US economy on verge
of collapse, warns Democrat LaRouche
Fakir Chand in Bangalore
Lyndon H LaRouche, US economist and Democratic Party candidate
for the 2004 presidential elections, has warned that the
beleaguered United States economy would collapse in the near future
due to the irrational fiscal and monetary policies being pursued by
the Bush Administration even after the Iraq war and the 9/11
attacks.
LaRouche, who is in Bangalore to participate in the two-day
'International Conference on World Situation after Iraq War' told
rediff.com on Monday that the US dollar, which has been weakening
against a basket currencies of late, was likely to erode further by
another 25-50 per cent by this year-end.
"The
US economy is on the verge of collapse due to the parasitical and
monetary policies of the war-mongering Bush government. Its foreign
exchange rate and monetary system are in the grip of serious crisis
that may take the economy into a terminal state if remedial
measures are not taken immediately," LaRouche stated.
Euro
Soars to Record High Against Dollar
By
David McHugh AP Business Writer
Frankfurt, Germany (AP) -- The euro soared to a record high against
the dollar Tuesday in a major boost for many U.S. exporters but
deepening the pain for the continent's struggling economy and
American tourists in Europe.
The euro reached a high of $1.1932 in trading in Europe, breaking
the old high of $1.1884 set Jan. 4, 1999, a few days after the euro
began to circulate as the shared currency of 12 European
countries.
Winners include the many U.S. companies that sell overseas, many of
which have reported fatter earnings in recent weeks due to the
weaker dollar.
Losers include Europe's export-fueled economy, whose pricing edge
over U.S. competitors is vanishing, and American fanciers of
European vacations and imported goodies like French wine and German
sports cars.
They're going to pay more.
Is
there really an Al-Qaeda group?
Syrian President says he doubts existence of the terrorists and
their ability to launch attacks
KUWAIT CITY - Syrian
President Bashar Assad said in an interview published on Sunday
that he doubts the existence of Al-Qaeda, the terror group the US
blames for the Sept 11, 2001 attacks and suspects of involvement in
more recent strikes in Saudi Arabia and Morocco.
'Is
there really an entity called Al-Qaeda? Was it in Afghanistan? Does
it exist now?' Mr Assad told Al- Anba, a Kuwaiti
daily.
He expressed doubts that the Al-Qaeda network was capable of
organising attacks on such a large scale.
Osama bin Laden, the
Saudi-born Islamic extremist who heads Al-Qaeda, 'cannot talk on
the phone or use the Internet, but he can direct communications to
the four corners of the world'? he asked.
'This is
illogical.'
The
Syrian leader's comments are not uncommon in the Arab world, where
speculation is rife that the United States has manufactured or
exaggerated the threat posed by Al-Qaeda in order to paint Muslims
as dangerous.
Comment: There it is, from someone who
should know. And the whole deal is not just "illogical" its
downright farcical, but apparently the general population's
appetite for swallowing crass and obvious BS knows no bounds.
"The greatest threat to our world and its
peace comes from those who want war, who prepare for it, and who,
by holding out vague promises of future peace or by instilling fear
of foreign aggression, try to make us accomplices to their
plans."
Hermann Hesse - Author (1877-1962)
North Korea warns
Japan of "fatal fiasco" if it blindly follows
US
AFP-Japan will "meet a fatal fiasco" if it continues to blindly
follow US policy, Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency
(KCNA) said.It said Japan's cabinet had approved a statement
defending American use of cluster bombs in Iraq, saying the targets
were "carefully selected" and that the US military "strove to
prevent civilians from falling victim" to them."
This
was nothing but Japan's shameful act of flattery and servile
support for its master, the US," said the report Tuesday, quoting a
commentary in the North Korean ruling party mouthpiece Rodong
Sinmun."Japan's act of supporting and shielding the US use of
weapons of mass destruction indicates that it will leave no means
untried for overseas aggression as the US does," it
said.
"The
Japanese authorities are well advised to bear in mind that if they
continue acting blindly to the tune of the US out of their senses,
they will only meet a fatal fiasco," the report said...
Military
investigation into ITN duo missing in Iraq
Ananova
A
military investigation into the disappearance of ITN cameraman Fred
Nerac and translator Hussein Osman in Iraq during the war has been
launched.
They
have not been seen since a shooting incident involving coalition
and Iraqi forces more than nine weeks ago, when veteran TV reporter
Terry Lloyd was killed.
Since then, ITN has
conducted its own investigations on the ground and has made
repeated calls for help from the British military who control the
area around Az Zubayr.A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman has
confirmed the Royal Military Police is now conducting its own
investigation.
ITN
chairman Mark Wood said: "We have found out a good deal ourselves,
but we need the skills and experience that only the Royal Military
Police can offer to conduct a full and formal investigation.Defence
Secretary Geoff Hoon told ITN earlier this month that a formal
investigation could not begin until there was evidence of war
crimes.
He
now believes fresh evidence has come to light which suggests that
an Iraqi war crime may have been committed, ITN has been told.The
US military had opened an investigation into the incident, but the
British authorities were criticised for lack of action.
ITN
says its investigations, conducted by two former SAS soldiers on
behalf of the company, produced evidence that at least one of its
vehicles had been hit by both US and Iraqi forces in a
firefight.The French cameraman and Lebanese translator were
travelling in a two-car convoy with Terry Lloyd before they
vanished on March 22, near Az Zubayr, in southern Iraq..
American Account of Killing of 2 Journalists Is
Disputed
By
CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS
New York Times
WASHINGTON, May 27 —
There is no evidence that American forces were fired on from the
Palestine Hotel in Baghdad before they shelled the building,
killing two of nearly 100 journalists staying there, a journalist
advocacy group said today.
The
Committee to Protect Journalists, which chronicles abuses against
news personnel worldwide, said that its investigation of the April
8 incident concluded that the attack on the journalists, while not
intentional, could have been avoided.Citing interviews with a dozen
reporters who witnessed the event, the committee said that Pentagon
officials and field commanders in Baghdad were aware that the
Palestine Hotel was full of foreign journalists and were determined
not to hit it.
"These senior commanders
apparently failed to convey their concern to the tank commander who
fired on the hotel," the committee said in its 11-page
report.Administration officials have denied they erred in the
decision to fire on the 17-story Palestine Hotel, on the eastern
bank of the Tigris River.
The
tank attack on the hotel killed Taras Protsyuk, a Ukrainian-born
cameraman for Reuters, and José Couso, a Spanish cameraman.
The journalists had been filming the fighting from the hotel
balconies.Six days after the incident, the Pentagon spokeswoman,
Victoria Clarke, notified the committee in writing that "coalition
forces were fired upon and acted in self-defense by returning
fire.
"In
a letter to Spain's foreign minister, Secretary of State Colin L.
Powell said last month that the American tank had fired in response
to "hostile fire appearing to come from a location later identified
as the Palestine hotel." He called the use of force "justified" and
"proportionate."[...]
Relatives of Mr. Couso, the
Spanish cameraman, have filed suit against Sergeant Gibson, Captain
Wolford and Colonel DeCamp, accusing them of war crimes for using
excessive force against civilians, according to Pilar Hermoso, the
family's lawyer."The civilian nature of these buildings and the
fact that the international media was lodged there were known to
the Anglo-American forces and to U.S. commanders," the plaintiffs
charged in their suit.
US
soldiers killed in checkpoint 'ambush'
17:49 Tuesday 27th May
2003
Associated Press
Gunmen killed two US
soldiers when they opened opened fire on a checkpoint in the Iraqi
town of Fallujah.
American troops returned
fire, killing two attackers and capturing six Iraqis, according to
US officials.Hours later, two US military police officers were
injured, at least one seriously, after two attacks with
rocket-propelled grenades on a Baghdad police station.
Fallujah residents say
they're angry at the US presence. Street vendor Safa al-Jubair
said: "We are 26 million Iraqis and we are all resisting and, God
willing, occupation will end." [...]
Rumsfeld Echoes
Notion That Iraq Destroyed Arms
By
ERIC SCHMITT
May 28, 2003
New York Times
Defense Secretary Donald H.
Rumsfeld suggested publicly for the first time yesterday that Iraq
might have destroyed chemical and biological weapons before the war
there, a possibility that senior American officers in Iraq have
raised in recent weeks.
Mr.
Rumsfeld has repeatedly expressed optimism that it is just a matter
of time, and of interviewing enough senior Iraqi scientists and
former government officials, before military teams uncover the
illicit arms that President Bush cited as a major reason for
attacking Iraq and toppling Saddam Hussein's rule.
While Mr. Rumsfeld repeated
that assertion yesterday, he added, "It is also possible that they
decided that they would destroy them prior to a conflict." Maj.
Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the Army's 101st Airborne
Division, now in northern Iraq, mentioned the same possibility two
weeks ago.Senior defense aides insisted that Mr. Rumsfeld's
response to a question after his speech to the Council on Foreign
Relations in Manhattan yesterday broke no new ground, and that it
was consistent with his past explanations.[...]
But
the fact that Mr. Rumsfeld even raised the possibility that Iraq
might have destroyed unconventional weapons before the war prompts
new questions about the intelligence that President Bush and his
senior advisers relied on to go to war, and about the credibility
of the United States, defense analysts said yesterday.
"They don't have a good
explanation, and therefore are trying to come up with as long a
list as possible," said Joseph Cirincione, a senior associate at
the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. "But
it's impossible to destroy or hide the quantities the
administration said they had without our noticing it."
[...]
U.S. forces find
suspected gold cache in Iraq
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- For the
second time in a week, U.S. troops have discovered what appears to
be a cache of gold bars hidden in a truck, which could be worth
just less than a quarter of a billion dollars, according to a
Pentagon official.[...]
Pentagon officials said the
gold will be kept safe by U.S. forces until an Iraqi government is
set up and decides how to use it.
US rejects
Iran nuclear denial
BBC
The
United States has rejected Iranian denials that it is trying to
develop nuclear weapons or harbouring al-Qaeda
fugitives.
The
reaction came as a meeting of top US officials due to discuss US
policy on Iran was postponed.Iran is facing intense pressure from
Washington on a number of issues, but US Secretary of State Colin
Powell said contacts with the Islamic republic had not been
stopped, as some reports had suggested."Our policies are well-known
and I'm not aware of any changes in policy [on Iran]. We have
contacts with them. They will continue," he said.[...]
White House spokesman Ari
Fleischer said the arrests of several suspected al-Qaeda members in
Iran on Monday did not quell concerns about the presence of members
of Osama Bin Laden's network.
He
also rejected Tehran's assertions that its extensive nuclear
programme was exclusively designed for power-generating purposes.
"We continue to have concerns that a nation that is awash in gas
and oil would seek to produce peaceful nuclear energy," Mr
Fleischer said.[...]
Proposed Legislation to end US Membership in
UN
uncommonthought.com
Just came across this
Bill H.R. 1146 To end the membership of the United
States in the United Nations introduced by Mr. Ron Paul (R-Tx) and
sent to
the Committee on International Relations.
The
proposed legislation severs any and all connections with the UN and
its
programs -- including peacekeeping forces and the World Health
Organization.
Soldiers
to sue as Gulf War illness strikes again
By Michael Evans, Defence Editor
THE Government is facing a fresh round of allegations concerning
Gulf War syndrome, this time from service personnel committed to
the latest military campaign against Iraq.
At least four soldiers, two of them reservists and two from the
regular Army, have approached lawyers to seek advice about suing
the Ministry of Defence after falling ill when they were given
multiple vaccinations. Other servicemen contacted the same legal
firm yesterday and described the same symptoms, which included
breathing difficulties, skin rashes and depression.
Veterans who have been fighting for compensation since the 1991
Gulf War predicted yesterday that about 6,000 of the 45,000 British
personnel committed to this year’s campaign could fall sick
from the multiple doses of vaccines.
Tony
Flint, of the National Gulf Veterans and Families’
Association, said he expected that up to 30 per cent of the 22,000
British troops given the anthrax jab and other inoculations would
suffer ill-effects. He based this prediction on what he said was
the American experience.
1,200 more in Canada under quarantine
Straits Times
TORONTO (AP) -- More than a
thousand people were told to quarantine themselves at home on
Tuesday due to possible exposure to a new cluster of Sars cases in
Toronto, health officials said here.Ontario's chief medical officer
of health Colin D'Cunha said on Tuesday that the authorities told
an additional 1,200 people to quarantine themselves at home for 10
days due to possible exposure to the new Sars cluster.
The
additions raised the overall quarantine figure to 3,442 and
included 70 in the Muskoka-Parry Sound area, 150 km north of the
city.The nine probable cases and 23 suspected cases of severe acute
respiratory syndrome first identified last week put Canada's
largest city back on the World Health Organisation's list of
Sars-affected areas.Three more probable cases from the initial
Toronto outbreak also remained hospitalised.[...]
Despite the spread of
possible exposures, Dr D'Cunha stressed that all the known cases
occurred in hospitals.'There's no evidence to date of community
transmission,' he said.
AIDS Activist sues US
governement
SAN
DIEGO (Wireless Flash) -- An AIDS activist who is convinced the
U.S. government is behind the spread of the virus is finally
getting his day in court. Dr. Boyd Graves is suing the government
for creating AIDS and will
finally present his case before a San Diego judge on June 27.
[...]
Taiwan reports 14 new Sars cases, five more
deaths
The
Straits Times
TAIPEI (AFP) -- Taiwan's
health authorities on Wednesday reported 14 new cases of Severe
Acute Respiratory Syndrome and five new deaths, taking the toll on
the island to 81 from 610 cases.[...]
Up
to 95 per cent of Sars cases on the island have come from outbreaks
in hospitals...
Chrétien
talks about Bush's differences
CBC
ATHENS - Prime Minister
Jean Chrétien told reporters on a flight to Europe Tuesday,
that he and the U.S. president have many opposing views on several
matters.
Chrétien pointed out:
"I am a Catholic and for abortion and he is not."
"He
is right wing and running a big deficit (while) Canada has balanced
its books and ensured the future of the Canada Pension Plan for the
next 50 years by increasing contributions.
"Chrétien was headed
to Athens to attend the annual Canada-European Union summit.Bush is
"for capital punishment and I am not," the prime minister
added.Chrétien and Bush spoke by phone on Monday, their first
conversation in three months.
"Look, I don't have to
speak to him every day and he doesn't have to speak to me,"
Chrétien said.He added the differences have not harmed the
mutual $1-billion-a-day trans-border trade relation or Canada's
reputation.
Chrétien pointed out
that Canada is recognized for its global contributions and remains
an influential voice internationally.
Dispute Arises Over
Mideast Summit Date
By
MARK LAVIE
Associated Press Writer
JERUSALEM - Palestinian
leader Yasser Arafat stepped in to assert Tuesday that he not his
prime minister — is in charge of the Palestinian side in
negotiations with Israel, throwing plans for an Israeli-Palestinian
summit into confusion.
The
dispute underlined the power struggle between Arafat and Mahmoud
Abbas, the prime minister he grudgingly appointed under
international pressure, as efforts to move forward on a new peace
plan intensified.Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had
been set to hold talks Wednesday on implementing the U.S.-backed
"road map" peace plan — their second meeting since Abbas
assumed office in April.
But
at a meeting of the PLO executive committee, Arafat said he wanted
to review Israeli proposals on security arrangements before
approving another summit — raising the possibility of a
delay, a member of the committee said on condition of
anonymity.Afterward, Palestinian Cabinet Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo
said the summit was on for Wednesday as planned.But Sharon aide
Raanan Gissin denied that. "There will be no meeting Wednesday," he
told The Associated Press. Israel Radio reported the summit would
take place Thursday, but officials in Sharon's office said no date
has been set. The Israelis had no further comment.[...]
Sharon on Tuesday clarified
a comment that caused a stir a day before — when he referred
to Israeli "occupation" in the West Bank for the first time, a term
often used by Palestinians and their dovish Israeli backers.In a
statement, Sharon said he was referring to Israeli rule over
Palestinians as opposed to Israeli rule over the land, underlining
his policy that Israel must retain strategic parts of the West
Bank. Palestinians demand a total Israeli pullout.In a speech
Tuesday, Sharon said, "We are not occupiers. This is the homeland
of the Jewish people."[...]
In
the West Bank, Israeli troops killed a 16-year-old they said was
throwing a firebomb. Two children, ages 7 and 9, were critically
wounded in clashes with the military, Palestinian hospital
officials said.
Five
Palestinian children, a Palestinian woman and a police officer were
injured Tuesday after accidentally detonating explosives in the
West Bank city of Hebron. The children found the explosives under a
tree...
Roadmap
or Road Kill?
By
Kareem M. Kamel
Researcher - International Relations
[...] In essence, the
"roadmap" can be seen as part of a US public relations campaign in
the Middle East, to try to convince skeptics that the US is indeed
engaged in the quest for Middle East so-called peace. The roadmap
claims that it seeks reciprocal Palestinian and Israeli steps
towards peace - beginning with Palestinian reform, an unconditional
end to all Palestinian resistance to Israel, Israeli troop
withdrawals, a freeze on settlement activity (not the dismantling
of existing illegal settlements), and proceeding eventually to
negotiations on an interim arrangement that would create a
Palestinian state with provisional borders. [...]
Sharon the lion and the lamb
By
Abraham Rabinovich
Is PM Sharon's acceptance of the peace plan just a political ploy
or is it something that stems from an inner conviction?
JERUSALEM - In a land that
has seen its share of miracles, Mr Ariel Sharon's apparent
political conversion over the weekend is viewed with an
astonishment normally reserved for phenomenon like the parting of
the Red Sea.
Sharon "the bulldozer" was responsible for the construction of many
settlements.
Some Israelis regard his sudden acceptance of the
internationally-backed 'road map' as a tactical move, short on
intent and long on rhetoric.
But
it is precisely the rhetoric that is so astonishing.
Addressing members of his
Likud Knesset faction, most of whom were balking at the peace
plan's terms, Mr Sharon said on Monday that Israel's presence in
the West Bank and Gaza Strip amounted to 'occupation'.
Though outsiders would
regard this as a straightforward description, the Israeli right -
of which Mr Sharon is a prominent member - has always viewed the
conquest of the West Bank, heartland of biblical Israel, as a
liberation of a land that belongs to the Jews.
'There are 3.5 million
Palestinians living under occupation,' Mr Sharon told the
right-wing Knesset members.
'Yes, occupation. It is bad
for Israel and for the Palestinians and for the Israeli
economy.'
Initial reaction among
Israelis and Palestinians to Mr Sharon's embrace of the road map is
that it is a political ploy.
If
Palestinian terror does not derail the peace initiative, according
to this view, Israeli reservations would have the same
effect.
In
reluctantly approving the peace plan on Sunday by a 12-7 vote with
four abstentions, the Cabinet insisted on attaching to it 14
reservations, most of them unacceptable to the
Palestinians.
What
gives sceptics pause is Mr Sharon's new tone which appears to
suggest that he is not being dragged into a peace process but that
he is borne by an inner conviction.
US
pressure, however, will play a major role and the planned summit
meeting next week of Mr Sharon, President Bush and Palestinian
Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas will be critical in determining how
the peace process unfurls.
Even
right-wing Israelis would have understood it if Mr Sharon had bowed
to US pressure as a tactical necessity.
They
would have expected some bland comment about seeking peace,
accompanied by a wink suggesting that Palestinian terror will leave
this peace plan in the dust, as with all previous ones.
Comment: Of course this is exactly what Sharon has been able to
rely on to date, the seeminlgly incredible stupidity of Palestianas
who continually shoot themselves in the foot by carrying out
"suicide bombings" at precisely the right time to scupper the
various peace processes and "unfortunately" forcing the Israelis to
abandon any ideas of relinquising the occupied territories.
Generally the suicide attacks are perpetrated by Hamas, a groups
which, also conincidentally, was
founded
and financed by the Israeli government
itself.
Arafat asserts
authority, throwing plans for summit into confusion
03:29 AM EDT May 28
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in the West Bank city of Ramallah
Monday. (AP/Muhammed Muheisen)
MARK LAVIE
JERUSALEM (AP) - Palestinian President Yasser Arafat stepped in
to assert Tuesday that he - not his prime minister - is in charge
of the Palestinian side in negotiations with Israel, throwing plans
for an Israeli-Palestinian summit into confusion.
The
dispute underlined the power struggle between Arafat and Mahmoud
Abbas, the prime minister he grudgingly appointed under
international pressure, as efforts to move forward on a new peace
plan intensified.
Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had been set to
hold talks Wednesday on implementing the U.S.-backed "road map"
peace plan - their second meeting since Abbas assumed office in
April.
But
at a meeting of the Palestine Liberation Organization's executive
committee, Arafat said he wanted to review Israeli proposals on
security arrangements before approving another summit - raising the
possibility of a delay, a member of the committee said on condition
of anonymity.
Afterward, Palestinian cabinet member Yasser Abed Rabbo said
the summit was on for Wednesday as planned.
But
Sharon aide Raanan Gissin denied that. "There will be no meeting
Wednesday," he told The Associated Press. Israel radio reported the
summit would take place Thursday, but officials in Sharon's office
said no date has been set. The Israelis had no further
comment.
U.S.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said he had been told
the Sharon-Abbas meeting was postponed "for technical reasons." And
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said he "would not be surprised
if a bilateral meeting still took place in the near
future."
The
PLO executive member said that with the jockeying over the summit,
Arafat was sending a message to the United States, Israel and Abbas
that Arafat makes the decisions over negotiations.
Arafat has been fighting a rearguard action to limit Abbas'
powers - objecting to the makeup of his cabinet, retaining control
of most Palestinian security forces and keeping for himself the
final word over peace moves.
The
law that brought in Abbas in April limits his authority and gives
the PLO executive the right of approval over negotiating steps with
Israel. Arafat controls the executive, where Abbas is his
deputy.
Israel and the United States have been seeking to sideline
Arafat, charging that he is tainted by terrorism and has led his
Palestinian Authority into corruption and inefficiency.
In
an interview with the Israeli daily Haaretz, published on the
newspaper's Web site late Tuesday, Abbas spoke out in support of
Arafat.
"Arafat is the elected president of the Palestinian Authority
and should not be isolated," he said, calling on Israel to release
Arafat from a virtual house arrest in his West Bank
headquarters.
Sharon and Abbas met on May 17, the first Israeli-Palestinian
summit meeting since the violence erupted in September 2000. No
agreements emerged.
Meanwhile, officials are arranging a three-way summit with U.S.
President George W. Bush, Sharon and Abbas early next month,
possibly in Jordan.
Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said Tuesday that
concrete results could be expected. Bush "would not bother coming
all the way out here to leave without a decision of some kind,"
Shalom told Israel TV.
Abed
Rabbo said he hoped the trilateral summit would result in
implementation of the peace plan.
Jordan's information minister said Bush would hold a three-way
summit as well as a separate meeting with Egypt and Jordan's
leaders next week in Jordan. But the White House said Bush is still
considering a number of possibilities.
Meanwhile, violence continued Tuesday.
In
the West Bank, Israeli troops killed a 16-year-old they said was
throwing a firebomb. Two children, ages 7 and 9, were critically
wounded in clashes with the military, Palestinian hospital
officials said.
Five
Palestinian children, a Palestinian woman and a police officer were
injured Tuesday after accidentally detonating explosives in the
West Bank city of Hebron.
Late
Monday, Israeli soldiers fired on four diplomatic vehicles in the
northern Gaza town of Beit Hanoun, diplomats said. No one was hurt.
Peter Lundberg, an official from the Swedish Consulate in
Jerusalem, said two bullets hit the windshield of the Swiss
Consulate's armoured car, and diplomatic cars of Sweden, Denmark
and the European Union also came under fire.
The
military expressed regret, saying soldiers fired to break up a
crowd of Palestinians and bullets inadvertently hit the diplomat's
vehicle.
The
road map is a three-stage U.S.-backed plan that calls for the
creation of a full Palestinian state in 2005. The first stage calls
for a halt to violence. Israel conditionally accepted the plan
Sunday, a month after the Palestinians approved the formula and
insisted it be implemented unchanged.
At
the United Nations, Secretary General Kofi Annan called Israel's
acceptance of the road map "a very encouraging
development."
Israel, however, has raised 14 reservations about the plan,
including a demand that only the United States should oversee
implementation of the road map - not the other members of the
"Quartet" - the UN, Russia and the European Union.
"It
is something we will tackle as we move forward," Annan said when
asked about that demand.
Sharon on Tuesday clarified a comment that caused a stir a day
before - when he referred to Israeli "occupation" in the West Bank
for the first time, a term often used by Palestinians and their
Israeli backers.
In a
statement, Sharon said he was referring to Israeli rule over
Palestinians as opposed to Israeli rule over the land, underlining
his policy that Israel must retain strategic parts of the West
Bank. Palestinians demand a total Israeli pullout.
Sharon said: "We are not occupiers. This is the homeland of the
Jewish people."
In
the interview, Abbas said he would not judge Sharon by his
statements. "I know Sharon inside and out," said Abbas, who has met
Sharon several times. "I'll believe him only when he implements the
road map."
The
Hardness of Condoleezza Rice: Huckstress of Israeli
Myth
By KURT NIMMO
CounterPunch
In
an interview with the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot, National
Security Adviser and daughter of a Presbyterian minister,
Condoleezza Rice, recently expanded upon her Christian Zionist
ideology. "I first visited Israel in 2000. I already then felt that
I am returning home despite the fact that this was a place I never
visited. I have a deep affinity with Israel. I have always admired
the history of the State of Israel and the hardness and
determination of the people that founded it."
While Rice does not
elaborate on this "hardness and determination," or provide
specifics, we can safely assume she is talking about Israel's
relationship with the Arabs, both Palestinian and those surrounding
the Zionist state. "Israel was a state who in the beginning was not
given a chance to survive," Rice explained. "She survived mainly
because of the hardness of the Israelis and their readiness to
sacrifice their lives for the state."
Rice
may know something about Russia, her area of expertise, but when it
comes to the history of Palestine and Israel she appears to be
seriously misinformed. Rice is simply perpetuating the overworked
myth of hardscrabble Zionists rising above the hatred of
duplicitous Arabs.
In
fact, the British promoted the economic destabilization of the
indigenous Palestinian economy in favor of Zionist settlers as a
colonial tactic well before the creation of Israel. "The Mandatory
Government granted a privileged status to Jewish capital, awarding
it 90% of the concessions in Palestine," writes Ralph Schoenman
(The Hidden History of Zionism). "This enabled the Zionists to gain
control of the economic infrastructure (road projects, Dead Sea
minerals, electricity, ports, etc.). By 1935, Zionists controlled
872 of a total of 1,212 industrial firms in Palestine. Imports
related to Zionist industries were exempted from taxes.
Discriminatory work laws were passed against the Arab workforce
resulting in large scale unemployment and a substandard existence
for those who were able to find employment."[...]
In
the meantime, the Palestinians continue to suffer at the hands of
rabid Likudites determined to realize a Greater Israel. Once again,
the accused war criminal Ariel Sharon appears to hold out an olive
branch, proclaiming on Israeli radio that to "keep 3.5 million
people under occupation is bad for us and them... This can't
continue endlessly. Do you want to remain forever in Ramallah,
Jenin, Nablus?"
As
Sharon made these seemingly reasonable comments, the ugly head of
Israeli occupation reared once again: Samer Arar, an 11 year old
boy from the West Bank village of Krawat Bani Zeid was executed for
the crime of throwing stones.
Is
it possible the killing of children is the sort of "hardness and
determination" Condoleezza Rice had in mind when she mentioned her
emotional attachment to the state of Israel?
The Bad Weather Over
America
James Carroll
Boston Globe
WHEN
WILL the bad weather end? Why the distance between what is and what
ought to be? Where are Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass
destruction? If he was such a threat, why did his army perform so
poorly? Does it matter where he is? If the war in Iraq was not
about oil, why does the United States insist on its indefinite
control? If the war was, instead, about democracy, why are the
Iraqi people, including Saddam's proven enemies, excluded from
authority? Is Iraq to be like Afghanistan, where war lords rule and
heroin thrives? Are there more suicide-bombers now than ever? Has
the American war on terrorism advanced safety? How did relations
between the United States and its European allies become so
fragile? Will history recognize the 21st century Anglo-American
combine as a mere continuation of the 19th century British Empire?
What do good intentions count for if they cut a wake of wreckage?
And is the bad weather the result of an atmospheric low that will
not lift without the answers? ....
Global Eye -- Devil's Advocate
By
Chris Floyd
Too little attention has been paid to a remarkable declaration by
George W. Bush in his State of the Union address last January. In
between great lardbuckets of warmongering lies and vacuous
preening, Bush also delivered this ringing passage: "We do not
claim to know all the ways of Providence, yet we can trust in them,
placing our confidence in the loving God behind all of life, and
all of history."
Dismissed at first as either a bit of overheated rhetorical
trumpery or else a slab of coded red meat thrown to his voracious
"core constituency" on the hard Christian Right, Bush's declaration
is in fact a powerful tool for understanding what otherwise seems
to be the irredeemably chaotic nature of human reality. In essence,
his masterful philosophy can be boiled down to this: "God did
it."
For
example, last week Iraqis began unearthing a mass grave that could
contain up to 15,000 bodies of Shiites slaughtered during an
uprising against Saddam Hussein in 1991. Some heretics might want
to blame Saddam for this atrocity, or even assign partial blame to
George H.W. Bush, who specifically called on these Shiites to
rebel, then betrayed them, granting the just-conquered Saddam
permission to use his full military might against the rebels, while
a vast American army stood by, motionless, in Kuwait. But now,
thanks to Bush Junior's revelation of divine agency behind every
single act in history, we know that neither ex-CIA asset Saddam nor
his long-time supporter and sugar daddy Bush Senior were in any way
responsible for those corpses moldering in the desert wastes. God
did it.
It's
all so simple, isn't it? So blindingly clear, so infinitely
comforting. Feel free to try it at home. Take any situation you
please and run it through the patented George W. Bush God Did It
meat-grinder. You'll find a neat little patty of moral clarity on
the other end, ready to fry up in a creamy sauce of red wine,
onions, amnesia and self-absolution.
Big
event or private failing, it doesn't matter. That father who just
slammed his infant's head into a wall? All part of God's plan --
for verily, His loving hand is behind all of life and all of
history. The Holocaust? Surely it goes it without saying that those
6 million Jews weren't killed by the Nazi regime, nor that any of
the American financial elitists -- such as the Bush Family -- who
made millions of dollars bankrolling Nazi enterprises while
American soldiers were dying on the battlefield, were in any degree
responsible for what seemed to be their own actions. No, you poor,
misguided, Satan-deceived wretches -- God did it, don't you
see?
And
the Sept. 11 attacks? Again, no true believer could ever hold
Mohammed Atta or ex-CIA asset Osama bin Laden responsible --
especially not for an act which, as many Bushist evangelicals now
openly avow, was a blessing for America, because it greatly
augmented the powers and popularity of the man the Lord Himself has
appointed to lead the nation -- yea, the world -- to a new Promised
Land of peace and prosperity. No: God killed those 3,000 innocent
people, He burned them, He crushed them, He flung them out of
windows hundreds of meters in the air. It was His loving hand, that
same hand behind all of life and all of history.
This
divine principle applies equally to acts of omission, as well as
commission. Consider Bush's "war on terror." It's true, the anthrax
killer has not been caught. Osama bin Laden has not been caught (in
fact, he's busier than ever). Mullah Omar has not been caught.
Saddam Hussein has not been caught. It's true, Afghanistan has
collapsed again into anarchy, rampant warlordism, fierce Islamic
extremism, hopelessness, violence, despair. It's true, Iraq is
collapsing into anarchy, incipient warlordism, fierce Islamic
extremism, hopelessness, violence, despair.
But
none of this has anything to do with the staggering, criminal
incompetence of the Bush Regime in gutting legitimate domestic
security measures at home -- both before and after Sept. 11 -- and
launching mindless foreign adventures aimed largely at thrusting
American military power into the world's oil regions, regardless of
the consequences. No; it is without doubt the will of the loving
God behind all of life and all of history.
When -- and if -- He wants these miscreants to be caught, they will
be caught. For now, He is quite content to let them roam the earth
and murder more innocent people. When -- and if -- He wants to
relieve the suffering of the Afghan and Iraqi peoples, He will do
it.
For
now, He is happy to watch children blow themselves to pieces with
brightly colored cluster bombs. There's nothing that His faithful
servant, George W. Bush, can do about any of this. He is not to
blame; God did it. We are all merely automatons, pushed hither and
yon by the all-encompassing wisdom of His totalitarian
order.
Yes,
on the surface, this all sounds like the self-justifying moral
onanism of a complacent, pampered, willfully ignorant upper-class
twit -- but it is actually one of the most profound and
earth-scorching expressions of religious nihilism ever uttered by a
public figure. Stepping far beyond Nietzsche, who merely asserted
that God is dead, Bush's philosophy declares that God is a
lust-maddened, child-devouring demon, glutted with the blood and
bones of the innocent; the malevolent agent of every atrocity ever
committed in "all of life and all of history."
Does
Jerry Falwell know about this?
Fourteen
Defining Characteristics Of Fascism
By
Dr. Lawrence Britt
Source Free Inquiry.co
Dr.
Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler
(Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia)
and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defining
characteristics common to each:
1.
Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make
constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and
other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols
on clothing and in public displays.
2.
Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of
enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes
are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases
because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even
approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long
incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3.
Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The
people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need
to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or
religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists,
etc.
4.
Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread
domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount
of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected.
Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
5.
Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be
almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes,
traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and
homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the
ultimate guardian of the family institution.
6.
Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled
by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly
controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media
spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is
very common.
7.
Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational
tool by the government over the masses.
8.
Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist
nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a
tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and
terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major
tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the
government's policies or actions.
9.
Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business
aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the
government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial
business/government relationship and power elite.
10.
Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor
is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are
either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
11.
Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to
promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and
academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to
be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and
letters is openly attacked.
12.
Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the
police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people
are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil
liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national
police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist
nations.
13.
Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are
governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other
to government positions and use governmental power and authority to
protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in
fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be
appropriated or even outright stolen by government
leaders.
14.
Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a
complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear
campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates,
use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district
boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also
typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control
elections.
Supreme Court backs police in Miranda case
March 27, 2003
Associated Press
Washington — A
fractured U.S. Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that a police officer
did not violate the rights of a gravely wounded farm worker by
interrogating him at the hospital without reading him his Miranda
rights.
Oliverio Martinez, however,
may still be allowed to collect damages on grounds that his
constitutional due-process rights were violated by the 1997
hospital-room questioning, the court said in sending the case back
to California for more consideration.
Mr.
Martinez was shot five times by police and then subjected to a
lengthy interrogation as he awaited medical treatment. He was never
told of his rights, and he says a police sergeant kept questioning
him even after he said that he did not want to answer.Mr. Martinez,
who was never charged with a crime, was left blind and
paralyzed.Justice John Paul Stevens compared the interrogation to
"an attempt to obtain an involuntary confession from a prisoner by
torturous methods." [...]
Comment:
First they install Bushy in the White House, and now they back
police torture. The highest court in the United States - the
supreme legal authority, the dispenser of justice, the protector of
those wonderful freedoms enjoyed by all Americans - has been bought
and paid for by the Bush Reich.
US money
funding Uzbeki torture chambers
BELIEVE IT OR NOT: The Bush
administration, in its zeal to put an end to Islamists in the
country, is providing aid to the remnants of communist-era
Brezhnevism
THE
GUARDIAN
[...] The US condemned this
repression for many years. But since Sept. 11 rewrote America's
strategic interests in central Asia, the government of President
Islam Karimov has become Washington's new best friend in the
region.
The US is funding those it once condemned. Last year Washington
gave Uzbekistan US$500 million in aid. The police and intelligence
services -- which the US Department of State's Web site says use
"torture as a routine investigation technique" has received US$79
million of this sum. [...]
Ashcroft hails Supreme Court
action
By
Michael Kirkland
UPI Legal Affairs Correspondent
(UPI) -- Attorney General
John Ashcroft saluted the Supreme Court's rejection Tuesday of a
challenge to closed deportation hearings for "special interest"
aliens detained in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror
attacks.
He
said the Justice Department now has successfully defended against
repeated legal challenges to its post-Sept. 11 policies.Since the
attacks, "the Department of Justice has used all legal tools
available to disrupt and neutralize potential terrorist threats by
removing dangerous individuals who have broken our nation's laws
from the streets of our communities," Ashcroft said in a statement
released after the Supreme Court's action."
Time
and again, the department has successfully defended legal
challenges to the tools we have used and actions we have taken to
protect the American people. The Supreme Court today refused to
disturb a 3rd Circuit ruling that is an important victory in
support of our work to secure the nation."A media consortium in New
Jersey had argued in the lower courts that the public and the media
had a First Amendment right to know what was going on in the
deportation hearings for "special interest" aliens.Though a federal
judge in New Jersey agreed, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals
for the 3rd Circuit disagreed. Tuesday, the Supreme Court let stand
the appeals court decision without comment...
Found: Phoenix
Program Documents
supplied and introduced by
Douglas Valentine
author of The Phoenix Program
memoryhole.org
Created by the CIA in
Saigon in 1967, Phoenix was a program aimed at "neutralizing" -
through assassination, kidnapping, and systematic torture - the
civilian infrastructure that supported the Viet Cong insurgency in
South Vietnam. It was a terrifying "final solution" that violated
the Geneva Conventions and traditional American ideas of human
morality.
While researching the
Phoenix Program for my book on the subject, I conducted over a
hundred interviews and collected boxes full of documents from
individuals, as well as from the State Department and Department of
Defense. The most important documents provided by any one
individual came from retired CIA officer Nelson Brickham, the man
most responsibile for the creation of the Phoenix Program.
Luckily for history, Brickham kept copies of the documents he wrote
while with the CIA; otherwise, there would be no documentary
evidence of how Phoenix was actually created. During the evacuation
of Saigon in April 1975, the CIA destroyed most of the documents it
had about its assassination program, and none of what it kept at
Langley headquarters can be obtained through Freedom of Information
Act requests. This is no accident, for Phoenix is the model for the
equally terrifying US homeland security aparatus.
Proposal: Webcams
to keep homeland safe
SAN
JOSE, California (AP) -- Jay Walker jump-started an online shopping
craze by inventing Priceline.com, the Web site that lets people bid
on airplane tickets and hotel rooms.
Now
Walker is hoping his newest brainchild revolutionizes a completely
different field: national security.The premise behind Walker's
USHomeGuard is simple: America has 47,000 power plants, airports
and other "critical infrastructure facilities.
"Walker believes a
terrorist can get within 100 feet of most of them, unchallenged and
undetected, and kill or injure thousands.But if onsite cameras
beamed photos to the World Wide Web, Americans could monitor these
sites from home. If they spied a potential attacker -- a masked man
trying to scale a power plant fence, or a van parked next to a
reservoir -- they could alert security agents with a click of the
mouse. Agents would call local authorities and help avert
disaster.
Walker envisions spotters
getting up to $10 per hour, paid by the government agencies and
companies that need protecting. He wants to sell USHomeGuard to the
federal government for $1, then charge fees to run the
system.Critics dismiss USHomeGuard as a doomed scheme that exploits
September 11 paranoia. Others question the effectiveness of a
security system built on the Internet -- itself vulnerable to
hackers, power outages and congestion...
Airport rolls out biometric
security
England (CNN) -- London
City Airport has become one of the first in Europe to establish
biometric security access for its 1,600 employees.
Initially the system will
only be used for staff, although "it could easily be rolled out to
include all passengers," Jenny Lloyd of London City Airport told
CNN.The system, designed by identity management company Daon, uses
fingerprint recognition and a photo ID card to identify a unique
data pattern for each scan. Actual fingerprints are not stored to
preserve privacy.
"It
will make this airport one of the most secure in Europe," Oliver
Tattan, Chief Executive Officer of Daon said in a statement.[...]
"Biometrics have been used as just a single point system, but
that's useless, it's like putting a door in the middle of a plain,
people just walk round it," Tatton told Computing
magazine.
The
weak global economy is also taking its toll on the roll out of
biometric initiatives. Many businesses and government agencies are
postponing orders for new security systems or even updating
existing ones.
[...] Earlier this month G8
states -- Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the
United States and Russia -- agreed to develop a new high-tech
passport to help the fight against terrorism.However, Britain
warned against rushing to meet a U.S. deadline of October 2004. The
identity documents could include fingerprints and details of the
bearer's iris, as well as a photograph.
Stating the
Obvious
By
PAUL KRUGMAN
New York Times
The
lunatics are now in charge of the asylum." So wrote the normally
staid Financial Times, traditionally the voice of solid British
business opinion, when surveying last week's tax bill. Indeed, the
legislation is doubly absurd: the gimmicks used to make an
$800-billion-plus tax cut carry an official price tag of only $320
billion are a joke, yet the cost without the gimmicks is so large
that the nation can't possibly afford it while keeping its other
promises.
But then maybe that's the point. The Financial Times suggests that
"more extreme Republicans" actually want a fiscal train wreck:
"Proposing to slash federal spending, particularly on social
programs, is a tricky electoral proposition, but a fiscal crisis
offers the tantalizing prospect of forcing such cuts through the
back door."
Why the boom in
drugs? CIA Bribe Neutralized Baghdad
A
peek into how the US fights wars?
ARIS: These are not the
smart bombs, intelligent bunker busters or the valiant US soldiers
who fought well to capture the Iraqi capital and overthrow the
regime of Saddam Hussein. These were the dollars of CIA, probably
earned through the drugs, lavishly distributed amongst the Baathist
leaders for a deal leading to the surrender Baghdad.
One
of Saddam Hussein’s cousins, Special Republican Guard chief
Maher Sufian Al-Tikriti, betrayed the deposed Iraqi leader by
ordering his elite forces not to defend Baghdad after making a deal
with the United States, the French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche
reported yesterday.
Citing an Iraqi source
close to Saddam’s former regime, the newspaper said that the
general, responsible for defending the Iraqi capital, left Baghdad
aboard a US military transport plane, bound for a US base outside
Iraq.
His
departure, along with that of a 20-strong entourage, came on April
8 — the day before US forces swept into Baghdad, and after US
Marines announced that the general had been killed, the paper
reported.
Before he left Baghdad,
following the capture of the capital’s international airport
on April 4, Sufian ordered his troops to lay down their weapons,
another Iraqi general, Mahdi Abdullah Al-Dulaimi, was quoted as
saying.
Sufian does not appear on
the US military’s list of most wanted Iraqis, which names
Barzan Al-Ghafur Sulayman Majid as commander of the Special
Republican Guard.
An
Arab diplomat told Le Journal du Dimanche that the plot was hatched
more than a year before by the US Central Intelligence Agency
(CIA), noting: “Many suitcases filled with dollars were
floating around.”
“Being cautious,
those who accepted the deal only agreed to defect once the American
soldiers were in sight. The signal was to be the taking of the
airport in Baghdad,” the diplomat added.
In
Baghdad, the US military said yesterday it had captured a suspected
ringleader behind attacks on coalition troops in the flashpoint
Iraqi city of Fallujah, and nabbed 17 others.
FlashBack: Hidden Agenda Behind the "War on
Terrorism":
By Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research
May 20, 2002
US Bombing of Afghanistan
Restores Trade in Narcotics
In
2000, the Taliban government under advice from the United Nations
Drug Control Program (UNDCP) imposed a total ban on opium
production. Prior to the ban, according to the US Drug Enforcement
Agency (DEA) Afghanistan produced more than 70% of the world's
opium in 2000, and about 80% of opiate products (meaning heroin)
destined to the European market.1
The
annual proceeds of the Afghan Golden Crescent drug trade (between
100 and 200 billion dollars) represented approximately one third of
the worldwide annual turnover of narcotics, estimated by the United
Nations to be of the order of $500 billion.2
In
many regards, the trade in narcotics as well as the drug routes to
the European and North American markets are considered to be
"strategic". There are powerful financial interests behind the drug
trade, which have a pervasive influence, behind the scenes, on the
conduct of US foreign policy. These multibillion dollar revenues of
narcotics were deposited in the Western banking system. Most of the
large international banks -together with their affiliates in the
offshore banking havens-laundered large amounts of narco-dollars.
In other words, Afghanistan, the poorest country on earth, was the
source of tremendous financial wealth derived from the drug trade
to financial institutions, business syndicates and organised crime.
Part of the drug related revenues accrue to the CIA, which
continues to protect both the Asian and Latin American drug trade.
Visibly, only a very small percentage of these revenues stays in
Afghanistan.
Following the year 2000 ban
on poppy production imposed by the Taliban government, opium
production collapsed by more than 90 percent, leading to a
dwindling drug trade and substantial losses to the inters
underlying this multibillion dollar trade including Western
financial institutions.3 The Northern Alliance became the main
political force involved in protecting the production and marketing
of raw opium.
The
Drug Trade Restored by the US Puppet Regime
While oil and oil pipelines
out of the Caspian sea basin were undoubtedly a factor, the bombing
of Afghanistan also served to restore the multibillion drug trade,
which is protected by the CIA. Immediately following the
installation of the US puppet government under Prime Minister Hamid
Kharzai, opium production soared, regaining its historic levels.
According to the UNDCP, opium cultivation increased by 657 % in
2002 (in relation to its 2001 level). In 2001, opium cultivation
had fallen to an estimated 7606ha.(See table below). It is
currently estimated by the UNDCP to be of the order of 45 000 -65
000ha.
In
the immediate wake of September 11, the price of opium in
Afghanistan increased three-fold. By early 2002, the price
(dollar/kg) was almost ten times higher than in the year
2000.
State
of emergency declared in Peru
Last
Updated Wed, 28 May 2003
LIMA, PERU - Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo declared a
30-day state of emergency across Peru on Tuesday.
"The
country cannot be shut down," Toledo said in a televised
address.
Peru
has been crippled by a series of strikes by health care workers,
farmers, teachers and judiciary personnel. On Monday, strikers
disrupted traffic by placing boulders across stretches of highway
and caused further mayhem by burning tires.
The
farmers seek protection from imports and lower sales taxes on
certain crops, while other strikers are demanding higher wages. The
government has also faced protest by coca farmers who don't want
their cocaine-producing crop eradicated. This is the second
time Toledo has declared a state of emergency.
'Three
dead' as aftershock rattles Algeria
Tuesday 27th May 2003
21:08
Ananova(AP) - A strong
earthquake aftershock has rocked Algiers, reportedly killing at
least three people and leaving 187 injured.
State radio, quoting
Algerian geological officials, said the aftershock had a magnitude
of 5.8 and was the strongest of several to hit the area since last
Wednesday's quake.
The
aftershock was felt throughout the damaged zone east of the
capital. In the quake-ravaged town of Boumerdes, at least one home
collapsed.In one hotel in Algiers, panicked visitors ran out of the
building fearing it would collapse and hotel workers huddled
together to comfort each other.
Many
residents have fled their homes and are living in the streets or in
tents set up in parks out of fear that aftershocks may cause
unstable buildings to topple over.
Freak rains hit
Florida:
Fort
lauderdale airport reported 9.18 inches of rain as of 8:00 pm. This
breaks the old record of 3.10 inches set in 1954.
Passengers in terror as hailstorm batters
jet
PASSENGERS on a flight from Cyprus said yesterday that they thought
their aircraft was about to crash when it was battered by giant
hailstones on its way to Manchester.
The violent weather stove in the nose cone on the bmi Airbus A321
and cracked the windscreen. Passengers were thrown from their seats
as the aircraft descended rapidly to a safer altitude.
Pat
Mallon, 56, a medical secretary, who was on the Monday evening
flight from Larnaca, said: “We suddenly started to dip like a
rollercoaster and were lifted from our seats.
“As I looked to the left there was a man on the floor
sliding towards the cockpit. As I looked to the right there were
several elderly people on the floor but they were told to stay down
because it was safer there.” Mrs Mallon, from Swinton,
Manchester, added: “It was a terrifying experience for a few
minutes. I really thought we were going down.”
Bruce Johnstone, 47, a photo-journalist who was travelling to
Manchester for a family wedding, said: “If I had not been
strapped in I would have bounced off the ceiling.
“People were thrown out of their seats. Some people were
in the aisles on the floor. I was just hanging on for dear
life.
“We had hit hail, blocks of ice. We heard it and it
sounded like a machinegun.”
“The pilot said that it was the worst thing he had flown
into in 20 years. But he said, ‘Don’t let that put you
off flying’.
Bird attack on
German woman recalls Hitchcock frightener
A German woman was attacked by a flock of crows, police said, in
scenes reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock's natural horror movie The
Birds.
The 24-year-old was walking her dog through a park in the
northern city of Hamburg when "the birds swooped down on her and
tried to peck at her head and neck," police said in their report on
the incident.
When
the woman returned to the park with police, the flock of some 20
crows were perched on a tree.
But as she approached, they again swarmed around her,
strangely leaving the police officers and dog alone.
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