Independent Online Edition > World Politics

Independent Online Edition > World Politics: "Lorne Waldman, the human rights lawyer representing Maher Arar, said it was 'ridiculous' for the US Ambassador to London, Robert Tuttle, to deny any renditions by the US of terrorist suspects to Syria had taken place.
Mr Tuttle denied there was evidence of a rendition to Syria but the US Embassy in London later issued a clarification admitting there were reports of one case involving Mr Arar.
'The case of Mr Arar is too public for someone to claim they are not aware of it,'' Mr Waldman said on BBC radio. 'To suggest, as the US ambassador did, that they were not aware of the case is ridiculous.''"

I'll take that back

OK, maybe there is some WoT related news after all. The Independent reports that the US Embassy in London has had to retract remarks about extraordinary rendition to Syria made in a BBC interview by its ambassador“

”Robert Tuttle [the US Ambassador] told Radio 4's Today programme last Thursday that there was no evidence that US forces had sent suspected terrorists for questioning in Syria“

Its not the first time either.

”Mr Tuttle was involved in an earlier embarrassing denial when he insisted in a letter to The Independent that US forces did not use white phosphorous as a weapon. His remarks were quickly contradicted by US gun crews in their own internet magazine, in which they boasted of using white phosphorous in a “shake and bake” mission against insurgents in the assault on Fallujah.“

The article also notes:

”Robert 'Bob' Holmes Tuttle, Republican fundraiser and Beverley Hills car-dealer, was sworn in as Ambassador to the Court of St James on 14 July, 2005.

Tuttle's appointment came after nearly a year without a US ambassador, which sparked controversy over how seriously the US treats the position.“

Mayor of London talks about WoT

It's that slow-news time of year, particular in the WoT arena. However, the BBC interviewed London Mayor Ken Livingston and he is quoyed as saying that 10 terrorist plots against targets in London have been defeated since 11 September 2001. Livingston went on to say that:

“Largely what you're talking about is fairly disorganised and small groups of disaffected people...”

Which does beg the question “What are they disaffected about?” Perhaps that is why it is so problematic in defining what a terrorist is.

“Hanging on the telephone”

With suitable apologies to Debbie Harry et al...

The Whitehouse must be full of Christmas Cheer this year. I've been following the NSA wiretapping story for about a week and it appears that the Bush Administration is on the defensive in a way that has not been seen since the Abu Ghraib photos last year.

The New York Times first broke the story on Friday 16/12/2005 and I logged it here. About 500 suspects were having their telephone and email communication monitored for National Security purposes.

What is most interesting from a News and Current Affairs perspective is that the NYT sat on the story for about a year, at the behest of the Bush Administration. Apparently, it would jeopardize National Security operations if it were revealed. This makes the timing of its disclosure all the more interesting. The Administration is having a trying time with Republican led Senate and Congress. In theory, the two houses should be a source of rubber-stamp support for executive decisions, but these days the republican party is split over the Presidents actions.

The Whitehouse was so shaken by the NYT piece, and the subsequent media frenzy over it, that the President ditched his previously recorded weekly radio speech about the Iraqi elections and the spread of democracy. Instead he went with a live broadcast, and “often appearing angry”, defended his decision to authorize the surveillance.

Not that the Whitehouse has anything to hide, apparently. Vice President Chenney says that Americans back wiretapping, while ex secretary of state Colin Powell says saw “nothing wrong” with the President's decision. And anyway members of congress were informed of what was going on. Not so, say some Democrats, who deny they gave approval.

Which brings me back to the New York Times. Perhaps what we are seeing is a case of “indexing”, where the News media is sensing the split, not only between Democrats and Republicans, but within the Republican party itself, and is now digging into the split, widening it and offering stories that create political debate.

Later, Yahoo reported the New York Times as saying that the wire tapping was much wider spread than first stated. Instead of the 500-or-so specific suspects, the NSA were data mining the electronic records of the phone companies and internet service providers, to find patterns of activity that might indicate terrorist behavior. Patterns, like “Calls to and from Afghanistan.”

Now it seems the NYT is keeping the pressure up. It's latest article, “The Agency That Could Be Big Brother”, is a feature on the contemporary work of the NSA, which was set up during the Cold War to monitor the communications of States deemed to be dangerous to the interests of the United States. But now:

“the agency is still struggling to adjust to the war on terror, in which its job is not to monitor states, but individuals or small cells hidden all over the world. To accomplish this, the N.S.A. has developed ever more sophisticated technology that mines vast amounts of data. But this technology may be of limited use abroad. And at home, it increases pressure on the agency to bypass civil liberties and skirt formal legal channels of criminal investigation. Originally created to spy on foreign adversaries, the N.S.A. was never supposed to be turned inward.”

But hey, the troops are coming home. That's a nice christmas present, even if the timing is suspicious.

Whatever the new year may bring, at least the Administration will be able to sleep soundly, knowing the national defense is secure from dangerous saboteurs.

Obituary

Albert L. Weimorts Jr. 1938-2005

“Time after time, Weimorts has put weapons in the warfighter's hands and has made a difference in the national defense of our country”

Mosques in US checked for radiation

The latest twist on US-Islamo Relations

Keeping "On Message"

Following my last entry, I listened to he President Bush's radio broadcast and read the transcript here.

Just out of interest I counted the frequency of certain words within this speech. Here are the results:

Terrorist: 19
Terror: 2
Freedom: 2 (In first paragraph)
Liberty: 1
Democracy: 0

Not Happy, George

Bush: Eavesdropping Helps Save U.S. Lives - Yahoo! News:

"One Democrat said Bush was acting more like a king than a democratically elected leader. But Bush said congressional leaders had been briefed on the operation more than a dozen times. That included Democrats as well as Republicans in the House and Senate, a GOP lawmaker said.

Often appearing angry in an eight-minute address, the president made clear he has no intention of halting his authorizations of the monitoring activities and said public disclosure of the program by the news media had endangered Americans.

Bush's willingness to publicly acknowledge a highly classified spying program was a stunning development for a president known to dislike disclosure of even the most mundane inner workings of his White House. Just a day earlier he had refused to talk about it....

The NSA program's existence surfaced as Bush was fighting to save the expiring provisions of the USA Patriot Act, the domestic anti-terrorism law enacted after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Democrats and a few Republicans who say the law gives so much latitude to law enforcement officials that it threatens Americans' constitutional liberties succeeded Friday in stalling its renewal.

So Bush scrapped the version of his weekly radio address that he had already taped — on the recent elections in Iraq — and delivered a live speech from the Roosevelt Room in which he lashed out at the senators blocking the Patriot Act as irresponsible and confirmed the NSA program."

What is interesting is that the Bush Whitehouse machine decided to forego an opportunity to talk up the fruits of WoT (Democracy in Iraq) and instead fight domestic fires. The Bush Whitehouse is on the defensive, with crack opening in the party line over torture and now journalists are driving a wedge into the crack with the release of a story that the New York Times has sat on for a year.

Supporters of Patriot Act Suffer a Stinging Defeat in Senate

Supporters of Patriot Act Suffer a Stinging Defeat in Senate - New York Times: "After an emotional debate about the balance between national security and personal liberties and the very character of the republic, the Senate voted, 52 to 47, to end debate and take a yes-or-no vote on the law itself.But since 60 votes are required under Senate rules to end debate, the Patriot Act was left hanging. The House of Representatives voted, 251 to 174, last week in favor of the latest version of the bill, which had been worked out in negotiations between the two chambers. The Senate action today leaves the bill up in the air and due to expire on Dec. 31. President Bush and House Republican leaders had pushed hard for the bill and had spoken strongly against any further compromises. But no one would be surprised if yet another round of talks is undertaken to avoid the prospect of the lawmakers going home for Christmas and allowing the statute to lapse."

Off you go, sonny...And don't do it again

Ouch. The Guardian report:

Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, America's most wanted man in Iraq, was arrested last year but released because his captors did not know who he was, an Iraqi government minister has claimed.

Now that had to hurt.

WoT Becomes WoB/A/G/K/I/M ?

The Guardian reports that the BBC are issuing guidelines on "the use of language when reporting terrorism."

Bush Lets NSA Spy on Citizens Phone Calls

The New York Times has this article about the NSA spying on American citizens, in contravention of the US constitution. According to Yahoo, The Whitehouse asked the NYT to sit on the article for about a year so not to "jeopardize continuing investigations and alert would-be terrorists they were under scrutiny."

White House 'agrees torture ban'

In the 'Oh, I getcha' Department (See Cultural Reference for decryption):

The BBC resports that the White House has agrred to a ban on the torture or degrading of foreign terror suspects. The Bush Administration is under a lot of domestic pressure and this incident has but them between a rock and a hard place: Refuse and risk implicating itself in allegations of torture or comply and 'back down' from the argument, something this administration does not like to do.

But is this a tacit admission by the Bush Administration that they have lost control of the agenda? Only yesterday, George W. Bush got as close to saying sorry about the WMD intelligence as he ever has. I'm not getting too excited. He's a second term president with nowhere to go but out. Already this year he has lost the moment he had during his re-election, what with the climb-down over Social Security and the fallout from Hurricane Katrina. Libby, and possibly Rove, or on the legal hitlist over their involvement in the Plame Affair (no, I refuse to gate-erise).

However, on a more post-modern tack, what the Whitehouse agree to and what the Whitehouse do are two completely different things. This is a case of Strategic Communications, even Public Diplomacy: that's Public Relations "spin" to the un-initiated.

Only one thing will allows us to know for sure: transparency in government. Don't hold your breath.

Sorry seems to be the hardest word

The Guardian reports that George W. Bush has apologised for the Bad Intelligence:

"It is true that much of the intelligence turned out to be wrong," Mr Bush said. "As president, I am responsible for the decision to go into Iraq."
However, he added: "My decision to remove Saddam Hussein was the right decision. Saddam was a threat, and the American people and the world is better off because he is no longer in power."

The intelligence Mr Bush could have been referring to may be the pre-war information gathered from Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, a Libyan, who claimed al-Qaida was linked to Iraq.

Mr Libi later said he made his most specific claims whilst in Egyptian custody in a bid to avoid "harsh treatment".

In a CIA report published in the New York Times last week, unnamed officials admitted that Mr Libi been subjected to rendition when he told his interrogators that Iraq had trained al-Qaida operatives.

Before the Iraq war, the Bush administration frequently cited Mr Libi's information as "credible evidence".

What is Torture?

This article on BBC News looks at definitions of torture.

First the Ashes, Now Hicks

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Australian terror suspect can become UK citizen: "Mr Hicks's lawyers argue that the Australian government has refused to plead for his release and has made no attempt to prevent his trial by a US military commission. They say that, in contrast, the UK government has acted to remove all nine of its citizens imprisoned at Guantanamo, and would be compelled to call for the release of Mr Hicks. After today's ruling, his lawyers will now press the British government to make arrangements for him to take the required citizenship oath and pledge. They will then urge the Home Office to seek his release from the detention centre, in Cuba, and bring him to the UK."

When pragmatism prevails

This piece is particularly interesting. What is the ethicacy of using intelligence extracted under torture in a third-party country. Can we fight terror and ignore torture? What is more compelling: The human rights of a lesser group or the security of society-at-large?

The favourite question posed in defence of the torutre question is: What if there is a nuclear bomb which is about to explode in a city of millions and one person knows the location of the device? Surely the nees of the many outweigh the needs of the few?Shame that utilitarian imperative isn't extended to society in times of relative peace.

"The Sky Is Dark"

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Terrorism threat has increased: Met chief: "'The level of threat has intensified and continues to intensify. The terrorists are here and they are going to go on attempting to kill people like you and people like me,' he said. 'The sky is dark. You may argue on the current legal position or British government's position, but we are in a different place than before the opening of this century.'There are currently people in the UK as we speak who are planning mass atrocities and who will use suicide as a weapon. That's a different place to where we have been in my lifetime.'"

Is there a connection?

I was interested if anyone else in the Blogosphere was making connections between WoT and what's been happening in Sydney over the last few days. The answer seems to be 'yes.' A quick look on Google Blog search found more than one or two entries about what's going. Of course, John Howard wants to paint the rioters as simple law breakers. "Don't complicate things" is his plea.

Which is rich, considering the track record of the Liberal government involvement in WoT. If Tampa was the beginning, WoT was the "gift from heaven", then Cronulla is a predictable result.

Like Gahan wrote this on his blog:

It is no surprise that this weekends race riots in Sydney occurred when the Australian Prime Minister John Howard enacts Xenophobic legislation such as the August 13 2004 Marriage Equality Ban, sends Afghan refugees to Concentration Camps and joins the US in an illegal invasion of Iraq.

There is more to this, of course. It's not a simple one-to-one connection: Socio-economic, gender and other factors play a part. But maybe the "Aussies" involved are just following the example set by the man-in-charge. I guess its better than just "following orders."

Patriot Act up for renewal

GOP Seeks Quick Passage of New Patriot Act - Yahoo! News: "Rep. James Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, issued a statement saying the measure would aid 'in the detection, disruption and dismantling of terrorist cells before they strike.'
Key provisions cover the ability of law enforcement officials to gain access to a wealth of personal data, including library and medical records, as part of investigations into suspected terrorist activity.
The measure provides a four-year extension of the government's ability to conduct roving wiretaps -- which may involve multiple phones -- and to seek access to many of the personal records covered by the bill.
Also extended for four years is the power to wiretap 'lone wolf' terrorists who may operate on their own, without control from a foreign agent or power. An earlier, pre-Thanksgiving stab at compromise had called for seven-year extensions of these provisions.
Yet another provision, which applies to all criminal cases, gives the government 30 days to provide notice that it has carried out a search warrant."

Technorati Tags: Terrorism, Torture, US Administration

All Quiet on the Western (Suburbs) Front

I've been a little preoccupied the last couple of days with another summer session course at UTS. I'm also taking Public Relations Principles, which is giving me some interesting insights into the other side of News and Current Affairs: The Source.

I will be back tomorrow with some analysis of this week in WoT.

Enjoy the beach, while I'm stuck inside Bon Marche on a Saturday. I must be insane.

It's all in the semantics

Rice Signals Shift in Interrogation Policy - Yahoo! News: "Rice said cruel and degrading interrogation methods are off limits for all U.S. personnel at home and abroad. But she gave no examples of banned practices, did not define the meaning of cruelty or degradation, did not say if the rules would apply to private contractors or foreign interrogators and made no mention of whether exceptions would be allowed."

In the "That was money well spent" Department...

BBC NEWS | Middle East | Bin Laden is 'alive and fighting'

US court clears professor of terrorism

Independent Online Edition > Americas: "In a major defeat for the federal government, a Florida jury last night acquitted a Palestinian professor on charges of leading a terrorist group that carried out suicide bombings in Israel. Three of his co-defendants were also cleared of dozens of related charges."

Independent Online Edition > World

Independent Online Edition > World: "Condoleezza Rice virtually shrugged off a formal EU request for clarification about CIA-chartered 'ghost flights' last night, as the American intelligence agency was accused of having deliberately misled Italian investigators looking into the disappearance of an Islamic cleric."

EU hypocrisy on CIA secret prisons

EU hypocrisy on CIA secret prisons

UK Government "Breaking the Law"?

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | UK 'breaking law' over CIA secret flights: "The British government is guilty of breaking international law if it allowed secret CIA 'rendition' flights of terror suspects to land at UK airports, according to a report by American legal scholars."

It's just for the Duty Free Allowance

BBC NEWS | Americas | Rice defends US terror policies: "US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has admitted that terror suspects are flown abroad for interrogation, but denied they were tortured."

Then why fly them out of the US? Why rely on interogation in a third party country?

'She said renditions had been carried out for decades between the US and its allies.

"Renditions take terrorists out of action, and save lives," she said. "Such renditions are permissible under international law."

However, some legal experts have suggested that the process of rendition is open to challenge under international law.'

If a week in politics is a long time...

Then what about...

NSW Parliament expected to endorse terror law - National - smh.com.au: "The law includes a 10-year sunset clause."

Breaking Sports News

OK, first off: I am not a sports fan. This is a congenital condition, something I was born with. My passport says I'm British, and until very recently, that meant we were crap at sport--all sport. Although, having said that, we are probably the greatest threat to the Australian way of life.

This is all, by round-about method, leading to the Wot connection. A search for "terror" on today's SMH website has this little ditty regarding the up coming commonwealth games:

ASIO conducts terror checks for Games - Breaking News - Sport - Breaking News

Of particular interest to me, in the wider story of WoT is this quote:

"Those involved in the event will have their names checked against information held in the intelligence agency's terrorism databases, The Australian reports...

I have to ask -- If someone is desperate to pull off an act of terrorism, then surely they are not going to use their own identity? Of course, authorities have to give the perception they are in control, doing something to protect their publics. Some undesirables will be filtered out by this process:

"...ASIO said so far no-one checked had been rejected."

There's still time.

"And So We Begin..."

Ah, university: home of many an orphan blog.

This is a project for my News and Current Affairs class, and as with every good enterprise, I start with a mission statement:

WoT on Earth will present a perspective on the "global War on Terror" from internet, print, TV and radio sources from around the world.

That should do for now.