Colombian officials said the gang allegedly supplied an unknown number of citizens from Pakistan, Jordan, Iraq, Egypt and other countries with false passports and Colombian nationality without them ever setting foot in the country.

An undisclosed number of those arrested are wanted for working with the al-Qaida terror network and the militant Palestinian group Hamas, said acting Attorney General Jorge Armando Otalora.

The counterfeit Colombian, Spanish, Portugese and German passports were used to enter the United States and Europe, he said.

But Justice Department spokesman Bryan Sierra said an indictment unsealed Wednesday in Miami charges 10 foreign nationals with smuggling "people that they thought were members of FARC into the United States."

"We are not alleging any connections to any terror organization other than the FARC," said Justice Department spokesman Bryan Sierra.

He said the U.S. will seek to extradite the 10 alleged smugglers, of whom eight have been arrested.

"The operation was, in fact, a sting operation led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement," he said, adding that Colombian law enforcement were "an active and critical part" of the investigation

The Colombian attorney general's office said 19 people were arrested in Thursday's raids, adding they were carried out in collaboration with U.S. authorities.

Four Jordanian citizens were among those arrested, Manuel Saenz, head of foreign immigration for the DAS secret police, said on Caracol television. Eight people are being sought inside the United States for extradition to Colombia, Otalora said.

Colombian authorities began to covertly trail and film suspects to unveil a criminal network with the help of their U.S. counterparts.

The eight wanted by federal authorities in Florida on charges of abetting illegal immigration rings and collaborating with terrorist groups include a Jordanian national and a DAS detective, Colombian authorities said.

Colombian officials didn't say if they believed any Colombian terrorist groups were involved in the scheme.

U.S. officials have long feared al-Qaida could take advantage of corrupt government officials and weak institutions to launch an attack from south of the border.

As always when he expresses himself, Osama bin Laden managed last Thursday to qualify as the top news story on every news channel on earth. WindowsVideo The Saudi sheik is a communications champion. He has a natural gift for this modern concoction, this monstrous stepchild of politics and advertising. And he did this all on his own, from somewhere in the mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan's tribal areas, without a "Dircom" [Director of Communications] or a "media planner."

Mystery surrounds his lifestyle. No one except his personal bodyguards know what his life is like. We thought he was dead, and then here he comes again. Does he have several wives and children? Except the Egyptian doctor Zawahiri, how many companions are supporting him? What does he eat, what does he read, is he sick? What did he do with the fortune he inherited from his father? Does he still have well-filled bank accounts somewhere and does he have access to them? Does he correspond with Islamist or cell leaders all around the world, and how? Does he actually have some operational command over them or is he simply a spiritual authority? It is all a mystery …

The obvious can be found in his message, directed with some urgency to the politically frustrated masses of Arab-Muslim world. The obvious being that the Americans, a nation of infidels, must leave the holy land of Arabia where the Prophet was born and preached. The obvious being that they have no business being in Baghdad, a place where the Caliphate was founded, an institution that bin Laden wishes to resurrect. The obvious being that Jerusalem, the third holiest place in Islam (the legend says that Mohamed was transported from there to paradise on a white horse), cannot be under a Jewish domination. The obvious being that borders between Muslim nations should be abolished, since they are an impious creation of the "crusaders," aimed at dividing the Ummah [community] of believers in order to dominate them more easily. The obvious being that democracy is an impious idea, since the government of man cannot prevail over God's regime.

If the obvious isn't so obvious for Westerners, it more than appeals to a great number of people in Arab and Muslim countries (which doesn't necessarily mean it appeals to governments). A recent poll taken in politically moderate countries such as Egypt and Jordan showed that bin Laden was considered by 90% of those polled as a "resistance fighter" rather than "terrorist."

As soon as the international media discovered him, relaying the words of the American President, Osama bin Laden was able to don a completely new set of clothes. In his last video tape WindowsVideo, broadcast on the Al-Jazeera channel of Qatar (a small oil-kingdom of the Gulf under American protection), the Saudi sheik with great ease puts himself on the same level as the American President. He talks like a great statesman, offering the American people a truce profitable to both sides so that American troops that are "bogged" down in Iraq and Afghanistan can properly retreat.

What makes bin Laden a great master of modern communication is his patience. This terrorist leader never promoted himself. He waited for others to do it for him throughout the Westerns world that he despises. Presidents Clinton and Bush gave him worldwide fame by designating him Public Enemy Number One. What makes him such a powerful spiritual and political leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist group? Bin Laden always manages to remain a mystery but state the obvious. "We are a nation in which God forbids lies and treachery."

Because of his great popularity in the Arab-Muslim world, he doesn't hesitate to speak in the name of all Islam. He and his followers have become masters when it comes to using modern tools of communication. If bin Laden hasn't made a phone call since 9/11 because he is afraid he might be located by the big ears of American intelligence, his followers have been able to take as much advantage of the Internet as possible. It is thanks to the Internet (an invention of American universities) that the most radical Islamist ideology has been spread throughout the world for the past ten years. Aren't the best strategists famous for their abilities to turn the weapons of their enemies against them?

As far as the military is concerned, bin Laden has nearly nothing. He knows it and doesn't care. Because he understands that typical military operations have become just a detail in a more global war, a war of the media, which aims at winning the hearts and minds of the world's people.

The terrorist leader has taken to heart the unwritten rules of the Western media, which have more to do with emotion than reason. Militarily speaking, a single hostage situation is insignificant in the field. But politically, it has a tremendous impact in the Western world because of the media ramifications it can bring.

Al-Qaeda never wasted time trying to conquer basic military positions. It always chooses its targets according to the media impact the attack will trigger (a nightclub in Bali, a train station in Madrid, a subway in London). The group's top priority is to conquer the field of television images that is fed to the world.

Better than anyone, Osama bin Laden has spotted how opinion is a weakness inherent to democracies, and has turned that weakness against them.

*Reporter at Le Figaro, author of Why are they fighting, a closer look at the Middle-Eastern Warfare (Pourquoi ils se battent, Voyages à travers les guerres du Moyen-Orient) published by Flammarion.

His defense lawyers submitted to the court on Tuesday a list of expert witnesses prepared to testify about Moussaoui's upbringing in France by his Moroccan mother, his alienation from society and his mental state.

A neuroscientist and author, Dr Nancy Andreasen, will tell the court that Moussaoui "suffers from a major thought disorder, most likely schizophrenia," the defense lawyers wrote.

Andreasen, chair of psychiatry at the University of Iowa's college of medicine, bases her analysis on Moussaoui's rambling writings, his appearances in court and the findings of another psychiatrist who examined Moussaoui, the lawyers said.

Another witness, clinical social worker Jan Vogelsang, will testify about how Moussaoui had a traumatic childhood, spending five years in orphanages after his mother separated from his "violent alcoholic" father.

"While Zacarias' mother struggled to support her four children in a strange country where she had to learn a new language, Zacarias and his brother basically raised themselves," the lawyers said.

The witness will recount how Moussaoui suffered from racism in France due to his Moroccan heritage and that his condition deteriorated further after moving to Britain. He eventually was attracted to "radical mosques which flourished in London in the 1990's," they said.

The witness will also testify about an alleged history of mental illness in Moussaoui's family.

US law recognizes mental illness as a possible mitigating factor in a death penalty case but the defense strategy may prove difficult given Moussaoui's often defiant attitude during court proceedings. He has also refused a psychiatric examination.

In his trial, Moussaoui showed contempt for the United States and held forth about his belief in Islamic militancy.

Moussaoui is the only person who has been brought to trial in a US civilian court in connection with the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington.

He initially insisted he was not part of the September 11 plot and that he was to fly another jet into the White House as part of a second wave of attacks.

But he has signed a statement of fact in his guilty plea that identifies him as the "20th hijacker" of September 11, when 19 hijackers smashed passenger jets into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in Washington and a field in Pennsylvania.

Moussaoui aroused suspicion at a flight school in the state of Minnesota where he was arrested before September 11, 2001 for overstaying his visa.

The sentencing hearing starts with jury selection on February 6.

It is undoubtedly Osama bin Laden's one true victory. Even if no "apostate" Arab regime has been toppled by al-Qaeda's blows, and the terrorist attacks merely wounded the world's democracies without actually threatening their survival, the moral and legal foundations of America have, on the other hand, been shaken. With the apocalyptic nature of bin Laden's battle plan, the great leader of international jihad has succeeded in making George W. Bush lose his sangfroid and has led him into dark, tormented territory. And the polemic surrounding the use of torture and secret jails by the CIA has caused collateral damage, in Washington and in the rest of the world.

At the same time, the French army has been shaken by the "Mahé affair," named after a prisoner that was the victim of a sordid murder by a patrol in Ivory Coast. The two affairs are hardly of the same magnitude. On the one hand, we have a repressive system put in place by a politico-military establishment. On the other, an isolated blunder committed by a handful of individuals. But in both cases, those originally meant to contain and limit non-conventional conflicts were ultimately undermined by these very same forces. And the specter of dirty warfare, lying ever in ambush, was reawakened [in France, as well].

With regard to the "total war" against terrorism, the issue of contention is ultimately rather simple, almost trivial in nature: does the end justify the means? Yes, was the unhesitating answer of a handful of American strategists, shaken by the September 11 massacre. Only victory matters and the fight against terrorism necessitates greatly dirtying one's hands. Even Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld has stated that the traditional laws of warfare have become "outdated." American Vice President Dick Cheney appears still to share this opinion four years later: this past autumn, he firmly fought to exempt certain American intelligence services, notably the CIA, from an amendment banning any and all acts of torture which was proposed by Senator John McCain. Who better than this hero of the Vietnam War to campaign against the "inhuman, cruel and degrading treatment" of prisoners? In 2002, in the name of the fierce fight to be waged against al-Qaeda, such techniques as the "waterboarding," which provokes a feeling of drowning, were officially approved.

The subcontracting of the war certainly hasn't helped. The privatization of violence, with the growing reliance on new "mercenaries," for exotic missions or alongside the largest Western armies, carries with it complicated ethical considerations.

Geographical subcontracting, when the CIA delocalizes presumed terrorists to countries with little or no qualms regarding the use of torture. Technical subcontracting, when private contractors work alongside CIA and American military agents during interrogations, as in the infamous Abu Ghraib prison. All of a sudden, in Iraq the supposed liberators have transformed into torturers. Thousands of kilometers away, at Guantanamo, the "enemy combatants" are lost in the haze of a legal vacuum. By altering the rules of the game, Washington runs the risk of sacrificing its honor.

Abu Ghraib and the Mahé affair clearly differ in terms of magnitude. However, a shared origin allows their comparison: the absence of a well-defined battle front or a classic enemy makes it more difficult to follow and respect ethical guidelines. In the present military action, two paths of reasoning are now at loggerheads: the "logic of effectiveness" and the "logic of control." The amount of violence used must be massive enough to defeat one's adversary - this is the "effectiveness principle." However, at the same time, this force must not be applied in a manner which contradicts the values for which the war is being waged in the first place - this is the "control principle." It says, in effect, that the end does not justify the means. The legitimacy of military action is based upon meeting this requirement. It is precisely this legitimacy that is today threatened by the indignities suffered by Iraqi prisoners and the abusive hunt for international jihadis. All arguments linking the war on terror to the defense of international law or human rights - rules instituted by the Western Powers themselves - have been weakened and their credibility seriously damaged. Granted, the new world order has not banished war, but mustn't armed conflict remain subject to the rule of law?

Along with moral considerations, the legitimacy of military intervention and therefore the power relationships within the international arena are at stake. Considering tactical effectiveness to be of greater importance than moral considerations can perniciously undermine operational effectiveness. General Jean-René Bachelet, strategist for the French military, puts it well when he writes in Inflexions - the army's remarkable, new magazine - that "the combination of crushing military might and the humiliation of demonized adversaries results in a vicious circle: fertile soil is tilled for growing the self same terrorism which is being fought, ultimately and paradoxically strengthening the hand of the weaker side." If one follows the general's line of reasoning, winning the battle by sacrificing one's soul carries the seeds of future defeat.

Taking into account America's overwhelming technological and military superiority, the general believes that the Europeans should uphold an alternative, "not in terms of military power, but rather in terms of a moral conception of this power." In his book Of Paradise and Power, the neoconservative thinker Robert Kagan compared two visions of geopolitics: the European "Kantian" view, where one dreams of world peace uniquely resulting from the rule of law, and the American "Hobbesian" view, heavily influenced by a culture of international violence, comprised of aggressively competing individual states. Clearly, the debate reaches far beyond a simple consideration of the meaning of military action: what is at stake is the very makeup of Western civilization.

*Defense correspondent for the Figaro's foreign press office.

Washington has expressed concerns about Venezuelan democracy under Mr Chavez and about the effect of his government's military purchases on regional stability.

'Internal matter'

In early January Mr Chavez accused the US of blocking the purchase of training jets from Brazil because the planes contained protected US technology.

The US had objected to a decision by Spain to sell jets and patrol boats to Caracas.

The vice-president did not disclose the number of people involved in the alleged spying, or the kind of information they were said to have passed on. Press reports said that those detained were naval officers.

A spokesman for the US embassy said officials had received no communication from the Venezuelan authorities and it was an "internal matter" for Venezuela.

Here is the Summary:

“In the years ahead, the United States will assuredly find itself in new international crises involving nations or groups that have powerful leaders. In some cases, these leaders may have a special, dangerous mindset that is the result of a ‘hubris-nemesis complex.’

This complex involves a combination of hubris (a pretension toward an arrogant form of godliness) and nemesis (a vengeful desire to confront, defeat, humiliate, and punish an adversary, especially one that can be accused of hubris). The combination has strange dynamics that may lead to destructive, high-risk behavior. Attempts to deter, compel, or negotiate with a leader who has a hubris-nemesis complex can be ineffectual or even disastrously counterproductive when those attempts are based on concepts better suited to dealing with more normal leaders.

This essay introduces and defines the concept of the hubris-nemesis complex, illustrates it by drawing upon both mythic characters and real personalities, relates it to other psychological phenomena that have been described well in the past, and discusses some challenges that may be faced in recognizing and dealing with the complex in the course of international relations. The essay argues that the complex is relatively common, but often unappreciated, and that we can see it at work in current-day figures such as Fidel Castro, Saddam Hussein, and Slobodan Milosevic—leaders about whom the United States has made serious misjudgments over the years. Thus, while the essay is intended to be conceptual and scholarly, it may have direct significance for understanding and dealing with foreign leaders in future crises and conflicts.”