. Classrooms will be built for vocational training and religious discussion, and there will be more space for recreation and family visits, officials said.

“The tragedy is, the U.S. is spending tens of millions of dollars building better detention facilities, but still has no process in place to handle these guys,” said Sam Zarifi, director of Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific program, which is based in London.
Carlotta Gall contributed reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27briefs-GUNFIRENEARE_BRF.html
January 27, 2009
World Briefing | Middle East
Yemen: Gunfire Near Embassy
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Yemen] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [****]
Gunmen fired on a police checkpoint near the United States Embassy in the capital, Sana, on Monday, an Interior Ministry official said, hours after the embassy received

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27briefs-GUNFIRENEARE_BRF.html
January 27, 2009
World Briefing | Middle East
Yemen: Gunfire Near Embassy
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Yemen] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [****]
Gunmen fired on a police checkpoint near the United States Embassy in the capital, Sana, on Monday, an Interior Ministry official said, hours after the embassy received threats of a possible attack. The police returned fire at two gunmen in a car, which fled, the official said. He said three men in the area were later detained.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:58 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/asia/27briefs-BICYCLEBOMBK_BRF.html
January 27, 2009
World Briefing | Asia
Pakistan: Bicycle Bomb Kills 5
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [another suicide bomber] [may well be sent from jihadis forces] [if so, likely a foreign fighter—perhaps an Arab] [followup] [use psci469b] [****]
A bomb rigged to a bicycle exploded in northwestern Pakistan on Monday, killing at least 5 people and wounding 20. The explosion occurred in Dera Ismail Khan, near the Waziristan tribal areas, which are insurgent strongholds. In Datta Khel, a village in North

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/asia/27briefs-BICYCLEBOMBK_BRF.html
January 27, 2009
World Briefing | Asia
Pakistan: Bicycle Bomb Kills 5
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [another suicide bomber] [may well be sent from jihadis forces] [if so, likely a foreign fighter—perhaps an Arab] [followup] [use psci469b] [****]
A bomb rigged to a bicycle exploded in northwestern Pakistan on Monday, killing at least 5 people and wounding 20. The explosion occurred in Dera Ismail Khan, near the Waziristan tribal areas, which are insurgent strongholds. In Datta Khel, a village in North Waziristan, a man accused of spying for the United States was found shot to death with his right hand chopped off, intelligence officials said. In Quetta, in the southwest, gunmen fatally shot the leader of a small Shiite political party, setting off violent protests. Several hundred people torched vehicles and a bank, the police said. A spokesman for the outlawed Sunni Muslim militant group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi claimed responsibility for the Quetta killing. [not definitive] [***]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:57 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/africa/27somalia.html
January 27, 2009
Islamists Overrun Somalia City as Ethiopians Leave
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM and ALAN COWELL [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [Ethiopia withdraws/Islamists surge] [followup Jan 25] [****]
MOGADISHU, Somalia — Islamist insurgents took over the city that houses Somalia’s Parliament on Monday, just hours after Ethiopian troops withdrew and formally ended a

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/africa/27somalia.html
January 27, 2009
Islamists Overrun Somalia City as Ethiopians Leave
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM and ALAN COWELL [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [Ethiopia withdraws/Islamists surge] [followup Jan 25] [****]
MOGADISHU, Somalia — Islamist insurgents took over the city that houses Somalia’s Parliament on Monday, just hours after Ethiopian troops withdrew and formally ended a failed two-year effort to defeat Islamist militants in the country.

Witnesses reached by telephone in the city of Baidoa, which had been the seat of Parliament since 2006, said that Islamist militias were patrolling the streets and that government offices in the city had been ransacked. There were no immediate reports of clashes with residents.

“The Islamists have taken control of the town this afternoon,” said Xaaji Isaaq, a traditional elder.

Ethiopia began withdrawing its troops earlier this month, leaving a power vacuum that the Islamists rushed to fill — with little to no opposition from the government. [***]

The country now faces a new period of uncertainty. Baidoa was one of the last cities in Somalia where the government had any significant presence. In the capital, Mogadishu, the government controls only a few city blocks, while Islamist factions control most of the southern regions of the country.

In an effort to stabilize the nation, the government reached a power-sharing deal with moderate Islamists last October, hoping to pave the way for a national unity government. Since the Ethiopians began withdrawing, some parts of the country have come under the control of moderate Islamist militias loyal to the government.

Most lawmakers had, in fact, left Baidoa for Djibouti, to the north of Somalia, over the weekend to begin incorporating members of the moderate Islamist opposition into Parliament, leaving the city largely empty of its leadership when the insurgents stormed in. [****]

The change in Baidoa came as the last of the Ethiopians completed their withdrawal from the country, leaving fractious Islamist factions to compete for control.

On Saturday, a suicide car bomber detonated his explosives near an African Union peacekeepers’ base in Mogadishu, killing at least 15 people and wounding dozens.

There had been some speculation over whether the Ethiopian troops had merely moved to border areas. But Reuters quoted a government spokesman, Abdi Haji Gobdon, as saying Monday: “The Ethiopians have fulfilled their promise. Their last troops crossed the border this morning.”

International mediators have urged Somali leaders to overcome their divisions in talks in Djibouti this week.

Parliament is supposed to select a new president to replace Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who resigned in late December. Many Somalis, Western diplomats and aid officials have crossed their fingers in the hope that moderate Islamists and transitional government figures would work together to pick a new, unifying leader.

Mr. Yusuf, a former warlord, had been widely criticized for trying to thwart peace negotiations. One of the leading contenders to replace him is a moderate Islamic cleric.
Mohammed Ibrahim reported from Mogadishu, and Alan Cowell from Paris.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:57 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27saudi.html
January 27, 2009
9 Alumni of Saudi Program for Ex-Jihadists Are Arrested
By ROBERT F. WORTH [Lebanon] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [prosecution of global jihadis abroad—extraterritoriality and other complex issues] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [jihadis recidivism?] [how domestic politics will likely make hay] [domestic cognate rarely an issue] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [followup from Jan 25] [****]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Nine graduates of an influential Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists, including some who had been imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay, have

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/middleeast/27saudi.html
January 27, 2009
9 Alumni of Saudi Program for Ex-Jihadists Are Arrested
By ROBERT F. WORTH [Lebanon] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [prosecution of global jihadis abroad—extraterritoriality and other complex issues] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [jihadis recidivism?] [how domestic politics will likely make hay] [domestic cognate rarely an issue] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [followup from Jan 25] [****]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Nine graduates of an influential Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists, including some who had been imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay, have been arrested for rejoining terrorist groups [***]since the program started in 2004, Saudi officials said Monday.

The Saudi Interior Ministry acknowledged the arrests after it emerged late last week that two other graduates had joined the Yemeni branch of Al Qaeda, raising questions about how the Saudis lost track of them. Both had been released from Guantánamo, in Cuba, in 2007, and one of the men is suspected of having helped plan a deadly attack in Yemen last year.

The statement on Monday about the arrests appeared to be an effort by the Saudi authorities to underline their vigilance, despite the lapses, in keeping track of former militants. [***] [in other words, principally window dressing]

Hundreds of men have passed through the Saudi program, and it has been viewed as a model for similar efforts elsewhere. Late last year, Saudi officials said none of the program’s graduates had returned to violence, but the statement about the arrests, which took place separately over the course of the past few years, appeared to contradict that.

It is not clear how many of the nine men had been at Guantánamo, said Maj. Gen. Mansour al-Turki, a spokesman for the Saudi Interior Ministry. The rehabilitation program also includes people who were convicted of involvement in terrorist activities or groups inside Saudi Arabia.

“When they were released from the program they were O.K., but in one way or another they were recruited again” by terrorist groups, General Turki said. The program, which includes religious re-education, therapy and assistance with reintegrating the former jihadists into their families and jobs, is more comprehensive than earlier, similar efforts in Yemen and Egypt, and appears over all to have been more successful. [***]

If doubts are raised about the Saudi program, they could complicate President Obama’s plan to close the Guantánamo detention center within a year, as required by one of his first executive orders after taking office last week. Almost half of the remaining prisoners there are Yemeni, and their return home depends in part on Yemen’s creation of a rehabilitation program, paid for partly by the United States, that is modeled on the Saudi one.

Pentagon officials have said that 61 of the more than 525 Guantánamo detainees who have been released have returned to terrorism. [they have changed that number consistenly] [***] That claim has generated some skepticism, and the Pentagon is expected to declassify portions of a report on the subject in the coming days.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/europe/27hague.html
January 27, 2009
International Court Begins First Trial
By MARLISE SIMONS[UN] [ICC] [ICC’s first trial] [US has been reluctant to jettison other UN entities for this new court] [sovereignty issues] [use psci350] [****]
PARIS — More than six years after openings its doors, the International Criminal Court in The Hague began its first trial Monday, as Thomas Lubanga, a former Congolese warlord, took his seat in the dock, facing a crowded court and public gallery.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/europe/27hague.html
January 27, 2009
International Court Begins First Trial
By MARLISE SIMONS[UN] [ICC] [ICC’s first trial] [US has been reluctant to jettison other UN entities for this new court] [sovereignty issues] [use psci350] [****]
PARIS — More than six years after openings its doors, the International Criminal Court in The Hague began its first trial Monday, as Thomas Lubanga, a former Congolese warlord, took his seat in the dock, facing a crowded court and public gallery.

Mr. Lubanga, 48, once the leader of a powerful and violent militia, is accused of war crimes, including commandeering children under the age of 15 and sending them into war to maim and kill. He pleaded not guilty to the crimes, which prosecutors said occurred in 2002-2003 during ethnic fighting in the Ituri region of Eastern Congo.

Supporters of the court have hailed the long-awaited trial as a momentous step for the tribunal, created to try large-scale human rights violations, while critics contend it has been too long in coming. Both sides see the trial as a test case that will be closely watched by lobbyists and human rights activists.

Long delays, bitter legal squabbles and irritation among the trial judges had almost torpedoed the case. Last July, as the trial was about to start, judges put a halt to the proceedings, citing legal and strategic errors by the prosecution, and said Mr. Lubanga should be set free, though he was ultimately kept in custody. The judges said the prosecution’s handling of evidence amounted to “wholesale and serious abuse” and ruled that at that point a fair trial was not possible.

Now that the judges have given their green light and errors have been redressed, Mr. Lubanga will be tried by three international judges in a process that is expected to go on until the end of this year.

Prosecutors will start their case calling on close to 40 witnesses, nine of them young men and women who were themselves former child soldiers.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/asia/27hong.html
January 27, 2009
Year of the Ox Is Looking Inauspicious
By MARK MCDONALD and BETTINA WASSENER [Hong Kong] [PRC] [Lunar new year] [year of Ox] [2009]
HONG KONG — Hong Kong’s gleaming past and current troubles are right there, plain to see, on Vincent Chan’s wall — photographs of more than a hundred Bentleys, Rolls-Royces and Jaguars for sale, luxury cars dumped by their once-flush owners in need of some ready cash.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/27/world/asia/27hong.html
January 27, 2009
Year of the Ox Is Looking Inauspicious
By MARK MCDONALD and BETTINA WASSENER [Hong Kong] [PRC] [Lunar new year] [year of Ox] [2009]
HONG KONG — Hong Kong’s gleaming past and current troubles are right there, plain to see, on Vincent Chan’s wall — photographs of more than a hundred Bentleys, Rolls-Royces and Jaguars for sale, luxury cars dumped by their once-flush owners in need of some ready cash.

Mr. Chan sells only one or two cars a week now — a third of the sales his dealership has made in recent years. And under pressure from his bank, he is prepared to sell any of his cars at a loss, just to free up some money. He is ready to haggle.

The Chinese Lunar New Year began Monday, and projections for the Year of the Ox from astrologers, lawyers, bankers and fishmongers are anything but auspicious.

“The mood is confused and desperate,” said Kerby Kuek, a feng shui master and Chinese astrologer. “Two years ago, people would ask me if they should change from a medium house to a big house, or from a Nissan to a BMW.

“Now people ask me directly, ‘When am I going to get laid off?”’

Mr. Kuek said he was getting the same fearful questions from clients as he heard in 2003, when Hong Kong was rocked by the epidemic of SARS severe acute respiratory syndrome. Foreigners fled, tourism disappeared, local people went around in surgical masks, and the economy, of course, buckled.

Hong Kong’s other economic calamity came with the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis. Property values dropped 50 percent.

But Mr. Chan, 58, does not see a current parallel to that dark period, which he called “completely horrible.”

“We haven’t had any suicides this time!” he said brightly. “So, you see: Not so bad as ’98!”

Most of his customers are expatriates, and the global crisis and the ensuing recession in Hong Kong are forcing many of them to economize. (Which explains the huge backlog of cars in Mr. Chan’s jammed warehouse.) Some expats have been recalled to their home countries, especially those in banking, law and finance, while others have been fired outright.

But gloom can be relative. There are no signs of mortgage defaults in Hong Kong, and people are not losing their homes like they are in the United States. And even if thousands of expats have been handed one-way tickets back to New York, London and Sydney, a number have chosen to remain.

“There isn’t the desperate urge to leave like there was during SARS,” said Shriram Chaubal, chief operating officer of GeoClicks, which runs a popular Hong Kong Web site called GeoExpat.com. “They know Hong Kong is a lot better than wherever they’d be expatriating back to.”

But Mr. Chaubal said friends and clients working in the manufacturing, retail, and food and beverage sectors were worried. And while enrollments have grown a bit at the Discovery Bay International School, the principal, Grant Ramsay, has heard plenty of gruesome layoff stories on the parental grapevine.

“We certainly know a dip is coming,” he said. “So it’s eyes wide open and bracing for the worst.”

And the worst appears yet to come. Donald Tsang, Hong Kong’s chief executive, delivered this blunt warning last Tuesday: “Hong Kong is in the grip of the financial tsunami.” He predicted more layoffs and company closings after the New Year holiday.

The economic numbers — macro and micro — certainly support Tsang’s baleful analysis. The Hang Seng stock index, for example, was off 48 percent in 2008.

The unemployment rate ticked up recently to 4.1 percent, a mild cough compared to the tubercular rate of 8.8 percent in 2003. But a new Citigroup analysis warns that “this cycle appears worse,” with no appreciable recovery until 2011.

Personal bankruptcies, up 85 percent from a year ago, are increasing 10 percent per month, said Thomas Tse, a partner at the law firm Yip, Tse & Tang. He expects bankruptcies to double between now and late summer, eventually ensnaring 1 percent of the city’s working population, largely on personal loans and credit card debt.

A dozen years ago, a bankruptcy was a traumatic loss of face, a deep humiliation in a society that prizes propriety and thrift. But now, after a dozen years of economic peaks and troughs, Mr. Tse said it carries much less of a stigma.

John Carroll, a historian of Hong Kong, said people here were “legendary for their resourcefulness and ability to recover” from economic shocks.

He pointed to rebounds from labor strife in the mid-1920s; the Japanese occupation from 1941 to 1945; United Nations and United States embargoes during the Korean War that prompted a shift from trade to light industry 50 years ago; and Hong Kong’s more recent move to a service economy after industrial jobs were shipped to mainland China.

Anil Daswani, head of research at Citigroup in Hong Kong, wrote a strategy report last week that admired the city’s transformation from a trading port into “a genuine global financial powerhouse alongside London and New York.”

“Hong Kong has always prospered by being able to reinvent itself,” he wrote, “and we are of no doubt that during this downturn it will do it again.”

The go-go years in the middle of this decade certainly burnished the city’s reputation as an Asian hub for business, banking and excess. Those were the days when the Peninsula Hotel, in a single order, bought 14 custom-made Rolls-Royces specially painted in “Peninsula green.”

The Hong Kong wealthy remain wealthy, and stratospherically so. But for people a few rungs down the economic ladder, the impromptu weekend trips to Bali or Tokyo, the jewelry binges, the full-on lush life — that is mostly over.

“The whole party-party thing, the let’s-go-splurge thing, that’s clearly not happening now,” said Chaubal of GeoClicks.

If there is any time for Hong Kongers to party, however, it is now. The New Year holiday in Asia calls for a long break from work, with money spent on new clothes, big dinners, flowers and gifts. But this year, in street markets and marbled malls alike, the buzz of commerce is more muted. And with consumers more cautious, prices have plunged.

Caterpillar fungus, a kind of Chinese cure-all that is cooked into stews, has dropped in price by a third, down to about $250 an ounce. Crocodile jerky, sea cucumbers, shark’s fin and dried fish bellies have seen similar reductions.

Kumquat trees, a traditional holiday gift that symbolizes prosperity, are the same price as last year, although more buyers are going for the lower-priced potted shrubs rather than the grander 5-footers.

And at his showroom on Dragon Road, Mr. Chan has a ’96 Rolls-Royce Silver Spur for sale. Marked down from $48,000, the sticker now says $38,000 — and even that is negotiable.

Mr. Chan is making other changes. He has always reserved four tables at a good restaurant where he treats his employees and a few dozen loyal customers to a New Year’s dinner. This year he has cut back to one table, staff only.

He is also cutting back on the money he is putting into the red-and-gold envelopes traditionally given to children, staff members and service people during the holiday. In previous years he has put in a crisp bill of 100 Hong Kong dollars, worth about $12.80. This year he will use 50-dollar notes.

“They won’t be angry,” Chan said. “Everybody knows the problems with the economy. They know what’s happened.”

A former garage mechanic, Mr. Chan bought a 1956 Vauxhall junker when he was a teenager, fixed it up, and sold it for five times the money. He has been buying and flipping cars ever since.

“If I sell a car now and lose money, O.K., I’m still alive,” he said. “I can always make money again.” He snapped his fingers. “This is Hong Kong. We’re gamblers.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/01/26/business/AP-EU-Iceland-Crisis.html
January 26, 2009
Iceland’s Government Collapses
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 10:27 a.m. ET [Iceland] [in recent years Europe’s most affluent country with tremendous real estate bubble] [Iceland’s comparably high interest rates drew Euros and Pounds from UK and continental Europe in the billions] [they are now gone] [incredible how people thought that it was normal for Iceland to be the affluence capital of Europe] [I know of restaurateurs and others moving there] [now what?] [global economics] [IPE] [govt finally collapses] [*****]
REYKJAVIK, Iceland (AP) -- Iceland's coalition government collapsed Monday, leaving

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/01/26/business/AP-EU-Iceland-Crisis.html
January 26, 2009
Iceland’s Government Collapses
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 10:27 a.m. ET [Iceland] [in recent years Europe’s most affluent country with tremendous real estate bubble] [Iceland’s comparably high interest rates drew Euros and Pounds from UK and continental Europe in the billions] [they are now gone] [incredible how people thought that it was normal for Iceland to be the affluence capital of Europe] [I know of restaurateurs and others moving there] [now what?] [global economics] [IPE] [govt finally collapses] [*****]
REYKJAVIK, Iceland (AP) -- Iceland's coalition government collapsed Monday, leaving the island nation in political turmoil amid a financial crisis that has pummeled its economy and required an international bailout to keep the country afloat.

Prime Minister Geir Haarde said he was unwilling to meet demands from his coalition partners in the Social Democratic Alliance Party, which insisted upon the post of prime minister in order to keep the coalition intact.

Haarde, who has been prime minister since 2006, said he would officially inform the country's president later Monday that the government had collapsed.

Foreign Minister Ingibjorg Gisladottir, who heads the Social Democrats, is expected to start talks immediately with opposition parties in an attempt to form a new government. That government would sit until new elections are held, likely in May.

Haarde had previously said he wouldn't lead his Independence Party into new elections, because he has cancer.

He told reporters on Monday that he had proposed Education Minister Thorgerdur Katrin Gunnarsdottir, of Haarde's own party, be appointed Iceland's new prime minister -- but Gisladottir rejected that offer.

''It was an unreasonable demand for the smaller party to demand the premiership over the larger party,'' Haarde said.

Iceland has been mired in crisis since the collapse of the country's banks under the weight of debts amassed during years of rapid expansion. Inflation and unemployment have soared, and the krona currency has plummeted.

Haarde's government has nationalized banks and negotiated about $10 billion in loans from the IMF and individual countries. In addition, Iceland faces a bill likely to run to billions of dollars to repay thousands of Europeans who held accounts with subsidiaries of collapsed Icelandic banks.

The country's commerce minister, Bjorgvin Sigurdsson, quit on Sunday citing the pressures of the economic collapse. Sigurdsson, a member of Gisladottir's party, said Icelanders had lost trust in their political leadership.

Thousands have joined noisy daily protests in the last week over soaring unemployment and rising prices.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/americas/26bolivia.html
January 26, 2009
Bolivians Ratify New Constitution
By SIMON ROMERO [[Bolivia] [LAmerica] [now comes Evo Morales attempting to get off on the right foot with the new Obama administration] [use psci350] [use ir text] [*****]
EL ALTO, Bolivia — President Evo Morales seemed assured of an easy victory in a referendum on Sunday over a sweeping new Constitution aimed at empowering Bolivia’s Indians. The vote capped three years of conflict-ridden efforts by Mr. Morales to overhaul a political system he had associated with centuries of indigenous

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/americas/26bolivia.html
January 26, 2009
Bolivians Ratify New Constitution
By SIMON ROMERO [[Bolivia] [LAmerica] [now comes Evo Morales attempting to get off on the right foot with the new Obama administration] [use psci350] [use ir text] [*****]
EL ALTO, Bolivia — President Evo Morales seemed assured of an easy victory in a referendum on Sunday over a sweeping new Constitution aimed at empowering Bolivia’s Indians. The vote capped three years of conflict-ridden efforts by Mr. Morales to overhaul a political system he had associated with centuries of indigenous subjugation.

Citing preliminary vote counts, reports on national television said about 60 percent of voters had approved the new Constitution. If that margin holds or goes higher, it would strengthen Mr. Morales’s mandate, political analysts here said.

Still, regional conflict over the results may loom in the months ahead. Citing the same counts, both state and private news media said at least four departments, or provinces, in Bolivia’s rebellious eastern lowlands had rejected the charter by wide margins.

Vaguely worded items among the new Constitution’s 411 articles would broaden definitions of property to include communal ownership; allow Indians to mete out corporal punishment under their own legal systems; extend limited autonomy to regional prefects; and reaffirm state control over Bolivia’s ample natural gas reserves.

It is up to Congress to draft regulations for many of these articles, but the legislature also is an institution in flux, with Indians guaranteed new representation in its chambers.

“With my humble vote, I am creating a little bit of hope for my children,” said Ismael Pocoaca, 42, a construction worker who voted Sunday morning at the Chuquiago Marka School here in this city of slums on the windswept plain overlooking the capital, La Paz.

After the vote, Mr. Pocoaca and other Aymara Indians gathered in front of the school, where vendors sold fried-pork sandwiches and posters of Mr. Morales, a former llama herder. “We are finally recapturing our dignity,” said Maria Laure, 38, a soap saleswoman who voted for the new Constitution.

But while Indians across the country celebrated the vote, the Constitution opens a new stage of uncertainty in fractious Bolivia. [***]

Few people claim to know precisely how the laws will function under the new Constitution, in what way they will undergo substantial revision in Congress or how they will affect a nation facing a sharp economic slowdown this year.

Officials in the lowlands, where most of Bolivia’s food and petroleum are produced, ridiculed the new charter. “No constitution can be implemented if it has not been approved in all of the departments,” said Carlos Dabdoub, a political leader in Santa Cruz, an eastern department that rejected the Constitution.

Given the festering resistance in Santa Cruz and elsewhere, it was notable that the Constitution came to a vote. Violence over the proposed charter reached a head in September when more than a dozen peasants, mostly supporters of Mr. Morales, were killed in a clash in the Amazonian department of Pando.

Talks between Mr. Morales’s supporters in Congress and the splintered opposition produced a compromise from earlier versions of the charter. One of the most polemical articles in the final draft reversed a plan to allow Mr. Morales to indefinitely run for re-election, limiting him to one five-year term if he wins a new election later this year. [***]

But other articles reflect the influence wielded by Mr. Morales, 49, an Indian who lacks fluency in Aymara and Quechua, Bolivia’s main indigenous languages. Communicating with audiences in the colonialist language, Spanish, he has nevertheless forged a political movement imbued with nationalism and has heightened ethnic awareness.

“After 500 years, we have retaken the Plaza Murillo!” Mr. Morales told followers last week in a speech at the end of the campaign in La Paz’s central square, which until the 1950s Indians were prohibited from entering.

The new Constitution would allow Mr. Morales, whose government is supported financially by Venezuela, to assert even greater state control of the economy, with articles that could forbid foreign companies from repatriating profits or resorting to international arbitration to resolve nationalization disputes. [***]

Indeed, Mr. Morales seems undaunted by a dearth of investment and a slowing economy as prices decline for Bolivia’s natural gas and neighboring Brazil lowers imports of the fuel.

On the eve of the vote, he announced the nationalization of a Bolivian unit of the British oil giant BP, and created a new daily newspaper, Cambio, controlled by his government. And after his recent expulsion of the American ambassador and Drug Enforcement Administration agents, whom he accuses of espionage, he repeated his criticism of the United States.

“Bolivia, little by little, is shutting itself off from the world,” said Gonzalo Chávez, a Harvard-educated economist at the Catholic University of La Paz, who sees economic growth falling to 2 percent this year from about 6 percent in 2008.

But others say the new Constitution addresses underrepresentation of Indians, pointing to articles that would reserve seats for them in Congress and in other areas of the fast-growing bureaucracy. Even Mr. Morales’s cabinet has just two Indian ministers; his top aides, the vice president (a former guerrilla) and the chief of staff (a former military officer), are light-skinned intellectuals.

In symbolic importance, said Xavier Albó, a Jesuit scholar and linguist, the new Constitution may be the equivalent of Spain’s Reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula from the Moors in 1492. But instead of the blood spilled in that process, Mr. Albó said, Bolivia is “advancing in a democratic process that does not exclude or subjugate anyone.”

Some Bolivians who read the entire Constitution came away with other impressions.

Edmundo Paz Soldán, a writer who teaches at Cornell University, said it reminded him of an essay by Jorge Luis Borges that describes a Chinese encyclopedia’s attempt to divide fauna into myriad nonsensical categories. For instance, Mr. Paz Soldán said that the Constitution recognized 36 different indigenous groups in Bolivia, some with fewer than 100 people, but that it was unclear how precisely each group would be enfranchised in a country where three main indigenous groups — the Quechua, Aymara and Guaraní — wield much larger influence.

“The mind-boggling text may have the ratification of the majority,” Mr. Paz Soldán said, “but it might not be the recipe for a viable country.” [***]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/middleeast/26maliki.html
January 26, 2009
Maliki Pushes for Election Gains, Despite Fears
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections?] [****]
JANAJUH, Iraq — Few have as much to gain or lose from the provincial elections on Saturday as Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, whose party is battling rivals across

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/middleeast/26maliki.html
January 26, 2009
Maliki Pushes for Election Gains, Despite Fears
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections?] [****]
JANAJUH, Iraq — Few have as much to gain or lose from the provincial elections on Saturday as Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, whose party is battling rivals across Iraq.

From palm grove-sheltered villages, like his hometown here in southern Iraq, to the crowded streets of Baghdad, Iraqis will cast votes that will strongly signal how much power Mr. Maliki, an increasingly authoritarian leader, will be able to command. Either the vote will strengthen his party at the local level or it will bolster his rivals, who want to keep more power in the provinces.

For now, Mr. Maliki is trying to reassure Iraqis that while he will be a strong leader, he will also respect local interests. At a gathering of thousands of tribal leaders in Karbala recently, he said, “The iron centralization has ended,” and added that the country would have federalism, a term used here to mean provincial power.

Many Iraqi politicians — even some onetime allies — do not believe him. They fear a return to the sway of a single leader, arbitrary and bloodthirsty, with power concentrated in Baghdad. [***]

“That’s why there is a crisis of confidence now; it might not be realistic, but a person who has been bitten by a snake is afraid every time he sees a rope,” said Hadi al-Ameri, a leader of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, one of the largest Shiite parties and one that in the last election ran in a coalition with Mr. Maliki’s Dawa Party. [***]

Mr. Maliki’s critics have been rattled by his efforts to control the armed forces more directly, [***]a reminder of the days when Saddam Hussein personally controlled a number of special security forces loyal only to him. Mr. Maliki has reshuffled military commanders and created two handpicked military forces that report primarily to him as the commander in chief rather than to the Interior or Defense Ministries.

He has also created tribal councils across the country that are directly linked to his office, which critics fear are stalking-horses to extend the reach of the Dawa Party and make gains in the provincial elections at the expense of his rivals. The councils are often financed by the government and organized by local Dawa members. [***]

Mr. Maliki’s actions seem prompted by fears of another sort, ones born of his history as a dissident and exile: that the outlawed Baath Party he fought for so many years will regroup and oust him, [***]particularly as the American forces that have supported him begin to withdraw.

“If Bush and Obama were to suddenly leave, then Baathist officers would surround the Green Zone and kill all the leaders,” said Mohammed Ridha al-Numani, a Shiite cleric who has known Mr. Maliki since they lived in Iran in exile in the 1980s.

While that seems unlikely any time soon, such experiences of terror and embattlement have shaped the way Mr. Maliki governs. “His party, Dawa, had to operate secretly, in cells, like Communist parties in non-Communist countries; this makes a lot of sense for guerrilla warfare, but not for nation building,” said Joost Hiltermann, the director of the International Crisis Group’s Istanbul office and an expert on Iraq. “So you end up with a paranoid, very closed circle around you; no open debate. And in Iraq, you have to build a coalition government.”

The anger at Mr. Maliki from the political class is strong enough that he has twice narrowly missed being voted out of office, in December and in late 2007. Both efforts failed because his opponents could not agree on a replacement. And Mr. Maliki is gaining popularity. Recent polling suggests that he has the most favorable ratings of any Iraqi politician.

The Americans lobbied strongly against deposing Mr. Maliki primarily because stability, as much as democracy, has been their short-term goal and they feared a vacuum that would destabilize the fragile country.

“You have to remember what it was like in 2006 when Iraq was between prime ministers; there was no one in charge, there was sectarian killing, 60, 70 bodies a day and that was just in Baghdad,” said a senior American diplomat.

Few people inside or outside Iraq believe that Mr. Maliki will quickly accrue the kind of power that Mr. Hussein wielded. Checks are embedded in the new Iraqi system, including the fact that a prime minister cannot freely choose his own ministers. And the country has already agreed to devolve significant power to the provinces — although how that will work in practice remains ambiguous and fiercely contested.

But many fear backsliding. “Maliki thinks that more power in the center is better,” said Fuad Hussain, chief of staff to Massoud Barzani, the leader of the Iraqi Kurdistan region, who has often been at odds with Mr. Maliki. “The problem is two things: What is the limit of that power? Who decides the limit?”
Youth and Exile
The dirt streets and the crumbling brick houses of Janajuh, Mr. Maliki’s home village, are a reminder of how far he has come. Lying along a muddy irrigation canal between the southern cities of Karbala and Hilla, it has one relatively new building, a school, but everything else is simple brick weathered gray by the mud of winter and the dust of summer. The streets are barely wide enough to accommodate cars, and the traffic more often consists of women leading donkeys hauling hay and firewood.

Mr. Maliki was born in 1950, the son of a government employee and the grandson of a former education minister during the monarchy. By the time he was an adolescent he was bicycling along the gravel roads to Hindiya, the nearest town of any size, to go to school, said Shaker Jabber Abdul Hussain al Maliki, a cousin who still lives in Janajuh.

He joined the Dawa Party in college. At the time, the Islamist party, founded by an uncle of the anti-American cleric Moktada al-Sadr, was already largely underground. Mr. Hussein saw its religious philosophy and predominantly Shiite membership as a threat. In 1979, shortly after he seized power, Mr. Hussein ordered the arrests of all Dawa Party members nationwide. In Mr. Maliki’s home district alone, at least 70 men were detained; most were never seen again.

Mr. Maliki was one of fewer than five who escaped. He took refuge in Syria, moved to Iran and then returned to Syria, where he stayed until the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

While Shiite Islamist parties like Dawa are often accused of being close to Iran, Mr. Maliki saw the Iranians as neighbors but not always friends, his associates said. Dawa’s exiles were treated as “unwelcome guests” in Iran, said Sami Alaskary, a member of Parliament and a close friend of the prime minister.

He recalled one occasion when Mr. Maliki sought permission from the Iranians to send a Dawa operative across the border to Iraq. After Mr. Maliki had waited for weeks, an Iranian official called to say that the answer was ready but that Mr. Maliki needed to pick it up at the border office. It was winter and bitter cold, but he made the 14-hour drive there. When he arrived, the paper said: “Permission denied.”

“That person who called him to tell him the answer was ready, he knew it was a rejection but he didn’t tell him; he did it to humiliate him,” Mr. Alaskary said.
New Military Forces
The legacy of those years in exile is a deep distrust of all but those closest to him and the fear that rivals will gang up to unseat him.

Aiming, among other things, to ensure that that never happens, he created at least two military forces that report to him, the Baghdad Brigade and the elite Counterterrorism Task Force. The brigade will have about 3,000 members when fully staffed and is rigorously vetted to exclude those with sectarian or criminal agendas, Mr. Alaskary said. Details of the Counterterrorism Task Force are hazy. Members of Parliament have begun to protest publicly.

“The country is being militarized,” said Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish member of Parliament. “People think he has overreached.”

American military commanders privately defend Mr. Maliki, saying that he has had to exert control over security forces and that having forces loyal to him reduces the influence of Shiite and Kurdish militias that function within the security ministries.

The Baghdad Brigade works primarily to secure the Green Zone, but also supports the counterterrorism unit, which focuses on militias, kidnappings and gangs. Government officials in Diyala Province, northeast of Baghdad, have reported that people have been detained by armed men in unmarked sport utility vehicles who said they were from the prime minister’s office.

The Baghdad Brigade places detainees in a special holding area in the Green Zone. That is where Muntader al-Zaidi, the journalist who threw his shoes at President Bush, has been held. Family members assert that he was tortured there, though a spokesman for the Supreme Judicial Council said that an investigating judge found no physical evidence of torture.

Other parties accuse these military forces of detaining their members for political reasons. Ammar Wajih, a member of the Iraqi Islamic Party’s political leadership, said the senior Sunni member of the provincial council in Diyala, Hussain al-Zubaidi, had been detained since November.

“There is no evidence against him; we think this arrest is related to electoral politics,” Mr. Wajih said.

Fears are growing that these forces are not accountable to the broader Iraqi government. “What do they do? How do they decide who to go after? There’s no transparency,” said a senior official who works with the Presidency Council, which includes Iraq’s president and two vice presidents.

Mr. Maliki’s office has said that his position as commander in chief affords him wide latitude to take the steps necessary to protect the country.
Helping Tribal Councils
Dawa controls only one province, Karbala, and wants to gain seats, if not control, in several more. So Mr. Maliki is turning to the tribes for support, a tactic that Saddam Hussein used as well. The tribal councils have angered the Kurds as well as the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, which wants to maintain its grip on nearly every southern province. The Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq has an armed wing, as do the Kurds and the Sadr movement; Dawa does not.

A look at one southern province, Qadisiya, exposes the battle lines. The Supreme Council is vulnerable there. Many local residents are dissatisfied with services. The poor areas of the provincial capital, Diwaniya, are thick with trash, and in rural areas many school buildings are made of mud and lack even rudimentary plumbing and water. Mr. Maliki is popular because he has visited there and brought in reconstruction projects.

The tribal councils in Qadisiya, organized by a member of the Dawa Party, Fadil Mawat, receive $25,000 each to rent and furnish an office. There are 16 councils in this province alone. Each member may hire five or six people into the police force and give jobs to 20 others, Mr. Mawat said.

Giving tribes the means to hand out patronage positions increases their power and also makes them indebted to Mr. Maliki.

That is politics by the Maliki playbook.

“You know, we hear this criticism all the time, that he keeps only people from Dawa around him,” said his friend Mr. Alaskary. He added that while Mr. Maliki did have a smaller inner circle of close associates, he also had recruited many other advisers from different backgrounds.

“Condoleezza Rice came to Baghdad after he became prime minister, and she gave him some advice,” Mr. Alaskary said. “She said: ‘The people around you are very important. They have to have loyalty and be the people who you trust most.’ ”

Riyadh Mohammed, Suadad al-Salhy and Tareq Maher contributed reporting from Baghdad.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/asia/26afghan.html
January 26, 2009
From Hospital, Afghans Rebut U.S. Account
By CARLOTTA GALL [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [eventually they will be judged by it] [hence, if they want to be reelected in 4 years they better put a classic counterinsurgency strategy in place, et vite] [use psci469b] [****]
MEHTARLAM, Afghanistan — The American military declared the nighttime raid this month a success, saying it killed 32 people, all Taliban insurgents — the fruit of an emphasis on intelligence-driven use of Special Operations forces. [***]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/asia/26afghan.html
January 26, 2009
From Hospital, Afghans Rebut U.S. Account
By CARLOTTA GALL [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [eventually they will be judged by it] [hence, if they want to be reelected in 4 years they better put a classic counterinsurgency strategy in place, et vite] [use psci469b] [****]
MEHTARLAM, Afghanistan — The American military declared the nighttime raid this month a success, saying it killed 32 people, all Taliban insurgents — the fruit of an emphasis on intelligence-driven use of Special Operations forces. [***]

But the two young men who lay wincing in a hospital ward here told a different story a few days later, one backed up by the pro-American provincial governor and a central government delegation.

They agreed that 13 civilians had been killed and 9 wounded when American commandos broke down doors and unleashed dogs without warning on Jan. 7 in the hunt for a known insurgent in Masamut, [***]in Laghman Province in eastern Afghanistan. The residents were so enraged that they threatened to march on the American military base here.

The conflicting accounts underscore a dangerous rift that has grown between Afghans and the United States forces trying to roll back widening Taliban control of the countryside. [****]

With every case of civilian casualties or mistaken killings, the anger that Afghans feel toward the government and foreign forces deepens and makes residents less likely to help American forces, Afghan officials warn. Meanwhile, American forces are reluctant to share information about future military raids with local officials, fearing that it will be passed on to the Taliban.

Added to all that is a complication for American forces here: many villagers are armed, in the absence of an effective local police force.

Into that increasingly complex environment, the Obama administration is preparing to send as many as 30,000 more troops this year. As the plan moves forward, Afghan officials and some Western coalition partners are voicing concern that the additional troops will only increase the levels of violence and civilian casualties, after a year in which as many as 4,000 Afghan civilians were killed.

The outrage over civilian deaths swelled again over the weekend. Hundreds of angry villagers demonstrated here in Mehtarlam, the capital of Laghman Province, on Sunday after an American raid on a village in the province on Friday night. The raid killed at least 16 villagers, including 2 women and 3 children, according to a statement from President Hamid Karzai. [****]

The president condemned the raid, saying it had not been coordinated with Afghan officials, and called for such raids to stop. The United States military said that 15 armed militants, including a woman, had been killed.

In a sign of how serious the episode was, an American military spokesman, Col. Greg Julian, said the military would send an investigation team to the area, [***]The Associated Press reported.

Raids like the ones in Laghman Province by United States Special Operations forces, on Jan. 7 and on Friday, have been a special focus of complaint for several years.

Provincial governors say the tactics used, and the lack of coordination with Afghan and other American and NATO forces, alienate villagers and cause unneeded casualties among civilians. The raids are undoing much of the good work done by other American and international troops and reconstruction teams, they say.

The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission warned that the lack of accountability of those conducting such raids, and the lack of redress for civilian victims, was stoking resentment. “The degree of backlash and community outrage that they provoke suggests they may often not be an advisable tactic within the Afghan context,” the commission concluded in a report in December.

Mr. Karzai said in an address at the opening of Parliament on Tuesday that he had once more sent written requests to United States forces and to NATO to end civilian casualties.

Afghans would never complain about casualties among their security forces, but they would never accept the suffering of civilians, he said, to a great shout of support from the chamber. The speaker of the Senate, Sebaghatullah Mojadeddi, followed with a warning that if more care was not taken, the nation could rise up against the foreign troop presence here.

A number of different American units, Special Forces and others, have been conducting counterterrorism operations around the country for the past seven years, operating out of the Bagram and Kandahar airfields, and several small Special Forces bases. [***] They do not operate under NATO command and usually do not coordinate their operations with Afghan forces, since they argue that the element of surprise is critical.

Military spokesmen often release results of raids but do not identify the forces involved. Philip Alston, a United Nations special rapporteur, or investigator, complained last year that despite high-level meetings with the military, he had been unable to identify some of the groups conducting the raids or to establish the chain of command under which they operated.

Afghan officials and others suspect some of the raids may also be carried out by the C.I.A.

The raid in Masamut on the night of Jan. 7 was typical of many conducted in Afghanistan. United States Special Operations forces entered the village under cover of darkness looking for a known Taliban insurgent, Gul Pacha, who was killed in the raid, along with a visitor to his home, another Taliban member, Bahadur Khan.

According to several villagers, the nighttime raid stirred alarm and confusion as people were roused from their sleep.

One of the first to be shot and killed was a man called Qasem, a member of the Afghan Border Police who was at home on leave. His brother, Wazarat Khan, said Qasem was killed as soon as he looked out his front door.

“We did not think they were Americans; we thought they were thieves,” he said. “They killed my brother right in the doorway.”

One of the men in the hospital, Abdul Manan, 25, who had a bullet wound in the shoulder, said he woke up when he heard a female neighbor calling for help and heard three shots.

He said he came out of his house and saw soldiers wearing headlamps. “I thought they were smoking cigarettes,” he said. “They said something in English that I did not understand, and then they shot me.”

Another man, Darwaish Muhammad, 18, hospitalized with shrapnel wounds, said he was awakened by the mother of a neighbor, Shahpur Khan, calling for help. He had been shot.

Mr. Muhammad said he and two others rushed to help carry the woman’s son on a rope bed down a slope outside the village to get help. They were 10 minutes from the village when a helicopter fired a rocket at them, killing the wounded man and two of the bearers. He and the mother were badly wounded, he said.

A United States military spokesman, Col. Jerry O’Hara, confirmed that United States air support forces had fired on a group of five carrying a wounded person outside the village. He said all five had been killed and all were militants. That some of the villagers survived may explain some of the discrepancy of the death toll.

Colonel O’Hara added that care had been taken not to use air power inside the village, to avoid civilian casualties. He dismissed the villagers’ accounts that they had mistaken the soldiers for thieves. “I am not buying that,” he said. “These people were acting as sentries.”

In a statement, Colonel O’Hara said, “Coalition forces exercised great restraint and prevented any civilian casualties at the same time the enemy placed the whole village in harm’s way by operating the way they do.”

In an interview, he also expressed frustration that four years after his earlier tour in Afghanistan, people still were not coming forward with information against Taliban members. “Until there is active involvement amongst Afghan civilians to turn in or give a tip on people with explosives, you are not going to get on the road to peace,” he said.

Yet, after seven years of war, Afghans say that villagers are less and less inclined to side with a foreign army that still conducts house searches and bombardments.

The villagers of Masamut readily acknowledged that Mr. Pacha had been a member of the Taliban. They had even nicknamed him “Al Qaeda.” But they criticized the United States forces for killing his elderly father and two sons along with him, and for the shooting of the other villagers. [***]

“The government should have informed us not to come outside while they surrounded the house of Gul Pacha,” said Mawla Dad, 35, whose brother, nephew and cousin, an off-duty policeman, were all killed.

The governor of Laghman Province, Lutfullah Mashal, acknowledged that some of the villagers were armed. But he explained that because there was no police force to speak of in rural areas, villages kept security through a kind of neighborhood watch. “Whoever came out with a weapon, he was shot because the American forces have night-vision devices,” the governor said.

Villagers of Masamut, and local officials who visited the village afterward, protested the tactics used in the raid to United States military officials. The governor also complained that the raid had been conducted without coordination with Afghan forces or even with other American forces based in the province.

The raid undermined the government, Mr. Mashal said, and the tactics violated Afghan customs and whipped up a religious hatred, which was very damaging for both the government and the international forces.

“The people are angry with us,” he said. “Unless the international community, and especially military forces, coordinate with us, we are not going to win this war, because to win the war is to win the hearts and minds of the people, and then you can beat the enemy.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:50 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/africa/26sudan.html
January 26, 2009
Sudan’s Government Bombs Rebel-Held Town in Darfur
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Sudan] [in the strategic Horn of Africa] [Sudan partly forgotton in the the recent commotion but Bush administration making indications it may support ICC trial against al Bashir regime] [ICC warrants?] [followup November 15] [after some quiet, Bashir forces again on move against southern “rebels”] [**]
CAIRO (AP) — Sudanese government planes have bombed a rebel-held town in southern Darfur, killing a child, burning homes and sending civilians fleeing to a peacekeepers’ compound, the peacekeeping force there said Sunday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/africa/26sudan.html
January 26, 2009
Sudan’s Government Bombs Rebel-Held Town in Darfur
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Sudan] [in the strategic Horn of Africa] [Sudan partly forgotton in the the recent commotion but Bush administration making indications it may support ICC trial against al Bashir regime] [ICC warrants?] [followup November 15] [after some quiet, Bashir forces again on move against southern “rebels”] [**]
CAIRO (AP) — Sudanese government planes have bombed a rebel-held town in southern Darfur, killing a child, burning homes and sending civilians fleeing to a peacekeepers’ compound, the peacekeeping force there said Sunday.

The bombing on Saturday destroyed eight homes in Muhagiriya, a town of 30,000 people, many of whom had been displaced in previous fighting, said Noureddine Mezni, spokesman for the joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur.

The Sudanese government has vowed to take control of the town from Darfur’s most powerful rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement. The rebels seized control of Muhagiriya this month from another rebel group that signed a peace deal in 2006 with Sudan’s government.

The conflict in Darfur, a region of western Sudan, has pitted the Arab-led government in Khartoum against mainly ethnic African rebels who rose up in 2003, complaining of discrimination. The government is accused of unleashing Arab militias to wage a campaign of violence on ethnic African civilians, including killings and rapes.

United Nations officials say up to 300,000 people have been killed in the conflict and more than 2.5 million have been displaced. The Sudanese government says the figures are exaggerated.

Many rebel groups and government troops have been vying for control in the vast region.

On Saturday, government aircraft dropped two bombs on Muhagiriya’s western edge, near a settlement for refugees and a base for the peacekeeping mission, Mr. Mezni said. The bombardment set homes on fire, and a child died in one of the blazes, he said. Another civilian was seriously wounded, but the peacekeepers did not have a final casualty count.

“About 1,000 civilians were reported to have fled their homes” and were taking shelter near the peacekeeping camp, Mr. Mezni said in a telephone interview from Sudan.

A spokesman for the Justice and Equality Movement, Abu Bakr Hamed, said three people were killed in the attack, none of them rebels, and six others were wounded.
Government military officials were not available for comment on Sunday.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/asia/26india.html
January 26, 2009
2 Die in Clash in India
By THE NEW YORK TIMES [India] [Mumbai Massacres] [SAsia] [by almost all accounts, the Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [here Pakistan denies what Indians take as granted] [at least some of the jihadis came from Pakistan but it’s extremely difficult to know how much if any cooperation comes from Pakistan’s military and/or ISI elements] [followup] [use psci469b] [new details invariably emerge that greatly complicate South Asia politics] [****]
NEW DELHI — The Indian police said Sunday that two Pakistani militants were killed in a shootout in a suburb of New Delhi, a day before India’s Republic Day celebrations.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/26/world/asia/26india.html
January 26, 2009
2 Die in Clash in India
By THE NEW YORK TIMES [India] [Mumbai Massacres] [SAsia] [by almost all accounts, the Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [here Pakistan denies what Indians take as granted] [at least some of the jihadis came from Pakistan but it’s extremely difficult to know how much if any cooperation comes from Pakistan’s military and/or ISI elements] [followup] [use psci469b] [new details invariably emerge that greatly complicate South Asia politics] [****]
NEW DELHI — The Indian police said Sunday that two Pakistani militants were killed in a shootout in a suburb of New Delhi, a day before India’s Republic Day celebrations.

New Delhi, the capital, Mumbai and other Indian cities have been on high alert for the holiday, which commemorates the adoption of India’s Constitution after the country gained independence from Britain. [***]The festivities come just two months after terrorists killed more than 160 people in coordinated attacks in Mumbai; India and other nations blamed Pakistani militants for the violence.

The New Delhi police said they would deploy 30,000 officers and commandos to secure the capital. “We do not have any specific input of a terrorist attack but we are taking no chances,” said Rajan Bhagat, the police spokesman. On Sunday, the police said the militants were killed in a predawn shootout in Noida, an eastern suburb of New Delhi, after officers stopped their vehicle to question them. The police said that the men began firing, one was killed at the scene and the other died on the way to the hospital. Both were in their early 20s. [***]

The officers recovered AK-47 assault rifles, hand grenades, high-grade explosives and a Pakistani passport, among other documents, the police said.

“They were hard-core Pakistani terrorists,” said A. K. Jain, a police official. It was impossible to verify the police account.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/24/AR2009012401702.html
Guantanamo Case Files in Disarray
Situation Complicates Prison's Closure
By Karen DeYoung and Peter Finn
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, January 25, 2009; A05 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [yesterday, Obama announced order to close gitmo in one year’s time] [likely, easier said than done] [we shall see] [continuity in USFP?] [use psci355, 455] [this brouhaha caused by recent revelation that prisoner held at gitmo—who was released by Bush administration without charges or strings—has now become head of al Qaeda in Yemen] [followup since Obama’s announcement that he intends to close gitmo within a year] [****]
President Obama's plans to expeditiously determine the fates of about 245 terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and quickly close the military prison there

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/24/AR2009012401702.html
Guantanamo Case Files in Disarray
Situation Complicates Prison's Closure
By Karen DeYoung and Peter Finn
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, January 25, 2009; A05 [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [yesterday, Obama announced order to close gitmo in one year’s time] [likely, easier said than done] [we shall see] [continuity in USFP?] [use psci355, 455] [this brouhaha caused by recent revelation that prisoner held at gitmo—who was released by Bush administration without charges or strings—has now become head of al Qaeda in Yemen] [followup since Obama’s announcement that he intends to close gitmo within a year] [****]
President Obama's plans to expeditiously determine the fates of about 245 terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and quickly close the military prison there were set back last week when incoming legal and national security officials -- barred until the inauguration from examining classified material on the detainees -- discovered that there were no comprehensive case files on many of them.

Instead, they found that information on individual prisoners is "scattered throughout the executive branch," a senior administration official said. The executive order Obama signed Thursday orders the prison closed within one year, and a Cabinet-level panel named to review each case separately will have to spend its initial weeks and perhaps months scouring the corners of the federal government in search of relevant material.

Several former Bush administration officials agreed that the files are incomplete and that no single government entity was charged with pulling together all the facts and the range of options for each prisoner. They said that the CIA and other intelligence agencies were reluctant to share information, and that the Bush administration's focus on detention and interrogation made preparation of viable prosecutions a far lower priority. [***] [c.f., today’s oped on same] [catalogue of mistakes made by Bush administration civilians] [military attempted to resist but was circumvented] [***]

But other former officials took issue with the criticism and suggested that the new team has begun to appreciate the complexity and dangers of the issue and is looking for excuses.

After promising quick solutions, one former senior official said, the Obama administration is now "backpedaling and trying to buy time" by blaming its predecessor. Unless political appointees decide to overrule the recommendations of the career bureaucrats handling the issue under both administrations, he predicted, the new review will reach the same conclusion as the last: that most of the detainees can be neither released nor easily tried in this country.

"All but about 60 who have been approved for release," assuming countries can be found to accept them, "are either high-level al-Qaeda people responsible for 9/11 or bombings, or were high-level Taliban or al-Qaeda facilitators or money people," [**]said the former official who, like others, insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to reporters about such matters. He acknowledged that he relied on Pentagon assurances that the files were comprehensive and in order rather than reading them himself.

Obama officials said they want to make their own judgments.

"The consensus among almost everyone is that the current system is not in our national interest and not sustainable," another senior official said. But "it's clear that we can't clear up this issue overnight" partly because the files "are not comprehensive."

Charles D. "Cully" Stimson, who served as deputy assistant defense secretary for detainee affairs in 2006-2007, said he had persistent problems in attempts to assemble all information on individual cases. Threats to recommend the release or transfer of a detainee were often required, he said, to persuade the CIA to "cough up a sentence or two." [CIA fighting turf wars] [***]

A second former Pentagon official said most individual files are heavily summarized dossiers that do not contain the kind of background and investigative work that would be put together by a federal prosecution team. He described "regular food fights" among different parts of the government over information-sharing on the detainees.

A CIA spokesman denied that the agency had not been "forthcoming" with detainee information, saying that such suggestions were "simply wrong" and that "we have worked very closely with other agencies to share what we know" about the prisoners. While denying there had been problems, one intelligence official said the Defense Department was far more likely to be responsible for any information lapses, [parts of DOD fighting turf wars] [rearguard action] [***] since it had initially detained and interrogated most of the prisoners and had been in charge of them at the prison.

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said that the Defense Department would cooperate fully in the review.

“Fundamentally, we believe that the individual files on each detainee are comprehensive and sufficiently organized,” Morrell said. He added that “in many cases, there will be thousands of pages of documents . . . which makes a comprehensive assessment a time-consuming endeavor.”

“Not all the documents are physically located in one place,” Morrell said, but most are available through a database.

“The main point here is that there are lots of records, and we are prepared to make them available to anybody who needs to see them as part of this review.”

There have been indications from within and outside the government for some time, however, that evidence and other materials on the Guantanamo prisoners were in disarray, even though most of the detainees have been held for years.

Justice Department lawyers responding in federal courts to defense challenges over the past six months have said repeatedly that the government was overwhelmed by the sudden need to assemble material after Supreme Court rulings giving detainees habeas corpus and other rights.

In one federal filing, the Justice Department said that “the record . . . is not simply a collection of papers sitting in a box at the Defense Department. It is a massive undertaking just to produce the record in this one case.” In another filing, the department said that “defending these cases requires an intense, inter-agency coordination of efforts. None of the relevant agencies, however, was prepared to handle this volume of habeas cases on an expedited basis.”

Evidence gathered for military commission trials is in disarray, according to some former officials, who said military lawyers lacked the trial experience to prosecute complex international terrorism cases.

In a court filing this month, Darrel Vandeveld, a former military prosecutor at Guantanamo who asked to be relieved of his duties, said evidence was “strewn throughout the prosecution offices in desk drawers, bookcases packed with vaguely-labeled plastic containers, or even simply piled on the tops of desks.”

He said he once accidentally found “crucial physical evidence” that “had been tossed in a locker located at Guantanamo and promptly forgotten.” [***]
Staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:31 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012302325.html
Even Ordinary Iranians Took Up This Banner
By Azadeh Moaveni
Sunday, January 25, 2009; B03 [oped] [evidence of majority of Iranians resentful of Iran’s support of Arab Hamas and Hezbollah] [interesting] [****]
During a recent trip to Tehran, I noticed that the Benetton shop in my old neighborhood of Darrous was closed, its windows papered over. In the past, fundamentalists offended by the shop's immodest displays had decried its immorality and spread rumors of "Zionist ownership." This time, however, they set the place on fire -- not to protest the mannequins, dressed in the latest fashions, sans veils, but rather to protest the carnage

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012302325.html
Even Ordinary Iranians Took Up This Banner
By Azadeh Moaveni
Sunday, January 25, 2009; B03 [oped] [evidence of majority of Iranians resentful of Iran’s support of Arab Hamas and Hezbollah] [interesting] [****]
During a recent trip to Tehran, I noticed that the Benetton shop in my old neighborhood of Darrous was closed, its windows papered over. In the past, fundamentalists offended by the shop's immodest displays had decried its immorality and spread rumors of "Zionist ownership." This time, however, they set the place on fire -- not to protest the mannequins, dressed in the latest fashions, sans veils, but rather to protest the carnage in the Gaza Strip. Though my visit happened to coincide with the Israeli offensive that killed an estimated 1,300 Palestinians over three weeks, I hadn't expected the conflict to reverberate in my old neighborhood.

If anything, I've always found that my former neighbors -- many deeply pious, but not known for any special antipathy toward Israel -- are, like the majority of Iranians, resentful of Iran's support for militant groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah. [***]

During Israel's 2006 bombing of Lebanon, I was living in Iran with my family. I remember people congregating one morning outside the local bakery, which was unexpectedly closed. The small crowd concluded that the government had sent all the country's flour to Lebanon, and everyone dispersed with bitter complaints against leaders who forsook their own struggling people in favor of Islamic militancy. Later, we learned that the bakery was under renovation.

That's why what happened this time was so surprising to me. I don't believe that my old neighbors had had a dramatic change of heart in a little more than two years; it's just that this time, they were being skillfully spun. Their response reflected the government's swift commandeering of the crisis's message, made clear on the second evening of the Israeli offensive by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader. He declared on the evening news that anyone killed while defending the Palestinians would be greeted as a martyr in heaven. [***]

Khamenei's decree touched off a fierce propaganda campaign of astonishing effectiveness. Newspapers linked to the supreme leader ran editorials excoriating Arab leaders for not doing more to help the Palestinians.

Emotional news coverage of Palestinian casualties, along with Khamenei's decree, seemed to convince many that Iran should aid the Palestinians' fight. I overheard variations of this sentiment in my eye doctor's crowded waiting room a few days after the conflict began. "It's time to put Israel in its place," a young man from the provinces said. "If the Arabs helped, too, we could finish them off and achieve what's rightfully ours." Another man chimed in, and others agreed. Only a mother drawing cats on a notepad to entertain her little girl raised her eyebrows at the young man's choice of possessives.

The government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad marshaled its own resources to incite rage over Israel's offensive to distract attention from its own myriad failures. And it worked. [***]In a matter of days, thousands of Iranians signed up in person and online to be sent to Gaza as suicide bombers, though there are no reports of anyone actually having gone. Hard-line student groups circulated lists in universities and put up an Internet site called Esteshhadi (martyrdom-seeker), where outraged Iranians could fill in their basic details and await the call. Suicide-bomber sign-up lists are standard stuff in Iran during Israeli military offensives, and typically neither the state nor the young men who sign up take them very seriously. I remember a relative's neighbor signing up in 2006 because he thought he'd receive a check to help him meet his car payments. He reported others showing up in hopes of a free kabob lunch. Israel knows that it need not fear the infiltration of thousands of such jihadists, and the symbolic exercise mostly provides European diplomats here with a gripe to air with Iranian officials.

But this time, the lists grew more rapidly than usual, swollen by sincere recruits who seemingly felt compelled to fight by the barrage of government propaganda. [**]I've witnessed years of what passes for television in Iran -- biased news, mullah sermonizing and talk shows where ideologues fulminate against various enemies -- but the television coverage of the Gaza fighting was remarkable, even by local standards. On the state news, it was often difficult to distinguish between the correspondent and the victims he was interviewing, so seamless was the switch between their torrents of grief.

The government cast the conflict in essentially Shiite Islamic terms -- an outnumbered, "mazloom" (oppressed) people massacred by a more powerful, evil army. "The Israelis are truly loathsome," a cousin said one evening, transfixed by the deftly edited images on the broadcast, though I could swear that he'd uttered the same words about Hamas in the past.

One evening, I attended a dinner party at the home of a well-connected professor, who drinks tea with some of the country's most senior politicians. "This TV propaganda is unbelievable," he told me. "They're trying to create the atmosphere for the seizure of an embassy or a U.N. building, something catastrophic like that." [***]He was prescient. The next afternoon, Basiji demonstrators -- members of the state's radical volunteer militia -- forced their way into a British Embassy residential compound and occupied the grounds for nearly an hour. Militant young people also staged a sit-in at Tehran's Mehrabad Airport, demanding to be sent to Gaza. The crowd, composed of about 100 Basijis, white-turbaned clerics and women in black chadors, hunkered down on red, machine-woven rugs, refusing to budge.

Such protests seemed to persuade the authorities to recalibrate their approach. They wanted people angry enough to forget about the crumbling economy, but not so angry that they were raiding diplomatic compounds and demanding to be flown to their deaths in Gaza. [***]The government dispatched officials to lecture demonstrators at the airport about resistance "in the framework of the system." The exchanges bordered on the comic but were still a striking display of public defiance of the authorities. In one, a young man in a puffy jacket insisted that Khamenei had effectively called for jihad, and that bureaucrats were obstructing his decree.

As the fighting in Gaza continued, Ahmadinejad and his allies were able to use the conflict as a pretext for silencing critics and attacking rivals. The government shut down a moderate newspaper for publishing a statement by a dissident student group that criticized Hamas and called Tehran complicit in its crimes. The student group was later also shut down. Early this month, Khamenei appeared on national television to temper his previous declaration encouraging martyrdom on behalf of the Palestinians. He thanked the young people who had offered to go die in Gaza but said that "our hands are tied in this arena." Khamenei didn't really want anyone's hands to be untied, however; the whole Gaza incident was meant to distract Iranians, not to jeopardize Iran's role in the region.

And the job it has done as a distraction isn't wholly convincing. "We're miserable and destitute ourselves, now we have to help the orphans of Gaza?" Mehdi Hakimi, a 35-year-old former civil servant, said to me. He complained about rising prices, his shrinking income, and the things he was forced to do to support his family -- ferrying passengers on his way home, working weekends most of the year and borrowing money to invest in a shop selling cosmetics and "As Seen On TV" weight-loss devices, items that never fail to sell in Iran. Still, authorities are having trouble cooling the rage they had earlier stoked. While some Iranians such as Hakimi bristle at the government sending aid to Palestinians while the economy at home suffers, many remain concerned. My friends in Tehran are still sending out e-mails that decry what they term Israeli genocide, though some also forward distressed reports of the Basiji militants' most recent thuggery, an attack on a demonstration by the women's group Mothers for Peace. The Basijis apparently felt that the group's name implied a criticism of Hamas and assaulted them shouting, "Death to seekers of peace."

Since at heart most Iranians share Hakimi's sentiments, the days ahead will be tricky ones for Ahmadinejad and his allies. They want Iranians diverted, not brawling in the streets.
azadeh1355@gmail.com
Azadeh Moaveni covers Iran for Time magazine. She is the author of "Lipstick Jihad" and the forthcoming "Honeymoon in Tehran: Two Years of Love and Danger in Iran."
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:30 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012302313.html
When Gitmo Was (Relatively) Good
By Karen J. Greenberg
Sunday, January 25, 2009; B01 [oped] [brouhaha over gitmo] [****]
In his first week in office, President Obama signed an executive order that would shut down the notorious U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within a year. But as the United States moves to end this shameful episode, it's worth reflecting on the untold story of the very beginnings of Guantanamo. [***]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012302313.html
When Gitmo Was (Relatively) Good
By Karen J. Greenberg
Sunday, January 25, 2009; B01 [oped] [brouhaha over gitmo] [****]
In his first week in office, President Obama signed an executive order that would shut down the notorious U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within a year. But as the United States moves to end this shameful episode, it's worth reflecting on the untold story of the very beginnings of Guantanamo. [***]

The following account, which draws on dozens of interviews I conducted over the past few years, tells the startling tale of a period shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, when military officers on the ground tried to do the right thing with the recently captured detainees but were ultimately defeated by civilian officials back in Washington. [***]Those early days -- back before Gitmo became Gitmo -- strongly suggest that the damage the prison inflicted on America's honor and security could have been avoided if policymakers had been willing to follow the uniformed military's basic instincts. [***]It may be too late for these revelations to help redeem Guantanamo in its waning days. But those crafting U.S. detention policy in the years ahead could still benefit from learning about these small initial efforts at decency.

The story begins in the first week of January 2002, when Joint Task Force 160, [**]led by Marine Brig. Gen. Michael Lehnert, dutifully landed at Guantanamo Bay. Lehnert's approximately 2,000 troops were fired up about their mission: building the first detention facility for prisoners taken from the Afghan battlefield. The unit had a 96-hour deadline, according to Lehnert, and they were told that about 300 detainees were already en route to Cuba. [**]As Col. William Meier, Lehnert's chief of staff, explained it, the task force had to scavenge materials from existing structures on the base to help build hundreds of cells and the massive tent city needed to house the U.S. troops coming in to guard them. One commander working on the construction mission, Lou V. Corielo, told a Marine Corps interviewer at the time that he found himself lamenting the absence of a Home Depot.

But it wasn't the logistics that most worried Lehnert. It was the policy vacuum into which he and his troops had been thrown. "We are writing the book as we go," one officer said at the time. Lehnert said he had been told by the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the Geneva Conventions would not technically apply to his mission: He was to act in a manner "consistent with" the conventions (as the mantra went) but not to feel bound by them. [***] The Joint Task Force, advised by U.S. Southern Command, was essentially left on its own to improvise a regime of care and custody for the allegedly hardened al-Qaeda terrorists [***]-- whom the Bush administration famously called "the worst of the worst" -- who would be coming their way. The idea, as Lehnert told me he understood it, was to detain them and wait for a legal process to begin. [***]

In the absence of new policy guidance about how to treat the detainees, Lehnert told me that he felt he had no choice but to rely on the regulations already in place, ones in which the military was well schooled: the Uniform Code of Military Justice, other U.S. laws and, above all, the Geneva Conventions. The detainees, no matter what their official status, were essentially to be considered enemy prisoners of war, a status that mandated basic standards of humane treatment. One lawyer for the Judge Advocate General Corps, Lt. Col. Tim Miller, told me that he used the enemy-POW guidelines as his "working manual." A corrections specialist, Staff Sgt. Anthony Gallegos, called Washington's orders "shady," which he told me gave his colleagues no choice but to "go with the Geneva Conventions." [***]

The task force set to work around the clock, processing the detainees upon arrival, administering medical treatment and providing general care in the cells of the newly built Camp X-Ray. Lehnert's lawyers studied the 143 articles of the Geneva Conventions, paying particular attention to Common Article 3, which prohibits "humiliating and degrading treatment." [***]The head of the operation's detention unit, Col. Terry Carrico, summed up the situation to a team of Marine Corps interviewers several weeks into the mission: "The Geneva Conventions don't officially apply, but they do apply."

But there were early signs of trouble. Lehnert told me that his request to bring representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to Guantanamo -- something international law requires for all prisoners being held in war-related situations -- was, as he heard it, shunted aside somewhere up the chain of command. [***]"The initial request," he recalled, "was turned down." He persisted. Even if he obviously could not implement some of the Geneva Conventions requirements -- the right to musical instruments, for instance, or the right to work for payment -- he wanted advice from ICRC professionals to help him ensure the prisoners' safety and dignity.

Exasperated by repeated attempts to find out which guidelines to apply to the detainees, Col. Manuel Supervielle, the head JAG at Southern Command, picked up the phone and called the ICRC's headquarters in Geneva. As one member of the Southern Command staff remembers the episode, the Joint Chiefs of Staff had warned the Gitmo task force that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's office opposed getting involved with the ICRC. [***]But now, according to Supervielle, a U.S. officer was asking the ICRC to help out at Guantanamo. The ICRC answered with an immediate "Yes."

It was a pivotal moment in the history of Guantanamo. Once Supervielle's call had been made, the civilian policymakers around Rumsfeld could not undo what the uniformed military had done -- although, according to Supervielle, an irritated team of lawyers, including Pentagon general counsel William J. "Jim" Haynes II, asked the Southern Command lawyer days later whether there was "a way to back out of it now."

The ICRC arrived at Guantanamo on Jan. 17, 2002 -- six days after the detainees did. Thus began what amounted to a period of subtle defiance of Washington's lack of direction. [***]The ICRC worked with Joint Task Force 160 to create a rational, legal detention operation. ICRC representatives immediately began to help Lehnert's troops improve the grim physical situation of the hastily constructed camp: the open-air cages in which prisoners were held, the cells without toilets, the constant exposure to heat and rain.

To intensify his efforts, Lehnert told me, he requested a Muslim chaplain, Navy Lt. Abuhena M. Saifulislam. "Saif," as the Bangladeshi American imam was known throughout the camp, became a fixture inside the blocs of cages at Camp X-Ray. Task force members recall him strolling daily through the camp, sometimes accompanied by Lehnert, and conversing with the detainees -- some of whom were in no mood to chat, some of whom had stories to tell. Lehnert tried to assure them that some form of legal remedy or transfer home was in the works, as one former detainee, British citizen Shafiq Rasul, told me.

Brig. Gen. Lehnert had built his own Guantanamo, one with ICRC oversight, a Muslim chaplain and an overriding ethos that stressed codified law and the unwritten rules of human decency. Lehnert's team let the detainees talk among themselves; it provided halal food, an additional washing bucket inside cells that lacked toilet facilities, a Koran for each detainee, skullcaps and prayer beads for those who wanted them, and undergarments for the prisoners to wear at shower time, in accordance with Islamic laws that proscribe public nakedness.

Perhaps Lehnert's Guantanamo could have been sustained. But Rumsfeld wanted something else: He expected to get valuable, actionable intelligence from the detainees. [***]By late January 2002, according to Brig. Gen. Galen B. Jackman, Lehnert's chief contact at Southern Command, the defense secretary told officers on a video conference call with Southern Command that he was frustrated by the absence of such information.

A displeased Rumsfeld seems to have decided to create a second command, one that would exist side by side with Lehnert's. It would be devoted solely to gathering intelligence and would be headed by a reservist major general, [***]a former U.S. Army interrogator during the Vietnam War named Michael Dunlavey. Jackman told me that he considered the idea of two parallel commands a "recipe for disaster." At the same time, Navy Capt. Robert Buehn, the commander of the naval base at Guantanamo, recalled, the Gitmo task force's initial expectations of orders to build a courtroom began to fade.

As Dunlavey's command took shape in late February and early March, the fabric of prisoner's rights that Lehnert had woven was beginning to unravel. By the end of February, nearly 200 detainees had mounted a hunger strike to protest their treatment. Interrogations, not trials, had become the future of Guantanamo.

But Lehnert did not concede defeat. In later accounts, several detainees described the surprise they felt watching the general walk through the camp in response to the hunger strike. As these prisoners remembered it, Lehnert would sit on the ground outside the wire-mesh cells, hat in hand, and make promises to prisoners in exchange for their agreement to eat. According to these detainees, he promised to remove a guard who they said had kicked a copy of the Koran and to find a way to reduce the chafing of the ankle shackles they wore during transport. One German detainee, Murat Kurnaz, was among the detainees who watched Lehnert negotiate with the prisoners. "Was he trying to signal that . . . he wanted to speak to the prisoner as a human being?" Kurnaz wondered. Lehnert admitted to me that, with the help of Saif, the chaplain, he even put in a call to a detainee's wife to find out whether she had safely delivered the baby they were expecting -- a boy, it turned out. Above all, the U.S. general hoped to avoid having to feed the prisoners by force.

Thanks in large part to Lehnert's efforts, the hunger strike dwindled to a couple of dozen fasters by the first week of March. But as much as he might have championed the need to respect the detainees as individuals -- albeit allegedly dangerous terrorists -- Guantanamo's future had been decided. As the hunger strike wound down, Lehnert said, he and his unit were given notice that they would soon be leaving. [****]

Once Lehnert's troops departed, a new Guantanamo took shape -- the Guantanamo that an appalled world has come to know over the past seven years. Inmates were kept in isolation, interrogation became the core mission, hunger strikers were regularly force-fed, and above all, the promise of a legal resolution to the detainees' cases has eluded hundreds of prisoners.

As Obama moves to close Guantanamo down, the story of Joint Task Force 160 takes on new significance. Had the United States been willing to trust in the professionalism of its superb military, it could have avoided one of the most shameful passages in its history. Lehnert still regrets the legal limbo that Guantanamo became -- and the damage that did to America's "stature in the world." As he put it, "the juice wasn't worth the squeeze."

And there is a final irony on the horizon.

One of the places now being considered as a new U.S.-based destination for the remaining Gitmo detainees is Camp Pendleton, a Marine Corps base in Southern California. The base's commanding general is none other than Michael Lehnert, now a major general. [***]The detainees might well be returned to his custody. In several senses, we could wind up right back where we started. This time, however, we should have the law on our side -- not to mention a conscience.
kjg550@gmail.com
Karen J. Greenberg is the executive director of New York University's Center on Law and Security and the author of the forthcoming "The Least Worst Place: Guantanamo's First 100 Days."
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:29 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/middleeast/25mideast.html
January 25, 2009
Amid the Destruction, a Return to Life in Gaza
By ETHAN BRONNER [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [Hamas immediately returns to rebuilding its tunnel infrastructure] [****]
GAZA — The boys clapped and sang to pulsating music. They played games and

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/middleeast/25mideast.html
January 25, 2009
Amid the Destruction, a Return to Life in Gaza
By ETHAN BRONNER [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [Hamas immediately returns to rebuilding its tunnel infrastructure] [****]
GAZA — The boys clapped and sang to pulsating music. They played games and shouted. It could have been a group activity at any school in any place, but this was the middle school in the Jabaliya refugee camp in Gaza, near where the United Nations says some 40 people were killed by Israeli mortar fire earlier this month.

Saturday was the first day of school since before the war, and 1,000 homeless people had been removed from the building so that classes could begin.

Even then, normal schoolwork had to wait. A team trained in trauma and group activities was running the assembly, and after the singing and clapping, there was a play devoted to how to handle dangerous materials, like shell parts, still in or near homes. Later, each pupil described what had happened to him and to his friends and family in Israel’s 23-day war aimed at stopping Hamas’s rockets.

“They are not ready to learn yet,” said Asem Bajah, an English teacher, as he watched the singing. “And I am not ready to teach.”

One week after the war between Israel and Hamas stopped, Gaza remains in a kind of stupor. There are numbers, of course, to describe its misery — 4,000 homes destroyed, 21,000 badly damaged, 100,000 people homeless, according to several aid agencies — but they do not tell the full story.

Most of Gaza, especially the capital, Gaza City, remains largely intact. This is not Grozny after the Chechen war or Dresden after World War II. The hospitals are coping; shops are reopening; traffic is becoming a problem once again. Israel has tripled the amount of goods flowing in here since before the war. [***]

But the areas where Israeli tanks and artillery poured in at the start of the ground war are devastated: Juhr el Dik to the east, Beit Lahiya, El Atatra and sections of Jabaliya to the north, as well as the outer Gaza City neighborhoods of Zeitoun and Toufah.

Homes have been blown up or bulldozed, their squashed furniture visible beneath layers of collapsed concrete. Factories — for paint, dairy products, soft drinks — have been smashed. Schools have 10-foot holes in their walls. Wedding halls are blackened hulks. The American International School, a private institution in northern Gaza, has been destroyed. Mosques are gone.

Moreover, in addition to the buildings that housed Hamas’s main security networks, institutions like the parliament, the main ministries, the central prison and nearly all the police stations are crushed beyond repair.

In some homes, families have been cleaning for five days straight, removing bullet casings, sweeping broken glass, sorting through charred clothing. Since electricity has been lost in most of those areas, the evenings see families gathered around makeshift fires outside, cooking and warming themselves.

In the neighborhood of Zeitoun, where 30 members of an extended family, the Samounis, were killed and homes were bulldozed, survivors can be seen each day using hoes and other crude tools on the piles of rubble and dirt hoping to salvage a few useful or valuable items.

A couple of days ago, Ghalia Samouni, 44, was sitting atop one such pile and picking away at it with her bare hands, explaining that she had left 1,000 Israeli shekels, or about $250, in a bag somewhere around there before the war started. Her daughter Amani, 19, was trying to find her gold and identity card as she dug a few feet away.

In El Atatra, where a mosque and many homes around it were destroyed, Israeli troops said they had uncovered a hand-drawn map showing homes that had been booby-trapped with explosives. It was hard to match the map with the area, and residents said they were farmers, not fighters, and that there had been no explosives or booby traps in their houses. But several acknowledged that under the area’s main street was a long tunnel used by Hamas’s fighters, now collapsed by Israeli explosives.

Still, the impression left from the worst-hit areas was that Israeli troops entered expecting a horrific battle. Little came their way, apparently because Hamas fighters decided that it was not worth dying, and Israel’s casualty count was low. But the damage is overwhelming.

Hamas officials have slowly emerged from hiding over the past few days, although the top leaders have remained underground, apparently worried that their lives could be in danger.

Their police force is back on the streets. On Saturday, in Remal, a neighborhood in central Gaza, policemen in blue uniforms gathered in front of what used to be their headquarters as a bulldozer heaved a mangled car out of the way behind them. They had been doing their work from the sidewalk, they said. One had even caught a burglar in town.

“Our building is gone, but we still come to work in the morning,” said one policeman, as another reached up to a lamppost to hang a portrait, pulled from the rubble, of Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of Hamas who was killed by Israel in 2004.

Gaza has no functioning glass or cement factories and has not been able to bring in raw materials for them for months because Israel and Egypt closed commercial crossings. Now efforts are under way to change that.

John Holmes, a United Nations humanitarian relief official who came here on Thursday, said by telephone that he had been talking with Israel about how to get such materials and other vital components to rebuild.

“We need to fix the water and sanitation networks as quickly as we can,” he said. “That means importation of construction materials on a big scale. It has not happened for the last 18 months. The Israelis don’t say no, but they say we need to have assurances it will not be misused by Hamas. We are trying to work out the mechanisms.”

Hamas officials left Gaza on Saturday for Cairo, where they were to discuss longer term cease-fire details.

In Israel, officials said that on Sunday, the cabinet is expected to discuss a proposal that the government defend the military if there are any international attempts to accuse it of improper activity or war crimes. The proposal is expected to assert that soldiers and officers operated in accordance with international law, the military’s values and moral principles.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:28 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/24/AR2009012402051.html
Iraq Election Highlights Ascendancy of Tribes
In Anbar, Clans Are Coddled, Cultivated
By Anthony Shadid
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, January 25, 2009; A01 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections tribalized] [****]
RAMADI, Iraq -- In rugged western Iraq, once the bastion of the insurgency against the

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/24/AR2009012402051.html
Iraq Election Highlights Ascendancy of Tribes
In Anbar, Clans Are Coddled, Cultivated
By Anthony Shadid
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, January 25, 2009; A01 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [upcoming provincial elections tribalized] [****]
RAMADI, Iraq -- In rugged western Iraq, once the bastion of the insurgency against the American occupation and now a freewheeling arena of electoral politics steeped in payola, the conversation in the tribal guesthouse in Anbar province was the equivalent of a stump speech.

"If anything happens to any of our candidates, even a scratch on one of their bodies, we will kill all of their candidates!" bellowed Hamid al-Hais, a tribal leader and party boss whose voice was like his build -- husky, coarse and forceful.

"That's right," shouted another sheik, who had suggested -- in jest, inshallah -- that a friend resolve a dispute by strapping on explosives and blowing himself up.

"Of course!" yelled another, who had accused the governor of urinating on Anbar.

"We'll break all the ballot boxes on their heads!" Hais declared, wagging a finger.

Part sheik and part showman, with a dose of barroom humor, Hais leads a party that has helped make Iraq's provincial elections this month the first truly competitive vote in Sunni Muslim lands since the United States overthrew Saddam Hussein in 2003. By all accounts, that is a good thing. [***]But the results of next Saturday's ballot may say less about the campaigns themselves than about the political geography of Anbar, where tribes, sprawling clans steeped in tradition and courted by the U.S. military, enjoy more power than at any time since the Iraqi monarchy was toppled half a century ago.

Here, the new Iraq looks like the old one, imbued with politics that might be familiar to Gertrude Bell, the British diplomat and adventurer who drew the country's borders after World War I.

There is a saying heard these days in Anbar: "Everyone claims they have the love of Laila, but Laila loves none of them." In other words, Laila gets to choose. The same might be said of the tribes, whose mantle everyone claims and which often demand a tidy sum for their support. Coddled and cultivated, the tribes are kingmakers.

"The center of power in Anbar," Hais called them as he sat in the guesthouse, decorated with purple, red and yellow plastic flowers, with 25 tribal leaders gathered over a sprawling, artery-clogging dish of chicken, lamb and a slab of fat, mixed with rice.

The Americans might have hoped the tribes had less power, Hais said, in their vision of a modern state built on the rule of law. "But now," he added, "they're stronger."

It is still democracy, the sheik insisted, gruffly.

A soft-spoken doctor, Sabah al-Ani, managing a crowded clinic in Fallujah, shook his head at the assertion. "If you believe in a stone," he said, "you can say it's God."

"We wanted technocrats," he went on, "and we were left with the tribes."
A Perfidy of Politics

Raad al-Alwani, another sheik in the mold of Hais, is one of more than 520 candidates in Anbar who are running on 37 electoral lists, though only a handful have real clout. His posters adorn blast walls, cluttered with the symbols and portraits of his opponents. Promises are few. Politics are often reputation, and a name usually suffices. "You're aware of me," one candidate declares, a bit menacingly.

In such places as Najaf and Karbala, steeped in Shiite Muslim scholarship, the turbaned clerics often speak in abstract metaphor and sometimes impenetrable analogies. When they speak. A grand ayatollah is still remembered for answering almost any question posed to him with one of two phrases: yajuz or la yajuz, possible or not possible.

In Anbar, a desert bisected by the Euphrates River that stretches west of Baghdad, such reticence would qualify as effeminate. And Alwani, as he likes to point out, is a man.

To guests, he hands out a leaflet with seven pictures of a bloodied corpse. "This is the fate of anyone who dares attack the house of Sheik Raad Sabah al-Alwani," it reads.

His criticism runs fast and no less furious.

He loathes the Iraqi Islamic Party, an heir of the Muslim Brotherhood and one of the most powerful Sunni parties that has controlled the province since elections in 2005. "I wouldn't work with them even if the Euphrates River changed directions and flowed back to Syria." He barely disguises his disgust at his former allies in the Awakening, a tribal gathering sometimes called the Sons of Iraq that helped defeat the group al-Qaeda in Iraq in Sunni regions with U.S. support. Cowards, he said. "And liars, too. How are they not?" The same goes for Harith Dhari, a cleric who once spoke on behalf of the Sunni community but now lives in exile in Jordan. "A barking dog," he said dismissively.

That leaves the tribal leaders, he said -- at least the ones he deems honorable. They are men who boast of their sway over the vast networks of clan, patronage and loyalty that the tribes in Iraq represent, and of their history in organizing Iraqi society for centuries and serving as a pillar of the monarchy installed by the British. Members of Albu Fahd, the largest tribe in Anbar, with a leadership determined by sometimes elusive consensus, say they can mobilize 80,000 voters -- and almost as many men with guns.

An exaggeration perhaps -- not uncommon here -- but not by far.

In the early years of the occupation, Anbar seemed monochromatic in its sentiments. There was an occupation, people often said, and it was the duty of Muslims to resist it. Bordering Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, with a porous frontier, the province soon became the most lethal locale for the U.S. military -- al-Qaeda in Iraq effectively ruled swaths of its flat desert. The revolt by the Awakening that began in 2006, led by tribal leaders such as Hais and Alwani, vanquished al-Qaeda and brought a remarkable, if precarious, calm. In Fallujah, once an insurgent stronghold where the mutilated and charred bodies of contractors were strung from a bridge in 2004, in an indelible image of the war, the popular restaurant Hajji Hussein has reopened, drawing throngs of customers for kebab reputed to be the best in Iraq.

But as Alwani's criticism testifies, postwar Anbar is a complicated landscape of shifting loyalties, often pushed and pulled by American largess that has made tycoons of men such as Alwani, who flaunts two prized falcons at his palatial home worth $4,000 each. Even the Awakening itself is in tatters, nearly all of its original leaders having deserted it.

"People here don't have principles. Their principles are zero," said Alwani, sitting with another tribal sheik, Jassim Swaidawi, a man he described as his dear friend.

Alwani left the room, and Swaidawi acknowledged his own fleeting loyalty.

He planned to vote for someone else. "I haven't told him yet," he admitted.

The perfidy of politics here has made for a scramble as sheiks and the Iraqi Islamic Party try to cobble together a slate of candidates that can claim the greatest breadth of tribal support. The Islamic Party is unpopular but still powerful given its presence in the government, [***]access to the official budget and recourse to patronage that awards jobs in the state and security forces.

Some have recoiled at the ferocity of the competition.

"By God, all these parties are making for us fitna," discord and conflict, said Mishaan al-Jumaila, a tribal leader in Garma, a town near Fallujah that was once so dangerous no one but its residents dared venture there.

Beneath the tumult, residents say, it is clear that the tribes, wherever their loyalties, whatever their divisions, play the decisive role. [***]Of the most powerful groups, only Saleh al-Mutlaq, a Sunni parliament member drawing support from the still-substantial sympathy for Hussein's Baath Party, stands apart. The rest claim the tribes' mantle.

Hais's party, appropriately called the Tribes of Iraq List, offers candidates from 11 clans, among them the powerful Albu Fahd. No less insistent is the Islamic Party, which has staked its future on its own tribal alliances. One list joins a few of its candidates with the remnants of the Awakening, led by Ahmed Abu Risha, whose brother, Abdel-Sittar, led the movement until he was assassinated in September 2007, inaugurating its divisions. Another list claims the support of Amr Abdel-Jabbar, deemed by many as Anbar's preeminent sheik. Its leaders make clear the Islamic Party is the junior partner.

Of the 29 candidates, 15 are tribal figures. The Islamic Party has 12, but they had to agree to let the tribes vet, then choose, their candidates from a pool of 25 nominees.

"As the lead partner," said Abdel-Rahman al-Zubaie, who heads the Tribal Council of Fallujah and is himself a candidate, "we had the right to say the final word."

He shook his head, in a look that comes from stating the obvious.

"Of course," he added.
'I Speak From Bitterness'

In a land of swagger, Ali al-Rahal is modest. Amid the bombast, he is retiring. And in a campaign where money talks, he is penniless, having sold his and his wife's wedding rings to pay for campaign posters.

Rahal is a leader of the Sons of the Two Rivers Movement, a group of secular liberals running under the slogan "Together for Development." Shiites and Kurds sit on their board. So do a Christian and a Jew, one of the handful left in the country. They advocate human rights, transparency, an end to corruption and the rehabilitation of Iraq.

"We consider this real democracy," he said.

And no one seems to be listening. No one really can. The movement has almost no way to get the word out.

One party member sold his car for $4,000. Another donated $1,250. They are considering auctioning off their red and gold furniture, lonely as it is in an office bereft of posters, party literature and the campaign pens tribal candidates pass out.

"We can't even afford these," Rahal said, waving a leaflet the size of a playing card for one of their candidates. "And this is something simple!"

Everyone rails against the corruption in Anbar these days. Complaints run rife against the Islamic Party, accused by detractors of everything from skimming off contracts for tens of millions of dollars to build a hospital, a factory for artificial limbs and a sewage system to trying to bribe journalists with $40 Citizen watches. [***]Sheiks protest, but their outrage seems more indignation that a rival managed to somehow steal more than they did.

To Rahal, though, that corruption speaks to a deeper malaise in postwar Anbar. To bring peace, the Americans chose allies -- tribal leaders such as Hais. To rebuild Anbar, they awarded vast contracts; in a glass case, Alwani framed a certificate of appreciation from the U.S. military that declares him "one of the best contractors the Marines have ever worked with." The result has left Rahal and liberals like him adrift in a landscape stitched together by the tribes, their new wealth and the alliances that ensued.

It has left him resentful, too. "Saddam Hussein gave the sheiks 5 million dinars each, right before he was overthrown, and they turned around and used the money to buy the Americans lunch. This is true," Rahal said. "You can buy and sell a lot of the sheiks for a glass of Scotch."

"Forgive me if I'm forthright," he added. "I speak from bitterness."

A few days later, Rahal showed up for an appointment at his office, which was now locked. The landlord had kicked the group out for failing to pay the $600-a-month rent. The landlord's assistant said he planned to confiscate the furniture, too. Whispering, Rahal pleaded with him to use the office for just a few minutes, and he reluctantly agreed.
A Coming-of-Age Fight

For a man, just 40, whose name was known to few outside his family in Ramadi before the U.S.-led invasion and Hussein's fall, Hais carries authority well.

In his Toyota Land Cruiser, Anbar's equivalent of a Cadillac, he takes the wheel. "I drive better," he said.

He scoffs at the idea of visiting a mosque and brags of his 2,000 olive trees and show horse named for his oldest son, Adham. He shows off his scars: a partial right finger and two wounds in his right leg, suffered in a clash in 2007 with al-Qaeda in Iraq.

"The Americans told me to be afraid. They said I should fear something, but I swear to God, I've never felt fear," he said. "God doesn't want me to be killed."

Since the American invasion, myths have always seemed to shape the sentiments of Anbar. During the battles for Fallujah in 2004, residents traded stories about birds guided by God casting stones at Apache helicopters and a scented breeze that descended on fighters as they battled U.S. troops. Hais has his own lore, the story of the fight he and other tribal leaders waged against al-Qaeda in what they call a liberation and a revolution.

To him, that struggle was a coming-of-age, his in a province where his generation will wield far more power than their fathers, some of whom fled abroad during the fight.

The older sheiks "are like verbs in the past tense," Hais said. "We rely on the tribes to the greatest extent. But not the sheiks of the tribe. The sons of the tribes."

Even he seems surprised, though, by the power he was delivered.

"If you look into my heart, you'll see that I don't think the power of the tribes is a good thing," he said, sitting underneath portraits of fellow sheiks and friends and family killed in the fight against al-Qaeda in Iraq. "With the fall of Saddam Hussein, we were ready to gaze up at skyscrapers, and all we found was houses destroyed and streets abandoned."

"This is what we got," he said.

For a moment, his rough humor subsided. So did his swagger. And for once, he turned reflective. "If we had a modern state, we wouldn't have to rely on the rule of tribes," he insisted. But until then, "a little bit of evil is better than more."

"A little bit of evil is better," he said again.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/middleeast/25iraq.html
January 25, 2009
Soldiers Kill Iraqi Couple During Raid at a Home
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [****]
BAGHDAD — American soldiers fatally shot an Iraqi couple in their home near Kirkuk

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/middleeast/25iraq.html
January 25, 2009
Soldiers Kill Iraqi Couple During Raid at a Home
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [****]
BAGHDAD — American soldiers fatally shot an Iraqi couple in their home near Kirkuk early Saturday after the wife reached for a pistol hidden under a mattress, American and Iraqi officials said. The couple’s 8-year-old daughter was wounded.

United States troops, using helicopters, raided the family’s house in Hawija, a town in northern Iraq, around 2 a.m. in search of members of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the Iraqi police and witnesses said. Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia is a homegrown militant group that American intelligence officials say is led by foreigners.

In one room, soldiers saw a woman reaching under a mattress, Agence France-Presse reported, quoting an unidentified United States Army spokesman.

The woman was told several times in Arabic to show her hands, but she refused and was shot, the spokesman said. The American military said soldiers found a pistol under the mattress.

After the woman was shot, her husband, Dhia Hussein Ali al-Tikriti, attacked the soldiers and was shot and killed, the spokesman said, adding that Mr. Tikriti had been suspected of belonging to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia.

The couple’s 8-year-old daughter, Ahlam Dhia, was shot once in the leg and was taken to a hospital. Her injuries were not life-threatening.

“They killed my mother and father right in front of me,” she said. “I was under the blanket. I heard my mom screaming, and I started to cry.”

She described the soldiers as being bearded. American Special Operations troops often wear beards in an effort to fit in with the local population. The United States military would not confirm whether the soldiers were from a Special Operations unit.

Neighbors said that Mr. Tikriti had been an officer in Saddam Hussein’s army. He was arrested by American forces in 2004, held for about a year and then released, said Abu Aya, a cousin. [Tikriti suggests from Saddam’s tribal home] [***]

He said four other children in the house were unharmed.

Elsewhere on Saturday, three Iraqi police officers were killed and 14 other people, including 5 police officers, were wounded when a car bomb exploded in Karma in Anbar Province as an Iraqi police patrol passed.

The area, in western Iraq, has become significantly less violent during the past year and a half, since tribal leaders switched their support from militants to American and Iraqi forces.

Also Saturday, Iraq’s Independent High Electoral Commission said borders and airports would be closed for provincial elections next Saturday. A curfew is to begin Friday evening.
Suadad al-Salhy and Mudhafer al-Husaini contributed reporting from Baghdad, and Iraqi employees of The New York Times from Kirkuk and Falluja.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/01/25/world/international-us-afghan-protest.html
January 25, 2009
Afghans Protest Over Civilian Deaths
By REUTERS
Filed at 6:03 a.m. ET [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [eventually they will be judged by it] [hence, if they want to be reelected in 4 years they better put a classic counterinsurgency strategy in place] [and fast] [use psci469b] [****]
MEHTAR LAM, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Thousands of Afghans protested against

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/01/25/world/international-us-afghan-protest.html
January 25, 2009
Afghans Protest Over Civilian Deaths
By REUTERS
Filed at 6:03 a.m. ET [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [eventually they will be judged by it] [hence, if they want to be reelected in 4 years they better put a classic counterinsurgency strategy in place] [and fast] [use psci469b] [****]
MEHTAR LAM, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Thousands of Afghans protested against President Hamid Karzai and the United States on Sunday over reports of fresh civilian deaths caused by U.S.-led troops during a raid against Taliban militants.

The issue of civilian casualties is sensitive in Afghanistan and has eroded public support for Karzai's government and the foreign troops backing it.

It has also caused a rift between Karzai and his Western allies more than seven years after U.S.-led and Afghan forces overthrew the Taliban's government.

The operation causing the latest controversy happened this week in eastern Laghman province. The U.S. military said on Saturday that troops, backed by air support, had killed 15 militants in an overnight operation.

Assadullah Wafa, a Karzai adviser investigating the deaths, said on Sunday that "16 civilians, many of them children and women, were killed" in the operation.

"We strongly condemn it and want an end to it (civilian casualties)," he told reporters in Mehtar Lam, Laghman's provincial capital, where the protest was held. [****]

A statement from the presidential palace quoted Karzai as saying that bombing villages and causing civilian deaths "will not bear any progress in the war against terrorism."

Karzai said failure to coordinate attacks with his government would weaken its sovereignty and bolster the militants, it added.

A spokesman for the U.S. military said it planned to jointly investigate the incident with the Afghan government this week.

Chanting slogans against Karzai and the United States, thousands of people took part in the protest despite heavy rain.

"If the foreign troops do not put an end to their operations, we will launch jihad," said Malik Hazrat, a protest leader.

The provincial governor tried to calm the demonstrators and invited them for talks with representatives of the U.S.-led troops. But some protesters threw stones at him and he stopped his speech.

There was no report of injuries and by midday the protest had simmered down.

Nearly 700 civilians were killed in operations by foreign and Afghan forces against the militants until October last year, according to a national human rights body based on a U.N. estimate. [****]

Karzai, who has repeatedly urged foreign troops to coordinate operations with his government, last week termed civilian deaths as a main source of Afghanistan's instability.
(Writing by Sayed Salahuddin; Editing by Alex Richardson)
Copyright 2009 Reuters Ltd.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/weekinreview/25cooper.html
January 25, 2009
Obama's War
Fearing Another Quagmire in Afghanistan
By HELENE COOPER [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [eventually they will be judged by it] [hence, if they want to be reelected in 4 years they better put a classic counterinsurgency strategy in place] [and fast] [use psci469b] [****]
When you’re wounded and left on Afghanistan’s plains
And the women come out to cut up what remains
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An’ go to your Gawd like a soldier.
—Rudyard Kipling, “The Young British Soldier,” 1892

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/weekinreview/25cooper.html
January 25, 2009
Obama's War
Fearing Another Quagmire in Afghanistan
By HELENE COOPER [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [now the Obama administration will own this mess] [eventually they will be judged by it] [hence, if they want to be reelected in 4 years they better put a classic counterinsurgency strategy in place] [and fast] [use psci469b] [****]
When you’re wounded and left on Afghanistan’s plains
And the women come out to cut up what remains
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An’ go to your Gawd like a soldier.
—Rudyard Kipling, “The Young British Soldier,” 1892
WASHINGTON — Can President Obama succeed in that long-lamented “graveyard of empires” — a place that has crushed foreign occupiers for more than 2,000 years?

Ever since the Bush administration diverted its attention — and resources — to the war in Iraq from the war in Afghanistan, military planners and foreign policy experts have bemoaned the dearth of troops to keep that country from sliding back into Taliban control. And in that time, the insurgency blossomed, as Taliban militants took advantage of huge swaths of territory, [****]particularly in the south, that NATO troops weren’t able to fill.

Enter Mr. Obama. During the campaign he promised to send two additional brigades — 7,000 troops — to Afghanistan. During the transition, military planners started talking about adding as many as 30,000 troops. And within days of taking office, Mr. Obama announced the appointment of Richard Holbrooke, architect of the Balkan peace accords, to execute a new Afghanistan policy.

But even as Mr. Obama’s military planners prepare for the first wave of the new Afghanistan “surge,” there is growing debate, including among those who agree with the plan to send more troops, about whether — or how — the troops can accomplish their mission, and just what the mission is. [****]

Afghanistan has, after all, stymied would-be conquerors since Alexander the Great. It’s always the same story; the invaders — British, Soviets — control the cities, but not the countryside. And eventually, the invaders don’t even control the cities, and are sent packing.

Think Iraq was hard? Afghanistan, former Secretary of State Colin Powell argues, will be “much, much harder.”

“Iraq had a middle class,” Mr. Powell pointed out on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” a couple of hours before Mr. Obama was sworn in last Tuesday. “It was a fairly advanced country before Saddam Hussein drove it in the ground.” Afghanistan, on the other hand, “is still basically a tribal society, a lot of corruption; drugs are going to destroy that country if something isn’t done about it.”

For Mr. Obama, Afghanistan is the signal foreign policy crisis that he must address quickly. [***]Some 34,000 American troops are already fighting an insurgency that grows stronger by the month, making this a dynamically deteriorating situation in a region fraught with consequence for American security aims. Coupled with nuclear-armed Pakistan, with which it shares a border zone that has become a haven for Al Qaeda, Afghanistan could quickly come to define the Obama presidency.

Mr. Obama’s extra troops will largely be battling a Taliban insurgency fed by an opium trade estimated at $300 million a year. And that insurgency is dispersed among a largely rural population living in villages scattered across 78,000 square miles of southern Afghanistan.

One question for Mr. Obama is whether 30,000 more troops are enough. “I think that this is more of a psychological surge than a practical surge,” said Karin von Hippel, an Afghanistan expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. She said she favored the troop increase, but only as a precursor to getting the Europeans to contribute more, and to changing America’s policy so it focuses more on the countryside, as opposed to the capital.

“In Afghanistan, the number of troops, if you combine NATO, American and Afghan troops, is 200,000 forces versus 600,000 in Iraq,” Ms. von Hippel said. “Those numbers are so low that an extra 30,000 isn’t going to get you to where you need to be. It’s more of a stop-gap measure.”

“But something,” she said, “is better than nothing.”

That last assertion, however, is also open to debate. Some foreign policy experts argue that Mr. Obama’s decision to send additional troops to Afghanistan is simply an extension of Bush administration policy in the region, with the difference being that Mr. Obama could be putting more American lives at risk to pursue a failed policy.

While more American troops can help to stabilize southern Afghanistan, that argument goes, they cannot turn the situation around in the country unless there are major changes in overall policy. Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, the darling of the Bush administration, has begun to lose his luster; American and European officials now express private frustration over his refusal to arrest drug lords who have been running the opium trade.

Mr. Karzai has also been widely criticized for not cracking down enough on corruption. [****]And diplomats say his distaste for venturing far beyond his fortified presidential palace in Kabul reinforces the divide between Afghanistan’s central government and its largely rural population, giving the Taliban free rein in the countryside.

Before sending in more American troops, argues Andrew Bacevich, an international relations professor at Boston University, Mr. Obama should figure out if he is going to change an underlying American policy that has shrunk from putting pressure on Mr. Karzai.

“It seems there’s a rush to send in more reinforcements absent the careful analysis that’s most needed here,” said Mr. Bacevich, author of “The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism.”

“There’s clearly a consensus that things are heading in the wrong direction,” Mr. Bacevich said. “What’s not clear to me is why sending 30,000 more troops is the essential step to changing that. My understanding of the larger objective of the allied enterprise in Afghanistan is to bring into existence something that looks like a modern cohesive Afghan state. Well, it could be that that’s an unrealistic objective. It could be that sending 30,000 more troops is throwing money and lives down a rat hole.”

Putting aside the question of whether a modern cohesive Afghan state is a realistic objective, United States policy makers would like, at the very least, to get to a point in Afghanistan where the country is no longer a launching pad for terrorist attacks like what happened on Sept. 11, 2001. Beating back the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, and rooting out Qaeda training camps on the Pakistani border in eastern Afghanistan with the goal of finding Osama bin Laden, are all central parts of American policy, even absent a modern cohesive Afghan state.

Can 30,000 more troops help with that objective?

J. Alexander Their, an Afghanistan expert at the United States Institute of Peace, argues that additional troops can form a basis for stability, but that their presence will be for naught unless there is also government reform. “The Afghan population, particularly in the rural areas, have a strong degree of ambivalence toward the government,” he said. “People expect very little from government, or expect bad things. Yet we’ve ignored government reform and rule of law as part of our strategy.”

The appointment of Mr. Holbrooke as special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan may signal the direction that the Obama administration will take there. In the past, Mr. Holbrooke has written — as he did in a column in The Washington Post last spring — that in Afghanistan, “massive, officially sanctioned corruption and the drug trade are the most serious problems the country faces, and they offer the Taliban its only exploitable opportunity to gain support.”

And during her confirmation hearing, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called Afghanistan a “narco-state” with a government “plagued by limited capacity and widespread corruption.” So an Obama administration may, indeed, look for ways to press Mr. Karzai to crack down on corruption and drug trafficking. [*****]

But Mr. Their, of the peace institute, says that for a troop increase to produce anything but the limited securing of a few areas, Mr. Obama and NATO may have to go further. “There has to be increasing recognition that what is most important is some form of accountable government,” he said. “If they’re willing to contemplate a world without Karzai, they’ll be more open to a fair process and more open to the idea that there may be others out there.” [****]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/asia/25swat.html
January 25, 2009
Radio Spreads Taliban’s Terror in Pakistani Region
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [didn’t take long for the first CIA strike using UAVs to cross into Pak sovereign territory under Obama admin] [reportedly, president did not approve—said approvals made at lower level—but was briefed] [here, indications of Taliban controlling hearts and minds—albeit with fear only—by way of small, roaming radio stations] [followup] [use psci469b] [****]
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Every night around 8 o’clock, the terrified residents of Swat, a lush and picturesque valley a hundred miles from three of Pakistan’s most important

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/asia/25swat.html
January 25, 2009
Radio Spreads Taliban’s Terror in Pakistani Region
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [didn’t take long for the first CIA strike using UAVs to cross into Pak sovereign territory under Obama admin] [reportedly, president did not approve—said approvals made at lower level—but was briefed] [here, indications of Taliban controlling hearts and minds—albeit with fear only—by way of small, roaming radio stations] [followup] [use psci469b] [****]
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Every night around 8 o’clock, the terrified residents of Swat, a lush and picturesque valley a hundred miles from three of Pakistan’s most important cities, crowd around their radios. They know that failure to listen and learn might lead to a lashing — or a beheading. [***]

Using a portable radio transmitter, a local Taliban leader, Shah Doran, on most nights outlines newly proscribed “un-Islamic” activities in Swat, like selling DVDs, watching cable television, singing and dancing, criticizing the Taliban, shaving beards and allowing girls to attend school. He also reveals names of people the Taliban have recently killed for violating their decrees — and those they plan to kill. [***]

“They control everything through the radio,” said one Swat resident, who declined to give his name for fear the Taliban might kill him. “Everyone waits for the broadcast.”

International attention remains fixed on the Taliban’s hold on Pakistan’s semiautonomous tribal areas, from where they launch attacks on American forces in Afghanistan. But for Pakistan, the loss of the Swat Valley could prove just as devastating. [*****]

Unlike the fringe tribal areas, Swat, a Delaware-size chunk of territory with 1.3 million residents and a rich cultural history, is part of Pakistan proper, within reach of Peshawar, Rawalpindi and Islamabad, the capital. [****]

After more than a year of fighting, virtually all of it is now under Taliban control, marking the militants’ farthest advance eastward into Pakistan’s so-called settled areas, residents and government officials from the region say.

With the increasing consolidation of their power, the Taliban have taken a sizable bite out of the nation. And they are enforcing a strict interpretation of Islam with cruelty, [***]bringing public beheadings, assassinations, social and cultural repression and persecution of women to what was once an independent, relatively secular region, dotted with ski resorts and fruit orchards and known for its dancing girls.

Last year, 70 police officers were beheaded, shot or otherwise slain in Swat, and 150 wounded, [***]said Malik Naveed Khan, the police inspector general for the North-West Frontier Province.

The police have become so afraid that many officers have put advertisements in newspapers renouncing their jobs so the Taliban will not kill them.

One who stayed on the job was Farooq Khan, a midlevel officer in Mingora, the valley’s largest city, where decapitated bodies of policemen and other victims routinely surface. Last month, he was shopping there when two men on a motorcycle sprayed him with gunfire, killing him in broad daylight.

“He always said, ‘I have to stay here and defend our home,’ ” recalled his brother, Wajid Ali Khan, a Swat native and the province’s minister for environment, as he passed around a cellphone with Farooq’s picture.

In the view of analysts, the growing nightmare in Swat is a capsule of the country’s problems: an ineffectual and unresponsive civilian government, coupled with military and security forces that, in the view of furious residents, have willingly allowed the militants to spread terror deep into Pakistan. [***]

The crisis has become a critical test for the government of the civilian president, Asif Ali Zardari, and for a security apparatus whose loyalties, many Pakistanis say, remain in question.

Seeking to deflect blame, Mr. Zardari’s government recently criticized “earlier halfhearted attempts at rooting out extremists from the area” and vowed to fight militants “who are ruthlessly murdering and maiming our citizens.” [***]

But as pressure grows, he has also said in recent days that the government would be willing to talk with militants who accept its authority. Such negotiations would carry serious risks: security officials say a brief peace deal in Swat last spring was a spectacular failure that allowed militants to tighten their hold and take revenge on people who had supported the military. [***]

Without more forceful and concerted action by the government, some warn, the Taliban threat in Pakistan is bound to spread.

“The crux of the problem is the government appears divided about what to do,” said Mahmood Shah, a retired Pakistani Army brigadier who until 2006 was in charge of security in the western tribal areas. “This disconnect among the political leadership has emboldened the militants.”

From 2,000 to 4,000 Taliban fighters now roam the Swat Valley, according to interviews with a half-dozen senior Pakistani government, military and political officials involved in the fight. By contrast, the Pakistani military has four brigades with 12,000 to 15,000 men in Swat, [****]officials say.

But the soldiers largely stay inside their camps, unwilling to patrol or exert any large presence that might provoke — or discourage — the militants, Swat residents and political leaders say. The military also has not raided a small village that locals say is widely known as the Taliban’s headquarters in Swat.

Nor have troops destroyed mobile radio transmitters mounted on motorcycles or pickup trucks that Shah Doran and the leader of the Taliban in Swat, Maulana Fazlullah, have expertly used to terrify residents.

Being named in one of the nightly broadcasts often leaves just two options: fleeing Swat, or turning up headless and dumped in a village square.

When the army does act, its near-total lack of preparedness to fight a counterinsurgency reveals itself. [***]Its usual tactic is to lob artillery shells into a general area, and the results have seemed to hurt civilians more than the militants, residents say.

In some parts of Pakistan, civilian militias have risen to fight the Taliban. But in Swat, the Taliban’s gains amid a large army presence has convinced many that the military must be conspiring with the Taliban. [****]

“It’s very mysterious how they get so much weapons and support,” while nearby districts are comparatively calm, said Muzaffar ul-Mulk Khan, a member of Parliament from Swat, who said his home near Mingora was recently destroyed by the Taliban.

“We are bewildered by the military. They patrol only in Mingora. In the rest of Swat they sit in their bases. And the militants can kill at will anywhere in Mingora,” he said.

“Nothing is being done by the government," Mr. Khan added.

Accusations that the military lacks the will to fight in Swat are “very unfair and unjustified,” said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the chief military spokesman, who said 180 army soldiers and officers had been killed in Swat in the past 14 months.

“They do reach out, and they do patrol,” he said.

Military officials also say they are trying to step up activity in Swat. This weekend, soldiers were deployed to protect a handful of educational buildings in Mingora, amid a wave of school bombings.

General Abbas said the military did not have the means to block Taliban radio transmissions across such a wide area, but he disputed the view that Mingora had fallen to the militants.

“Just because they come out at night and throw down four or five bodies in the square does not mean that militants control anything,” he said.

Few officials would dispute that one of the Pakistani military’s biggest mistakes in Swat was its failure to protect Pir Samiullah, a local leader whose 500 followers fought the Taliban in the village of Mandal Dag. [***]After the Taliban killed him in a firefight last month, the militants demanded that his followers reveal his gravesite — and then started beheading people until they got the information, one Mandal Dag villager said.

“They dug him up and hung his body in the square,” the villager said, and then they took the body to a secret location. The desecration was intended to show what would happen to anyone who defied the Taliban’s rule, but it also made painfully clear to Swat residents that the Pakistani government could not be trusted to defend those who rose up against the militants.

“He should have been given more protection,” said one Pakistani security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the subject. “He should have been made a symbol of resistance.”

Gruesome displays like the defilement of Pir Samiullah’s remains are an effective tactic for the Taliban, who have shown cruel efficiency in following through on their threats.

Recently, Shah Doran broadcast word that the Taliban intended to kill a police officer who he said had killed three people.

“We have sent people, and tomorrow you will have good news,” he said on his nightly broadcast, according to a resident of Matta, a Taliban stronghold. The next day the decapitated body of the policeman was found in a nearby village.

Even in Mingora, a town grown hardened to violence, residents were shocked early this month to find the bullet-ridden body of one of the city’s most famous dancing girls splayed on the main square.

Known as Shabana, the woman was visited at night by a group of men who claimed to want to hire her for a party. They shot her to death and dragged her body more than a quarter-mile to the central square, leaving it as a warning for anyone who would flout Taliban decrees.

The leader of the militants in Swat, Maulana Fazlullah, [***]gained prominence from making radio broadcasts and running an Islamic school, [***]becoming popular among otherwise isolated homemakers and inspiring them to sell their jewelry to finance his operation. He also drew support from his marriage to the daughter of Sufi Mohammed, a powerful religious leader in Swat until 2001 who later disowned his son-in-law.

Even though Swat does not border Afghanistan or any of Pakistan’s seven lawless federal tribal areas, Maulana Fazlullah eventually allied with Taliban militants who dominate regions along the Afghan frontier.

His fighters now roam the valley with sniper rifles, Kalashnikovs, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, mortar tubes and, according to some officials, night-vision goggles and flak vests.

His latest tactic is a ban on girls’ attending school in Swat, which will be tested in February when private schools are scheduled to reopen after winter recess. The Taliban have already destroyed 169 girls’ schools in Swat, government officials say, and they expect most private schools to stay closed rather than risk retaliation.

“The local population is totally fed up, and if they had the chance they would lynch each and every Talib,” said Mr. Naveed Khan, the police official. “But the Taliban are so cruel and violent, no one will oppose them. If this is not stopped, it will spill into other areas of Pakistan.” [calls for classic counterinsurgency tactics!] [****]
Ismail Khan contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:24 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/africa/25somalia.html
January 25, 2009
Suicide Attacker Kills 15 in Somalia
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [Ethiopia withdraws/Islamists surge] [****]
MOGADISHU, Somalia — A suicide car bomber detonated his explosives near an African Union peacekeepers’ base here, killing at least 15 people, [***]witnesses

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/africa/25somalia.html
January 25, 2009
Suicide Attacker Kills 15 in Somalia
By MOHAMMED IBRAHIM [Somalia] [northern Africa] proximity to horn and south] [redoubt for various factions-actors in Somalia and elsewhere] [hydra II] [bloodbath continues in Somalia with transitional government desperate to hang on while Islamist and jihadis movements gain traction with Somalis] [seen as stability, if only short term] [transitional government loyalists, brigands, Islamists, clans, or jihadis] [use psci469b] [followup] [Ethiopia withdraws/Islamists surge] [****]
MOGADISHU, Somalia — A suicide car bomber detonated his explosives near an African Union peacekeepers’ base here, killing at least 15 people, [***]witnesses said.

The bomber drove up to an armored vehicle and set off his explosives as a public bus was passing by, killing 14 passengers and wounding 24 others, a witness said.

A policeman who tried to stop the suicide bomber’s car was also killed.

An African Union spokesman, Bahoku Barigye, said no peacekeepers were killed or wounded in the attack, The Associated Press reported.

The blast in the Somali capital was followed by a gunfight and an artillery exchange between peacekeepers and insurgents. [***]At least one person was killed and several were wounded.

A witness, Mohamoud Muhammad Ali, described a scene of panic and pools of blood. He said the bomber’s four-by-four S.U.V. exploded when it hit the peacekeepers’ vehicle.

“This is a very shocking event and I don’t know when we’ll ever get peace,” Mr. Mohamoud added.

Mogadishu’s deputy governor, Abdifatah Ibrahim Shaweye, who went to the scene, said that based on the lighter skin of what was thought to be the bomber’s hand, “the suicide bomber was not a Somali.” [***] [foreign fighter]

“It is a gloomy day for us,” he said. “They have killed only innocent Somali civilians.”

A doctor at Madina Hospital confirmed that 20 people wounded in the attack had been brought to the hospital.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Somalia’s weak government was dealt a blow this month when the Ethiopian troops that had supported it withdrew.

Since then, several Islamist insurgent groups have been steadily taking over the country.

African countries are sending more troops to bolster the 3,000 African Union peacekeepers, but they have not yet arrived.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:23 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/middleeast/25yemen.html
January 25, 2009
2 Ex-Detainees in Qaeda Video
By ROBERT F. WORTH [from Lebanon] [Yemen] [Yemen] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [prosecution of global jihadis abroad—extraterritoriality and other complex issues] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [jihadis recidivism?] [how domestic politics will likely make hay] [domestic cognate rarely an issue] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [followup from Jan 23] [****]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Two former Guantánamo Bay detainees now appear to have joined Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch, which released a video on Friday showing them both

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/world/middleeast/25yemen.html
January 25, 2009
2 Ex-Detainees in Qaeda Video
By ROBERT F. WORTH [from Lebanon] [Yemen] [Yemen] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [prosecution of global jihadis abroad—extraterritoriality and other complex issues] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [jihadis recidivism?] [how domestic politics will likely make hay] [domestic cognate rarely an issue] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [followup from Jan 23] [****]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Two former Guantánamo Bay detainees now appear to have joined Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch, which released a video on Friday showing them both and identifying them by their names and Guantánamo detainee numbers. [***]

American counterterrorism officials have already confirmed that Said Ali al-Shihri, 35, who was released from the American prison camp at Guantánamo in November 2007, is now the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch. [***]He is suspected of playing a role in a deadly attack on the American Embassy in the Yemeni capital, Sana, in September.

In the video released Friday, Mr. Shihri sits alongside a man identified as Abu Hareth Muhammad al-Awfi, who appears with a script at the bottom of the screen giving his Guantánamo identification number, 333. That number corresponds to a man known in Pentagon documents as Mohamed Atiq Awayd al-Harbi, [***]who was also released to Saudi Arabia in November 2007.

The difference in names is partly due to the common Arab practice of referring to men by their kunya, an honorific, in this case Abu Hareth, derived from the name of his first son. The name Al Harbi is a tribal designation. [***]

Both men passed through a Saudi rehabilitation program for jihadists after their release from Guantánamo. [***]That program has been seen as a model, and the Saudi government had previously said that none of its graduates had returned to terrorism. [I have always written with ambivalence about it] [***]

In the video released Friday, Mr. Awfi warns fellow prisoners about the Saudi program and threatens attacks against Saudi Arabia. He also speaks angrily about the Israeli attacks on Hamas in Gaza.

Mr. Shihri also speaks in the video, saying “by God, our imprisonment only increased our perseverance in the principles for which we went out, did jihad for, and were imprisoned for.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:22 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/24/AR2009012401703.html
To Combat Obama, Al-Qaeda Hurls Insults
Effort Hints at Group's Consternation
By Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 25, 2009; A01 [al Qaeda] [post-election video with Dr. Ayman al Zawhiri calling for more attacks on “apostate” regimes] [more fo the usual stuff] [interestingly, nothing about India] [unclear when tape made] [al Qaeda struggling to respond to Obama’s administration] [clearly, early indications are Obama plans to attack aggressively] [use psci469b] [****]
Soon after the November election, al-Qaeda's No. 2 leader took stock of America's new

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/24/AR2009012401703.html
To Combat Obama, Al-Qaeda Hurls Insults
Effort Hints at Group's Consternation
By Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 25, 2009; A01 [al Qaeda] [post-election video with Dr. Ayman al Zawhiri calling for more attacks on “apostate” regimes] [more fo the usual stuff] [interestingly, nothing about India] [unclear when tape made] [al Qaeda struggling to respond to Obama’s administration] [clearly, early indications are Obama plans to attack aggressively] [use psci469b] [****]
Soon after the November election, al-Qaeda's No. 2 leader took stock of America's new president-elect and dismissed him with an insulting epithet. "A house Negro," Ayman al-Zawahiri said.

That was just a warm-up. In the weeks since, the terrorist group has unleashed a stream of verbal tirades against Barack Obama, each more venomous than the last. Obama has been called a "hypocrite," a "killer" of innocents, an "enemy of Muslims." [***] He was even blamed for the Israeli military assault on Gaza, which began and ended before he took office.

"He kills your brothers and sisters in Gaza mercilessly and without affection," an al-Qaeda spokesman declared in a grainy Internet video this month.

The torrent of hateful words is part of what terrorism experts now believe is a deliberate, even desperate, propaganda campaign against a president who appears to have gotten under al-Qaeda's skin. [***] The departure of George W. Bush deprived al-Qaeda of a polarizing American leader who reliably drove recruits and donations to the terrorist group. [al Qaeda could hardly do a bigger favor for Obama] [****]

With Obama, al-Qaeda faces an entirely new challenge, experts say: a U.S. president who campaigned to end the Iraq war and to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and who polls show is well liked throughout the Muslim world. [***]

Whether the pro-Obama sentiment will last remains to be seen. On Friday, the new administration signaled that it intends to continue at least one of Bush's controversial counterterrorism policies: allowing CIA missile strikes on alleged terrorist hideouts in Pakistan's autonomous tribal region.

But for now, the change in Washington appears to have rattled al-Qaeda's leaders, some of whom are scrambling to convince the faithful that Obama and Bush are essentially the same. [****]

"They're highly uncertain about what they're getting in this new adversary," said Paul Pillar, a former CIA counterterrorism official who lectures on national security at Georgetown University. "For al-Qaeda, as a matter of image and tone, George W. Bush had been a near-perfect foil."

Al-Qaeda's rhetorical swipes at Obama date to the weeks before the election, when commentators on Web sites associated with the group debated which of the two major presidential candidates would be better for the jihadist movement. While opinions differed, a consensus view supported Republican Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) as the man most likely to continue Bush administration policies and, it was hoped, drive the United States more deeply into a prolonged guerrilla war.

Soon after the vote, the attacks turned personal -- and insulting. In his Nov. 16 video message, Zawahiri denounced Obama as "the direct opposite of honorable black Americans" such as Malcolm X. He then used the term "house Negro," [***]implying that Obama is merely a servant carrying out the orders of powerful whites.

Since then, as Obama has begun moving to reverse controversial Bush administration policies, the verbal attacks have become sharper, more frequent and more clearly aimed at Muslim audiences.

On Jan. 6, [***]Zawahiri issued a message calling for a global jihad by Muslims to counter Israel's military campaign in Gaza. He then sought to frame the Israeli assault as a "link in the chain of the crusade against Islam and Muslims," [***]with then-President-elect Obama at the head of the chain.

"These raids are Obama's gift to you before he takes office," the Egyptian-born Zawahiri said in the message, addressed to "Muslim brothers and mujaheddin."

"This is Obama, whom the American machine of lies tried to portray as the rescuer who will change the policy of America," Zawahiri said, according to a translation provided by Site Intelligence Group, a private company that monitors jihadist communications.

Days before Obama's inauguration, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden chimed in with a mocking prediction that the new president would founder under the weight of the military and financial burdens he would inherit. No matter what he tried to do, Obama would ultimately lose, bin Laden said on Jan. 14. [****] [OBL’s take]

"If he withdraws from the war, it is military defeat," he said in an audiotaped message. "And if he continues it, he drowns in economic crisis. How can it be that [Bush] passed over to him two wars, not one war, and he is unable to continue them? We are on our path to open other fronts, with permission from Allah."

Friday, a new al-Qaeda salvo attempted to embarrass Obama, a day after the new president announced his plans for closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay. [***]Appearing on the videotaped message were two men who enlisted in al-Qaeda after being freed from that detention center.

"By Allah, imprisonment only increased our persistence in our principles for which we went out, did jihad for and were imprisoned for," said Abu Sufyan al-Azdi al-Shahri, who described himself as a deputy commander for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. The translation was also provided by the Site group.

Site founder Rita Katz said the messages show "just how much al-Qaeda is intimidated by Obama." [****]

"The leadership of al-Qaeda is very concerned about the wide support that Obama has been receiving from Arab and Muslim countries," Katz said. "To combat this threat, al-Qaeda has embarked on a propaganda campaign against Obama, not only by linking him to the policies of the Bush administration, including the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, but also by accusing him of actions in which he had no part."

Other jihadist groups appear less threatened, or perhaps more accepting of an American commander who appears more open to peaceful accommodation, Katz said. A publication known as Al-Samoud, linked to the Taliban in Afghanistan, viewed Obama's election as a welcome sign that Americans are "very much tired from the bitter war" and do not wish to prolong a conflict "ignited by Bush's insanity and his satanic policy." [does this indicate a rift between al Qaeda proper and Talibs?] [****]

Regardless of how Obama is viewed now by the Muslim world -- savior, menace or something in between -- the opinions will almost certainly change in the coming months. For Muslim countries, as for the United States, perceptions based on rhetoric and image will soon collide with reality as the policies of the new administration take form, said Pillar, the former CIA official.

"Inevitably Obama will make certain decisions that will be unpopular and which the propagandists will quickly castigate," Pillar said. "I expect that the honeymoon will be just as fragile and short as with the American electorate."
Staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:21 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/us/politics/24brfs-ETHICSWAIVER_BRF.html
January 24, 2009
National Briefing | Washington
Ethics Waiver Is Granted for Pentagon Nominee
By THOM SHANKER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [file under self-inflicted wounds] [why they need Lynn as deputy sec def is beyond me] [the guy has enough ethics questions to choke the entire congress] [mr. revolving door] [did Gates ask for this guy?] [if so, why?] [use psci355, 455] [****]
Senate consideration of President Obama’s choice for the Pentagon’s No. 2 job will be

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/us/politics/24brfs-ETHICSWAIVER_BRF.html
January 24, 2009
National Briefing | Washington
Ethics Waiver Is Granted for Pentagon Nominee
By THOM SHANKER [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [file under self-inflicted wounds] [why they need Lynn as deputy sec def is beyond me] [the guy has enough ethics questions to choke the entire congress] [mr. revolving door] [did Gates ask for this guy?] [if so, why?] [use psci355, 455] [****]
Senate consideration of President Obama’s choice for the Pentagon’s No. 2 job will be allowed to proceed after the Armed Services Committee chairman said that an ethics waiver would be granted to the nominee, William J. Lynn III, who was a registered lobbyist for a military contractor. [***]Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan and chairman of the committee, said the director of the Office of Management and Budget waived provisions of Mr. Obama’s new executive order on ethics for Mr. Lynn, nominated to be deputy defense secretary. Without a waiver, those provisions would appear to preclude Mr. Lynn’s acting on many significant issues. With the waiver, Mr. Levin said, the Senate can act on the nomination. He also emphasized that the committee would continue to insist that Mr. Lynn comply with ethics rules that would require him to recuse himself for one year from decisions involving his prior employer, Raytheon, unless specifically authorized to participate. [who needs this sort of headache?] [****]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:27 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/us/politics/24intel.html
January 24, 2009
Where Will Detainees From Guantánamo Go?
By MARK MAZZETTI and SCOTT SHANE [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [yesterday, Obama announced order to close gitmo in one year’s time] [likely, easier said than done] [we shall see] [continuity in USFP?] [use psci355, 455] [this brouhaha caused by recent revelation that prisoner held at gitmo—who was released by Bush administration without charges or strings—has now become head of al Qaeda in Yemen] [hardly a surprise that some will do so] [some of America’s murderers and rapists are recidivists!] [****]
WASHINGTON — Is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed coming to a prison near you?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/us/politics/24intel.html
January 24, 2009
Where Will Detainees From Guantánamo Go?
By MARK MAZZETTI and SCOTT SHANE [Obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [yesterday, Obama announced order to close gitmo in one year’s time] [likely, easier said than done] [we shall see] [continuity in USFP?] [use psci355, 455] [this brouhaha caused by recent revelation that prisoner held at gitmo—who was released by Bush administration without charges or strings—has now become head of al Qaeda in Yemen] [hardly a surprise that some will do so] [some of America’s murderers and rapists are recidivists!] [****]
WASHINGTON — Is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed coming to a prison near you?

One day after President Obama ordered that the military detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, be shuttered, lawmakers in Washington wrestled with the implications of bringing dozens of the 245 remaining inmates onto American soil.

Republican lawmakers, who oppose Mr. Obama’s plan, found a talking point with political appeal. [***]They said closing Guantánamo could allow dangerous terrorists to get off on legal technicalities and be released into quiet neighborhoods across the United States. If the detainees were convicted, the Republicans continued, American prisons housing terrorism suspects could become magnets for attacks.

Meanwhile, none of the Democrats who on Thursday hailed the closing of the detention camp were stepping forward to offer prisons in their districts or states to receive the prisoners.

Senator Christopher S. Bond, Republican of Missouri and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, taunted the chairwoman, Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, by suggesting that the authorities reopen Alcatraz Prison in the San Francisco Bay.

On Friday, a spokesman for Mrs. Feinstein countered that Alcatraz now was a “national park and tourist attraction, not a functioning prison,” and that the senator “does not consider it a suitable place to house detainees.”

But Mrs. Feinstein does believe that some Guantánamo prisoners could be moved to maximum-security civilian or military prisons in the United States, the spokesman said, not naming any specific ones.

Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan and the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in response to a question on Friday that Guantánamo detainees who were moved to the United States “should be held at maximum-security federal facilities wherever they are available.” Like other Democrats queried Friday, Mr. Levin did not specifically address the question of prisoners moving to his state.

One of the first Democrats in Congress to address the not-in-my-backyard issue directly was Representative John P. Murtha of Pennsylvania, who told reporters this week that terrorism suspects would be no more dangerous in a secure Pennsylvania prison than they were in Cuba. [silly] [of course America’s supermax prisons can hold them] [there are close to 100 terrorist already in said prisons] [****]

“There are thousands of dangerous prisoners being held securely behind bars in supermax prisons across the United States,” Mr. Murtha said Friday. He noted, however, that there was no supermax facility in his district.

The number of detainees who may face federal trials — by various estimates, 50 to 100 of the remaining Guantánamo inmates — is tiny by the standards of the federal prison system, which currently holds 201,375 people in 114 facilities, according to Felicia Ponce, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Those include 9 detention centers that hold defendants awaiting trial, 21 high-security penitentiaries and a supersecure prison in Florence, Colo., where several convicted terrorists are already locked up.

Obama administration officials are beginning to review the files on the remaining detainees at Guantánamo to decide where they should go. Some have been judged not dangerous and cleared for release, but officials have not found a country to take them. Others, including Mr. Mohammed, the chief planner of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, will almost certainly face trial, either in a federal or a military court.

But incoming administration officials admit that every option is imperfect. “There aren’t pretty choices for what we have to do with them,” Dennis C. Blair, the nominee for director of national intelligence, told senators on Thursday.

Republican lawmakers have watched these struggles with a certain relish.

Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, the senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said, “As people start getting an indication that they’re going to Kansas, that they’re going to California, that they’re going to Illinois or to Michigan, people are going to say, ‘No, why would we want them here and put them in a general prison population and make our hometowns a target for terrorists?’ ”

Despite speculation about the possibility of moving large numbers of detainees to a single military jail, like those in Leavenworth, Kan., or Charleston, S.C., government officials and legal experts say it is more likely that inmates would be sent to civilian or military facilities across the country. That would reduce the burden on any single location and make each site less of a potential terrorist target.

Sarah E. Mendelson, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who led a study of options for closing Guantánamo, said it would be best if detainees facing prosecution were indicted while still at Guantánamo and then moved into federal pretrial facilities in the United States, which routinely house people accused of murder and other dangerous inmates.

“We’ve had extremely dangerous terrorists tried in various courts and put away,” Ms. Mendelson said.

Federal courts have convicted 145 people on terrorism-related charges since 2001, according to one review, while the military commissions at Guantánamo have been plagued with delays and legal setbacks.

“The Obama administration has to have a little more of a conversation with the American people” about the feasibility of prosecuting terrorism suspects in the United States, she said. “There are plenty of Americans who would want to see some of these guys prosecuted and locked up.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:26 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012304189.html
2 U.S. Airstrikes Offer a Concrete Sign of Obama's Pakistan Policy
By R. Jeffrey Smith, Candace Rondeaux and Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, January 24, 2009; A01 [Obama administration] [apparently the president was briefed but the decision locus in bureaucracy] [implications for Obama’s NSC principals and deputies] [111th Congress, 1st session] [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [didn’t take long for the first CIA strike using UAVs to cross into Pak sovereign territory under Obama admin] [followup] [use psci469b] [see today’s NYTs piece on same in external] [****]
Two remote U.S. missile strikes that killed at least 20 people at suspected terrorist

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012304189.html
2 U.S. Airstrikes Offer a Concrete Sign of Obama's Pakistan Policy
By R. Jeffrey Smith, Candace Rondeaux and Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, January 24, 2009; A01 [Obama administration] [apparently the president was briefed but the decision locus in bureaucracy] [implications for Obama’s NSC principals and deputies] [111th Congress, 1st session] [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [didn’t take long for the first CIA strike using UAVs to cross into Pak sovereign territory under Obama admin] [followup] [use psci469b] [see today’s NYTs piece on same in external] [****]
Two remote U.S. missile strikes that killed at least 20 people at suspected terrorist hideouts in northwestern Pakistan yesterday offered the first tangible sign of President Obama's commitment to sustained military pressure on the terrorist groups there, even though Pakistanis broadly oppose such unilateral U.S. actions.

The shaky Pakistani government of Asif Ali Zardari has expressed hopes for warm relations with Obama, but members of Obama's new national security team have already telegraphed their intention to make firmer demands of Islamabad than the Bush administration, and to back up those demands with a threatened curtailment of the plentiful military aid [***]that has been at the heart of U.S.-Pakistani ties for the past three decades.

The separate strikes on two compounds, coming three hours apart and involving five missiles fired from Afghanistan-based Predator drone aircraft, were the first high-profile hostile military actions taken under Obama's four-day-old presidency. A Pakistani security official said in Islamabad that the strikes appeared to have killed at least 10 insurgents, including five foreign nationals and possibly even "a high-value target" such as a senior al-Qaeda or Taliban official.

It remained unclear yesterday whether Obama personally authorized the strike or was involved in its final planning, but military officials have previously said the White House is routinely briefed about such attacks in advance. [it was pretty clear] [***]

At his daily White House briefing, press secretary Robert Gibbs declined to answer questions about the strikes, saying, "I'm not going to get into these matters." Obama convened his first National Security Council meeting on Pakistan and Afghanistan yesterday afternoon, after the strike. [***] [that’s pretty clear: “after the strike”]

The Pakistani government, which has loudly protested some earlier strikes, was quiet yesterday. In September, U.S. and Pakistani officials reached a tacit agreement to allow such attacks to continue without Pakistani involvement, according to senior officials in both countries.

But some Pakistanis have said they expect a possibly bumpy diplomatic stretch ahead.

"Pakistan hopes that Obama will be more patient while dealing with Pakistan," Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to Washington, said in an interview Wednesday with Pakistan's Geo television network. "We will review all options if Obama does not adopt a positive policy towards us." He urged Obama to "hear us out."

At least 132 people have been killed in 38 suspected U.S. missile strikes inside Pakistan since August, all conducted by the CIA, in a ramped-up effort by the outgoing Bush administration.

Obama's August 2007 statement -- that he favored taking direct action in Pakistan against potential threats to U.S. security if Pakistani security forces do not act -- made him less popular in Pakistan than in any other Muslim nation polled before the election. [****]

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton indicated during her Senate confirmation hearing that the new administration will not relent in holding Pakistan to account for any shortfalls in the continuing battle against extremists.

Linking Pakistan with neighboring Afghanistan "on the front line of our global counterterrorism efforts," Clinton told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that "we will use all the elements of our powers -- diplomacy, development and defense -- to work with those . . . who want to root out al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other violent extremists." She also said those in Pakistan who do not join the effort will pay a price, adding a distinctly new element to the long-standing U.S. effort to lure Pakistan closer to the West.

In blunt terms in her written answers to the committee's questions, Clinton pledged that Washington will "condition" future U.S. military aid on Pakistan's efforts to close down terrorist training camps and evict foreign fighters. She also demanded that Pakistan "prevent" the continued use of its historically lawless northern territories [seems to be toeing the line] [***] as a sanctuary by either the Taliban or al-Qaeda. And she promised that Washington would provide all the support Pakistan needs if it specifically goes after targets such as Osama bin Laden, who is believed to be using Pakistani mountains as a hideout.

At the same time, Clinton pledged to triple nonmilitary aid to Pakistan, long dwarfed by the more than $6 billion funneled to Pakistani military forces under President George W. Bush through the Pentagon's counterterrorism office in Islamabad.

"The conditioning of military aid is substantially different," as is the planned boost of economic aid, said Daniel Markey, a Council on Foreign Relations senior fellow who handled South Asian matters on the State Department's policy planning staff from 2003 to 2007.

Bush's focus on military aid to a Pakistani government that was led by an army general until August eventually drew complaints in both countries that much of the funding was spent without accountability or, instead of being used to root out terrorists, was diverted to forces intended for a potential conflict with India.

A study in 2007 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies reported that economic, humanitarian and development assistance under Bush amounted to no more than a quarter of all aid, less than in most countries.

The criticism helped provoke a group of senators who now have powerful new roles -- Joseph R. Biden Jr., Clinton and Obama -- to co-sponsor legislation last July requiring that more aid be targeted at political pluralism, the rule of law, human and civil rights, and schools, public health and agriculture.

It also would have allowed U.S. weapons sales and other military aid only if the secretary of state certified that Pakistani military forces were making "concerted efforts" to undermine al-Qaeda and the Taliban. In her confirmation statement, Clinton reiterated her support for such a legislative restructuring of the aid program, while reaffirming that she opposed any "blank check."

Some Pakistanis have been encouraged by indications that Obama intends to increase aid to the impoverished country, said Shuja Nawaz, a Pakistani who directs the South Asia Center of the Washington-based Atlantic Council of the United States. Nawaz said Pakistanis may be willing to overlook an occasional missile lobbed at foreign terrorists if Obama makes a sincere attempt to improve conditions in Pakistan.

"He can't just focus on military achievements; he has to win over the people," Nawaz said. "Relying on military strikes will not do the trick." Attaching conditions to the aid is wise, Nawaz said, because "people are more cognizant of the need for accountability -- for 'tough love.' "
Rondeaux reported from Islamabad. Special correspondent Haq Nawaz Khan in Islamabad contributed to this report.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/health/24ebola.html
January 24, 2009
Pig-to-Human Ebola Case Suspected in Philippines
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. [global pandemics] [hemorrhagic-fever viruses] [ebola] [if true, this could bode very badly for spread of Ebola with a mortality rate of some 80%] [use ir text] [related to climate change?] [ecology?] [****]
In the first known case of what may be transmission of the Ebola virus from a pig to a human, a pig handler in the Philippines has tested positive for a strain of the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/health/24ebola.html
January 24, 2009
Pig-to-Human Ebola Case Suspected in Philippines
By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. [global pandemics] [hemorrhagic-fever viruses] [ebola] [if true, this could bode very badly for spread of Ebola with a mortality rate of some 80%] [use ir text] [related to climate change?] [ecology?] [****]
In the first known case of what may be transmission of the Ebola virus from a pig to a human, a pig handler in the Philippines has tested positive for a strain of the virus, [***]world health officials and the Philippine government announced Friday.

But the strain — Ebola Reston — is not known to be dangerous to humans, and the worker, who was infected at least six months ago, is healthy, officials said.

The development is worrying, because pigs are mixing vessels for other human and animal viruses, like flu, and because it shows that pigs may also be able to transmit the lethal strains of Ebola. [***]Far more humans are in regular contact with pigs than with apes, monkeys or bats, the other known hosts.

But Dr. Juan Lubroth, chief of animal health at the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization, said that there was “more need to investigate than to worry” and that many unanswered questions remained.

Ebola Reston, normally a monkey virus, was first found in pigs last year in the Philippines. Health authorities closed two farms and took blood samples from 6,000 pigs and 50 workers on the farms and in slaughterhouses. Only four pigs and the one worker tested positive, the Philippine health secretary, Francisco Duque, said at a news conference in Manila.

Dr. Lubroth said the first pigs tested were very sick, but turned out to have more than one infection, including a virulent reproductive and respiratory syndrome. The Reston virus may not have been what sickened them.

“But farmers, of course, would prefer to have pigs without Ebola,” he said. “So we want to do more testing to see what they can do to protect them.”

Broader sampling will determine, among other things, whether the disease is more common in pigs and humans than is known, whether it causes fever and how long its incubation period is.

Ebola Reston was first found in monkeys from the Philippines that died after arriving at a laboratory in Reston, Va., in 1989. Antibodies to it were found in more than 20 workers in several labs, but it is not known to have caused more than a mild flu.

By contrast, the Zaire, Sudan and Bundibugyo strains of Ebola, found in African apes, cause fatal hemorrhagic fever in humans.

It is not known how the pigs were infected, but Dr. Lubroth noted that studies in Africa found Ebola viruses in fruit bats. Similar bats live in the Philippines, and fruit bats are thought to have transmitted the deadly Nipah virus to pigs, possibly through their droppings or dead bodies.

Even if the Ebola Reston virus can be shared between pigs and people, there is little chance it will mutate to become more lethal, said Dr. Pierre Rollin, acting chief of special pathogens for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who also visited the Philippines for the investigation. [except that it has and viruses are quick-mutating organisms!] [****]

“This virus is very stable, not like flu or H.I.V.,” he said. “Previously, when the virus went from primates to humans, it did not change. The identical virus was found in both.”

Also, humans do not carry other members of the filovirus family that could mix with it, the way that influenza strains from birds, pigs and humans can swap parts of genes.

The infection does suggest that pigs could transmit lethal Ebola, which inspired germ-terror movies like “Outbreak.” Fortunately, Dr. Rollin noted, there are no large pig-farming operations in Sudan, a Muslim country, in rural Congo or in most other places where the fatal strains flourish. [***]

“It’s probably a rare event that pigs get infected,” said Dr. Thomas G. Ksiazek, a pathogens specialist at the University of Texas Medical School in Galveston. “It hasn’t led to a past catastrophe. We’d know about a catastrophe.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/business/worldbusiness/24euro.html
January 24, 2009
Once a Boon, Euro Now Burdens Some Nations
By LANDON THOMAS Jr. [Euro] [lesser economies] [burdens of the once vaunted Euro] [now its coming home to roost] [when we were in Eastern Mediterranean in 2006, most were giddy over Euro’s strength] [use ir text?] [****]
ATHENS — “The Italians, the Spaniards, the Greeks, we all have been living in happy land, spending what we did not have,” said George Economou, a Greek shipping magnate, contemplating his country’s economic troubles and others’ from his spacious boardroom. “It was a fantasy world.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/business/worldbusiness/24euro.html
January 24, 2009
Once a Boon, Euro Now Burdens Some Nations
By LANDON THOMAS Jr. [Euro] [lesser economies] [burdens of the once vaunted Euro] [now its coming home to roost] [when we were in Eastern Mediterranean in 2006, most were giddy over Euro’s strength] [use ir text?] [****]
ATHENS — “The Italians, the Spaniards, the Greeks, we all have been living in happy land, spending what we did not have,” said George Economou, a Greek shipping magnate, contemplating his country’s economic troubles and others’ from his spacious boardroom. “It was a fantasy world.”

For some of the countries on the periphery of the 16-member euro currency zone — Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain — this debt-fired dream of endless consumption has turned into the rudest of nightmares, raising the risk that a euro country may be forced to declare bankruptcy or abandon the currency. [***]

The prospect, however unlikely, is a humbling one. The adoption of the euro just a decade ago was meant to pull Europe together economically and politically, ending the sometimes furious battles over who could devalue their currency the fastest and beggar their neighbor.

For the Continent, the currency signaled the potential to one day rival the United States. For its poorer countries, winning admission to the euro zone was a point of pride, [***] showing that they had tamed their budget deficits and set their financial houses in order.

Now, in the middle of the worst economic downturn since the euro’s birth, a new view is emerging — especially as the creditworthiness of Greece, Spain and Portugal, one after the other, has been downgraded. The view is that the balm of euro membership allowed these countries to gloss over serious economic problems that have now roared to the fore.

“Membership is not a panacea for a country’s social and economic problems,” said Simon Tilford, the chief economist at the Center for European Reform in London.

“In fact, there has been a huge divergence in competitiveness that shows up in massive trade imbalances,” he said, comparing Greece with the wealthier euro countries. “While Greece may have been insulated from the risk of a currency crisis, there is also the risk of a credit crisis and a collapse of confidence in its solvency.” [***]

While sharing a currency with some of the mightiest economies in the world helped Europe’s poorer nations share in the wealth, a boon during boom times, in hard times the rules of membership are keeping them from doing what countries normally do to ride out economic storms, including enormous spending. [***]

So Germany, France and the Scandinavian countries are mounting billion-dollar stimulus plans and erecting fences to protect their banks. But the peripheral economies are being left to twist in the market winds. [****]

With the need for stimulus to deal with the severe downturn, these countries find themselves caught in an awful policy bind: credit is available, but only at punitive rates; and further borrowing not only breaks with European Commission dictates but raises broader questions about their solvency.

Bond and currency speculators have demonstrated that they intend to punish countries with dubious economic prospects, just as they have punished banks. Yields are skyrocketing on the debt of peripheral European economies with growing deficits. The British pound has plummeted because of a lack of confidence in plans to shore up British banks.

Few experts expect Greece or the other Mediterranean countries to run out of money or leave the euro. But the widening gap between the interest rate that Greece and larger economies like Germany have to pay to borrow reveals the first cracks in what so far has been a fairly solid fortress Europe.

Standard & Poor’s has also downgraded the debt of Spain, another growth stalwart, because of the toll taken by its housing crisis.

In Ireland, once the high-growth darling of the European Union, the economy continues to reel from a housing collapse and a defunct banking sector with liabilities that surpass the country’s gross domestic product.

As with Greece, bond yields there are diverging from those in Germany. The apparent suicide of a prominent real estate developer, Patrick Rocca, is but the most recent reminder of the fear and shock gripping the country.

But Greece’s problems are probably the worst. The country has been an easy target for the vigilantes of the European bond market, and recently it has been shaken by a wave of violent protests.

The omnipotent hand of the Greek state produced a public debt of more than 90 percent of Greece’s total economic output. The relentlessly rising demand of its consumers, who were able to put off the day of reckoning because they enjoyed the shelter of the low-inflation euro, has created a current-account deficit of 14 percent of its gross domestic product — estimated to be the highest in Europe.

The current account measures the difference between a nation’s exports and imports of all goods and services.

Last week, Standard & Poor’s downgraded Greek debt to A—, and the gap between the interest rate it pays on its bonds, versus what richer countries like Germany pay, is nearly 3 percentage points, the widest in the euro zone.

Mr. Economou, the Greek shipping company operator, is caught in the crossfire. The stock of his company, DryShips, is down 90 percent; banks in Europe that once clamored for his business no longer do so.

“The psychology is shattered,” he said with a rueful smile as he considered the blow to his business and net worth. “I have already cried — now I have dried up.”

While a shock to many Greeks, who had become accustomed to the relatively recent comfort of buoyant economic growth and a strong currency, some others, who lived through the country’s past financial and political crises, say the current shakiness is to be expected.

“We knew this couldn’t last,” Vassilis Karatzas, a fund manager based in Athens, said as he sipped Greek coffee at an outdoor cafe in the city center. “There is fear about the euro zone, but I don’t think the commission will allow its periphery to go down. United we rise, divided we fall.”

Yannis Stournaras, an economist who was a top economic adviser to the previous government of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement, says that after a long period of convergence, the recent Greek divergence from northern Europe is to be expected.

Adding to the pressure, surpluses from countries like Germany are no longer being recycled back to Greece and other less prosperous countries. Moreover, Germany, the largest exporter in the world, tends not to encourage its consumers to buy more from the rest of Europe.

But Mr. Stournaras scoffed at the prospect of a bankruptcy like those once common in Latin America. Nor did he accept the idea that Greece might leave the euro zone and try to devalue its way back to recovery.

“Bankruptcy? No, no, no,” he said with a vigorous shake of his head. “Since the beginning of the 20th century, we have never had problems with our arrears.”

But others are not prepared to rule out such an event, though they concede it is highly unlikely.

One of the few politicians in Greece who has not shied from addressing these issues is Stefanos Manos, a gregarious former economic minister who in the early 1990s ushered in a drastic, and ultimately successful, privatization program.

He has founded a new party and is considering a return to Parliament in the hope of joining a new government that would heed his longstanding message: Greece needs to stop running deficits and address the issue of global competitiveness.

“We need money to finance our deficits and I see difficulty in us attracting such funds from abroad,” he said, as he received a string of admirers in the Old World splendor of the Hotel Grande Bretagne in Athens. “I am not sure that this won’t spiral out of control, and that makes me saddened and frustrated.”

As for the rest of Europe, particularly its weaker links, he also has doubts.
“I don’t think Europe is up to it,” he said. “It expanded too rapidly without fixing its institutions.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/europe/24georgia.html
January 24, 2009
Russia and Georgia Faulted in War
By ELLEN BARRY [Russia] [former USSR] [Georgia church leaders meeting with Russian leaders] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [this likely to be exacerbated with report that finds blame in Russia and Georgia] [many Georgians have turned on Saakashvili due to his rashness] [*****]
MOSCOW — Human Rights Watch released a comprehensive report on Friday on the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/europe/24georgia.html
January 24, 2009
Russia and Georgia Faulted in War
By ELLEN BARRY [Russia] [former USSR] [Georgia church leaders meeting with Russian leaders] [Vlad and his proclivities represent a lot of Russians who don’t care for the way the world has changed since 1991] [oddly, Russia ethos in action] [use ir text] [use psci350] [it’s larger than Kremlin] [young, relatively affluent Russians who have so bought into the Russian complex that they take the time to protest the US in dramatic ways] [this likely to be exacerbated with report that finds blame in Russia and Georgia] [many Georgians have turned on Saakashvili due to his rashness] [*****]
MOSCOW — Human Rights Watch released a comprehensive report on Friday on the brief August war in Georgia, accusing both Russia and Georgia of using indiscriminate force on civilians. It also said Russia had failed to prevent South Ossetian forces from carrying out “execution-style killings, rape, abductions and countless beatings.” [***]

The war began Aug. 7, when Georgia attacked Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, a separatist enclave. [***]Russia responded by sending columns of armor into South Ossetia and Abkhazia, a second breakaway region, and then driving deep into Georgia.

Early in the war, Moscow accused Georgia of “genocide” and said 2,000 people had been killed in the shelling of Tskhinvali. In its report, Human Rights Watch rejects those claims as exaggerated, and calls on Russia to acknowledge the more recent assessments of 162 to 400 dead.

Much of the report is devoted to a meticulous description of Ossetian rampages in ethnic Georgian villages in South Ossetia, in which houses were systematically looted, set ablaze and bulldozed, sometimes as their inhabitants watched. Human Rights Watch concluded that the militias’ intent was “to ethnically cleanse these villages” and that Russia as an occupying force was responsible for civilians’ safety. [***]

Russian forces “had full knowledge of what was going on,” said Anna Neistat, the organization’s senior emergencies researcher, at a news conference in Moscow. “I think they just didn’t care.” [***]

The report was based on interviews with 460 victims and witnesses. Georgian officials cooperated with the effort. Russian officials did not respond to requests for information sent to the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of the Interior, the Ministry of Emergency Situations and the president’s office, the report said.

Criticism of the Georgian side focuses on the shelling of Tskhinvali, starting the night of Aug. 7. The report called the Georgian shelling “indiscriminate” and a violation of international humanitarian law, largely because it used Grad multiple-rocket launching systems, which are notoriously inaccurate, in populated civilian areas. A man whose mother and aunt were killed when a rocket struck their yard in Tskhinvali told a researcher that it had left a 10-foot crater.

“When it hit, all the sharp, scorching fragments flew into the house, penetrating the walls as if it was paper,” said the man, Alan Sipols. “When such a fragment hits a person, it just shreds you apart, and I cannot describe what they turned the people I loved most into.”

Human Rights Watch also found that Georgia had used cluster bombs, which eject dozens or hundreds of bomblets over a large area. Weeks after the war, unexploded bomblets were scattered in fields and orchards, and farmers were too frightened to harvest their crops.

The report characterizes some Russian air and artillery strikes as indiscriminate, saying that in some cases weapons struck half a mile away from military targets and even where no military target could be discerned. The report also found that Russia had used cluster bombs — something the authorities vehemently denied during the war. It said Russian forces were responsible for an attack on the main square in Gori on Aug. 12, killing six people, including a Dutch journalist.

A Russian military official said on Friday that the allegations were untrue, the Interfax news service reported. “These are unproven allegations that have been repeatedly voiced by the Georgian authorities,” Interfax quoted the official, Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, as saying. “They have been denied on numerous occasions.”

Most vivid are accounts of the violence unleashed by South Ossetians after Russia had driven back the Georgian Army. The report documents 159 detentions of ethnic Georgian civilians, two rapes of ethnic Georgian women, the torture and execution of three prisoners of war and the razing of hundreds of houses.

A Georgian soldier, Kakha Zirakishvili, 33, told researchers that he and six other prisoners of war had been beaten by Ossetian civilians and fighters “with gun butts, iron bars, whatever they had: wooden sticks, chairs even.” Upon release, he had a broken rib, two broken fingers, a broken bone in his hand, internal bruising in his chest, a broken eardrum and severe head trauma.

Human Rights Watch urged all sides to conduct independent inquiries and to let more than 20,000 ethnic Georgian refugees return to South Ossetia.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:22 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/middleeast/24gaza.html
January 24, 2009
As Israeli Bombing Stops, Gazans Get Busy Rebuilding Damaged Tunnels
By SABRINA TAVERNISE [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [Hamas immediately returns to rebuilding its tunnel infrastructure] [****]
RAFAH, Gaza — It was Friday, the Muslim day of rest, but Gaza’s border with Egypt was a hive of activity. Men scraped sandy soil out of holes that had served as tunnels for smuggling, and were one of the main targets of Israel’s war in Gaza.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/middleeast/24gaza.html
January 24, 2009
As Israeli Bombing Stops, Gazans Get Busy Rebuilding Damaged Tunnels
By SABRINA TAVERNISE [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [Hamas immediately returns to rebuilding its tunnel infrastructure] [****]
RAFAH, Gaza — It was Friday, the Muslim day of rest, but Gaza’s border with Egypt was a hive of activity. Men scraped sandy soil out of holes that had served as tunnels for smuggling, and were one of the main targets of Israel’s war in Gaza.

Now, less than a week after it ended, Gazans were back, plunging deep underground with lamps to carry rocky loads of soil out on pulleys.

“Everybody’s busy rebuilding now,” said a manager of one digging team. “In a month, it will be back to normal.” [***]

The defiant pose seemed surprisingly brazen in light of recent events: Israel said smuggling tunnels were a prime concern, after Hamas rockets, in attacking Gaza, and it hit dozens of them in airstrikes during the war. But the tunnels are the principal livelihood for many people here, and as soon as the bombing stopped, they were right back in them with their shovels.

The revival may challenge what Israel sees as one of its main accomplishments in the war, crushing Hamas’s ability to rearm, and has drawn bitter reactions from residents, who say it is proof the war was a useless enterprise.

“The war was for nothing,” said Mahmoud Abu Adnan, a grocery store owner.

But Israel argues that very soon the tunnels, restored or not, will not matter as much. It has secured agreements with Egypt and the United States that will make this smuggling route far less important. The details have not been made public, but Israel says it is confident they will work.

“What is different today is that there is a good international commitment to prevent the link-up between Iran and Hamas,” said Mark Regev, the spokesman for the Israeli government. “We believe that Hamas will not be allowed to rearm.”

That commitment has yet to be tested. While Israel said that about 80 percent of the tunnels were out of commission after the bombing, Gazans seemed skeptical that anything would change.

“They can destroy as much as they want, but the tunnels will just come back,” Mr. Abu Adnan said.

That spirit of defiance is at the center of the Gazan psyche. Many people here do not condemn Hamas rockets, arguing vociferously that they are the only way Gaza can protect itself from Israeli aggression. The economic blockade, they argue, and the Israelis’ unwillingness to lift it, is justification for the attacks.

“Do you think we’d be busy digging underground if there was no embargo?” said Ahmed, a tall man in a leather jacket who was overseeing work on his tunnels on Friday. “If there was no embargo, we’d have real jobs.”

Ahmed, who did not want his last name to be used out of concern for his safety, voiced the assertions of others interviewed Friday, saying that his business had nothing to do with guns, and that his main imports were Pampers and cigarettes.

Israel says it does not believe that, and argues that a lot of the tunnel business is contraband weapons. Maj. Avital Leibovich, the spokeswoman for the Israeli military, said that before Hamas took power in a violent struggle with its Palestinian political rival Fatah in 2007, only four tons of explosives a year were smuggled in. Since Hamas took power, the number has risen to 100 tons, [****]she said.

“This definitely became an industry of smuggling,” Major Leibovich said.

Gazans argue it is out of necessity. Israel imposed an economic blockade with Hamas’s takeover, limiting the flow of goods — particularly snacks like chocolate and chips and sodas — and tripling prices. The industry also soaks up a portion of this city’s unemployed young men, who earn $100 for every meter they dig.

“You have 25,000 kids who have no work,” Mr. Abu Adnan said, “so they go to work in the tunnels. It’s an important source of income here.”

The tunnels are located under dozens of giant plastic tents that look like greenhouses. Those who came for the first time since the war did not recognize the area, the bombing was so extensive. The explosives made the tunnels smell strange.

“This will give us greater skills,” said one digger. “We’ll become artists.”

Israel has contended that the bombing is a way to drive a wedge between the people and Hamas, but it seems to be having precisely the opposite effect. A tunnel manager in his 30s named Mahmoud said he had felt closer to Hamas since the war, because, however flawed, Hamas was the one group that stood up to Israeli aggression.

Palestinians, he said, standing in a striped sweater and brown pants, feel like second-class citizens in Israel, and contraband goods can help them feel first class.

“When I bring a salad, I see that my son eats it and finds it good, it makes me happy,” said Mahmoud. “It makes me feel human.”

The tunnels do not address the more important question of reconstruction aid. Though the focus internationally has been on who will receive the money — the West does not want Hamas to get any — here in Rafah, a far more urgent question is whether the Israelis will let materials through official crossings. Tunnels, managers said, will not work.

“Reconstruction now depends on the Israelis’ good will,” said Jabbar Qeshta, deputy mayor of Rafah, and a member of Hamas.

The municipality has 3 bulldozers and about 30 cement mixers, Mr. Qeshta said, but the most basic ingredient was missing.

“Tell them I want cement,” he said.
Nadim Audi contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:21 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012303502.html
Battered Gaza Still In the Grip Of Hamas
Islamist Group Retains Strength Despite War
By Griff Witte and Jonathan Finer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, January 24, 2009; A07 [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [****]
GAZA CITY, Jan. 23 -- Israel waged war on Hamas for 22 days, but on the rubble-

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012303502.html
Battered Gaza Still In the Grip Of Hamas
Islamist Group Retains Strength Despite War
By Griff Witte and Jonathan Finer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, January 24, 2009; A07 [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [****]
GAZA CITY, Jan. 23 -- Israel waged war on Hamas for 22 days, but on the rubble-strewn streets of Gaza there is little question that the group retains a firm grip on power.

Hamas policemen wearing fatigues and cradling assault rifles stand guard at their usual posts, [***]even where the buildings they have been assigned to protect no longer exist. Movement officials -- some still in hiding, some back in public -- coordinate cleanup efforts. And pro-Hamas preachers celebrate their "victory" in mosques overflowing with followers who say their devotion to the group has only grown after a war that cost nearly 1,300 Palestinian lives.

If there is any significant disenchantment with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, it is largely hidden behind the fear that many feel in speaking out against the group. [***]

In dozens of interviews across Gaza on Friday, less than a week after the start of a tenuous cease-fire, Palestinians generally expressed either unbridled support for Hamas or resignation to the idea that the group's reign in Gaza will continue for the foreseeable future. No one suggested that the group is vulnerable, despite the hopes of some Israeli officials who have theorized that their military campaign could ultimately spur Palestinians to rise up against Hamas rule.

Hamas's resilience as the preeminent power in Gaza reflects the Islamist movement's success in consolidating its authority long before the war began, analysts say. It also underscores the dividends that any Palestinian group can earn by standing up to Israel, no matter how disastrous the consequences. Hamas vowed to kill hundreds of Israelis, but Israel's final death toll was 13, including three civilians who died as a result of the persistent rocket fire from Gaza that Israel says prompted the war.

"I hope Hamas gets more and more power and launches more and more rockets. I ask God to keep them strong," said Abed Abu Jalhoum, 45, her face framed by a black head scarf and her feet bare as she sat on a cinder block in what was once her living room but is now only a floor with one crumbling, concrete wall.

Just down the road in Beit Lahiya, one of the worst-hit areas of Gaza, Ibrahim Amreen was using a shovel and a pick to sift through the remains of his home, searching for valuables. He said he is not a Hamas member but nonetheless fully supports the group's decision to engage Israel with violence, not talks.

"Everyone has the right to fight," said Amreen, a 55-year-old teacher. "How did the Americans get liberated? They fought. So why do they consider us terrorists? The Israelis are the terrorists, and the Americans give them their weapons to kill us."

Hamas won Palestinian legislative elections in 2006 and assumed full control of Gaza in June 2007 after violently ousting its rival, the more moderate Fatah party. Fatah, which holds sway in the West Bank, advocates negotiations with Israel toward the creation of a Palestinian state, while Hamas rejects Israel's right to exist.

Israeli officials said throughout the war that one of their goals was to deal a crushing defeat to Hamas, although they never said they were seeking to destroy the group altogether. They instead said they hoped to drive a wedge between Hamas and the people of Gaza, which they hoped someday could lead to the movement's overthrow. They also said they hoped to bolster Fatah.

Israel destroyed a wide array of Hamas facilities, including police stations, government ministries, a university building allegedly used for developing weapons, and smugglers' tunnels. Airstrikes killed two top Hamas leaders, Interior Minister Said Siam and Nizar Rayyan, a cleric who served as a liaison between Hamas's political and military wings. But most Hamas leaders survived, Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh among them, and the homes of several of the movement's top officials made it through the war intact.

In announcing the cease-fire last Saturday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert asserted that "Hamas's capabilities have been struck a heavy blow which will harm its ability to rule and its military capabilities for some time." [not bloody likely] [***]

But on Friday, an Israeli military official said that Hamas remains fully in charge in Gaza and that dissenters have had to keep quiet.

"From the people that we have been speaking to in Gaza and from our assessment, there is criticism in Gaza towards Hamas," said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "It is not vocal because of fear."

That fear was apparent in Beit Hanoun, a Fatah stronghold.

"Hamas gave Israel justification to do what they are doing," said Bassem al-Abed, 36, who spoke beside a wall that had been creased with bullet holes. "We don't have real rockets. We don't have real power. We don't have an army like Israel. But now everyone has suffered, not just Hamas."

Abed grew silent, however, when a group of five men, several with long beards, wandered by and leaned into the conversation.

Another Beit Hanoun resident went further, belittling Hamas as "a toy of Iran and Syria" that is exclusively interested in holding on to power. But he would only give a nickname, Abu Mohammed, and said he feared for his life if Hamas found out what he had said. "No one can oppose them," he said, shaking his head in disgust. "They have control over everything." [***]

On Thursday, Fatah official Yasser Abed Rabbo said at a news conference in the West Bank that Hamas had “turned its rifles in the direction of Fatah members” after the cease-fire with Israel on Sunday. He accused Hamas of shooting Fatah members in the kneecaps, a common intimidation tactic. Hamas denied the claim.

While Fatah members whisper their contempt for Hamas, Hamas backers in Gaza are far more comfortable broadcasting their beliefs, even though Israel has classified anyone affiliated with the group as a legitimate military target.

At the pro-Hamas al-Rhama mosque in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, Sheik Almad Nemer compared the war with Israel to historic struggles, such as the 7th-century Battle of Badr, in which the prophet Muhammad’s 313 fighters defeated an army three times its size.

In a sermon that several of the 1,500 worshipers described as more defiant than usual, he accused Israel of understating its casualties, claiming that more than 200 Israeli soldiers had been killed and that a suicide bomber had destroyed a Merkava tank, killing everyone inside. Israel claims to have lost nine soldiers inside Gaza, none in suicide bombings.

“Just because we lost hundreds of martyrs and more than 5,000 wounded doesn’t mean we are not victorious,” he said. “The Israelis could hardly even get inside the cities of Gaza, because Allah is with the Muslims, not the Jews.”

Nemer also warned worshipers not to be persuaded by what he called “deception” by Fatah. “Already they are trying to look down on the resistance and say we achieved nothing but the destruction of Gaza,” he said. “Every war has its casualties, and we must be proud of our martyrs in heaven.”

At the Palestine mosque in Gaza City, the Hamas economy minister, Ziyad al-Zaza, was among the worshipers, having come out of hiding days ago. The Hamas government, he said, had continued to operate throughout the war and remained firmly in control. “We are operating all things in Gaza – security, the economy, health,” he said, wearing a crisp, gray blazer and professing to have emerged from the war unscathed. “We stayed our ground. We defended our government.”

Despite the bravado, Palestinian political analyst Mkhaimar Abu Sada said that Hamas knows it was beaten badly in the war and that it is unlikely to do anything to provoke more conflict because of the heavy toll on the civilian population.

“Hamas is declaring victory, but in reality it’s a catastrophe,” said Abu Sada, a professor at Gaza’s al-Azhar University. “The massive destruction that Israel inflicted will make Hamas and any other Palestinian group think twice before launching rockets in the future.” [***]

He added that Hamas is likely to try to focus on reconstruction and the need to provide tangible improvements for Gazans, who have seen their quality of life plummet in the 19 months since Hamas took control.

Special correspondent Samuel Sockol in Jerusalem and staff researcher Robert E. Thomason in Washington contributed to this report.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:20 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/middleeast/24iraq.html
January 24, 2009
Gunmen Kill at Least Six Members of a Family in Iraq
By SAM DAGHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [Diyala normally considered a Sunni-dominated province but the “poor” area may indicate Shia] [****]
BAGHDAD — Gunmen killed eight people, at least six of them members of the same

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/middleeast/24iraq.html
January 24, 2009
Gunmen Kill at Least Six Members of a Family in Iraq
By SAM DAGHER [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [renewed sectarian tensions and fault lines] [ “surge”] [clearly, positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [I have enumerated some of time bombs that concern me since late 2007] [in past couple of months there have appeared new efforts to reignite sectarian violence that had –ir in chaos during 2006-2007] [Diyala normally considered a Sunni-dominated province but the “poor” area may indicate Shia] [****]
BAGHDAD — Gunmen killed eight people, at least six of them members of the same family, on Friday at a house on the outskirts of the town of Balad Ruz in Diyala Province, northeast of Baghdad, a provincial police official said.

The killers’ motives were unclear, but the official, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the news media, said a preliminary investigation had indicated that some of the women might have been prostitutes.

His assertion could not be independently verified.

The early-morning attack was carried out by a group of gunmen in a poor area known as Ma’amel, which is dominated by brick factories.

Among the dead were a mother and her two sons and three daughters, all from the Abdul-Monim family. Two other women were also killed, but their relationships to the family were unclear. A child from the Abdul-Monim family was badly wounded.

It was not immediately known if the victims were Sunni or Shiite, the police official said.

The attack took place in a majority-Sunni Arab area where several sectarian killings occurred in 2006 and 2007, particularly among Shiite laborers [***]who had gone from southern Iraq to work in the brick factories.

Diyala Province, with its volatile mix of Sunni Arabs, Shiites and Kurds, has long been plagued by sectarian-motivated massacres, bombings and forced displacement. Although the level of violence has decreased significantly in the past year, tensions remain high in many parts of the province.

In Wasit Province, southeast of Baghdad, a leader of an Iranian-backed Shiite militia group was arrested Friday by a quick-reaction force from the Interior Ministry, according to a security official.

The arrested man, Mohammed al-Zameli, was immediately handed over to American troops even though primary responsibility for security in Wasit was transferred to the local government in October.

Mr. Zameli is suspected in dozens of attacks on Iraqi forces and civilians, and he was featured in large wanted posters placed at the entrance of Kut, the provincial capital.

On the diplomatic front, Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Friday that Iraq and Turkey would soon form a joint command center to coordinate efforts in fighting the Kurdistan Workers Party, known as the P.K.K., according to The Associated Press. He spoke after a meeting with his Turkish counterpart, Ali Babacan, in Ankara, Turkey’s capital.

The P.K.K., a Kurdish guerrilla group, is considered a terrorist organization by both countries and the United States. It continues to find safe haven along the mountainous and rugged border between Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan despite repeated military offensives by the Turkish military, including a major assault in 2007.

Mr. Zebari’s deputy, Labid Abawi, said in Baghdad that the command center, to be based in Iraqi Kurdistan, would focus on sharing intelligence and other information about the movements of the P.K.K.

Tareq Maher contributed reporting from Baghdad, and Iraqi employees of The New York Times from Diyala and Wasit Provinces.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:17 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/asia/24norkor.html
January 24, 2009
In New Sign of Recovery, Kim Meets China Official
By CHOE SANG-HUN [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [then begins again] [followup] [perhaps, full circle again with Kim’s improving health] [******]
SEOUL, South Korea — Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader, met a senior Chinese Communist Party official on Friday, Chinese and North Korean media reported. The meeting, in Pyongyang, North Korea, was Mr. Kim’s first public meeting with a foreign

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/asia/24norkor.html
January 24, 2009
In New Sign of Recovery, Kim Meets China Official
By CHOE SANG-HUN [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [then begins again] [followup] [perhaps, full circle again with Kim’s improving health] [******]
SEOUL, South Korea — Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader, met a senior Chinese Communist Party official on Friday, Chinese and North Korean media reported. The meeting, in Pyongyang, North Korea, was Mr. Kim’s first public meeting with a foreign visitor since August, when he is believed to have suffered a stroke.

Analysts in Seoul saw the meeting as a North Korean attempt to demonstrate to the outside world that Mr. Kim was in control of his government, well enough to make important decisions about its nuclear weapons program and deal with the new American administration. [***]

Xinhua, China’s state-run news agency, first reported Mr. Kim’s meeting with the official, Wang Jiarui, who is chief of the Chinese Communist Party’s International Department. The account did not mention Mr. Kim’s health. Xinhua said Mr. Wang had arrived in the North Korean capital on Wednesday for talks on strengthening economic and trade links.

North Korean news media later reported that Mr. Kim hosted a lunch for Mr. Wang’s delegation, adding that Mr. Wang gave Mr. Kim a personal letter from President Hu Jintao of China. North Korean media also released photos of the event.

“North Korea must have timed the meeting in part to demonstrate once and for all that Kim remains in charge,” said Kim Yong-hyun, a North Korea expert at Dongguk University in Seoul. “As the new U.S. president Barack Obama is said to support dialogue with North Korea, Kim needed to signal to Washington that he is well enough to accept an envoy.”

Analysts in Seoul had speculated that when Mr. Kim recovered sufficiently from what was believed to be a stroke, he would invite a dignitary from China, North Korea’s closest ideological ally, to demonstrate that he was still in charge.

Another sign that Mr. Kim’s health was improving came recently when North Korea announced that it would hold a long-delayed election of its rubber-stamp Parliament, the Supreme People’s Assembly, on March 8. An election had been expected last August. The legislature’s first task would be to re-elect Mr. Kim to another five-year term as chairman of the National Defense Commission, the North’s most powerful agency.

With no clear successor for Mr. Kim, the news that intelligence officials in Seoul and Washington believed he had had a stroke set off fear of a potential leadership vacuum in the isolated country, which has been the focus of international efforts to halt its nuclear weapons program. Intelligence officials in Seoul have said that Mr. Kim, 66, underwent brain surgery after the stroke.

North Korea has vehemently denied reports of Mr. Kim’s illness. In recent months, its state-run media have published a series of reports describing his visits to military units, factories and farms, releasing photographs but no video of his activities, fueling doubts about his health.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:16 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/europe/24tinner.html
January 24, 2009
Swiss Release Suspect in Nuclear Case
By WILLIAM J. BROAD Switzerland] [AQ Khan network] [Libya’s alleged involvement through mid 2003] [since interdiction in 2003—and slightly before—Qaddafi has cooperated in rolling said network up] [swiss, like much of Euro, have a real anti-foreigner sentiment] [borders on ugly] [this involves Libyans and other northern Africans] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [*****]
The Swiss authorities on Friday released from jail the last of three family members suspected of smuggling atomic technology to Libya and Iran as part of the nuclear black market of Abdul Qadeer Khan, officials disclosed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/europe/24tinner.html
January 24, 2009
Swiss Release Suspect in Nuclear Case
By WILLIAM J. BROAD Switzerland] [AQ Khan network] [Libya’s alleged involvement through mid 2003] [since interdiction in 2003—and slightly before—Qaddafi has cooperated in rolling said network up] [swiss, like much of Euro, have a real anti-foreigner sentiment] [borders on ugly] [this involves Libyans and other northern Africans] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [*****]
The Swiss authorities on Friday released from jail the last of three family members suspected of smuggling atomic technology to Libya and Iran as part of the nuclear black market of Abdul Qadeer Khan, officials disclosed.

They said the suspect, Marco Tinner, was freed in Bern after posting bail. [***]His release, ending more than three years of investigative detention, was delayed nearly a month because of worries that he still had access to nuclear-weapons secrets.

His brother Urs was released Dec. 22, and their father, Friedrich, was released in 2006. All three men are suspected of criminal export violations, and they still face possible charges as the Swiss inquiry advances.

“The release of the Tinners has no influence on the pretrial investigation,” Andreas Müller, the examining magistrate in the case who is assessing if a trial is warranted, said in an interview.

The inquiry has been stymied by the Swiss government’s decision last year to destroy a trove of computer files that documented the family’s business dealings. While officials said the action was meant to keep atomic plans out of terrorist hands, American officials said they had urged the destruction partly to hide evidence of a secret relationship between the Tinners and the C.I.A. [this rumor has been around for some time] [no idea whether it’s true] [***]

This week a Swiss parliamentary panel said the files’ continued existence would have posed no danger to Switzerland.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:15 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012303505.html
In Afghanistan, Terrain Rivals Taliban as Enemy
Mountainous Region in East Especially Challenging
By Candace Rondeaux
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, January 24, 2009; A10 [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [use psci469b] [****]
KHUGA KHEYL, Afghanistan -- It was near sunset when the tire on one of the armored

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/23/AR2009012303505.html
In Afghanistan, Terrain Rivals Taliban as Enemy
Mountainous Region in East Especially Challenging
By Candace Rondeaux
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, January 24, 2009; A10 [Afghanistan] [hydra] [Pakistan became the clear staging area for operations into Afghanistan during 2007] [AfPak] [followup] [additional indications that offensive is on: Taliban getting bolder in their stronghold] [hard to know where the insurgency ends and common criminality begins] [more bad news about civilian deaths by NATO] [Afghanistan going from bad to worse] [awaiting Patraeus’ counterinsurgency program?] [AfPak’s terrain as unique challenge] [use psci469b] [****]
KHUGA KHEYL, Afghanistan -- It was near sunset when the tire on one of the armored vehicles blew out on the way back through the village of Khuga Kheyl this month. The U.S. Army convoy stopped dead in a narrow, rocky cleft between two small mountains. A gang of Afghan boys ran down a nearby slope toward the convoy as it jerked to a halt near the border with Pakistan.

That morning, Capt. Jay Bessey had warned his platoon not to waste time and to stay tight. There was word that a suicide attacker might try to infiltrate his small base in a remote district in the eastern Afghan province of Nangahar. There was also a rumor that Taliban forces may have planted more than a dozen bombs along the convoy's route near another isolated district close by.

A flat tire an hour before sunset was the last thing Bessey needed. Yet there he sat, waiting for another unit to arrive with a spare. The incident underscored what all U.S. forces operating near the 1,500-mile-long border know: that the tyranny of the terrain is almost as formidable an obstacle to their goals here as the treachery of the Taliban.

The plan had been to meet with district tribal elders, deliver food aid and drop off a few benches and tables at a new school, creating a little local goodwill for U.S. efforts to stabilize the region, then get back to base before dark. Instead, Bessey sat listening to a village elder who had scrambled down the mountain from Khuga Kheyl with cups of tea and a laundry list of demands while the sun set on the convoy. [***]

The mission in Khuga Kheyl was textbook counterinsurgency [***]-- the kind of approach Gen. David H. Petraeus, the head of U.S. Central Command, has been trying to drive home to U.S. troops since he was a field commander in Iraq. There, under Petraeus, U.S. troops reached out to Sunni tribal leaders in the western province of Anbar to form community-based militias that helped reverse the tide of violence. The so-called Anbar Awakening, combined with an increase in U.S. troops, gradually created pockets of security in areas previously dominated by insurgents.

Petraeus, who is now in charge of the wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan, has said he plans to launch a similar approach this year in Afghanistan in a bid to retake the initiative from a resurgent Taliban. For that strategy to succeed, U.S. troops will have to broaden their presence in areas of Afghanistan where development has been slow, security precarious and confidence in the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai limited.

Many of those areas lie in eastern Afghanistan along the border with Pakistan, which has become a gateway for the insurgency. With U.S. troop levels set to double to about 62,000 in Afghanistan in the coming year, American military officials here say the struggle to win tribal allegiances in remote, isolated places such as Khuga Kheyl will define the success or failure of Petraeus's plan. But in far eastern Afghanistan, where tribal loyalties often trump national interests, that is no easy task.

Rough, often impassable mountain terrain has made it tough to make inroads into border areas where thousands of Pashtun tribesmen teeter between support for Karzai and support for the Taliban. Last year, Afghanistan's eastern border provinces witnessed some of the bloodiest battles between coalition and insurgent forces. Insurgent incursions in the east increased by nearly 45 percent in 2008, according to the U.S. military. And many of the 151 U.S. troops killed last year died in combat in areas bordering Pakistan.

The conditions have made for a tense atmosphere for Bessey's men in the 6th Squadron, 4th Cavalry Regiment, based in Fort Hood, Tex., but he has pushed hard to counter their fears. "I try to tell our guys, 'You know, we're not going to win this thing by killing people,' " Bessey said. "We're not going to win by being the ugly Americans out there." [****]

Bessey, a tall, athletic-looking West Point graduate from Michigan, glanced over at the stalled convoy while he settled in on a pile of rocks and waited for help to arrive. He vigorously worked a plug of tobacco in the corner of his mouth while he listened to Malik Dalawar, the Khuga Kheyl tribal elder, plead his case.

Thick-fisted and balding, with a stubbly white beard, Dalawar took Bessey's measure with a long, hard look. We need guns, he said. At night, there are few NATO forces or Afghan police or troops around to safeguard local villagers. Dalawar said he and his people needed some way to defend themselves against the Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters who regularly sweep into the area from Pakistan. But Bessey was not entirely convinced.

Dalawar, a member of the Mohmand tribe, said he is no fan of the Taliban. But in places such as Khuga Kheyl, the pressure on tribal elders to join the Taliban is intense. [***] Electricity is scarce. Paved roads are nonexistent. And insurgent hideouts are abundant on both sides of the border. Dalawar said insurgent commanders regularly try to entice him to join the fight against coalition forces.

"They tell us to fight alongside them. They say: 'We will give you roads. We will give you electricity.' The Taliban, they tell us: 'Look, the Afghan government has given you nothing. If you fight with us, you can have everything,' " Dalawar said. "When we tell them, 'No, we will not do this,' then they tell us they will take our villages by force if they have to." [and that’s why the above isn’t classic counterinsurgency—notwithstanding the authors’ assertions] [first and foremost, protect main population centers!] [***]

The threat in Khuga Kheyl is serious. A day before Bessey's convoy passed through the village, about 600 Afghan Taliban fighters had overrun a Pakistani military base in the Mohmand tribal area just across the border. The assault left 46 Pakistani troops dead. Regional experts and military officials speculated that many of the attackers came from an area not far from Khuga Kheyl.

"I am an elder, so if someone has a gun and I don't, I can't do anything," Dalawar said.

"If the area is secure, then you don't need a weapon," Bessey replied.

Dalawar tried again: "If something happens and I do not have an AK-47, it could be a problem."

"If you have a weapon, it could be a problem for someone else," Bessey said.

In other parts of Afghanistan, the debate over whether to arm local tribal leaders has been largely settled. In southern Afghanistan and in provinces near the capital, Kabul, where the Taliban is strongest, the training and arming of local tribal militias will soon be underway.

Nevertheless, some Afghans have said they fear that arming local militias will lead to abuses and could reignite the same intertribal frictions that sparked a protracted and brutal civil war in Afghanistan in the 1990s.

Lt. Col. Patrick Daniel Jr., commander of the U.S. battalion based in Nangahar province, said many American officers in the field support the idea of allowing responsible Afghan tribal elders to arm themselves. But such an approach carries risks and might not work in every province, Daniel said.

"For a lot of us out here, we recognize that it's much like how we feel about the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms in the States," Daniel said. "But we already have tribal disputes that are resolved by violence, and when you give them more weapons, that could mean those disputes could get resolved with those weapons. So it's a roll of the dice. Still, you can't rule it out . . . because people here need to protect themselves."

When another U.S. convoy arrived with a spare tire, Bessey deferred the decision on Dalawar's request for a few weeks, saying he would bring it up with the incoming U.S. commander in the region. He brushed the mountain dust from his pants and called for his troops to mount up.

Dalawar looked the American soldiers over one more time. He frowned slightly. The sky darkened as the sun dropped behind the mountains. He shook Bessey's hand and said he would be glad to see him again.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:14 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/asia/24pstan.html
January 24, 2009
Strikes in Pakistan Underscore Obama’s Options
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [didn’t take long for the first CIA strike using UAVs to cross into Pak sovereign territory under Obama admin] [reportedly, president did not approve—said approvals made at lower level—but was briefed] [libs up in arms but Obama said he would do precisely this if actionable intelligence] [strikes me that it would have been irresponsible from policy standpoint not to and over medium term politically stupid] [followup] [use psci469b] [see today’s WP piece on same in govt] [****]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Two missile attacks launched from remotely piloted American

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/asia/24pstan.html
January 24, 2009
Strikes in Pakistan Underscore Obama’s Options
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. [Pakistan] [SAsia] [Zardari government is trying to stop these jihadis and asking for help] [didn’t take long for the first CIA strike using UAVs to cross into Pak sovereign territory under Obama admin] [reportedly, president did not approve—said approvals made at lower level—but was briefed] [libs up in arms but Obama said he would do precisely this if actionable intelligence] [strikes me that it would have been irresponsible from policy standpoint not to and over medium term politically stupid] [followup] [use psci469b] [see today’s WP piece on same in govt] [****]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Two missile attacks launched from remotely piloted American aircraft killed at least 15 people in western Pakistan on Friday. The strikes suggested that the use of drones to kill militants within Pakistan’s borders would continue under President Obama. [shocker] [****]

Remotely piloted Predator drones operated by the Central Intelligence Agency have carried out more than 30 missile attacks since last summer against members of Al Qaeda and other terrorism suspects deep in their redoubts on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan.

But some of the attacks have also killed civilians, enraging Pakistanis and making it harder for the country’s shaky government to win support for its own military operations against Taliban guerrillas [no question] [it’s a tough tradeoff] [my own view is it should be limited to high-value targets] [***] in the country’s lawless border region.

American officials in Washington said there were no immediate signs that the strikes on Friday had killed any senior Qaeda leaders. They said the attacks had dispelled for the moment any notion that Mr. Obama would rein in the Predator attacks.

Mr. Obama and his top national security aides are likely in the coming days to review other counterterrorism measures put in place by the Bush administration, American officials said.

These include orders President Bush secretly approved in July that for the first time allowed American Special Operations forces to carry out ground raids in Pakistan without the approval of the Pakistani government. [something done only once and to bad effect] [***]

Friday’s missile attacks hit Waziristan, a remote and mountainous region controlled by the Taliban, in the semiautonomous Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the Afghan border.

The first struck a village known as Mir Ali in North Waziristan [***]late in the afternoon. In a statement, Pakistani government officials said the attack destroyed the house of a man identified as Khalil Dawar and killed eight people. The statement said militants had surrounded the area and retrieved the bodies.

A senior Pakistani security official said four of those killed were Arabs. Pakistani intelligence officials often take the presence of foreign fighters as an indication of Qaeda involvement.

In the second attack, missiles struck a house near the village of Wana in South Waziristan, [***] [both NWFP-FATA] killing seven people, according to local accounts and Pakistani news reports. The reports said three of the dead were children.

American officials believe that the drone strikes have killed a number of suspected militants along the frontier since last year, including a senior Qaeda operative who was killed Jan. 1 and was suspected in the 1998 bombings of the United States Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad four months ago.

But the civilian toll has angered Pakistanis. A senior Pakistani official estimated that the attacks might have killed as many as 100 civilians; it was not possible to verify the estimate.

American and Pakistani officials are known to share some intelligence about militants, but it is unclear whether Pakistani officials have in any way acquiesced to the drone strikes or helped provide intelligence for them while opposing them in public. Openly supporting the attacks would be untenable for a government perceived as being too close to the American government.
Ismail Khan contributed reporting from Peshawar, Pakistan, and Eric Schmitt from Washington.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:13 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23iraq.html
January 23, 2009
Departing U.S. Ambassador Warns Against Quick Withdrawal From Iraq
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [Obama administration] [residual of Bush administration] [Ambassador Crocker who ran US’s biggest embassy] [who’s to replace him?] [yesterday’s first NSC meeting followed by symbolic moves at State where Obama and Clinton shared stage] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [****]
BAGHDAD — Ryan C. Crocker, the departing American ambassador to Iraq, warned on Thursday against a rapid withdrawal of troops from the country, saying Iraq was not yet capable of handling its own security.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23iraq.html
January 23, 2009
Departing U.S. Ambassador Warns Against Quick Withdrawal From Iraq
By TIMOTHY WILLIAMS [Obama administration] [residual of Bush administration] [Ambassador Crocker who ran US’s biggest embassy] [who’s to replace him?] [yesterday’s first NSC meeting followed by symbolic moves at State where Obama and Clinton shared stage] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [****]
BAGHDAD — Ryan C. Crocker, the departing American ambassador to Iraq, warned on Thursday against a rapid withdrawal of troops from the country, saying Iraq was not yet capable of handling its own security.

“I think Iraqi security forces have made enormous progress during my time here, both quantitatively and, more important, qualitatively,” Mr. Crocker told reporters at the new American Embassy in the Green Zone in Baghdad. “There is still a ways to go. And clearly, still a continuing need for our security support.”

“If it were to be a precipitous withdrawal, that could be very dangerous,” he added, “but it’s clear that’s not the direction in which this is trending.”

On Wednesday, Mr. Crocker and Gen. Ray Odierno, the top commander in Iraq, spoke from Baghdad via video conference call to President Obama in Washington, offering their opinions about his pledge to pull combat forces out of Iraq in 16 months.

Mr. Crocker would not provide details to reporters of what he discussed with the president, saying he did not want to “rebroadcast it over the media.”

Mr. Crocker, a 59-year-old career diplomat who arrived in Baghdad in March 2007, has consistently advocated a strong and continued presence of American troops in Iraq to ensure stability.

During an appearance before a Congressional committee in 2007, he said the focus on Iraq should not be measured by benchmarks for progress and deadlines for troop withdrawals but by the informal ways in which Iraq had begun to improve. His watchword has been patience.

Gains made in reducing sectarian violence during the past two years were “still fragile, still reversible,” he said Thursday. “Anything can happen.”

A pact signed by Iraq and the United States requires American combat forces to leave Iraqi cities by June and calls for the withdrawal of all troops from Iraq by the end of 2011.

Mr. Crocker is scheduled to leave his post in two to three weeks. His replacement has not been announced. [****]

He has said he may retire to his home state, Washington, though he reminded reporters that he had previously announced his intention to retire, most recently before President Bush selected him to be the ambassador here, replacing Zalmay Khalilzad, who had been appointed ambassador to the United Nations.

Mr. Crocker, who has also served as ambassador to Pakistan, Kuwait, Syria and Lebanon, said this year would be a critical one in Iraq, particularly because of provincial and parliamentary elections on Jan. 31 and a referendum on the security pact in July.

“The conduct and outcome of those elections I think are going to be very important for the country, in particular that they be — and be perceived as — free and fair, in at least a general sense,” he said. “They’re not going to be perfect elections, I think we all know that. But it is important that they be credible elections.”

Successful elections will give Iraqis “a lot of confidence going forward,” he said.

Mr. Crocker, who was a diplomat in Baghdad during the Saddam Hussein era, said Iraq had been “traumatized” by Mr. Hussein and had not yet recovered.

“He created a dramatic climate of fear that all Iraqi communities still suffer from,” he said. “If there’s one word that still does describe a state of mind in Iraq, it would still be fear.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:15 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012203658.html
Intelligence Pick Calls Torture Immoral, Ineffective
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 23, 2009; A02 [Obama administration] [NSC principals insofar as they exist] [first indications about how the group—NSC—operates to date] [yesterday’s first NSC meeting followed by symbolic moves at State where Obama and Clinton shared stage] [two new emissaries first noted yesterday’s govt] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [****]
Retired Adm. Dennis C. Blair, President Obama's nominee to lead the U.S. intelligence community, told Congress yesterday that torture "is not moral, legal or effective" and

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012203658.html
Intelligence Pick Calls Torture Immoral, Ineffective
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 23, 2009; A02 [Obama administration] [NSC principals insofar as they exist] [first indications about how the group—NSC—operates to date] [yesterday’s first NSC meeting followed by symbolic moves at State where Obama and Clinton shared stage] [two new emissaries first noted yesterday’s govt] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [****]
Retired Adm. Dennis C. Blair, President Obama's nominee to lead the U.S. intelligence community, told Congress yesterday that torture "is not moral, legal or effective" and that "there will not be any waterboarding on my watch." [DNI Blair] [individual also] [**]

Blair, nominated to be director of national intelligence, used his confirmation hearing to outline a new approach to counterterrorism and told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that he would not support “any surveillance activities that circumvent” the law.

“I believe we are in a new era in the relationship between the two branches of government,” Blair told committee members, who over the past eight years were frequently denied information by the White House. Blair, the former head of U.S. Pacific Command who spent two years in the 1990s as an associate CIA director for military support, appeared headed for unanimous approval.

Blair hesitated to directly challenge as illegal the Bush administration’s approach to interrogations and surveillance. And he declined to respond directly to a question from Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) on whether waterboarding is torture. Instead, Blair reiterated his vow: “There will be no waterboarding on my watch. There will be no torture on my watch.” [****]

Blair still refused to respond when Levin pointed out that Obama’s nominee for attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., had called waterboarding torture.

Blair said that, if confirmed, he would be leading the same intelligence officers who, in using the technique of waterboarding, had been following presidential orders under legal authorities supplied by the attorney general.

“They had doubts . . . originally, so they asked, and they asked again,” Blair said. “There were very dedicated officers in intelligence service who thought they were carrying out activities that were authorized at the highest levels. I don’t intend to reopen those cases of those officers who acted within their duty.” [like Obama he doesn’t appear to want to go backward very far] [****]

He said he would "objectively" investigate previous reports that the waterboarding in 2002 and 2003 of three key al-Qaeda captives had resulted in information that had saved lives.

Blair took an unusual stance for a national security official on the question of secrecy, saying, "There is a great deal of overclassification, some of it . . . done for the wrong reasons."

He blamed that on a system that penalizes officers "if you get something wrong and don't classify it. . . . There is no incentive not to do that."

At the same time, Blair promised to take a tougher stand on government employees who leak classified intelligence information. Blair said he wanted to build in "procedural safeguards" and to "let everybody who works for the government know that if you are going to pass classified information to a reporter or someone, there will be a trace of it."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the intelligence committee, cited a study showing that 27 percent of the 100,000-plus people in the intelligence community are contractors who each cost "$80,000 more than a government employee" per year. She also noted that contractors performed missions that include interrogating CIA detainees.

Blair said it would be his "strong preference . . . that interrogators in the intelligence world be a professional cadre of the best interrogators" and that contractors be hired for interrogations only when they were needed to translate a particular dialect.
Blair said that contracting out intelligence was "a serious problem."
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/washington/23diplo.html
January 23, 2009
Appointing Emissaries, Obama and Clinton Stress Diplomacy
By MARK LANDLER [Obama administration] [NSC principals insofar as they exist] [we know little about how the group—NSC—operates to date] [yesterday’s first NSC meeting followed by symbolic moves at State where Obama and Clinton shared stage] [two new emissaries first noted yesterday’s govt] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [****]
WASHINGTON — Signaling his determination to use diplomacy to address the world’s toughest conflicts, President Obama went to the State Department on Thursday to install high-level emissaries to handle the Arab-Israeli issue and Pakistan and

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/washington/23diplo.html
January 23, 2009
Appointing Emissaries, Obama and Clinton Stress Diplomacy
By MARK LANDLER [Obama administration] [NSC principals insofar as they exist] [we know little about how the group—NSC—operates to date] [yesterday’s first NSC meeting followed by symbolic moves at State where Obama and Clinton shared stage] [two new emissaries first noted yesterday’s govt] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [****]
WASHINGTON — Signaling his determination to use diplomacy to address the world’s toughest conflicts, President Obama went to the State Department on Thursday to install high-level emissaries to handle the Arab-Israeli issue and Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Mr. Obama struck an empathetic tone toward Palestinians in Gaza, who he said were suffering greatly after the recently halted Israeli military campaign against Hamas. But he signaled no major shift in American policy toward the Israeli-Palestinian issue.

Mr. Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton jointly introduced the emissaries, George J. Mitchell, who will be special envoy for Arab-Israeli affairs, and Richard C. Holbrooke, who will hold the title of special representative and will be responsible for Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Mr. Mitchell, a former Senate majority leader, helped broker a peace agreement in Northern Ireland. Mr. Holbrooke, a longtime diplomat who was the American ambassador to the United Nations, played a central role in drafting the 1995 Dayton peace accords, which ended the war in Bosnia.

The appointment of such diplomatic heavyweights could pose a challenge to Mrs. Clinton as she seeks to carve out her place as the nation’s chief diplomat. Each was once viewed as a potential secretary of state, and Mr. Holbrooke, in particular, will have a wide-ranging portfolio.

Underscoring the potentially tangled lines of authority, Mrs. Clinton said that the National Security Council, led by Gen. James L. Jones, would play a coordinating role on Afghanistan and Pakistan. She emphasized unity, saying, “We want to send a clear and unequivocal message: we are a team.” [****] [which sends exactly the opposite message] [where was Jones?]

Already, though, there is some jockeying over whether the State Department or the White House will dominate foreign policy — with the first skirmishes playing out in the titles given to the emissaries.

Both Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Holbrooke will report to Mrs. Clinton, and through her, to Mr. Obama, according to a State Department spokesman. But as if to dramatize the murkiness of the arrangement, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., who accompanied Mr. Obama to the State Department, seemed confused at one point about whether the new president or the new secretary of state would introduce the emissaries. (It was Mrs. Clinton.)

As a special envoy, the State Department spokesman said, Mr. Mitchell will have a more traditional role, working out of the State Department. As a special representative, administration officials said, Mr. Holbrooke will have the freedom to roam — and to represent Mr. Obama, the National Security Council and even the Pentagon.

Mr. Holbrooke and General Jones, Mr. Obama’s national security adviser, wanted Mr. Holbrooke to be able to speak directly to the White House, an official said. General Jones once led NATO’s Supreme Allied Command in Afghanistan and plans to be deeply involved in Afghan policy.

With the United States about to deploy 30,000 more troops there, policymaking on Afghanistan is as much about the military as about diplomacy, officials said, so Mr. Holbrooke will have to cut across departments.

Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden visited the State Department hours after Mrs. Clinton arrived for her first day of work there. She received a hero’s welcome from more than a thousand State Department employees, who whooped and cheered as if it were a campaign rally.

“This is going to be a great adventure,” Mrs. Clinton said to employees in a lively 10-minute address, with people craning to see her from a balcony in the flag-lined lobby of the State Department.

“I will do all that I can, working with you, to make it abundantly clear that robust diplomacy and effective development are the best long-term tools for securing America’s future,” Mrs. Clinton said.

Mr. Obama made the same point in his speech to senior and midlevel diplomats in the ornate Benjamin Franklin room. And he went out of his way to praise his former rival for the Democratic presidential nomination. “I’ve given you an early gift: Hillary Clinton,” he said, to noisy applause. [****]

The State Department has been demoralized by a lack of resources and the primacy of the Pentagon in overseas operations. Among the crowd gathered to greet Mrs. Clinton, there was a palpable hope that the department finally had a forceful advocate. Her arrival — she was bathed in flashbulbs and mobbed by outstretched hands — was more suited to a celebrity than a government official.

“The employees are ecstatic that we now have a secretary of state who is going to fight for the resources we need,” said John Naland, the president of the American Foreign Service Association, the professional association and labor union representing career diplomats. “For three years, there were almost no requests for additional staffing and resources.”

To bolster the department’s fund-raising efforts on Capitol Hill, Mrs. Clinton has named Jacob J. Lew, a former budget director in the Clinton administration, as one of two deputies. The other deputy is James B. Steinberg, a deputy national security adviser to President Clinton. Both appeared before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday for their confirmation hearings.

While Mr. Obama’s remarks on the Middle East did not break new ground, his reference to the plight of Palestinians suggested that his administration might strive for a more evenhanded tone.

“Our hearts go out to the Palestinian civilians who are in need of food, clean water and basic medical care,” he said, noting that the blocking of border crossings in Gaza had deepened their misery.

Mr. Mitchell, 75, said his experience in Northern Ireland, where sectarian conflict raged for centuries, had prepared him for the grueling work of a Middle East peace negotiator. “We had 700 days of failure and one day of success,” he said.

Mr. Holbrooke, 67, who spoke of his roots as a junior diplomat, offered no details about future policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan. But he demonstrated his assertive personal style, saying he would coordinate “what is clearly a chaotic foreign assistance program” in Afghanistan.

Foreign-policy analysts uniformly praised both men, but some said Mrs. Clinton would need to assert her authority. [I wouldn’t worry about that] [she as close to Al Haig as we’ve had since Haig] [***]

“There’s no precedent for a secretary of state to subcontract two incredibly high-profile and politically resonant issues so early in her tenure,” said Aaron David Miller, an analyst at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington. “That could create a management problem.”
Helene Cooper contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:14 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012203929.html
Bush's 'War' On Terror Comes to a Sudden End
By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 23, 2009; A01 [Bush administration] [gsave] [Obama administration] [NSC principals insofar as they exist] [we know little about how the group—NSC—operates to date] [here we see that they are serious about ending gwot] [but will they end gsave?] [Priest really talking about TSPs and the like] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [***]
President Obama yesterday eliminated the most controversial tools employed by his predecessor against terrorism suspects. [***]With the stroke of his pen, he effectively

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012203929.html
Bush's 'War' On Terror Comes to a Sudden End
By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 23, 2009; A01 [Bush administration] [gsave] [Obama administration] [NSC principals insofar as they exist] [we know little about how the group—NSC—operates to date] [here we see that they are serious about ending gwot] [but will they end gsave?] [Priest really talking about TSPs and the like] [use psci355, 455, 469b] [***]
President Obama yesterday eliminated the most controversial tools employed by his predecessor against terrorism suspects. [***]With the stroke of his pen, he effectively declared an end to the "war on terror," as President George W. Bush had defined it, signaling to the world that the reach of the U.S. government in battling its enemies will not be limitless.

While Obama says he has no plans to diminish counterterrorism operations abroad, the notion that a president can circumvent long-standing U.S. laws simply by declaring war was halted by executive order in the Oval Office.

Key components of the secret structure developed under Bush are being swept away: The military's Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, facility, where the rights of habeas corpus and due process had been denied detainees, will close, and the CIA is now prohibited from maintaining its own overseas prisons. And in a broad swipe at the Bush administration's lawyers, Obama nullified every legal order and opinion on interrogations [***]issued by any lawyer in the executive branch after Sept. 11, 2001.

It was a swift and sudden end to an era that was slowly drawing to a close anyway, as public sentiment grew against perceived abuses of government power. The feisty debate over the tactics employed against al-Qaeda began more than six years ago as whispers among confidants with access to the nation's most tightly held secrets. At the time, there was consensus in Congress and among the public that the United States would be attacked again and that government should do what was necessary to thwart the threat.

The CIA, which had taken the lead on counterterrorism operations worldwide, asked intelligence contacts around the globe to help its teams of covert operatives and clandestine military units identify, kill or capture terrorism suspects. They set up their first interrogation center in a compound walled off by black canvas at Bagram air base in Afghanistan, and more at tiny bases throughout that country, where detainees could be questioned outside military rules and the protocols of the Geneva Conventions, which lay out the standards for treatment of prisoners of war. [recall Priest broke the “black sites” controversy] [most were in E. Europe] [***]

As the CIA recruited young case officers, polygraphers and medical personnel to work on interrogation teams, the agency's leaders asked its allies in Thailand and Eastern Europe to set up secret prisons where people such as Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Ramzi Binalshibh could be held in isolation and subjected to extreme sleep and sensory deprivation, waterboarding and sexual humiliation. These tactics are not permitted under military rules or the Geneva Conventions.

Over time, a tiny circle of federal employees outside these teams got access to some of the reports of interrogations. Some were pleased by the new aggressiveness. Others were horrified. They began to push back gingerly, as did an even smaller number of congressional officials briefed on the reports.

Eventually their worries reached a handful of reporters trying to confirm rumors of people who seemed to have disappeared: a Pakistani microbiologist spirited away in the dead of night in Indonesia. An Afghan prisoner frozen to death at a base code-named the Salt Pit. A German citizen who did not get back on his bus at a border crossing in Macedonia. [***]

Front companies and fictitious people were used to hide a system of aircraft that carried terrorism suspects to "undisclosed locations" and to third countries under a little-known practice called rendition.

Unlike the federal employees, who could go to jail for disclosing the classified program, the reporters and their news outlets were protected by the Constitution -- but not from government pressure. Then-CIA Director Porter J. Goss and, later, Bush summoned top editors of The Washington Post to press their case against disclosing the existence of the secret prison network.

The published reports in The Post and elsewhere earned the news media sharp recriminations from the administration, the Republican leadership in Congress and the public. Government leak investigations were launched. Bush administration officials argued that such methods and operations were necessary to effectively thwart terrorism, noting to this day that there have been no major attacks since 2001.

If there were dissenters back then, they were largely silent.

But in Europe, the reports set off a firestorm of criticism and government investigations in nearly every capital. Washington was pressured to move prisoners out of the secret jails. U.S. government officials scattered throughout the national security and foreign policy agencies scrambled to learn more about operations they knew little about. A growing chorus within the CIA and the State Department began to question how long the secret system of detention and interrogation could survive, and drew up plans for an alternative.

By then, the color-coded terrorist alerts had ended. Police disappeared from roadblocks around the Capitol. Washington the fortress drew millions of visitors again. Some Democratic members of Congress replaced the "war on terror" phraseology with language indicating vigilance and persistence, but not unending combat and military-only options.

On Sept. 6, 2006, Bush announced the transfer of 14 "high-value detainees" from secret prisons to Guantanamo. He suspended the CIA program, but defended its utility and reserved the right to reopen it. The secret was officially out.

Over the next 2 1/2 years, as Democrats gained power in Congress, as the violence in Iraq sapped public support for the president and as the fear of another terrorist attack receded, the debate over secret prisons, renditions and harsh interrogations grew louder. Presidential candidates felt comfortable to include these sensitive subjects in the debate on the efficiency of Bush's war against terrorists, and even on the notion that it was still a war.

During his campaign and again in his inaugural address Tuesday, Obama used a different lexicon to describe operations to defeat terrorists. "As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals," he said. ". . . And for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you." [****]
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:13 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012203443.html
War Planning
Iraq will test whether the pragmatic will trump the political in President Obama's administration.
Friday, January 23, 2009; A14 [editorial] [how Obama’s pledge to draw down –ir will be a bellwether?] [****]
THE WELCOME tone of pragmatism that President Obama conveyed during his transition and in his inaugural address seemed to carry over, during his first day in

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012203443.html
War Planning
Iraq will test whether the pragmatic will trump the political in President Obama's administration.
Friday, January 23, 2009; A14 [editorial] [how Obama’s pledge to draw down –ir will be a bellwether?] [****]
THE WELCOME tone of pragmatism that President Obama conveyed during his transition and in his inaugural address seemed to carry over, during his first day in office, to one of the issues for which he will most need it: Iraq. Fulfilling an oft-stated campaign promise, the new president met with his defense secretary and senior military commanders and, according to a statement he issued, asked for "additional planning necessary to execute a responsible military drawdown from Iraq."

Accounts of the meeting suggested that Mr. Obama spent much of the time listening to reports from those who know Iraq best -- Gens. David H. Petraeus and Ray Odierno and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker. In addition, the president's statement did not cite the 16-month withdrawal timetable that became one of the signal slogans of his campaign -- though his spokesman mentioned it. We hope that's evidence that Mr. Obama will not repeat one of President Bush's greatest mistakes -- allowing ideological and political considerations to trump good military judgment. [****]

There is broad agreement in Washington and Baghdad that U.S. troops should gradually be withdrawn, consistent with the goal of preserving Iraq's fragile and relative peace. Late last year, the outgoing administration concluded a formal agreement with the Iraqi government, laying out a plan for redeploying and withdrawing U.S. troops over the next three years. Both Iraqi leaders and U.S. commanders have made clear that they do not believe a pullout of all combat forces in 16 months is compatible with that strategy, and some U.S. officers have questioned whether, in purely logistical terms, it could be safely accomplished.

Gen. Odierno, who commands U.S. forces in Iraq, reportedly favors only a modest drawdown of troops this year, when Iraq will be staging two crucial elections and trying to resolve still-volatile questions of how to divide territory and power among regions and sectarian groups. The prospect of American forces leaving at the rate of a brigade a month, as required by a 16-month timetable, is regarded by leading Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish politicians as a potential catastrophe -- though their public statements sometimes suggest otherwise.

Wednesday's briefing should have underlined those facts for Mr. Obama, if he did not know them already. The president can certainly be expected to press for the quickest U.S. withdrawal that logistics and conditions in Iraq will allow. But Iraq's continuing improvement and the low and declining rate of U.S. casualties -- four soldiers have been killed in hostile action so far this month -- ought to decrease the urgency of a quick pullout. Pragmatism calls for working within the agreed U.S.-Iraqi plan, and for allowing adjustments based on positive and negative developments in Iraq, rather than on any fixed and arbitrary timetable.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:12 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/business/worldbusiness/23sweden.html
January 23, 2009
Sweden’s Fix for Banks: Nationalize Them
By CARTER DOUGHERTY [Sweden] [global financial meltdown] [Sweden forced to nationalize banks again] [repercussions] [when we were there this past July, things were quite positive for most Swedes] [use ir text] [****]
The Swedes have a simple message to the Americans: Bite the bullet and nationalize.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/business/worldbusiness/23sweden.html
January 23, 2009
Sweden’s Fix for Banks: Nationalize Them
By CARTER DOUGHERTY [Sweden] [global financial meltdown] [Sweden forced to nationalize banks again] [repercussions] [when we were there this past July, things were quite positive for most Swedes] [use ir text] [****]
The Swedes have a simple message to the Americans: Bite the bullet and nationalize.

Officials in Washington are trying to figure out how to shore up American banks that once ruled the financial world but now seem to weaken by the day, despite receiving hundreds of billions of dollars in government aid.

With Sweden’s banks effectively bankrupt in the early 1990s, a center-right government pulled off a rapid recovery that led to taxpayers making money in the long run.

Former government officials in Sweden, many of whom come from the market-oriented end of the political spectrum, say the only way to solve the crisis in the United States is for the government to be prepared to temporarily take full ownership of the banks.

Sweden placed its banks with troubled assets into a so-called bad bank, where they could be held and then sold over time when market and economic conditions improved. In the meantime, it used taxpayer money to provide enough capital to allow banks to resume normal lending.

In the process, Sweden wiped out existing shareholders. [***] [[bitten too many times investors will not capitalize Sweden’s industries again]

By contrast, the United States government, so far, has bailed out banks without receiving large equity stakes in return, said Bo Lundgren, Sweden’s minister of fiscal and financial affairs during the Swedish bank takeover.

“For me, that is a problem,” said Mr. Lundgren, who called himself more of a free marketer than some Republicans. “If you go in with capital, you should have full voting rights.”

To be sure, the United States has a much larger economy than Sweden’s, with a vast and international banking system. The toxic assets Sweden took from its banks improved when the economy improved, but Sweden was not confronted with a global recession.

Still, many analysts believe that Stockholm has lessons for Washington.

In effect, the Swedish state took on all the assets that were worthless or impossible to value at the time, and then managed them or sold them with the aim of getting as good a deal as possible for the taxpayer.

“We hired real estate people,” said Lars H. Thunell, the former chief executive of Securum, the institution that became Sweden’s repository of all the underwater assets. “We hired industrial M.& A. people. We needed to manage real assets.”

The United States has become embroiled in a debate about creating its own bad bank after months of decisions to recapitalize American banks without taking control of them.

For all the billions of dollars committed to the banks by the Treasury and the Federal Reserve, American taxpayers have, in effect, used mostly loans to turn themselves into emergency creditors of the financial system.

For their part, bank shareholders have taken big hits as the stocks plummeted. But the government has largely avoided acquiring equity and diluting the value held by existing shareholders.

Former Swedish officials said that was a mistake, for political reasons if nothing else, because owners of bank stocks did so well in the boom years early in the decade.

Fears of bank nationalization are diverse — skeptics worry that nationalization would cost too much, the government would not run banks effectively or nationalization would be too complicated. Mr. Lundgren, the former minister of financial affairs, said the costs of nationalization have to be measured against the perils a hobbled banking system creates for an economy.

Moreover, he said the mere threat of nationalization nudged some Swedish bankers to find creative solutions to their problems in the 1990s.

SEB, the bank controlled by the Wallenbergs, the first family of Swedish business, engineered a private recapitalization to plug the hole in its balance sheet. Distressed assets were then placed in a bad bank of its own, freeing management to run the sound parts of the business.

Nordbanken, a Swedish bank that had expanded in the go-go years of the late 1980s, fell entirely under the control of the government because its losses were so great. It is now Nordea, a banking giant in the Baltic Sea region, and still partly government-owned.

Securum was capitalized with 24 billion kronor ($2.88 billion), a sum equal to the country’s military budget at the time. (The total United States military budget is less than the $700 billion allocated to TARP.)

A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland concluded that Securum eventually returned about 58 percent of that upfront cost to the Swedish treasury, though in depreciated krona.

That does not mean Sweden has escaped the current banking turmoil unscathed. As credit markets froze last fall, it created a financial stabilization package intended to ensure new lending from banks. Only Swedbank initially signed up for the plan. Other banks have moved to raise capital in the market.

To make Securum work in the 1990s, the Swedish state had to become a specialist in such diverse industries as chemicals, biotechnology, office supplies, aerospace industry services and, as would certainly be the case in the United States, real estate.

Chunks of real estate from Stockholm to London to Atlanta had been collateral for loans and occupied 70 percent of the portfolio of Securum.

“As a result of the bubble, a lot of Swedish real estate people thought they were the best in the world,” recalled Mr. Thunell, who now heads the International Finance Corporation, a part of the World Bank.

Securum owned the Australian Embassy building in Myanmar, as well as a guitar that was said to have belonged to John Lennon and a company that employed military advisers in Yemen.

Since the whole idea was to eventually put Securum out of business, managing it required a deft touch that rewarded financial success with incentives for employees but also stressed their work’s nature as a public trust.

“I think people felt a tremendous responsibility for the taxpayer,” Mr. Thunell said. “But it was extremely stimulating from an intellectual and business standpoint because you were doing completely new things.”

Securum hemorrhaged money in its first year in business, which was 1993, but recovered quickly, as savvy deal-making combined with a swift pickup in the Swedish economy created markets for what once seemed so worthless. Early on, Securum sold a chemical company it controlled, Nobel Industries, to Akzo of the Netherlands, to form the largest paint producer in the world. With 18.2 percent of the combined company, Securum later reaped a hefty profit when it sold out.

Property proved less nettlesome than feared as the Swedish economy recovered. Pandox, a Swedish hotel company, was privatized and finds itself today trolling for distressed assets in North America.

There is no guarantee the Obama administration will be so fortunate, with a global economy facing its most severe downturn in decades.

If there is any criticism of how Sweden handled the bad bank, it is that it might have managed an even better return if Securum had sat on its assets longer.

Swedish law envisioned a 15-year life span for Securum when it was created in 1993. It closed four years later.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:11 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/africa/24congo.html
January 24, 2009
Feared Congolese Rebel Leader Apprehended
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [Congo] [DRC] [Africa] [Sub-Sahara Africa] [edge of civil war] [residual from Hutu-Tutsi bloodbath in early 1990s] [former Belgium colony] [corruption is rampant and UN peacekeepers have been disgracefully involved at time] [is the Hutu-Tutsi blood bath flowing into Congo?] [incredibly bad situation] [good news? Laurent captured] [******]
ENTEBBE, Uganda — Gen. Laurent Nkunda, the fearsome Congolese rebel leader whose national ambitions and brutal tactics threatened to destabilize eastern Congo,

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/africa/24congo.html
January 24, 2009
Feared Congolese Rebel Leader Apprehended
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [Congo] [DRC] [Africa] [Sub-Sahara Africa] [edge of civil war] [residual from Hutu-Tutsi bloodbath in early 1990s] [former Belgium colony] [corruption is rampant and UN peacekeepers have been disgracefully involved at time] [is the Hutu-Tutsi blood bath flowing into Congo?] [incredibly bad situation] [good news? Laurent captured] [******]
ENTEBBE, Uganda — Gen. Laurent Nkunda, the fearsome Congolese rebel leader whose national ambitions and brutal tactics threatened to destabilize eastern Congo, was arrested Thursday night along the Congolese-Rwandan border, United Nations officials said on Friday.

According to the U.N. officials and statements made by the Congolese military, General Nkunda was trying to escape a joint Congolese-Rwandan military offensive that was intended to wipe out several rebel groups terrorizing eastern Congo.

He was captured at a small border town called Bunagana after trying to resist Rwandan troops. “He’s going to Kigali,” said Lt. Col. Jean-Paul Dietrich, a U.N. spokesman, referring to Rwanda’s capital.

The arrest could be a turning point for Congo, which has been mired in rebellion and bloodshed for much of the past decade. It was also a stunning turn of events because Rwanda had recently been accused of supporting General Nkunda, who was widely considered to be an agent for Rwandan business and security interests in eastern Congo. [***]

Although he never controlled more than a few small towns in the verdant east, he was widely considered to be Congo’s No. 1 troublemaker. His troops are tough and brutal and were recently accused by United Nations officials of massacring civilians.

General Nkunda was also believed to harbor ambitions to overthrow Congo’s weak but democratically elected government, which threatened to draw in Congo’s neighbors and plunge the entire central Africa region back into war.

On Thursday evening, hundreds of Rwandan troops converged on Bunagana, one of General Nkunda’s mountain strongholds. Congolese officials said he refused to be arrested and crossed over into Rwanda, where he was surrounded and taken into custody, apparently without violence.

It was not clear what will happen to General Nkunda now. Earlier this week, Rwanda sent several thousand soldiers into Congo as part of a joint operation with Congolese forces to flush out Hutu militants who had killed countless people in Rwanda’s genocide in 1994 and were still haunting the hills on the Congolese side of the border.

But few expected the Rwandan troops to go after General Nkunda. He is a Tutsi, like Rwanda’s leaders, and he had risen to power by fighting these same Hutu militants. A United Nations report in December accused high-ranking Rwandan officials of sending money and troops to General Nkunda.

Several demobilized Rwandan soldiers recently revealed that there was a secret operation to slip Rwandan soldiers into Congo to fight alongside General Nkunda. In the late 1990s, Rwanda invaded Congo twice, both times using local proxy forces for cover.

But it appears that the Rwandan government has changed tack, possibly because of the criticism it has weathered in the past few weeks for allegedly supporting General Nkunda. Several European countries have cut aid to Rwanda, sending a strong signal to an impoverished country that desperately needs outside help.

At the same time, General Nkunda has gotten weaker after some of his top commanders recently defected, apparently because they were fed up with his megalomania. The result is a changed dynamic in eastern Congo and possibly an opportunity to finally end the fighting.

“Rwanda and Congo have cut a deal,” said John Prendergast, a founder of the Washington-based Enough Project, which campaigns against genocide. He said Congo had allowed Rwanda to send in troops to vanquish the Hutu militants, something Rwanda has been eager to do for some time.

“In exchange, the Congolese expected Rwanda to neutralize Nkunda and his overly ambitious agenda,” Mr. Prendergast said. “Now the hard part begins.” [***]
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23mideast.html
January 23, 2009
Hamas to Start Paying Gaza Residents Compensation and Reconstruction Aid
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [****]
JERUSALEM — Hamas said Thursday that it would begin handing out compensation

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23mideast.html
January 23, 2009
Hamas to Start Paying Gaza Residents Compensation and Reconstruction Aid
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [Hamas back to its vaunted “charity” work even though its recklessness caused the need for much new charity] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [****]
JERUSALEM — Hamas said Thursday that it would begin handing out compensation and reconstruction aid to residents of Gaza, in a sign of the challenges Israel faces as it tries to weaken the militant group’s hold after the army’s operation there.

Taher al-Nunu, a spokesman for the Hamas government in Gaza, said at a news conference that it would start to distribute the first installment of $35 million to $40 million in payments to Gazans on Sunday. Israel ended its three-week offensive against Hamas last Sunday, and withdrew its last troops from the area early Wednesday.

An adviser to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel said Thursday that the “last thing” Israel wanted was for Hamas to get stronger after the military operation, which Israel has said was intended to reduce the threat of Hamas rocket fire against southern Israel.

The adviser, who requested anonymity in speaking to a small group of reporters because of the delicacy of the issues under discussion, said Israel was working “very extensively” with the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority and the international community to find ways to transfer money from “moderate forces” into Gaza for reconstruction. The aim, he said, would be to ensure that the rebuilding would not be credited to Hamas.

But Hamas, like Hezbollah in southern Lebanon after the 2006 war, is eager to bolster its standing. Hamas estimates that more than 4,000 homes were destroyed and 17,000 damaged during the campaign. About 1,300 people were killed, [***]according to medical officials in Gaza (Israeli military officials have put the number at about 1,200), and more than 5,000 were reported injured.

Mr. Nunu said that each family who had lost a home would receive almost $5,200, while those with damaged homes would get half that. The families of the dead would receive almost $1,300, and those of the injured would get almost $650, he said.

Believing that it has established deterrence against Hamas, Israel says its next priority is to stop the smuggling of foreign-made rockets and other weapons into Gaza via Egypt, and to thwart Hamas’s efforts to rearm.

Amos Gilad, a senior Israeli Defense Ministry official, held talks with Egyptian officials in Cairo on Thursday about ways to stop the smuggling, Israeli officials said. Israel’s foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, was in Brussels on Wednesday to discuss the antismuggling effort with European officials.

Most of the smuggling, according to Israel, takes place through hundreds of tunnels that run beneath Egypt’s border with Gaza. Israel says it bombed 80 percent of the tunnels from the air. But television crews have already captured images of smugglers back at work, underlining Israel’s argument that international efforts have to be made to stop the weapons before they reach the border.

Egypt refuses to have international forces on its side of the border, and Israel says a foreign force on the Gaza side would be ineffective. Instead, Israel envisages solutions like more technical assistance on the Egyptian side, heavier policing in the Egyptian Sinai and international action to stop shipments of weapons en route to Egypt by sea.

With many of the tunnels used for the smuggling of goods, and weapons, out of commission, European and international pressure is mounting on Israel to open the official border crossings with Gaza for normal operations. Opening the crossings and ending an 18-month embargo on the area is a central Hamas demand for any lasting cease-fire deal.

Israel seeks to postpone discussion on the opening of the crossings, and it insists that Hamas will not play any role in its operation. At the same time, Israel is allowing increasing amounts of humanitarian aid into Gaza to meet people’s immediate needs, officials said.

Also on Thursday, Israeli leaders, including Mr. Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, said conditions after the operation in Gaza might improve the chances that Hamas would agree to a prisoner exchange that could lead to the release of a captured Israeli corporal, Gilad Shalit.

Corporal Shalit was seized in a cross-border raid by Hamas and other militant groups and taken into Gaza in 2006. Hamas has demanded the release of hundreds of its prisoners in Israeli jails, including many convicted of terrorism, for the soldier’s return.
Ethan Bronner contributed reporting from Gaza.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23revenge.html
January 23, 2009
Palestinian Rival Says It Is Attacked by Hamas
By SABRINA TAVERNISE [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [things seem to be spinning out of control] [this sort of powerful-family and factional feuds relatively common in Gaza] [less so in West Bank] [the times, they are a changing] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [****]
GAZA CITY — The 27-year-old in a sweatsuit limped to the table, heaved himself into a chair and began to talk about how he had been shot. Men from Hamas have begun to assault people they suspect of supporting its chief political rival, Fatah, [***]he

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23revenge.html
January 23, 2009
Palestinian Rival Says It Is Attacked by Hamas
By SABRINA TAVERNISE [Palestine] [former Gaza] [Hamastan] [things seem to be spinning out of control] [this sort of powerful-family and factional feuds relatively common in Gaza] [less so in West Bank] [the times, they are a changing] [PA’s security forces acting in positive ways to end blood feuds] [Hamas may be moving to extinguish Fatah again with Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza over] [****]
GAZA CITY — The 27-year-old in a sweatsuit limped to the table, heaved himself into a chair and began to talk about how he had been shot. Men from Hamas have begun to assault people they suspect of supporting its chief political rival, Fatah, [***]he said, and on Sunday, he became one of the victims.

It was impossible to verify the man’s account, which he provided on the condition that he remain anonymous, out of concern for his safety. But it came during a week in which leaders of Fatah accused Hamas of harassing and harming its members in the Gaza Strip.

Yasser Abd Rabbo, an ally of the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, said at a news conference in Ramallah on Thursday that Hamas had “turned its rifles in the direction of Fatah members” after Israel stopped its military offensive on Sunday. Mr. Rabbo accused Hamas of placing Fatah supporters under house arrest and shooting some of them in the legs, [***]an intimidation tactic that it used in the past.

A Hamas spokesman, Fawzi Barhoum, strongly denied the accusation, saying that Fatah was raising the issue to distract attention from the fact that it remained on the sidelines and did not challenge Israel during the three weeks of fighting in Gaza.

Hamas and Fatah have long been bitter rivals. Hamas, a militant Islamic organization, rejects Israel’s right to exist, while Fatah, a more secular group with backing from Western nations, has been receptive to the creation of a separate Palestinian state side by side with Israel.

Hamas, which seized control of Gaza during a brief but bloody civil war in 2007, appears to have emerged from the Israeli offensive with its authority in Gaza firm and its popularity growing in the West Bank. [***] [what is there to control in Gaza?]

But members of Fatah contend that Hamas has begun harassing Fatah supporters to reassert its authority in Gaza. The hopes of Mr. Abbas and Egypt for the creation of a unity government that would bring together the two rival groups could be undermined by reprisals.

Taher al-Nunu, a spokesman for the Hamas-led government in Gaza, said it was looking into a few reports of attacks by low-level supporters of the party, which he characterized as score-settling among local clans, actions that were not sanctioned by Hamas.

“Maybe there are some clashes between families,” he said. “We will investigate these cases. There are not a lot.”

A Palestinian human rights worker, who was granted anonymity because of the delicacy of the topic and the preliminary nature of his findings, said he had received reports of about 30 cases of abuse, including as many as five killings. He said he had not yet been able to verify each case.

Mr. Nunu vehemently denied reports that anyone had been killed. “There are no people from Fatah killed by anyone,” he said. “Let them give us just one name.”

The man in the sweatsuit said in an interview that he had been forced into a car by three men wearing masks while he was walking to his cousin’s house at dusk on Sunday. The men accused him of being happy that Israel had attacked Hamas, and they took him to the prime minister’s palace, which had been destroyed in an Israeli airstrike, he said. There they shot both of his legs just under the knee.

“It hurt like fire,” he said, pulling up the legs of his sweatpants to display thick bandages soaked with blood. He crawled to the road, he said, and someone gave him a ride to the hospital.

The motive for the shooting was not clear. The man said that he was a shoemaker and that he supported Fatah, but was not formally a member. The real target, he said, may have been his cousin, who is an activist in Fatah.

Some Fatah members said in interviews that some of those being sought had been singled out for having handed out sweets in celebration of Israel’s war on Hamas.

Nor was it clear how widespread the attacks were. Mr. Rabbo, the ally of the Palestinian president, said 200 people had been harassed and abused, but the human rights worker estimated that the number was much lower.

Many Fatah members and supporters said in interviews that Hamas might feel somewhat weakened by the Israeli offensive and was concerned that its political rivals not take advantage of the disorder created by the war.

The Palestinian human rights worker shared that view. “The internal security department is sending a very clear and strong message to Fatah to be quiet,” he said.

The shoemaker’s cousin, who actively supports Fatah, said that he had been moving from house to house after Hamas members searched his home on Sunday while he was out.

“They’re afraid that Fatah will take advantage of the chaos to come back to power,” the cousin said. “The message is: Stay at home. Be afraid. We didn’t lose power.”

A few patterns did seem to be emerging. Those who had Fatah and Hamas political affiliations within a single family tended not to be targets. And the cousin said it was not the central Hamas leadership that was looking for him, but only people from the party’s neighborhood branch, confirming, in part, what Mr. Nunu of the Gaza government said.

Several people said Hamas had given children cellphone credits to keep tabs on them. They are called “drones,” and when they pass, everyone knows to stop talking, said a man in Bureij, a town south of Gaza City, who said he had been told by local Hamas supporters to stay inside his house.

Typical of the political divisions here, people in Gaza had varying opinions about whether Hamas was carrying out reprisals against Fatah members. [****]

“The Fatah people in Ramallah are saying this for a reason,” said Sami Nasir, a Fatah supporter who was smoking a cigarette in front of Al Khoznadar restaurant. “It’s happening. A lot of Fatah sympathizers are hiding at home these days.”

Maher al-Hawalani, an elegant man with a neatly trimmed beard, who said he was a Hamas sympathizer, disagreed. “Does the Fatah have anything to do with the war?” he asked. “No! So why would Hamas go after them?”
Nadim Audi contributed reporting from Gaza City and Bureij.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23iran.html
January 23, 2009
Iran Hangs 22 in Executions This Week
By THE NEW YORK TIMES [iran] [domestic politics intersect foreign policy] [more factionalism] [a relatively common event in Tehran] [criminals include rapists, drug dealers, insurgents] [Shariah may not meet Western standards but it certainly efficient?] [****]
TEHRAN — Iran hanged 22 convicted criminals in mass executions on Tuesday and Wednesday in Tehran and a few other cities, official news media reported.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23iran.html
January 23, 2009
Iran Hangs 22 in Executions This Week
By THE NEW YORK TIMES [iran] [domestic politics intersect foreign policy] [more factionalism] [a relatively common event in Tehran] [criminals include rapists, drug dealers, insurgents] [Shariah may not meet Western standards but it certainly efficient?] [****]
TEHRAN — Iran hanged 22 convicted criminals in mass executions on Tuesday and Wednesday in Tehran and a few other cities, official news media reported.

Iran has the highest number of executions in the world after China. Crimes like murder, drug trafficking, armed robbery, rape and adultery are punished by execution. [***]

The state-run television news reported Thursday that 10 men were hanged in Tehran’s Evin prison on Wednesday. The semi-official Fars news agency reported that an 11th man, scheduled to be executed in February, witnessed the hanging of the 10.

The Iranian news accounts said the convicts included a drug addict who murdered his aunt, and a robber who killed a cabdriver.

Fars also reported that six men convicted of murder and drug trafficking were hanged on Tuesday in the central city of Yazd. Three more men were hanged in Yazd on Wednesday, the ISNA Student News Agency reported.

The government-run daily newspaper Iran reported that a drug smuggler identified only by his first name, Gholam, was hanged on Tuesday in the city of Kardj.

And two men also identified by their first names, Mohammad, 41, and Reza, 34, were hanged Tuesday in the central city of Isfahan.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/asia/24norkor.html
January 24, 2009
In New Sign of Recovery, Kim Meets China Official
By CHOE SANG-HUN [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [then begins again] [followup] [perhaps, full circle again with Kim’s improving health] [******]
SEOUL — Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader, met a senior Chinese Communist party official in Pyongyang on Friday, Chinese and North Korean media reported. It was Mr. Kim’s first public meeting with a foreign visitor since August, when he is believed to

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/24/world/asia/24norkor.html
January 24, 2009
In New Sign of Recovery, Kim Meets China Official
By CHOE SANG-HUN [DPRK] [anyone who has watched dear leader’s regime operate knows this is standard-operating procedure] [you’re just sort of stuck with it] [excruciatingly difficult negotiations] [followed by tortured agreements] [followed by West partially fulfilling its side of the deal] [followed by DPRK seeking a mulligan] [then begins again] [followup] [perhaps, full circle again with Kim’s improving health] [******]
SEOUL — Kim Jong-il, the North Korean leader, met a senior Chinese Communist party official in Pyongyang on Friday, Chinese and North Korean media reported. It was Mr. Kim’s first public meeting with a foreign visitor since August, when he is believed to have suffered a stroke. [***]

Analysts in Seoul saw the meeting as a North Korean attempt to demonstrate to the outside world that Mr. Kim was in control of his government, well enough to make key decisions about its nuclear weapons program and deal with the new American administration.

Xinhua, China’s state-run news agency, first reported Mr. Kim’s meeting with the official, Wang Jiarui, who is chief of the Chinese Communist Party’s International Department. The account did not mention Mr. Kim’s health. Xinhua said Mr. Wang had arrived in Pyongyang on Wednesday for talks on strengthening economic and trade links.

North Korean news media later reported that Mr. Kim held a lunch for Mr. Wang’s delegation, adding that Mr. Wang gave Mr. Kim a personal letter from President Hu Jintao. North Korean media also released photos of the event.

“North Korea must have timed the meeting in part to demonstrate once and for all that Kim remains in charge,” [***]said Kim Yong-hyun, a North Korea expert at Dongguk University in Seoul. “As the new U.S. president Barack Obama is said to support dialogue with North Korea, Kim needed to signal to Washington that he is well enough to accept an envoy.”

Analysts in Seoul had speculated that when Mr. Kim recovered sufficiently, he would invite a dignitary from China, North Korea’s closest ideological ally, to demonstrate to the outside world that he was still in charge.

Another sign that Mr. Kim’s health was improving came recently when North Korea announced that it would hold a long-delayed election of its rubber-stamp Parliament, the Supreme People’s Assembly, on March 8. An election had been expected last August to choose a new assembly. The legislature’s first task would be to re-elect Mr. Kim to another five-year term as chairman of the National Defense Commission, the North’s most powerful agency.

With no clear successor for Mr. Kim, the news that intelligence officials in Seoul and Washington believed he had a stroke triggered fear of a potential leadership vacuum in the isolated country, which has been the focus of international efforts to halt its nuclear weapons program. Intelligence officials in Seoul have said that Mr. Kim, 66, underwent brain surgery following the stroke.

North Korea has vehemently denied the reports of Mr. Kim’s illness. In recent months, its state-run media have published a series of reports describing his visits to military units, factories and farms, releasing photographs but no video footage of his activities, fueling doubts about his recovery.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23yemen.html
January 23, 2009
Freed by the U.S., Saudi Becomes a Qaeda Chief
By ROBERT F. WORTH [Yemen] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [prosecution of global jihadis abroad—extraterritoriality and other complex issues] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [jihadis recidivism?] [how domestic politics will likely make hay] [domestic cognate rarely an issue] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [****]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — The emergence of a former Guantánamo Bay detainee as the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch has underscored the potential

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/world/middleeast/23yemen.html
January 23, 2009
Freed by the U.S., Saudi Becomes a Qaeda Chief
By ROBERT F. WORTH [Yemen] [Saudi] middle east proper] [proximity to horn, Saudi peninsula] [jihadis and Islamists in Yemen] [USS Cole debacle in 2000] [prosecution of global jihadis abroad—extraterritoriality and other complex issues] [the restive hinterlands where the govt still lacks control] [followup] [jihadis recidivism?] [how domestic politics will likely make hay] [domestic cognate rarely an issue] [use hydra II] [use psci 469b] [shades of 2001] [****]
BEIRUT, Lebanon — The emergence of a former Guantánamo Bay detainee as the deputy leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemeni branch has underscored the potential complications in carrying out the executive order President Obama [***]signed Thursday that the detention center be shut down within a year. [why?] [it’s happened under the Bush administration several times and hasn’t raised much fuss] [***]

The militant, Said Ali al-Shihri, [***]is suspected of involvement in a deadly bombing of the United States Embassy in Yemen’s capital, Sana, in September. He was released to Saudi Arabia in 2007 and passed through a Saudi rehabilitation program for former jihadists before resurfacing with Al Qaeda in Yemen. [***] [seems to me the critical thing is the percentage of recidivism] [is it not quite low?]

His status was announced in an Internet statement by the militant group and was confirmed by an American counterterrorism official.

“They’re one and the same guy,” said the official, who insisted on anonymity because he was discussing an intelligence analysis. “He returned to Saudi Arabia in 2007, but his movements to Yemen remain unclear.” [why didn’t Saudi keep an eye on him?] [**]

The development came as Republican legislators criticized the plan to close the Guantánamo Bay, [***]Cuba, detention camp in the absence of any measures for dealing with current detainees. But it also helps explain why the new administration wants to move cautiously, taking time to work out a plan to cope with the complications. [there may be good reasons for keeping gitmo but GOP arguments thus far ring hollow] [***]

Almost half the camp’s remaining detainees are Yemenis, and efforts to repatriate them depend in part on the creation of a Yemeni rehabilitation program — partly financed by the United States — similar to the Saudi one. Saudi Arabia has claimed that no graduate of its program has returned to terrorism. [***]

“The lesson here is, whoever receives former Guantánamo detainees needs to keep a close eye on them,” the American official said.

Although the Pentagon has said that dozens of released Guantánamo detainees have “returned to the fight,” its claim is difficult to document, and has been met with skepticism. [**]In any case, few of the former detainees, if any, are thought to have become leaders of a major terrorist organization like Al Qaeda in Yemen, a mostly homegrown group that experts say has been reinforced by foreign fighters. [***]

Long considered a haven for jihadists, Yemen, a desperately poor country in the southern corner of the Arabian Peninsula, has witnessed a rising number of attacks over the past year. American officials say they suspect that Mr. Shihri may have been involved in the car bombings outside the American Embassy in Sana last September that killed 16 people, including six attackers.

In the Internet statement, Al Qaeda in Yemen identified its new deputy leader as Abu Sayyaf al-Shihri, saying he returned from Guantánamo to his native Saudi Arabia and then traveled to Yemen “more than 10 months ago.” That corresponds roughly to the return of Mr. Shihri, a Saudi who was released from Guantánamo in November 2007. Abu Sayyaf is a nom de guerre, commonly used by jihadists in place of their real name or first name.

A Saudi security official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said Mr. Shihri had disappeared from his home in Saudi Arabia last year after finishing the rehabilitation program. [seems a colossal failure on Saudi’s part] [***]

A Yemeni journalist who interviewed Al Qaeda’s leaders in Yemen last year, Abdulela Shaya, confirmed Thursday that the deputy leader was indeed Mr. Shihri, the former Guantánamo detainee. Mr. Shaya, in a phone interview, said Mr. Shihri had described to him his journey from Cuba to Yemen and supplied his Guantánamo detention number, 372. That is the correct number, Pentagon documents show.

“It seems certain from all the sources we have that this is the same individual who was released from Guantánamo in 2007,” said Gregory Johnsen, a terrorism analyst and the editor of a forthcoming book, “Islam and Insurgency in Yemen.”

Mr. Shihri, 35, trained in urban warfare tactics at a camp north of Kabul, Afghanistan, according to documents released by the Pentagon as part of his Guantánamo dossier. [***] Two weeks after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, he traveled to Afghanistan via Bahrain and Pakistan, and he later told American investigators that his intention was to do relief work, the documents say. He was wounded in an airstrike and spent a month and a half recovering in a hospital in Pakistan.

The documents state that Mr. Shihri met with a group of “extremists” in Iran and helped them get into Afghanistan. They also say he was accused of trying to arrange the assassination of a writer, in accordance with a fatwa, or religious order, issued by an extremist cleric.

However, under a heading describing reasons for Mr. Shihri’s possible release from Guantánamo, the documents say he claimed that he traveled to Iran “to purchase carpets for his store” in Saudi Arabia. They also say that he denied knowledge of any terrorists or terrorist activities, and that he “related that if released, he would like to return to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, wherein he would reunite with his family.”

“The detainee stated he would attempt to work at his family’s furniture store if it is still in business,” the documents say.

The Yemeni branch of Al Qaeda has carried out a number of terrorist attacks over the past year, [***]culminating in the assault on the American Embassy in Sana on Sept. 16. In that assault, the attackers disguised themselves as Yemeni policemen and detonated two car bombs. The group has also begun releasing sophisticated Internet material, in what appears to be a bid to gain more recruits.

Yemen began cooperating with the United States on counterterrorism activities in late 2001. But the partnership has been a troubled one, [***]with American officials accusing Yemen of paroling dangerous terrorists, including some who were wanted in the United States. Some high-level terrorism suspects have also mysteriously escaped from Yemeni jails. The disagreements and security lapses have complicated efforts to repatriate the 100 or so Yemenis remaining in Guantánamo.

Despite some notable Yemeni successes in fighting terrorist groups, Al Qaeda in Yemen appears to be gaining strength. [***]

“They are bringing Saudi fighters in, and they want to start to use Yemen as a base for attacks throughout region, including Saudi Arabia and the Horn of Africa,” said Mr. Johnsen, an expert on Al Qaeda in Yemen.
Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington; Khalid al-Hammadi from Sana, Yemen; and Muhammad al-Milfy from Beirut.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/us/politics/22obama.html
January 22, 2009
On Day One, Obama Sets a New Tone
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG [obama administration] [new president] [his views] [will this translate to changes in USFP?] [my guess is less than many think] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — President Obama moved swiftly on Wednesday to impose new rules on government transparency and ethics, using his first full day in office to freeze the salaries of his senior aides, mandate new limits on lobbyists and demand that the

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/us/politics/22obama.html
January 22, 2009
On Day One, Obama Sets a New Tone
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG [obama administration] [new president] [his views] [will this translate to changes in USFP?] [my guess is less than many think] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — President Obama moved swiftly on Wednesday to impose new rules on government transparency and ethics, using his first full day in office to freeze the salaries of his senior aides, mandate new limits on lobbyists and demand that the government disclose more information.

Mr. Obama called the moves, which overturned two policies of his predecessor, “a clean break from business as usual.” Coupled with Tuesday’s Inaugural Address, which repudiated the Bush administration’s decisions on everything from science policy to fighting terrorism, the actions were another sign of the new president’s effort to emphasize an across-the-board shift in priorities, values and tone.

“For a long time now there’s been too much secrecy in this city,” Mr. Obama said at a swearing-in ceremony for senior officials at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, adjacent to the White House. He added, “Transparency and rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.”

With the pageantry of Tuesday’s inaugural festivities behind them, Mr. Obama and his team spent Wednesday grappling with matters as mundane as e-mail access and getting to work (some aides arrived at the gates of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue on Tuesday morning to discover they lacked clearance to enter) and as weighty as Senate confirmation of cabinet secretaries.

On Capitol Hill, Hillary Rodham Clinton was confirmed by the Senate as Mr. Obama’s secretary of state — and later sworn in — and it appeared that Timothy F. Geithner, the Treasury secretary nominee, was headed for confirmation. But Republicans forced a one-week delay in the vote on Mr. Obama’s nominee for attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., and there are other jobs yet to fill, including that of commerce secretary.

The transparency and ethics moves were set forth in two executive orders and three presidential memorandums; Mr. Obama signed them at the swearing-in ceremony with a left-handed flourish.

The new president effectively reversed a post-9/11 Bush administration policy making it easier for government agencies to deny requests for records under the Freedom of Information Act, and effectively repealed a Bush executive order that allowed former presidents or their heirs to claim executive privilege in an effort to keep records secret.

“Starting today,” Mr. Obama said, “every agency and department should know that this administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information, but those who seek to make it known.”

Advocates for openness in government, who had been pressing for the moves, said they were pleased. They said the new president had traded a presumption of secrecy for a presumption of disclosure.

“You couldn’t ask for anything better,” said Melanie Sloan, the executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, an advocacy group that tangled frequently with the Bush administration over records. “For the president to say this on Day 1 says: ‘We mean it. Turn your records over.’ ”

A president’s first act in office carries great symbolism. Aides to Mr. Obama spent weeks debating a variety of options including an executive order to shut down the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba — a decision that is now expected to come on Thursday.

In the end, Mr. Obama used his first day to send two messages that echoed themes from his campaign: first, that he is intent on keeping his promises to run a clean and open government; and, second, that he understands the pain Americans are feeling as a result of the economic crisis.

“These executive orders are traditional for presidents — we did them the first day as have others,” said Dan Bartlett, who was counselor to President George W. Bush. “But he has decided to put a finer point on it by elevating a clear theme from his campaign, which was, ‘We’re not going to do business as usual.’ I think it’s a smart move, and the type of thing that the public wants to hear right now.”

It may not be the type of thing that Mr. Bush wants to hear, however. Experts said Mr. Obama’s moves would have the practical effect of allowing reporters and historians to obtain access to records from the Bush administration that might otherwise have been kept under wraps.

“Historians are overjoyed by this,” said Lee White, executive director of the National Coalition for History.

In announcing the salary freeze, Mr. Obama effectively gave pay cuts to roughly 100 top executive branch officials, like the national security adviser, the press secretary and the White House counsel, who earn more than $100,000 a year. “Families are tightening their belts,” Mr. Obama said, “and so should Washington.”

The new president also moved to fulfill his campaign pledge to end the so-called revolving door, the longstanding Washington practice whereby White House officials depart for the private sector and cash in on their connections by lobbying former colleagues.

In what ethics-in-government advocates described as a particularly far-reaching move, Mr. Obama barred officials of his administration from lobbying their former colleagues “for as long as I am president.” He barred former lobbyists from working for agencies they had lobbied within the past two years and required them to recuse themselves from issues they had handled during that time.

The Republican National Committee criticized that requirement and said the new administration was already violating it. Mr. Obama’s nominee for deputy secretary of defense, William Lynn, has been a lobbyist for the defense contractor Raytheon, and his nominee for deputy secretary of health and human services, William V. Corr, lobbied for stricter tobacco regulations as an official with the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.

A senior White House official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, conceded the two nominees did not adhere to the new rules. But he said that Mr. Lynn had the support of Republicans and Democrats, and would receive a waiver under the policy, and that Mr. Corr did not need a waiver because he had agreed to recuse himself from tobacco issues.

“When you set very tough rules, you need to have a mechanism for the occasional exception,” this official said, adding, “We wanted to be really tough, but at the same time we didn’t want to hamstring the new administration or turn the town upside down.”

Mr. Obama’s pledge for openness and transparency also ran smack into the stark reality that setting up a new administration takes time. During his campaign, Candidate Obama and his team of technically savvy young aides promised to harness the power of the Internet to allow the public easy access to government documents and presidential decisions.

It took six hours on Tuesday for the ordinarily fast-moving aides to Mr. Obama to post his executive orders on the White House Web site. Until then, the site declared, “The president has not issued any executive orders.”
Scott Shane and David D. Kirkpatrick contributed reporting.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/us/22list.html
January 22, 2009
Names of the Dead
The Department of Defense has identified 4,222 American service members who have

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/us/22list.html
January 22, 2009
Names of the Dead
The Department of Defense has identified 4,222 American service members who have died since the start of the Iraq war. It confirmed the death of the following American on Wednesday:
TURNER, Ricky L., 20, Pfc., Army; Athens, Ala.; 82nd Airborne Division.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/21/AR2009012102931.html
Immigrant Advocates Call for End to Raids
At Rally Outside ICE, Activists Also Urge Legislation Allowing Path to Citizenship
By N.C. Aizenman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 22, 2009; A02
Several hundred immigrant supporters and religious leaders from across the country marched to the Southwest Washington headquarters of the U.S. Immigration and

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/21/AR2009012102931.html
Immigrant Advocates Call for End to Raids
At Rally Outside ICE, Activists Also Urge Legislation Allowing Path to Citizenship
By N.C. Aizenman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 22, 2009; A02
Several hundred immigrant supporters and religious leaders from across the country marched to the Southwest Washington headquarters of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency yesterday, strumming guitars, beating drums and waving colorful homemade banners exhorting President Obama to halt immigration raids and promote legislation offering illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.

Although the demonstration featured many speeches in Spanish and cries of "Sí se puede!" -- Yes we can! -- the crowd was also notable for its diversity. Suely Neves, 26, of the Boston group Deported Diaspora had come on behalf of her fellow Cape Verde immigrants. Standing next to her, Indian American immigrant Dimple Rana, 28, said she was concerned about the fate of the Cambodian refugees she works with in Lowell, Mass.

"I've seen a lot of good friends deported because of minor prior convictions," Rana said as groups waving banners from Florida and New Orleans chanted behind her.

Many of the demonstrators had come to town to celebrate Obama's inauguration, and the mostly religious representatives who addressed the crowd portrayed the event as a chance to spiritually "cleanse" the agency of the Bush administration's stepped-up enforcement approach. At the same time, they urged Obama to make good on his campaign promise to push through a legalization plan similar to one that former president George W. Bush twice tried unsuccessfully to get through Congress.

Margarito Esquino, an activist for indigenous rights in El Salvador, lit incense and waved condor feathers toward the sky, shouting in Spanish, "O Great Spirit, we ask you to get rid of all the badness in this building and bring in the good!"

Rabbi David Schneyer, of the Am Kolel Sanctuary and Renewal Center in Beallsville, blew on a shofar, a ram's horn traditionally sounded for the Jewish new year.

The Rev. Frederick Hancock of Gethsemane United Methodist Church in Capitol Heights performed a libation ceremony meant to evoke African ancestral rituals, pouring grape juice -- symbolizing wine -- onto the roots of a potted plant as he called for strength from civil rights icons such as Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez.

Many participants said they believe Obama's first priority must be to right the economy, even if that means delaying an overhaul of immigration law for months and even years. But they are also eager for the administration to declare an immediate moratorium on deportations and immigration raids.

Antonio Bernabe, an organizer with the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles and one of several immigrant activists who met with Obama's transition team in recent weeks, said he was very optimistic based on its response. Still, he said, demonstrations remain necessary.

"The anti-immigrant groups are already moving, and we have to assure Obama that . . . [the raids] are not acceptable," he said.
© 2009 The Washington Post Company

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/us/politics/23blaircnd.html
January 23, 2009
Blair Pledges New Approach to Counterterrorism
By SCOTT SHANE [obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Dennis Blair as DNI] [Panetta nearly confirmed as CIA director] [Gen (retired) James Jones as NSC adviser] [Sec Def Robert Gates held over from Bush] [continuity in USFP] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — Dennis C. Blair, the retired admiral who is President Obama’s choice as the nation’s top intelligence official, pledged in testimony to be delivered on Thursday that he would require counterterrorism programs to operate “in a manner consistent with

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/23/us/politics/23blaircnd.html
January 23, 2009
Blair Pledges New Approach to Counterterrorism
By SCOTT SHANE [obama administration] [111th congress, 1st session] [executive order] [Dennis Blair as DNI] [Panetta nearly confirmed as CIA director] [Gen (retired) James Jones as NSC adviser] [Sec Def Robert Gates held over from Bush] [continuity in USFP] [use psci355, 455] [****]
WASHINGTON — Dennis C. Blair, the retired admiral who is President Obama’s choice as the nation’s top intelligence official, pledged in testimony to be delivered on Thursday that he would require counterterrorism programs to operate “in a manner consistent with our nation’s values, consistent with our Constitution and consistent with the rule of law.”

Mr. Blair appeared to drawing a sharp contrast with Bush administration policies. He indirectly criticized the eavesdropping without warrants by the National Security Agency and harsh interrogation methods used by the Central Intelligence Agency during the Bush presidency.

“The intelligence agencies of the United States must respect the privacy and civil liberties of the American people, and they must adhere to the rule of law,” Mr. Blair said in testimony prepared for his confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee, scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. Thursday.

Addressing complaints that the intelligence agencies have evaded Congressional oversight and skirted the law, Mr. Blair promised a different approach.

“I do not and will not support any surveillance activities that circumvent established processes for their lawful authorization,” he said in the testimony. “I believe in the importance of independent monitoring, including by Congress, to prevent abuses and protect civil liberties.”

In an unusual comment from a man who will head the most secret agencies of government, he said, “There is a need for transparency and accountability in a mission where most work necessarily remains hidden from public view.” He said that if confirmed, he would “communicate frequently and candidly with the oversight committees, and as much as possible with the American people.”

On the issue of detainee treatment, perhaps the most divisive security issue since 2001, Mr. Blair called torture “not moral, legal or effective” and said any interrogation program would have to comply with the Geneva Conventions, the Convention against Torture and the Constitution.

Mr. Blair is a sixth-generation Naval officer whose last job in the military was to command all American forces in the Pacific. Though not a career intelligence professional, he served for two years as a senior C.I.A. official. He referred indirectly to the flawed intelligence before the Iraq war, when the Bush White House pressed the agencies for information on the threat posed by Saddam Hussein.

“There is an obligation to speak truth to power,” he said, adding that he would honestly present “unpleasant” facts to the president.

He said he would seek an “extremely important balance” for the 16 intelligence agencies, which employ about 100,000 people, suggesting that he would emphasize the soft power of diplomacy and economic development as well as the tougher counterterrorism efforts that got most attention under President Bush.

He said that in addition to backing the military and intelligence operatives in hunting down terrorists, the agencies should support “policymakers who are looking for opportunities to engage and work with Arab and Muslim leaders who are striving for a progressive and peaceful future for their religion and their countries.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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