Det danske Fredsakademi
Kronologi over fredssagen og international politik maj 2004 / Timeline May, 2004
Version 3.0
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05/01/2004
Det er nu tolv måneder siden, at USAs præsident Bush
erklærede krigen i Irak for vundet.
05/01/2004
Præsident Bush har skabt en overhængende ririko for, at
den irakiske konflikt smelter sammen med den
israelsk-palæstinensiske konflikt og skaber én stor
uoverskuelig mellemøstlig konflikt, udtaler norges tidligere
stats- og udenrigsminister Thorbjørn Jagland til
Information.
05/01/2004
Books Not Bombs
The University of California in Santa Barbara where I live had an
exciting confrontation with the Army, Airforce and Coast Guard
recruiting officers. They wanted to recruit students promising an
officers training. Students for Peace demonstrated and
convinced the UNI administration to order the recruiters to leave
the campus. One of the posters of the protesters said BOOKS NOT
BOMBS.
The Chief Planer of the war in Iraq the neo conservative Vice
President Dick Cheney never fought in the Vietnam war since he was
able to obtain four deferments for his draft call.
Peter Carbone a columnist mentioned there are Neo Nazis in Germany
und now Neo Conservatives in the Bush Troica.
The 130 pictures of the flag draped wooden boxes with the dead
soldiers were released to the media without the Pentagon or White
House permission.A bureaucratic mistake under the Freedom of
Information Act. The military burial ceremonies were not seen in
the press or on TV.
A growing number of US soldiers crossed the Canadian borders in
civilian clothing. They are allowed to stay and have work permits.
Several polls state that 60 % of voters believe it was a mistake to
start a war against Iraq and the USA cannot win this high priced
war, writes Kurt Singer.
05/01/2004
EU udvides med ti østeuropæiske lande.
05/02/2004
There are shocking new details of torture by US troops
by Peter Beaumont, Kamal Ahmed and Chris Stephens
© 2004 The Observer (London)
A new report tells how Iraqi prisoners were threatened with rape.
Six British soldiers may be arrested over abuse claims.
Chilling new evidence of the torture and sexual abuse of Iraqi
prisoners by American soldiers emerged last night in a secret
report accusing the US army leadership of failings at the highest
levels.
Detainees were subjected to 'sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal
abuses', according to a military investigation suggesting that last
week's photographs of US soldiers humiliating their naked captives
may only have been the tip of the iceberg.
It comes amid reports that six British soldiers may shortly be
arrested over claims that they too mistreated detainees. Soldiers
from the Queen's Lancashire Regiment are understood to have been
questioned in Cyprus after the publication yesterday of shocking
photographs purporting to show a prisoner being beaten, kicked and
urinated on while in the regiment's custody.
Legal experts warned last night that British soldiers could face
war crimes trials if the allegations are proven, or if they are not
exhaustively investigated.
The revelations can only increase already widespread anger at
coalition forces' handling of the volatile situation in Iraq, where
yesterday a foreign security guard was killed and three others
wounded by a roadside bomb in the northern city of Mosul.
Annals of National Security : Torture at Abu Ghraib : American
Soldiers Brutalized Iraqis. How Far Up Does the Responsibility
Go?
by Seymour M. Hersh
© 2004 The New Yorker
In the era of Saddam Hussein, Abu Ghraib, twenty miles west of
Baghdad, was one of the world's most notorious prisons, with
torture, weekly executions, and vile living conditions. As many as
fifty thousand men and women -- no accurate count is possible --
were jammed into Abu Ghraib at one time, in twelve-by-twelve-foot
cells that were little more than human holding pits.
In the looting that followed the regime's collapse, last April, the
huge prison complex, by then deserted, was stripped of everything
that could be removed, including doors, windows, and bricks. The
coalition authorities had the floors tiled, cells cleaned and
repaired, and toilets, showers, and a new medical center added. Abu
Ghraib was now a U.S. military prison. Most of the prisoners,
however -- by the fall there were several thousand, including women
and teen-agers -- were civilians, many of whom had been picked up
in random military sweeps and at highway checkpoints. They fell
into three loosely defined categories: common criminals; security
detainees suspected of "crimes against the coalition"; and a small
number of suspected "high-value" leaders of the insurgency against
the coalition forces.
Last June, Janis Karpinski, an Army reserve brigadier general, was
named commander of the 800th Military Police Brigade, and put in
charge of military prisons in Iraq. General Karpinski, the only
female commander in the war zone, was an experienced operations and
intelligence officer who had served with the Special Forces and in
the 1991 Gulf War, but she had never run a prison system. Now she
was in charge of three large jails, eight battalions, and
thirty-four hundred Army reservists, most of whom, like her, had no
training in handling prisoners.
General Karpinski, who had wanted to be a soldier since she was
five, is a business consultant in civilian life, and was
enthusiastic about her new job. In an interview last December with
the St. Petersburg Times, she said that, for many of the Iraqi
inmates at Abu Ghraib, "living conditions now are better in prison
than at home. At one point we were concerned that they wouldn't
want to leave."
A month later, General Karpinski was formally admonished and
quietly suspended, and a major investigation into the Army's prison
system, authorized by Lieutenant General Ricardo S. Sanchez, the
senior commander in Iraq, was under way. A fifty-three-page report,
obtained by The New Yorker, written by Major General Antonio M.
Taguba and not meant for public release, was completed in late
February. Its conclusions about the institutional failures of the
Army prison system were devastating. Specifically, Taguba found
that between October and December of 2003 there were numerous
instances of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" at Abu
Ghraib. This systematic and illegal abuse of detainees, Taguba
reported, was perpetrated by soldiers of the 372nd Military Police
Company, and also by members of the American intelligence
community. (The 372nd was attached to the 320th M.P. Battalion,
which reported to Karpinski's brigade headquarters.)
Den britiske hær har indledt en undersøgelse af otte
soldater efter chokerende billeder af tortor mod en irakisk fange,
skriver Berlingske Tidende.
Litteratur
Leder: Organiseret ondskab. I: Information,
05/03/2004.
Juul Jensen: USAs medier er forsigtige. I:
Information, 05/03/2004.
Nielsen, Jørgen Steen: Fangetortur kan vælte USAs
spil i Irak. I: Information, 05/03/2004.
Rasmussen, Annegrethe: Bileder chokerer briterne. I:
Information, 05/03/2004.
05/03/2004
Folkemusikeren og pacifisten Pete Seeger fylder 85
år.
05/03/2004
Den internationle pressefriheds dag.
Kilde: Sperling, Vibeke: Stadig flere magthavere
lægger bånd på medier. I: Politiken,
05/03/2004.
05/04/2004
Reverse The Reversal by 53 Former U.S. Diplomats : Retired
U.S. diplomats urge President Bush to rethink his Israel
policy.
http://tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/10338
Dear Mr. President:
We former U.S. diplomats applaud our 52 British colleagues who
recently sent a letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair criticizing his
Middle East policy and calling on Britain to exert more influence
over the United States.
As retired foreign service officers, we care deeply about our
nation's foreign policy and U.S. credibility in the world.
We also are deeply concerned by your April 14 endorsement of
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's unilateral plan to reject the
rights of three million Palestinians, to deny the right of refugees
to return to their homeland, and to retain five large illegal
settlement blocs in the occupied West Bank.
This plan defies UN Security Council resolutions calling for
Israel's return of occupied territories.
It ignores international laws declaring Israeli settlements
illegal.
It flouts UN Resolution 194, passed in 1948, which affirms the
right of refugees to return to their homes or receive compensation
for the loss of their property and assistance in resettling in a
host country should they choose to do so.
And it undermines the Road Map for peace drawn up by the Quartet,
including the United States. Finally, it reverses long-standing
American policy in the Middle East.
Your meeting with Sharon followed a series of intensive negotiating
sessions between Israelis and Americans, but which left out
Palestinians.
In fact, you and Prime Minister Sharon consistently have excluded
Palestinians from peace negotiations.
Former Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo voiced
the overwhelming reaction of people around the world when he said:
"I believe President Bush declared the death of the peace process
today."
By closing the door to negotiations with Palestinians and the
possibility of a Palestinian state, you have proved that the United
States is not an even-handed peace partner.
You have placed U.S. diplomats, civilians and military doing their
jobs overseas in an untenable and even dangerous position.
Your unqualified support of Sharon's extra-judicial assassinations,
Israel's Berlin Wall-like barrier, its harsh military measures in
occupied territories, and now your endorsement of Sharon's
unilateral plan are costing our country its credibility, prestige
and friends.
It is not too late to reassert American principles of justice and
fairness in our relations with all the peoples of the Middle
East.
Support negotiations between Palestinians and Israelis, with the
United States serving as a truly honest broker.
A return to the time-honored American tradition of fairness will
reverse the present tide of ill will in Europe and the Middle
East-even in Iraq.
Because the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is at the core of the
problems in the Middle East, the entire region -- and the world --
will rejoice along with Israelis and Palestinians when the killing
stops and peace is attained.
Andrew I.Killgore, Ambassador to Qatar, 1977-1980
Richard H. Curtiss, former chief inspector, US Information
Agency
Colbert C. Held, Retired FSO and author
Thomas J. Carolan, Counsel General Istanbul, '88-'92
C. Edward Bernier, Counselor of Embassy, Information and Culture,
Islamabad, Pakistan
Donald A. Kruse, American Consul in Jerusalem
Ambassador Edward L. Peck, former Chief of Mission in Iraq and
Mauritania
John Powell, Admin. Counselor in Beirut, '75-'76
John Gunther Dean, U.S. Ambassador to India
Greg Thielmann, Director, Office for Strategic Proliferation and
Military Affairs, Bureau of Intelligence and Research
James Akins, Ambassador to Saudi Arabia
Talcott Seeyle, Ambassador to Syria
Eugene Bird, Counselor of Embassy in Saudi Arabia
Richard H. Nolte, Ambassador to Egypt
Ray Close, Chief of Station Jeddah, Saudi Arabia 1971-1979
Shirl McArthur, Commercial Attache, Bangkok
David Fredrick, Country Director Peace Corps Morocco 1986-1990
Bill Rugh, Ambassador to UAE and Yemen
James Curran, Deputy Chief of Mission Togo 1973-1975
Joseph Cheevers, Office of Inspectors General 1987
Robert L. M. Nevitt, Minister for Press Affairs for the U.N.
John Brady Kiesling, Political Counselor, Greece
E. William Tatge, Counselor for Commercial Affairs, France
Henry Precht, Deputy Chief of Mission, Egypt
John O. Sutter, FSO, The Asia Foundation's Representative for
Indonesia, 1982-1984
James J. Halsema, Counselor for Public Affairs, Egypt
Nancy LeRoy, Public Affairs Officer, Mexico
Thomas M. Martin, USIA Congressional Liaison Officer
Robert C. McLaughlin, USIA Madrid
Edward Alexander, Counselor for Public Affairs, East Berlin,
1976-1979
Roman Lotsberg, Admin. Officer, Office of European Affairs
Dr. Shirley Hill Witt, Cultural Affairs Officer, Zambia,
1994-1996
Arthur L. Lowrie, Political Advisor to the Commander in Chief, U.S.
Central Command
Carleton Coon, Ambassador to Nepal 1981-1984
Jane Coon, Ambassador to Bangladesh, 1981-1984
George B. Roberts, Ambassador to Guyana, 1979-1981
Robert V. Keeley, Ambassador to Greece
John E. Marsh, First Secretary, Embassy Kuwait, 1971-1973
Thomas W. Fina, Consul General, Milan, 1973-1979
Harland H. Eastman, Consul General, Tangier, Morocco, and Tel Aviv,
Israel
Arthur Mudge, Director, USAID Mission to Sudan, 1980-1983
Ronald I. Spiers, Undersecretary of State for Management
Albert L. Seligmann, Director, Office of Japanese Affairs,
1981-1983
Orin D. Parker, President, America-Middle East Educational
Services, 1979-1988
Robert C. Amerson, Counselor for Public Affairs, Italy
Christian Freer, Colonel, AUS ret., former chief of CIA stations
and War Plans staff
Thomas J. Hirschfeld, Deputy U.S. Rep MBFR Negotiations
Edward R. M. Kane, Deputy Chief of Station, CIA, Iraq
Col. Richard Hobbes, US Army Retired, Politico-Military Adviser to
NEA 1974-1977
Col. David Antoon, US Air Force, Retired
Brig. General Augustine A. Verrengia, USAF Ret.
Greg Thielmann, Director, Office for Strategic Proliferation
Military Affairs, Bureau of Intelligence and Research
Robin Berrington, Cultural Attache, Japan
Gary S. Usrey, Deputy Chief of Mission, Morocco
Owen Roberts, Ambassador to Togo
Chas W. Freeman, Jr. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Assistant
Secretary of Defense, 1993-1994
Edwin Paul Kennedy, Jr., Regional Affairs Officer for N. African,
Near Eastern, and S. Asian Affairs, USIA
Thomas J. Scotes, Ambassador to Yemen, 1975-1978
Michael Mennard, Ph.D., Regional Public Affairs Officer, India
Francois M. Dickman, Director Arabian Peninsula Affairs 1972-76,
Ambassador to UAE 1976-79 and Kuwait 1979-83
Terrell E. Arnold, Former Deputy Director Office of
Counterterrorism and Consul General, Brazil
05/05/2004
Regeringen læste ikke Amnesty Internationals rapport om
tortur i Irak
"Det er bedrøveligt, at rapporterne fra Amnesty
åbenbart ikke er blevet læst," siger Amnestys
pressechef, Stig Nielsen. Allerede i september 2003, dvs. for otte
måneder siden, sendte Amnesty Internationals danske afdeling
breve og rapporter til Udenrigs- og Forsvarsministeriet om, at der
foregik tortur i Irak efter Saddam Husseins fald. I brevene
opfordrede Amnesty regeringen til at lægge pres på den
amerikanske administration i Irak for at få undersøgt
påstandene om tortur. Det undrede derfor Amnesty, da
statsminister Anders Fogh Rasmussen tirsdag den 4. maj udtalte til
Folketinget, at regeringen ikke havde modtaget nogen oplysninger om
tortur i Irak, og organisationen valgte derfor i går at
offentliggøre brevene.
- Amnestys brev til Udenrigs- og Forsvarsministeriet, som blev udsendt i september 2003
- Læs den rapport, som Amnesty sendte sammen med brevet til Udenrigs- og Forsvarsministeriet i september 2003
- Læs Amnestys seneste rapport om menneskerettighedssituationen i Irak et år efter invasionen
Litteratur:
Ritzaus Bureau: Fogh beklager svar om Irak-tortur. I:
Information, 05/06/2004.
05/05/2004
Lederne af landets rehabiliteringscentre for torturofre og
traumatiserede flygtninge er bestyrtede over afsløring af
den amerikanske besættelsesmagts anvendelse af tortur over
for irakiske krigsfanger
Lederne af landets rehabiliteringscentre for torturofre og
traumatiserede flygtninge, forsamlet til møde den 3. maj
2004, giver udtryk for bestyrtelse over de seneste dages
afsløring af den amerikanske besættelsesmagts
anvendelse af tortur over for irakiske krigsfanger.
Det væsentligste argument for koalitionens
tilstedeværelse i Irak har været at beskytte
befolkningen mod hidtidige overgreb på menneskerettigheder.
Vi må derfor på det kraftigste fordømme, at
overgreb, som har været kendt under det tidligere styre, igen
tages i anvendelse i Irak.
Gennem arbejdet med behandling af torturofre ved vi, hvor
invaliderende det er for krop og sjæl at være udsat for
ydmygende overgreb. I tillæg til at de skyldige og ansvarlige
bliver straffet, vil vi understrege vigtigheden af, at ofrene
får hjælp til at overvinde følgerne og at sikre,
at noget lignende ikke kan ske igen.
Da Danmark er en del af koalitionen, vil vi kraftigt opfordre den
danske regering til over for den amerikanske og engelske regering
at fordømme amerikanske soldaters udøvelse af tortur,
således at der ikke kan rejses nogen tvivl om den danske
regerings holdning til det, der er foregået.
ARAMUS
ETICA
OASIS
RCT
RCT Fyns Amt
RCT Jylland
RRCF
RFB/BOMI
05/06/2004
Sexual Abuse in Iraq is No Accident
By Tom Cahill
President, Stop Prisoner Rape
http://www.spr.org
Stop Prisoner Rape is an organization I rescued in 1983, directed
until 1994, and have been president of since 1998.
Yes, I am a survivor of this barbarism. Memos from my FBI files
indicate the Bureau's Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO)
against the New Left may have set me up to be beaten, gang-raped
and otherwise tortured while jailed for civil disobedience in 1968
because of my anti-Vietnam War activities.
I'm not the only peace activist to receive such treatment at the
hands of the US criminal justice system. Arrested on the grounds of
the White House in Washington, DC, at a "Pray-In" to stop the
bombing of Cambodia in 1973, Stephen Donaldson, small and white,
was placed in an all-Black cell block where he was beaten and
gang-raped for two days. After release from the hospital, he went
public at a press conference. Donny and I teamed up in 1984 and
worked together on this issue till he died in 1994 of AIDS
contracted from rape in prison in the early 80s.
One of the "Watergate plumbers" was confined in the same DC jail as
Donny in August 1973. He writes about Donny on pages 318-321 in
"Will: The Autobiography of G. Gordon Liddy" (1980).
How many more activists raped in confinement is yet unknown. But
because of the extreme humiliation of this barbarism, sexual
assault must be an excellent way to silence dissidents. Therefore
it's my belief that among other "excesses," sexual torture is being
taught at the US Army's infamous "School of the Americas." And may
I remind you, Faith Fippinger, a human shield in Bagdad during the
invasion last year, is currently in prison for "tresspassing" at a
demonstration at the School of the Americas late last year.
Has the United States of America sunk to a new low in depravity,
greed, and lust for power? I don't think so. The USA has been
"abusing" the whole planet and even many of its own citizens for
decades. Pres. George W. Bush is no anomaly as members of the
Democratic Party would have us believe. Will politics be different
under President John F. Kerry? I don't think so.
The expression on Private Lynndie England's face is haunting. Posed
next to a hooded, naked Iraqi prisoner in a film shown on 60
Minutes 2, England is grinning and flashing a jaunty 'thumbs up' as
if she'd just hit a home run in a softball game.
But what's really behind England's seemingly casual gesture? In the
flurry of reporting and commentary about what took place in the
notorious Abu Ghraib prison, the deliberate decision by some
American soldiers to use sexual abuse as a tactic to humiliate
detainees warrants further examination.
The new reports from Iraq include allegations that coalition
soldiers threatened male prisoners with rape, sodomized a detainee
with an object, forced a naked, hooded detainee to masturbate,
posed groups of naked prisoners in human pyramids, left male
prisoners in cells naked or wearing women's underwear, and forced
one detainee to simulate oral sex with another detainee.
These are troubling events, but they didn't happen by accident. The
choice to use sexually charged forms of abuse was not random or
careless. More likely, it was humiliation by design.
Sexual violence is uniquely dehumanizing. Those who perpetrate this
kind of abuse, both at home and abroad, are undeniably aware of the
shame these acts induce.
And the psychological consequences shouldn't be underestimated.
Feelings of self-hate are common, and victims often hesitate to
report the abuse in order to avoid the stigma that comes with
victimization.
In particular, many male victims of sexual violence report feeling
that their masculinity has been compromised. Often, victims blame
themselves and even in impossible circumstances believe that they
somehow should have prevented it. Long-term psychological
consequences may include post-traumatic stress disorder, substance
abuse, and suicide.
Some observers have noted that nudity, forced masturbation and
humiliating sexual positions are particularly unacceptable in the
Islamic world. And it is certainly important to take cultural
differences into account. But sexual abuse is universally
appalling, and the similarity to what many U.S. prisoners routinely
undergo is striking.
Approximately one in five male inmates in the United States has
faced forced or pressured sexual contact in custody, according to
studies by researchers such as Cindy Struckman-Johnson at the
University of South Dakota. One in 10 has been raped. For women,
whose abusers are often corrections officers, the rates of sexual
assault are as high as one in four in some facilities.
This form of abuse reared its ugly head when police officers
sodomized Abner Louima in a New York stationhouse bathroom; when a
Wisconsin corrections officer impregnated mentally ill inmate
Jackie Noyes; and when corrections staff knowingly taunted Roderick
Johnson who was raped and prostituted by Texas prison gangs.
With this pattern of abuse so common at home, it's almost
unsurprising that the most senior of the individuals accused of
abusing Iraqi detainees, Staff Sergeant Ivan Frederick II, was
himself a six-year veteran of the Virginia Department of
Corrections.
But, whether it happens in Iraq or in the U.S., sexual abuse is a
form of torture employed to uniquely degrade and humiliate
prisoners, people who are virtually helpless to prevent it. And
unless we stop it, we give our own thumbs up, in a sense, to a well
documented and devastating form of brutality.
Lara Stemple
Executive Director
Stop Prisoner Rape
Alex Coolman
Communications Coordinator
Stop Prisoner Rape
05/06/2004
Red Cross Says It Urged U.S. to Act on Iraq Prison Abuse
Staff members of the International Committee of the Red Cross were
fully aware of the full spectrum of abuses of Iraqi prisoners by
American soldiers at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad and had
repeatedly urged the United States to take corrective action, a
spokesman for the humanitarian organization said today, writes the
New York Times.
05/06/2004
Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty: the Additional
Protocol enters into force in all the Member States
IP/04/602 - Brussels, 6 May 2004
On 30 April, the Vice-President of the European Commission, Loyola.
De Palacio officially informed Mohamed El-Baradei, Director General
of the International Atomic Energy Agency of the United Nations
(IAEA) based in Vienna, of the readiness of the Member States of
the EU to apply the Additional Protocol to the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons Treaty. This move will set an example to the
international community by guaranteeing a co-ordinated, smooth and
uniform implementation of the Additional Protocol in the territory
of the EU and by enabling international efforts to combat
proliferation to be concentrated in less stable regions of the
world. "Through this commitment, the EU has shown itself to be in
the vanguard of states seeking universal coverage of these
agreements and consequently the strengthening of the international
community's efforts to halt the spread of nuclear weapons", said
Loyola de Palacio.
The establishment of the Additional Protocol to the
Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty(1) follows the
discovery of clandestine nuclear activities in certain countries,
intended to allow the development of weapons of mass destruction.
This Protocol was therefore designed to enable the IAEA to improve
its ability to detect such activities, by extending the scope of
its investigations beyond nuclear fuel cycle installations. It
obliges signatory countries to make extensive declarations on all
installations holding nuclear materials (even in small quantities)
or engaging in nuclear fuel cycle activities, such as universities,
research establishments, industrial complexes or hospitals. It is
also aimed at installations which do not necessarily hold nuclear
materials but which, for example, manufacture the nuclear equipment
or have the necessary infrastructure for processing them.
The entry into force of the Additional Protocol will make the
European Commission the main interface between the Member States
and the IAEA. Most of the Member States' declarations on their
installations will originate from or pass through the Commission's
services in Luxembourg, before being transmitted to the Vienna
Agency. In addition to this, the presence of the Commission's
inspectors at site inspections will ensure uniform application of
the Additional Protocol provisions across the EU.
The Commission already plays a very important role in the control
of nuclear materials within the EU under the Euratom Treaty. It has
its own corps of 200 inspectors and also maintains a database
containing details of all civilian nuclear materials in the EU.
Inspections are already carried out in some locations in
co-operation with the IAEA.
(1) World-wide, 189 states are parties to the Treaty on the
Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Only three major states
are not party to this treaty, India, Pakistan and Israel. The NPT
aims to eliminate nuclear weapons completely by preventing their
spread to other states and progressively reducing existing
arsenals. All the countries which are parties to the NPT are
required to allow inspectors to verify that their nuclear materials
are not diverted to illegal weapons programmes.
05/08/2004
USAs forsvarsminister Donald Rumsfeld påtager sig ansvaret
for tortursagen, skriver Information.
05/08/2004
Iraqi deserters in Canada
by Kurt Singer
Deserting from the US Armed Forces produce automatically the death
sentences through lethal injection. 90.000 deserters found refuge
in Canada during the Vietnam war. The new breed of war resisters
and deserters are far fewer and no official numbers have been
released by the Pentagon. These refugees are hesitating to give
their names to protect themselves and their families. However there
are two courageous deserters who have opened a website and give
information to others.
Jeremy Hinzman had joined the army in the hope to earn money to go
to college and enlisted on January 17, 2001 and had married shortly
before.Hinzman was interested in Zen and Eastern culture.He and his
wife Nga Ngyuen started to visit Quaker meetings and were impressed
by their philosphy of non violence . Jeremy felt suddenly
uncomfortable in his army unit where he was training to kill an
enemy. He decided to apply for a conscentious objector status.Then
his unit was shipped to Afghanistan where he worked in the
kitchen.In April 2003 his commanding officer pulled him out of the
kitchen and informed Jeremy that his hearing was to take place.That
happened in Kandahar and Hinzman was not allowed to have a defense
attorney or witnesses. The hearing lasted 20 minutes and his
conscientious objector application was denied.Hinzman's unit
returned to Fort Bragg, North Carolina in April 2003 but in
December he received his orders to go to Iraq. It was then in
January 2004 that Hinzman and his wife and his 21 month old son
Liam went to Toronto. They told the Canadian border control that
they wanted to attend an ice hockey game. Canadian Quakers took
them in and they live now in an apartment of their own. Jeremy
became active in the peace movement.
Brandon Hughey is a teenager from Angelo, Texas. He, too, had
joined the armed forces in the hope to obtain a college education.
At 17 he had joined the National Guard and entered at 18 his boot
camp. Again Quaker meetings convinced Bradon that war was evil and
through the Internet he found a peace activist who helped him after
a 47 hour drive to cross the border into Canada where he had told
the border guards that he wanted to attend a basketball game. Again
the Quakers helped to establish Brandon in his new refugee life.
One of the Quaker members revealed that there were 317 applications
for refugee status pending before the Immigration authorities.
Not all may be anti war refugees but also marijuana smokers and
drug dealers.
Another group of deserters from the Iraq war are contractors hired
by the US Armed Forces. Several hundreds are employed, some even in
the prison areas. According to Bechtel, IRT and Haliburton
subsidiaries over one third of their employees quit their jobs and
returned to the USA, They felt endangered and insecure in their
positions in Iraq. Is this only the tip of the iceberg?
05/10/2004
Mandela on the war in Iraq
By Kurt Singer
Today, May 10th 2004, ten years after Nelson Mandela, 85, was sworn
in as the first black president of the Republic of South Africa,
the ailing leader addresses both houses of parliament. He spoke
about the American and British war in Iraq to both houses of
parliament.He mentioned the international uproar over the horror
photographs of tortured Iraqi prisoners.
"We see how powerful countries-all of them socalled democracies
manipulate multilateral bodies to the great disadvantage of the
suffering and poorer developing nations. in a war that the United
Nations did not sanction."Mandela has been an outspoken advesary of
President George W. Bush's war politics and called him openly "a
president who cannot think properly".
Mandela's speech received wild applause and was hardly mentioned by
the US press and television .
05/11/2004
A Double Ordeal for Female Prisoners
By Tracy Wilkinson
L.A. Times Staff Writer
BAGHDAD — One woman told her attorney she was forced to
disrobe in front of male prison guards. After much coaxing, another
woman described how she was raped by U.S. soldiers. Then she
fainted.
A U.S. Army report on abuses at Abu Ghraib prison documented one
case of an American guard sexually abusing a female detainee, and a
Pentagon spokesman said Monday that 1,200 unreleased images of
abuse at Abu Ghraib included "inappropriate behavior of a sexual
nature."
Whether it was one or numerous cases of rape, many Iraqis believe
that sexual abuse of women in U.S.-run jails was rampant. As a
result, female prisoners face grave prospects after they are
released: denial, ostracism or even death.
A woman who is raped brings shame on her family in the Islamic
world. In many cases, rape victims have been killed by their
relatives to salvage family honor, although there is no evidence
this has happened to women who have been prisoners in Iraq.
"It is like being sentenced to death," said Sheik Mohammed Bashar
Faydhi, a senior cleric based at Baghdad's largest Sunni
mosque.
05/12/2004
Detained Children Abuse Allegations Surface
Unicef ‘Profoundly Disturbed’ By Allegations Of Abuse
Of Detained Children The United Nations Children’s Fund
UNICEF) is profoundly disturbed by news reports alleging that
children might have been among those abused in detention centres
and prisons in Iraq, a spokesman said today.
“Although the news reports have not been independently
substantiated, they are alarming nonetheless,” UNICEF
spokesman Damien Personnaz told a news briefing in Geneva, adding
that any mistreatment, sexual abuse, exploitation or torture of
children in detention is a violation of international law.
Mr. Personnaz’s statement was the latest reaction by a UN
body to widely disseminated reports and photographs of abuse of
detainees by United States-led coalition personnel in Iraq. Last
week Acting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Bertrand
Ramcharan expressed revulsion regarding the reports and
photographs.
The detention or imprisonment of a child must be used only as a
measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of
time, and for their safety and protection children should never be
incarcerated with adults, Mr. Personnaz said.
“All persons in detention must be treated with humanity and
with respect for their inherent dignity as human beings,” he
added. “In particular, States had an obligation to protect
children and to ensure that their officials were aware of, trained
in, and complied with the relevant international
standards.”
05/13/2004
OECD's ministermøde den 13.-14. maj.
05/14/2004
Thule-aftale næsten klar
USA, Grønland og Danmark er meget tæt på en
aftale, der gør det muligt for USA at videreudvikle
radaranlægget på Thule til brug i et missilforsvar.
Den amerikanske regering er opsat på en snarlig
løsning, angiveligt helst inden 28. maj.
Baggrunden er blandt andet, at præsident George W. Bush i sin
2000-valgkamp lovede den amerikanske befolkning et missilskjold i
2004. Thule-radaren er ikke afgørende for dette
løfte, men for Bush ville en aftale være et konkret
tegn på fremskridt, skriver Jyllands-Posten.
05/14/2004
Torture prison pictures triggered reforms for the CIA
By Kurt Singer
The deputy director for foreign operations James L Pavitt anounced
that he would double the CIA's foreign agents. At the moment in
2004 the agency emplyes 1100 secret operatives spread around the
world. 41% speak a second language but only 4% each speak Arabic or
Chinese. This explains why American intelligence officers cannot
even read the street names in Iraq and Afghanistan.Mr. Pavitt also
told the press that the CIA no longer calls its agents intelligence
officers but case workers.The espionage training school at Camp
Peary in Virginia is working 24 hours around the clock. Arabic is
taught in Blitz Courses to new recruits at a yearly salary of
$50.000 a year. Mr.Pavitt said "WE NEED THOUSAND AND HUNDRED
THOUSAND OF PEOPLE TO WIN THIS WAR."Then he admitted " we are
running hard to meet the resources we need." Inspite of having been
successful in capturing several dozen of militant terrorists and
suicide bombers he CIA had many failures as well. They did not
prevent the actions of the 19 terrorists on 9/11, or prevent the
attack on the Cole or the bombings of the embassies in Kenya and
Tanzania nor did they caspture Ben Laden. Their clandestine
activities need definite improvements.The last thing they needed
were the 1000 plus torture pictures from a Baghdad prison.One of
the American reporters said jokingly" the CIA has now more nude
pictures than the Clinton administration showed."
The CIA had failed to predict or realize the comingdownfall of the
Soviet Union. After the demise of the Soviet empire the agency was
reduced by 20 % in panpower and budget.
Cold War espionage veterans are still teachers at Camp Peary and
use now Mao Tse Tung's book on Guerilla Warfare.To fight an
invisible terrorist enemy Mr. George J.Tenet, Mr. Pavitt's boss as
director of the CIA said the organization has to be streamlined and
moved from an unbelievable low situation into a high tech
scientific clandestine espionage and counter terrorist agency.
The revalry between CIA and FBI had to be ended.
A revamped and modernized CIA is aware that they are threatened
daily by Al Qaeda terrorists and suicide bombers who seem almost
invisible and replaced by unlimited masses of Muslims who hate the
American occupiers and their allies and above all the Western
infidels. Some time ago I asked a high ranking CIA officer who he
though hat the best acurate, imaginative and long period
visionara\y intelligence service. He answered without hesitance:
The Vatican.
05/15/2004
International militærnægterdag.
Grundlagt i 1982 af europæiske
militærnægtere.
05/16/2004
The Terrible and Strange Death of Nick Berg
by James Conachy
(Courtesy of WSWS.org and Tehran Times)
The terrible death of Nick Berg in Iraq -- beheaded in front of a
video camera -- has taken place in such strange and suspicious
circumstances that it raises deeply troubling questions. Among them
is whether American agencies had a direct or indirect hand in the
young man's murder.
Questions immediately arise from the timing and political
consequences of his killing. At the height of a massive scandal
engulfing the Bush administration, Berg's death has been exploited
by the American government and the US media to launch a
counter-offensive against the revelations of systematic US torture
in Abu Ghraib and other Iraqi prisons. A wholesale attempt is being
made to shift American and international public opinion away from
the outrage over the criminal character of the US occupation of
Iraq, and behind the self-serving argument that American forces are
needed in Iraq to prevent the country descending into barbarism and
chaos.
Were Berg's murderers being directly paid by the American
government, they could not have performed a more timely service for
the Bush White House.
05/18/2004
Folketingsmedlem Søren Søndergaard stillede
følgende § 20 spørgsmål S
3926 til forsvarsministeren: "vil ministeren oplyse, hvor mange
personer danske tropper i Afghanistan har taget som krigsfanger
henholdsvis tilbageholdt, hvem de er overdraget til, samt hvad der
siden er sket med dem?"
05/19/2004
URGE CONGRESS TO ELIMINATE FUNDING FOR NEW NUCLEAR
WEAPONS
Continuing its drive to develop new, more usable nuclear weapons,
the Bush Administration has requested increased funding for the
Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP) and the Advanced Concepts
Initiative for new nuclear weapons. Last year, Congress cut half of
the requested funds for the RNEP. This year--with your help--all
funds for both the RNEP and the Advanced Concepts Initiative can be
eliminated. Congress should not allow the Administration to develop
a new generation of nuclear weapons.
ACTION: The House will vote later this evening (Wednesday, May 19)
or early tomorrow to cut funds for new nuclear weapons. Contact
your representative and ask him/her to vote for the Tauscher-Markey
amendment to cut funding for the nuclear "bunker buster" in the
defense authorization bill (H.R. 4200).
A similar amendment will be offered by Sens. Kennedy and Feinstein
today or tomorrow in the Senate’s version of the defense
authorization bill (S. 2400). Contact your members of Congress and
tell them to support these amendments.
These votes are likely to be very close. Please forward this action
alert to five or more of your friends. Every fax and phone call is
important.
FAXING YOUR REPRESENTATIVE IS EASY: Start with the sample letter
posted in our Legislative Action Center, personalize the language,
then fax your message directly from our site. To view the sample
letter, click on the link below, then enter your zip code and click
"Go" in the "Take Action Now" box.
Here is the link:
http://capwiz.com/fconl/issues/alert/?alertid=5841011&type=CO.
BACKGROUND: Since the end of the Cold War, some civilian military
planners and nuclear scientists have promoted the creation of a new
class of earth-penetrating nuclear weapons. These weapons are
sometimes referred to as "bunker-busters" because they would be
designed to burrow into the ground to destroy underground military
facilities that are protected by 100 to 300 feet of reinforced
concrete or rock. The Energy Department’s budget includes
$27.6 million for the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP). The
RNEP would use an existing nuclear weapon, redesigned for use
against underground bunkers. It would have explosive power up to 70
times that of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima.
RNEP proponents claim that, because the weapon penetrates the earth
before detonating, it would be a "clean" nuclear weapon. In
reality, this would be an extremely deadly weapon. If detonated in
an urban setting, tens of thousands of people could receive a fatal
dose of radiation within the first 24 hours. More would be killed
or injured by the extreme pressures of the blast and thermal
injuries arising from the heat of the explosion. Still more
casualties would result from the resulting fires and the collapse
of buildings from the seismic shock that the explosion would
produce. According to Sen. Jack Reed (RI), Robust Nuclear Earth
Penetrators, "are really city breakers, not bunker busters."
The Bush Administration has repeatedly claimed that the RNEP
program is a study and nothing more. However, the
Administration’s intentions regarding RNEP go well beyond
their initial claims. Energy Department budget documents show
funding demands for RNEP increasing dramatically after this year,
despite congressional restrictions on further development of this
program. The initial three-year study was to cost $45 million, but
the Administration’s proposed spending in the next five years
would total nearly $500 million and move RNEP into early
development and engineering stages.
The Bush Administration is leading the world down the wrong path.
Instead of adhering to our obligations under the nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) by reducing reliance on the most
horrific weapons ever created and working for global disarmament,
the Administration is seeking new uses for nuclear weapons.
Adopting such a nuclear posture is a step backward and a virtual
invitation for other nations to opt out of their NPT obligations as
well.
David Culp, Legislative Representative
Friends Committee on National Legislation (Quakers)
245 Second Street, N.E.
Washington, D.C. 20002-5795
Tel.: (202) 547-6000, ext. 146
Toll-free: (800) 630-1330, ext. 146
Fax: (202) 547-6019
E-mail: david@fcnl.org
05/19/2004
Udenrigsministeriet refererer Folketingets 2. behandling af forslag
om Danmarks ratifikation af Tillægsprotokollen til FN's
Torturkonvention.
05/20/2004
Amnesty International støtter Dansk Røde Kors
kritik af regering og folketing
Amnesty bakker op om generalsekretær Jørgen Poulsen
fra Dansk Røde Kors offentlige kritik af såvel
tidligere som nuværende regeringer og folketing for ikke at
tage Genévekonventionerne alvorligt og dermed
forårsage et skred i holdningerne til tortur og
menneskerettigheder.
- Vi er fuldstændig enige med Jørgen Poulsen og det er
meget befriende, at Røde Kors sætter ord på det
centrale problem, nemlig at respekten for
Genèvekonventionerne skrider, siger Amnesty Internationals
generalsekretær, Lars Norman Jørgensen.
Læs mere om Amnestys arbejde med Irak og de rapporter, som
regeringen overså, på:
http://www.amnesty.dk/bibliotek/aktuelt/irak/
Amnesty International calls for a commission of inquiry into
'war on terror' detentions
Amnesty International is calling for an impartial and independent
commission of inquiry to be set up by the United States Congress to
conduct a thorough investigation into the USA's "war on terror"
detentions across the globe. Such a commission, composed of
credible experts independent of government, must have broad-ranging
powers to examine the administration's detention policies and
practices and ensure accountability at the highest level.
The investigation must have the full cooperation of the government.
Its purpose must be to ensure that from now on the USA adopts
policies that fully meet its international obligations, as well as
to identify any officials who may have authorized, condoned or
committed war crimes and other human rights abuses in Iraq,
Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay or elsewhere.
The evidence of war crimes committed in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq
has followed persistent claims of cruel, inhuman or degrading
treatment against detainees during the past two and a half years of
the "war on terror". The USA continues daily to violate
international law and standards in its detention policy -- by
holding detainees outside the protection of the law, including in
Guantánamo, Afghanistan and in secret locations. Its alleged
transfer of detainees to face torture in third countries has also
been a matter of deep concern throughout this period.
Since the outset of the "war on terror", the US administration has
fostered a climate conducive to torture and cruelty. A contemptuous
approach to international law and standards, the use of
incommunicado and secret detention, and the repeated dehumanization
and labelling of all detainees as "killers" and "terrorists", have
created conditions ripe for torture and other crimes under
international law.
Even the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has not
had full access to all detainees. The military investigation into
Abu Ghraib by Major General Antonio Taguba raised the situation of
"ghost detainees", who were moved around within the facility to
hide them from the ICRC. The ICRC's own report in February on
Coalition detentions in Iraq "establishes that persons deprived of
their liberty face the risk of being subjected to a process of
physical and psychological coercion, in some cases tantamount to
torture". Failure to notify relatives of detainees' whereabouts
resulted "in the de facto 'disappearance' of the arrestee for weeks
or even months." The ICRC report also said that ill-treatment of
detainees deemed to have high intelligence value was systematic,
and that the use of solitary confinement in small cells devoid of
daylight against such detainees violated the Geneva
Conventions.
The commander of the US forces in Iraq has now barred interrogators
from using some of the "stress and duress" techniques, reportedly
including sleep deprivation, dietary manipulation, stress
positions, and the use of dogs, techniques which Secretary of
Defense Rumsfeld told a Senate hearing on 12 May had been approved
at the Pentagon. Although some such techniques violate the
international prohibition on cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,
their use has not been precluded in interrogations in Afghanistan,
Guantánamo or at secret locations.
In an open letter to President Bush on 7 May 2004, Amnesty
International cited the case of a Yemeni national who told the
organization in April that he was subjected to sleep deprivation
and other cruel or degrading treatment by US agents, including
being photographed naked, at a secret detention facility in Kabul.
In another recent interview, a former Afghan police officer has
said that he was subjected to beating, kicking, sleep deprivation,
and sexual abuse during the more than a month he spent in US
custody in Afghanistan in 2003. He also said he had been repeatedly
photographed, often while naked.
Last week the New York Times published evidence that torture --
including water submersion -- has been used against "high value"
detainees at secret locations. The latest edition of the New Yorker
magazine reports that the Secretary of Defense approved the
expansion of a secret operation -- a "special-access program" (SAP)
-- originally for use against such detainees, to prisoners
incarcerated in Iraq in the insurgency there. The secret tactics,
it is stated, allowed for sexual humiliation and physical coercion.
The Department of Defense has issued a general denial of the New
Yorker's thorough report, characterizing it as "outlandish,
conspiratorial, and filled with error and anonymous conjecture",
but has not provided a detailed response to the allegations
made.
There is growing evidence that the abuse of prisoners in US custody
has been widespread and resulted from US policies as well as a
leadership failure. However, the administration continues to claim
that only a few soldiers have been responsible. President Bush
himself, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, is promoting this
message. The most appropriate way to get to the bottom of this and
to meet international concern is to establish an expert inquiry
independent of government. To ensure its effectiveness and the
appearance of impartiality in the eyes of the world, the inquiry
would benefit form the advice of international experts such as the
United Nations Special Rapporteur on torture.
Prosecuting the "few" alleged perpetrators caught on film in Abu
Ghraib prison would clearly not be enough. Full accountability, of
persons at all levels of the chain of command, including officers
in the armed forces, Central Intelligence Agency personnel and
private contractors, with no hint of scapegoating of low-level
soldiers and reservist officers, is crucial.
A commission of inquiry must not be a substitute for bringing to
justice anyone who has committed human rights violations, including
war crimes. As a matter of principle, across all countries, Amnesty
International takes the position that justice is best served by
prosecuting war crimes and other grave violations of international
law, such as torture, in independent and impartial civilian courts.
Any trials, however, whether military or civilian, must conform
fully to international standards for fair trial.
The problem does not begin or end at Abu Ghraib. The rule of law
and promotion of security and human rights demand that daylight be
shone onto all US detention policies and practices.
05/20/2004
IOF perpetrate a massacre in Rafah, Shelling a demonstration
with missiles and artillery; dozens killed and wounded
In a serious escalation of their war crimes against civilians in
Rafah, the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF ) shelled air-to-ground
guided missiles and tank shells on a peaceful demonstration in the
Gaza southern town of Rafah today Wednesday 19 May 2004. Dozens of
casualties were reported; mostly children. Eyewitnesses said that
human parts were seen on the ground of the shelling while IOF
opened fire at ambulances.
Al Mezan Center for Human Rights emphasizes that this deliberate
act constitutes a war crime and a serious escalation of the ongoing
crimes and human rights violations perpetrated by the IOF, which
have been going unpunished by the International Community. The
Center also asserts that the entire world keeps a shameful,
questionable state of silence towards Israel’s daily killing
of civilians and destruction of civilian property in a systematic,
punitive manner.
Al Mezan holds the International Community, and in particular the
High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention Relative
to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Times of War, of 12 August
1949, responsible for these continued war crimes, which are for a
great deal caused by its silence and disregard of reported crimes
in the past years, which has encouraged Israel to proceed and enjoy
a status of a impunity. The International Community holds a
responsibility to pursue and bring to justice the Israeli criminals
who perpetrated and ordered the perpetration of such crimes.
Hence, Al Mezan Center for Human Rights calls upon the
International Community to relinquish from implicitly encouraging
the war crimes perpetrated by IOF in the occupied Palestinian
territories and to take immediate steps to ensure the protection of
Palestinian civilians by bringing to an immediate halt the latest
IOF incursion in Rafah that started early Tuesday 18 May 19, 2004
and during which a civilian demonstration was shelled with heavy
ammunition, and to Israel's continued violations of Palestinians'
human rights. The Center reminds the International Community of the
responsibilities it bears under international law and treaty law
and that an urgent intervention is most urgent now.
8 arrested, 3 to hospital after police disperses T-A Rafah
protest
We heard what happened in Rafah while preparing in the Gush office
for the already announced Friday protest at the Gaza entrance. We
couldn''t think of a more fitting reaction than sending out a call
to come - once more - to the Defense Ministry for an immediate
protest. On the way there, with our banners and shields, we felt
rather futile compared with those on whose behalf we were going to
protest: the Rafah demonstrators in the middle of whom a helicopter
gunship had sent a missile wounding dozens and among the ones
killed several kids...
Still, the protest of some 250 - with besides Gush Shalom a very
visible (and loud) presence of the dissident reservists (Courage to
Refuse) and the Anarchists - had more spirit than the mass rally
some days earlier. People easily found each other in furious
chanting and the blag flags were there again. Nobody was surprised
when some of the young took the initiative of blocking the street.
More and more left the sidewalk. Police who started coming, closed
off the Kaplan road for traffic, but before they could isolate us
we had started marching. Chanting while walking from the Defence
ministry gate through the whole Kaplan street into Ibn Gvirol, and
from there towards the Rabin Square.
Reactions of passers-by were not unfriendly, and we nearly thought
that the police for once decided not to show the usual behavior on
this day of shame, but then suddenly they come from nowhere diving
into the crowd and singling some out for arrest. Gush Shalom
spokesperson Adam Keller was the first - seven polices dragged him,
forcing him face-down on the street, and from seeing how they
handled his arms and legs it seemed a miracle that he afterwards
was not among the three (out of eight arrested) who had to go to
hospital. The others were treated no better: Matan Cohen (wounded)
, Yonathan Pollack (the "recidivist" anarchist), Elad Orian,
refusnik David Zonscheine, Lezer Peled (wounded), Roni Avidov, Gal
Chajad (wounded).
Some thirty demonstrators came to the police station, with two of
them being able to function as lawyers (adv. Micheal Sfarad,
himself a refuser, and activist advocate Yael Varda). After we had
seen the wounded three handcuffed but on their feet coming out of
the sstation to enter an ambulance, at 11pm the message came that
the other arrestees would spend the night at Abu-Kabir (the Arabic
name of this prison dating back to the pre-'48 period) after which
the judge would decide what to do further.
UNICEF calls for the protection of children in Rafah
JERUSALEM, 19 May 2004 – UNICEF said today it is deeply
concerned about the impact on children of the ongoing military
operation in the Gaza Strip, particularly a missile strike
Wednesday that claimed the lives of at least 10 Palestinians, many
of them children.
"Palestinian children have a right to be protected against all acts
of violence in the midst of the current Israeli-Palestinian
conflict," said David S. Bassiouni, UNICEF Special Representative
in Jerusalem. "They have a right to a safe shelter, safe access to
their schools and to health services," he said.
With the recent military actions in Rafah – and Wednesday's
missile strike – at least 10 children have already lost their
lives, including Asma and Ahmed, a 16 and 13-year-old girl and boy,
respectively, shot in their home in Rafah on Tuesday morning. Many
additional children have been injured and all are facing
psychosocial distress.
The ongoing house demolitions in Rafah have left more 1,100
Palestinian people homeless in a 10 day period alone, out of which
almost 600 are children. Between September 2000 and May 2004, more
than 11,000 Palestinians have lost their homes.
UNICEF, jointly with other UN agencies, is assessing the impact of
house demolitions on children and will support efforts to help
restore normalcy to children's lives.
Since the start of the conflict, Israeli and Palestinian children
have paid a very heavy price, UNICEF said. Over 660 children under
age 18 have been killed, of which 560 were Palestinian and 104 were
Israeli – including four Israeli sisters killed by militants
in an attack in the Gaza Strip on May 2.
"UNICEF calls on the State of Israel to abide by its obligations to
the Convention on the Rights of the Child by protecting children
from direct exposure to violence, and providing those who have lost
their homes with alternative housing," Bassiouni said. "The
injudicious use of force where children are present can only bring
about the deaths of innocent youngsters. We urge the Israeli
authorities to reconsider the impact these incursions are having on
Palestinian children."
For further information, please contact:
Michael Bociurkiw
Communications Officer
UNICEF Jerusalem
Tel: +972-2-583-0013/4 (ext 242)
Fax: +1-416-352-5068
Mobile: +972-577-293214 / +972-59674385
Email: mbociurkiw@unicef.org
05/20/2004
Livermore Lab's draft operating document
May 20, 2004
Mr. Thomas Grim, L-293
U.S. Department of Energy,
National Nuclear Security Administration
Livermore Site Office, SWEIS Document Manager
7000 East Avenue
Livermore, CA 94550-9234
Fax: (925) 422-1776
Email: tom.grim@oak.doe.gov
RE: Comments on the Department of Energy's Site-Wide Environmental
Impact Statement (SWEIS) for Continued Operations at Lawrence
Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL).
Dear Mr. Grim:
Through this letter we are expressing our deep concern with the
health and environmental risks posed by the expanded nuclear
weapons mission for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
(LLNL) into the indefinite future. We appreciate your focused
attention to this matter. Below, we have outlined a number of
specific concerns that, taken cumulatively, lead us to the
conclusion that the Site Wide Environmental Impact Statement
(SWEIS) for the continuing operation of LLNL is so deficient in
information and analysis that it must be fixed and re-circulated in
draft form. This would allow the community, the regulators, and the
legislators to have the opportunity to evaluate the new information
that is requested in these comments. Our specific concerns are:
1. The same day of the public hearings for the SWEIS, April 27,
2004, the Congressional Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging
Threats, and International Relations for the Committee on
Government Reform held a hearing on the security of nuclear
materials. The hearing highlighted potentially insurmountable
problems with plutonium and highly enriched uranium at certain
Department of Energy (DOE) sites, with a focus on the vulnerability
of nuclear materials storage at LLNL. On May 7, 2004, Energy
Secretary Spencer Abraham delivered a speech on the deficiencies in
the security of nuclear materials at LLNL and other DOE sites. The
Energy Secretary made a commitment to consider removing the special
nuclear materials at LLNL by 2005. This recent acknowledgement by
the DOE that security at LLNL is questionable makes it imperative
that the SWEIS evaluate an alternative that would remove all
special nuclear materials from LLNL. These acknowledgements make
this not only a reasonable option, but one that should be evaluated
because it is a foreseeable outcome within the next decade at
LLNL.
2. Instead of reducing the amount of special nuclear materials
on-site at LLNL, this plan proposes to more than double the limit
for plutonium at Livermore Lab from 1,540 pounds to 3,300 pounds.
Additionally, under the Proposed Action, the administrative limit
for highly enriched uranium in Building 239 would increase from 55
pounds to 110 pounds. Seven million people live in surrounding
areas, and residences are built right up to the fence. Plutonium is
difficult to store safely because, in certain forms, it can
spontaneously ignite and burn. Moreover, it poses a criticality
risk when significant quantities are stored in close proximity. The
amount of plutonium proposed for LLNL is sufficient to make more
than 300 nuclear bombs. Because of the health risks, the
proliferation dangers, storage hazards, and very serious security
concerns, we believe it is irresponsible to store plutonium, highly
enriched uranium and tritium at LLNL. We are calling upon the DOE
to de-inventory the plutonium, highly enriched uranium and tritium
stocks at LLNL rather than to increase them.
3. The SWEIS proposes to increase the at-risk limits for tritium
ten fold, from just over 3 grams to 30 grams. The SWEIS proposes to
increase the at-risk limit for plutonium from 44 pounds to 132
pounds. We believe it is unsafe to increase the amount of tritium
and plutonium that can be "in process" in one room at one time.
LLNL has a history of criticality violations with plutonium and
releases of both tritium and plutonium, making it evident that
these amounts should be decreased, rather than increased.
4. This plan will revive a project that was canceled more than 10
years ago because it was dangerous and unnecessary. The project was
called Plutonium - Atomic Vapor Laser Isotope Separation (AVLIS).
Now it is called the "Integrated Technology Project"(ITP) and the
"Advanced Materials Program"(AMP). This is a scheme to heat and
vaporize plutonium and then shoot multiple laser beams through the
vapor to separate out plutonium isotopes. The ITP / AMP is a health
risk and a nuclear proliferation nightmare. We believe the ITP and
AMP work should be cancelled as the Plutonium AVLIS was cancelled
in 1990 - this time permanently.
5. This plan makes Livermore Lab the place to test new
manufacturing technologies for producing plutonium pits for nuclear
weapons. A pit is the softball-sized piece of plutonium that sits
inside a modern nuclear weapon and triggers its thermonuclear
explosion. DOE says these new technologies will then be used in a
new bomb factory, called the Modern Pit Facility (MPF). Public and
Congressional opposition to the MPF has caused its delay this year.
The Livermore Lab plutonium pit program goes full-speed ahead in
the wrong direction. It will enable the MPF and production of 150 -
450 plutonium bomb cores annually, with the ability to run double
shifts and produce 900 cores per year. This production capability
would approximate the combined nuclear arsenals of France and China
- each year. We call upon the DOE to halt all work on plutonium pit
production technologies at Livermore Lab. We believe it is
premature for the DOE to spend taxpayer dollars on this technology
and the prudent and reasonable outcome is to delay or cancel this
project.
6. This plan will add plutonium, highly-enriched uranium and large
quantities of lithium hydride to experiments in the National
Ignition Facility mega-laser when it is completed at Livermore Lab.
Using these materials in the NIF will increase its usefulness for
nuclear weapons development, including for the design of new types
of nuclear weapons. It will also make the NIF more hazardous to
workers and the environment. This is not only dangerous to people's
health and safety, and a proliferation risk, but it is sure to
result in an inordinate cost to the taxpayer. No cost estimate
associated with this proposal has been released to date. We ask the
DOE to cancel these dangerous, polluting, proliferation-provocative
and unnecessary new experiments proposed for the NIF.
7. The SWEIS reveals plans to manufacture tritium targets at LLNL.
The tritium-filled targets are the radioactive fuel pellets that
the NIF's 192 laser beams will "shoot" in an attempt to create a
thermonuclear explosion. Producing the targets will increase the
amount of tritium that is used in any one room at Livermore Lab
from the current limit of just over 3 grams to 30 grams - nearly
10-fold more. In the mid-1990's, LLNL stated that target
fabrication was to occur off-site because of LLNL's proximity to
large populations. Livermore Lab has a history of tritium
accidents, spills and releases. The NIF will increase the amount of
airborne radioactivity emanating from LLNL. We call on DOE to
cancel plans to manufacture tritium targets for NIF at Livermore
Lab. Further, we urge cancellation of the NIF megalaser.
Cancellation of NIF is a reasonable alternative that should be
fully analyzed in the SWEIS.
8. This plan also calls for Livermore Lab to develop diagnostics to
"enhance" the nation's readiness to conduct full-scale underground
nuclear tests. This is a dangerous step back to the days of
unrestrained nuclear testing. All work at LLNL to reduce the time
it takes to conduct a full-scale underground nuclear test should be
terminated immediately.
9. This plan mixes bugs and bombs at Livermore. It calls for
collocating an advanced bio-warfare agent facility (BSL-3) with
nuclear weapons activities in a classified area at Livermore Lab.
The plan proposes genetic modification and aerosolization
(spraying) with live anthrax, plague and other deadly pathogens.
This could weaken the international biological weapons treaty --
and it poses a risk to workers, the public and the environment here
in the Bay Area. The draft SWEIS does not adequately describe these
programs, or the unique security, health and environmental hazards
they present. Construction should be halted on the portable BSL-3
facility. All plans to conduct advanced bio-warfare agent (BSL-3)
research on site at LLNL should be terminated.
10. There are 108 buildings identified at LLNL as having potential
seismic deficiencies relative to current codes. The SWEIS should
include a complete list of these buildings and an accounting of the
ones that house or may house hazardous, radiological and biological
research materials. LLNL is located within 1 kilometer of two
significant earthquake faults, including the Las Positas Fault Zone
less than 200 feet from the LLNL boundary. How can we mitigate harm
done from an earthquake that damages these buildings before they
are brought up to code? We urge the Livermore Lab to stop any work
with hazardous, radioactive or biological substances that may be
occurring in any building that does not comply with federal
standards.
11. A contractor will be paid to package and ship more than 1,000
drums of transuranic and mixed transuranic waste to the WIPP dump
in New Mexico, yet the SWEIS says this is exempt from environmental
review. This work in its entirety must be included in the
review.
12. The DOE does not acknowledge in the SWEIS that the
double-walled shipping containers described in the document may be
replaced by less health - protective single-lined containers. We
believe that no waste should be shipped in single-walled containers
and the SWEIS should provide a guarantee to that effect.
13. The Purpose and Need statement in the SWEIS relies heavily upon
the US Nuclear Posture Review, which calls for an aggressive
modernization and manufacturing base within the US nuclear weapons
complex. This stands in stark contrast to the binding legal mandate
to shift "from developing and producing new weapons designs to
dismantling obsolete weapons and maintaining a smaller weapons
arsenal". We believe a revised Purpose and Need statement should
accurately reflect the Livermore Lab's legal responsibility with
regard to US law, including US obligations under the nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Further, the Purpose and Need statement in the SWEIS almost
completely omits LLNL's important role in civilian science
research. This omission fatally flaws the alternatives analysis in
the SWEIS by neglecting to consider the expanded role that civilian
science programs at the LLNL could play in the next decade.
The alternatives analysis should be revised to consider LLNL's role
in light of the commitments in the NPT and the Livermore Lab's
civilian science mission as well as the compelling case for
removing special nuclear materials (i.e., plutonium and highly
enriched uranium) from the LLNL site.
Sincerely,
05/21/2004
Spanien trækker sine sidste tropper hjem fra Irak.
05/21/2004
The Other Prisoners
By Luke Harding
© 2004 Guardian Newspapers Limited
Thursday, May 20, 2004 -- The scandal at Abu Ghraib prison was
first exposed not by a digital photograph but by a letter. In
December 2003, a woman prisoner inside the jail west of Baghdad
managed to smuggle out a note. Its contents were so shocking that,
at first, Amal Kadham Swadi and the other Iraqi women lawyers who
had been trying to gain access to the US jail found them hard to
believe.
The note claimed that US guards had been raping women detainees,
who were, and are, in a small minority at Abu Ghraib. Several of
the women were now pregnant, it added. The women had been forced to
strip naked in front of men, it said. The note urged the Iraqi
resistance to bomb the jail to spare the women further shame.
05/21/2004
Bush vs. Greenpeace - NOT GUILTY!
Thursday, May 20, 2004 -- It's over! I've been in court in Miami
all this week defending our ability to stand up for what's right
for the planet and our right to speak out against environmental
abuses.
And at 3:30 this afternoon the judge acquitted Greenpeace on all
charges. The prosecution's case was unproven before we even
presented our defense. I wanted you to be among the first to know.
Thanks so much for your support.
It's incredible -- in the last couple of weeks 81,311 people like
you, all around the world, have e-mailed President Bush and
Attorney General John Ashcroft to condemn this prosecution. The US
Government has never heard from Greenpeace in such strong numbers.
It's a great show of what we can all do together, and I
congratulate you.
Together we have won. Bush and Ashcroft have been shown to have
been vindictive, using an 1872 law, and shown to be trying to
stifle civil disobedience by shutting Greenpeace down.
But Greenpeace is still in business, and we come out of court more
determined than ever to stand up for the planet.
Our campaign to defend ancient forests, in the Amazon -- where this
Miami case started -- and the last remaining ancient forests in the
United States, continues. Watch us.
However, the threat to Greenpeace is not yet over. Hard on the
heels of the US Government's case, we may end up in court against
Exxon Mobil, the world's largest corporate producer of global
warming gases. Last year Greenpeace volunteers protested at their
headquarters dressed in tiger suits to highlight Exxon's role in
global warming. They didn't like it, and our volunteers face felony
charges. Like Bush, they are trying to shut us up for good.
So please, keep Greenpeace in action, be part of the action.
We couldn't have done it without you.
Rave on,
John Passacantando
Executive Director
Greenpeace
05/22/2004
An Oildriven Immoral War
by Kurt Singer
These were the words of the 26 year old Florida National Guard
soldier who had served over 8 years in the armed forces. 6 month in
Iraq. Staff Sgt.Camilio Mejia went home to Miami on a furlough,
bitter and disappointed about this abominable war. He had led an
infantry squad and experienced plenty of actions. In an interview
with the New York Times he told the columnist Bob Herbert that he
had seen "the slaughter of Iraqi civilians."
Mejia had personally seen the mistreatments of prisoners, the
killing of children, the cruel deaths of American soldiers. He
accused glory hunting officers putting American units in needlessly
dangerous positions.
"Imagine being in the infantry in Ramadi like we were and you get
shot at it every day and you get mortared where you lived with
rocket propelled grenades and people were dying and getting wounded
and maimed every day. A lot of horrible things became
acceptable.'"Sgt. Mejia told more and more of the war horrors were
childre childer and women were killed as if Iraqis were not human
beings. The staff sergeant deserted. But when his unite returned
home he returned and asked to be treated as a conscientious
objector and be discharged. This request was denied and he faced a
military court. The jury of seven men and one woman. Most of them
had served in Iraq. They sentenced Staff Sergeant Mejia to one year
of hard labor, losing his rank and he received a dishonorable
discharge. Mejia was not allowed to present witnesses or references
to the legality of this war. All wars create atrocities,
conscientous objectors and soldiers whose conscience turns them
against the wars. Mejia was not an American citizen. He held dual
ctzenship of Costa Rica and Nicaragua.
05/23/2004
Amerikaneren Michael Moore vinder med filmen Farnheit 911,
de gyldne palmer ved filmfestivallen i Cannes.
Litteratur: Monggård, Christian: Hvorfor lige
ham? I: Information, 05/28/2004.
05/24/2004
Kvindernes internationale nedrustningsdag.
Grundlagt i 1981 af 40 kvinder fra 11 europæiske lande.
05/26/2004
Forespørgselsdebat (F 60) i folketinget den 26. maj 2004
om opgradering af Thule-radaren
Folketinget noterer med tilfredshed, at Danmark og Grønland
i fællesskab er nået til enighed med USA om et
aftalekompleks i tilknytning til den amerikanske anmodning om
tilladelse til en opgradering af Thule-radaren. Idet Landsstyrets
tilslutning noteres, opfordrer Folketinget regeringen til at
imødekomme den amerikanske anmodning om opgradering af
Thule-radaren, under forudsætning af endelig indgåelse
af det foreliggende samlede aftalekompleks, som skitseret af
regeringen.
Forslaget vedtages med støtte fra størstedelen af
partierne - herunder de to grønlandske medlemmer af
Folketinget (101 stemmer). SF og Enhedslisten undlod at stemme (10
stemmer). Ingen stemmer imod forslaget.
05/27/2004
Africa Launches Peace and Security Council : Leaders are
Increasingly In Favor of Intervention
by Mohammed Adow
BBC, Addis Ababa
African leaders have launched the Peace and Security Council of the
African Union, in Ethiopia. Its mission is to deal with the main
problem facing African nations since they achieved independence --
war between nations and within nations.
The council's objective will be to work towards a common defense
policy and develop a united defense force.
But experts point to the new challenges facing the council, such as
the large number of conflicts -- and their scale.
And it is difficult to find funds to run the peacekeeping missions
and to pay for the conflict resolution responsibilities that the
council has undertaken.
05/27/2004
Forsvarsministeren besvarede § 20 spørgsmål S 3926: "Forsvarskommandoen har oplyst, at de
danske styrker ikke har taget krigsfanger i Afghanistan. Danske
styrker i Afghanistan har i samarbejde med de amerikanske styrker
været med til at tilbageholde 34 personer. Alle disse 34
personer er efterfølgende blevet frigivet i
Afghanistan."
05/29/2004
Norwegian city of Kragerø honours Bodil Biørn,
unsung hero and relief worker during Armenian genocide
Brussels, Belgium - On the initiative of the Armenian community of
Aleppo, Syria, the Norwegian city of Kragerø (11000
inhabitants) has erected a statue honoring Bodil Catharina
Biørn, who spent 30 years of her life providing relief to
the Armenians of Turkey before, during and after the Armenian
Genocide. The statue will be unveiled on Saturday, May 29.
After studying nursing in Germany, Bodil Biørn, the daughter
of a wealthy ship owner, left her native Kragerø in 1905 to
go to Turkey. There, as part of benevolent evangelical missions,
she provided aid to the Christian populations, and especially to
the Armenians, who endured oppression under the Ottomans and who
were regularly victims of extortion.
Stationed in various regions of the Ottoman Empire (e.g., Van,
Cilicia), Bodil Biørn was in Mush in 1915 when the Genocide began.
She poured her energy into providing assistance to survivors there
and later in Armenia, during the First Republic (1918-1920).
After the Sovietization of Armenia, she continued her
philathropical work in the Armenian orphanages of Syria and
Lebanon, where she adopted an orphan she named Fridjof. She finally
left the region to return to her country in 1936.
"It is a moral duty for Armenians to pay homage to the many
honorable, just people, often women, often Scandinavians, who
provided relief to the victims of the barbarity committed by the
Young Turks. With this commemoration, Bodil Biørn finally
emerges from anonymity and takes her place beside Maria Jacobsen,
Karen Jeppe, Alma
Johansson or Amalia Lange, her sisters in compassion," declared
Laurent Leylekian, executive director of the European Armenian
Federation.
05/29/2004
USA anvender
klyngebomber i Falluja i Irak, skriver Arbejderen.
05/30/2004
Operation Danish Bacon
Danske militærlæger skyder grise, som holdes kunstigt i
live, mens de er øvelsesmål for krigskirugi, skriver
Berlingske Tidende.
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