Over 50,000 turn out for Tel Aviv peace rally

Organizers of the peace rally estimated the number of participants at nearly 100,000.
Photo courtesy of Coalition of Women for Peace

May 12— More than 50,000 demonstrators turned out in Tel Aviv for a massive peace rally and to demand Israel withdraw from the Palestinian territories, Israeli police said Saturday evening.

The organizer of the rally, the Peace Now group, also claimed the protest was the biggest peace demonstration since the outbreak of the Palestinian intifada in September 2000.

“This is the first time since the intifada that we have had such a massive demonstration with people in clear opposition to the government,” said Peace Now spokesman Arye Arnon.

“This is radical. This turnout is on the basis that one day we will return to the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as the capital of two states and the elimination of the settlements,” Arnon said.

“It is a very important message to the Israeli government, the Arab world and the international community. There is a peace camp in Israel and it is raising its voice,” said the leader of the main opposition Meretz party, Yossi Sarid.

“From tonight, (Israeli Prime Minister Ariel) Sharon can be assured there is no consensus for a military operation” in Gaza, he added.

Peace Now spokeswoman Gali Golan put the number of demonstrators at over 100,000. Speaking from the podium, Sarid said there needed to be an “international mandate for the (Palestinian) territories.”

“If Israel attacks Gaza, they will do it without us,” he added.

Former justice minister and leading Labor dove Yossi Beilin accused Sharon of leading the nation into a tragedy.

“We are told Sharon is a man of peace but it is not true: he doesn’t want go to the negotiating table because he has nothing to say,” he said. “Sharon is dragging us into a catastrophe.”

The rally was organized by the Peace Now movement and an umbrella group of nine organizations called the Peace Coalition, under the theme of “Get out of the [Palestinian] territories for the sake of Israel.”

Rabin Square is the site where Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated by a Jewish extremist on Nov. 4, 1995.

More than 1,000 police were deployed in the area to protect demonstrators from attacks by either Jewish extremists or Palestinian militants, a senior police official said earlier in the day.

Earlier Saturday, about 150 members of the Arab-Jewish group Taayush (“coexistance” in Arabic) arrived at the Kissufim crossing point between Israel and the Gaza Strip, in a fleet of three buses calling on soldiers to return home.

Chanting “Soldiers Come Home,” and “End the Occupation,” the protesters also referred to Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer by his original name, calling out “Fuad, Fuad, how many children have you killed this morning?”

Police blocked the group about 50 yards from the checkpoint.

Source: Agence France Presse

Banking crisis in Argentina

By Vero Loka

Buenos Aires, Argentina, May 13 (AGR)— In Argentina, the state is spending about 47 billion pesos per year, but is only collecting about 32 billion. Many people don’t pay taxes, and much money is misspent and embezzled. The banks of Argentina are dependent on the interest that the state pays on the money it borrowed.

In November it became obvious to many people that the state would not be able to pay the banks, which would lead to their bankruptcy. The banks warned their richest customers of the coming crisis, and in response, these customers withdrew their money and converted it to dollars.

The withdrawal of these funds and the government’s default left the national banks with almost no cash on hand. To keep the national banks from going bankrupt and stop the foreign banks from completely taking over the economy, the government of Fernando De la Rua created the “Corralito” (little fence), a law which made it illegal to take out more than 200 pesos in cash per week and which is still in place. The banks still honor credit card accounts, leaving those with incomes greater than 200 pesos per week with the possibility to spend it, but most businesses only accept cards with a 10-30% surcharge, or simply don’t accept them due to the difficulty in collecting from the banks.

Although this law has saved the banks from immediate collapse, the 200 pesos per week and the more than 20,000 individual appeals that have passed on the law have reduced the total reserve in half, to about 30 billion pesos, or 10 billion dollars. Most of the appeals were passed for supposed medical emergencies. Though many appeals are legitimate, many individuals have greased the palms of judges to get their money.

The situation is a vicious circle.

First the government defaults its payments to the banks because of corruption, misspending, and lack of tax producing economic activity. Then the banks default on the loans of the people because there is a rush to collect all these loans at the same time.

This in turn causes a greater lack of economic activity, as the banks cannot loan money for the purchase of materials and payment of workers, leaving the government with even less intake.

The government cannot preserve the guise of a separate and independent Argentine economy if the national banks collapse, so therefore cannot lift the restriction on withdrawals, but without the insertion of more money into the economy, the money will slowly disappear.

Interest on the national debt to the IMF is still being paid, but nothing more. The representatives of the IMF are demanding a complete political and legal restructuring, including cutting public works to the bone. On the other hand, there are protests and marches outside of every ministry and the headquarters of every bank, demanding that the hospital workers (for example) be paid the money that is owed to them for the last 4 months of work.

At the beginning of the crisis, the peso was fixed, by law, 1to 1 with the dollar. Now it is worth 30 cents. The decision to devaluate the peso was taken by the current president, Duhalde, with the explanation that it was necessary in order to become competitive with exportation. In effect the real beneficiaries of this move are the larger companies that had debts to the national banks in dollars, and also foreign speculators in that they can buy Argentine companies for a song.

In the case of the companies, their debts were “pesified” to the tune of 1 dollar for 1.4 pesos, more or less the current exchange at that time. The dollar has already reached 3 pesos and these companies are still paying their debts at 1.4.

With the plummet of the peso, the prices of everything have risen -- even nationally produced goods. For example, Argentine wheat producers have tripled the price of flour, because they can make three times as many pesos by exporting than selling domestically.

There are many computers, cars, CD players, all those things that make the middle class neighborhoods look first world, but the Argentine economy has always been colonial in that the country sells resources and raw materials and buys the finished products imported from more industrialized countries. A terrible example of this is medical supplies which are not produced here. Public health care exists, as difficult and bureaucratic as it may be, but the state is not putting enough money toward the hospitals to pay the employees and buy medical supplies.

Wages have not risen. Unemployment has. Hunger has. Schools are in session less due to teacher strikes. Lack of medical goods is killing people. Employees, of the state and otherwise, have not been receiving their wages. The businesses that sell by bulk have rised their prices of foodstuffs around 40% on the whole, while those who run the corner stores (from which most people buy everything) only rose the prices 25%, cutting their earnings, but still driving the people to buy in the supermarkets and buy bulk from the distributors.

Another consequence of the fall of the peso is that some people have become rich buying and selling dollars at key moments. Almost every leftist or nationalist group has condemned the buying of dollars because the greater the demand, the higher the price.

Two Ministers of economy have left power since the beginning of the economic crisis, Cavallo with an angry mob lighting fires at his doorstep, and Remes Lenicov, who resigned the day after presenting his “Plan Bonex”. Before explaining the Plan Bonex, it must be said that in Argentina, although the national currency is pesos, many people had their savings, checking accounts, rent agreements, trust funds (trust funds of the short haul, with high interest rates for say 60, 30, 180 days are common), mortgages and such, in dollars.

The gist of the plan Bonex, is that the state would take on the bank’s debts to the people, trading the money the bank owes them for a state issued bond redeemable in dollars in three years (in the case of checking and savings accounts) with 2% interest, or in 10 years (for trust funds) with 1.9% annual interest. Though there have continually been protests outside of the central bank and the Capital building, the protests increased in size and fervor when this plan was presented.

The people in no way trusted that they would ever see their money again. Duhalde, the president, closed the banks after presenting this plan to congress, threatening that they would not be opened until this plan was passed. Coincidentally, the same day ScotiaBank from Canada had to close down because their central office refused to send more money. Eventually, this plan was completely abandoned, though there is still some rumor of bond issuing.

Another abandoned plan was the actualization of the CER (reference stabilization efficient), a plan to adjust mortgages, rents, car payments, and such according to inflation. It was very similar to a plan that was enacted by the last dictatorship when Argentina suffered hyperinflation in1980. In that time, it caused countless properties to fall into the hands of the banks and lengthened the mortgages on many houses to infinity. This plan didn’t interest the people or the banks, in that everyone with a mortgage would lose their house, and the banks did not want to become real estate brokers.

Now the only discernible plan is to cut public spending and appease the IMF in the hopes that they infuse the Argentine economy with more money. Very few people believe that any of the money the IMF has loaned to the Argentine government has ever reached the people in the form of public works or helped create industry. It is expected of every politician, every functionary, every employee of the government to steal as much as they possibly can, and for the most part they fulfill this expectation.

Hopes fade for
East Timor justice

By Richard Galpin

Jakarta, Indonesia, May 13— As East Timor readies for independence on May 20, most of those who wreaked terrible violence after the 1999 vote to end Indonesian rule still walk free.

The former Indonesian province of East Timor has been under United Nations’ control since its people voted for independence three years ago. But freedom came at a high price.

More than 1,000 people were killed, and almost every town and village systematically destroyed, by retreating Indonesian soldiers and their militias.

In a series of attacks across the city of Dili, 13 independence supporters were killed, nine people were seriously injured and many buildings destroyed.

Top militia leader Eurico Guterres was seen with the gunmen. Earlier that month he was also filmed in the town of Liquica, just after the massacre of dozens of refugees who had taken shelter inside a church.

An indictment, issued this year by a court in East Timor, accused Guterres and members of the Indonesian security forces of crimes against humanity for direct involvement in the violence in Dili.

While a handful of people have been prosecuted in East Timor, most of those responsible for the violence now live in Indonesia, where there has been little progress made in bringing them to justice.

Incriminating footage

Archive footage of Eurico Guterres shows him in front of a large crowd of his men in April 1999 in the East Timorese capital, Dili.

Today, Guterres lives in a comfortable suburb of the Indonesian capital, Jakarta. He knows he will not be extradited to East Timor to face trial. The Indonesian Government has refused to hand anyone over. And he continues to deny responsibility for the killings.

He could face trial in Jakarta at Indonesia’s own human rights tribunal, finally set up by the government in March after intense pressure from the international community.

Guterres and 17 other militiamen, government officials and members of the security forces, have been charged with crimes against humanity.

On Monday, Guterres answered questions from Indonesian state prosecutors about his role in the violence.

But so far only seven of the accused have actually appeared in court and there are increasing doubts as to whether Guterres or any other senior figures, particularly from the army, will ever be called to account.

Asmara Nababan, general-secretary of the National Human Rights Commission, is skeptical.

“I’m not sure these tribunals can deliver justice. The recruitment of the judges was not transparent, the indictments are very weak, and all the key witnesses are in East Timor.

“Also, they are only investigating very few of the violent incidents in 1999. It seems neither the judges, nor the prosecution, intend to reveal the truth of what happened -- although I think some middle-ranking officials will be sacrificed to save the senior military and police commanders.”

The original investigation by the Human Rights Commission into the violence in East Timor called for more than 100 people, including the former armed forces chief, General Wiranto, to stand trial.

But that list was cut right down by state prosecutors to remove the most senior military officers. Human rights lawyer Johnson Panjaitan is also deeply skeptical about the whole process.

“From the beginning, the only purpose of these tribunals was to meet the pressure from both inside the country and from the international community. It is not to get justice for the victims, it’s just lip service.

“The papers produced so far before the court are not about the systematic violations of human rights, which were well organized by the military,” said Panjaitan.

And certainly lawyers such as Hotma Sitompul, who are defending those who have appeared in the tribunals, are very confident their clients will not be prosecuted.

“So far there is no evidence, no witnesses, to prove that he is guilty,” he said. He said he thought his clients would be released.

In the immediate aftermath of the violence in 1999, there were calls for an international human rights tribunal to be set up.

But with the Indonesian Government promising to bring those responsible to justice, the United Nations backed off.

Despite the lack of progress, it now seems the idea of an international court has been shelved altogether.

Alex Flor, head of a German human rights organization called Watch Indonesia, has been observing the tribunals in Jakarta.

“The international community is very much interested in reinstating good relationships to Indonesia, to the Indonesian Government,” said Flor.

“And especially the United States -- who stopped their arms exports due to the East Timor case -- they are very keen to reinstate good relationship with the Indonesian army in the context of... ‘the war against terror’ after Sept. 11.

“So they are no longer interested in putting the Indonesian army into a corner,” he added.

So while a few mid-ranking military police and civilian officials may eventually be prosecuted, it seems most of those responsible for the bloodshed will remain free here in Indonesia.

Source: BBC News

Europe’s far-right making gains

By Matthew Arnold

London, United Kingdom, May 14 (AGR)— A rising tide of anti-immigrant racism has so far produced mixed results for Europe’s proto-fascist right in this election season.

In the UK, the neo-Nazi British National Party (BNP) has won three two-year terms to local council seats in the depressed Northern town of Burnley, recently the scene of race riots pitting poor whites against poor Pakistanis and Bangladeshis.

In France, Jean LePen’s Front Nationale (FN) sent alarm bells ringing across the continent when the immigrant-bashing ex-paratrooper and perennial candidate, benefiting from an unprecedented showing and a fractious left vote split between several candidates, beat liberal prime minister Lionel Jospin to qualify for the run-off vote against conservative Jacques Chirac.

Hundreds of thousands spilled into the streets in protest, and LePen was beat handily as the left jammed polling booths to back Chirac. Worryingly, however, the FN won over one-third of the vote in many coastal provinces and several in the North.

In Holland, Pim Fortuyn, an urbane, openly-gay right wing populist preaching openness on social issues while calling for a halt to immigration by “backwards” Muslims, appeared to be threatening the Dutch Labor government’s hold on power before he was assassinated by an animal rights activist. His death has been attended by a mass outpouring of grief spanning much of the political spectrum, and his lieutenants are poised to join the next coalition government.

In Denmark, the far-right Danish People’s Party, led by self-styled housewife Pia Kjaersgaard, has polled as high as 15% on calls for an end to immigration and a rejection of the euro currency.

The BNP, whose politicians have abandoned their traditional boots and braces of late in favor of suits and ties, had sought to gain from a string of racial disturbances last year by mounting a massive effort in local English elections. Under the leadership of Nick Griffin, the party has recast itself as a populist alternative to Labor, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, emphasizing issues of crime and immigration while toning down its more traditional outward racism.

Contesting 66 local council seats throughout England, BNP candidates polled an average of 12% to Labor’s 33% and the Conservative’s 34%.

While the results were hailed as a defeat for the fascists in the press, the BNP made clear inroads around the suburbs of Leeds.

Anti-fascist groups and mainstream politicians alike fear a groundswell of support for neo-Nazism in the North, where the government’s dispersal system has concentrated recent immigrant communities in impoverished industrial towns beset by spiraling unemployment.

Anti-fascists find the results particularly disturbing in light of ‘devolution’ policies granting local and regional governments increasing amounts of power, and the trend toward establishing powerful, American-style mayors for larger cities. They fear fascists could gain broad powers in future elections.

But in several key council races in East London, long a focal point of racism against Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, the party polled far lower than it has in the past. The BNP won its first seat there in 1993, on the largely white, working class Isle of Dogs, but fared poorly there this time around.

Though the neo-Nazi National Front threatened to become a third national party briefly in the 1970s, Britain boasts a popular hatred of fascism perhaps unmatched by any other nation in Europe.

Londoners still recall with glee the 1936 ‘Battle of Cable Street,’ in which residents of blue collar East London trounced a march by the BNP’s predecessor, Oswald Moseley’s British Union of Fascists.

The devastating aerial bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany in the Second World War remains fresh in the minds of Britons who weren’t yet born.

The governing Labor party is pressing ahead with plans to harden immigration controls, already the most stringent in Europe, by detaining asylum seekers at intake centers where would-be immigrants could be held for months and even years while their claims are processed.

War crimes court to become reality despite US withdrawal

By Gustavo Capdevila

Geneva, Switzerland, May 9 (IPS)— The International Criminal Court (ICC) for trying cases of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide will begin to operate within a year, in spite of the opposition of the United States, say human rights groups.

The process of setting up the 18-justice court will continue normally, even though Washington has renounced its obligations as a signatory of the Rome Statute, which established the tribunal in 1998, said William R. Pace, convenor of the Coalition for the International Criminal Court.

The United States told the United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Monday that it was formally withdrawing from the treaty that former US president Bill Clinton (1993-2001) had signed in 2000.

The US government of George W. Bush prefers to continue with the current mechanism of ad hoc tribunals for specific cases, such as those created for Yugoslavia and Rwanda, which are dependent on the UN Security Council, said Pace.

The treaty for creating the new court, known as the Rome Statute as it was adopted in that city in 1998 by a UN conference, enters into force July 1 having been ratified by 66 countries.

But the court will not become operational for approximately one year because the states party to the treaty will not hold their first assembly until early September, in New York. There, they will have to approve the budget for the first 12 months and the program for establishing the tribunal.

At that meeting, the delegates of the ratifying countries will determine the rules of procedure for the nomination and the election of the ICC’s 18 judges and the prosecutor.

The Coalition for the International Criminal Court, made up of 15 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) specializing in human rights -- including Amnesty International, International Commission of Jurists, and Human Rights Watch -- issued a forewarning about the process.

The credibility of the designations of the court justices and the quality of the judges themselves will determine the image, the moral authority and the success of the ICC, stated coalition leader Pace.

The European Union (EU), which strongly supports the creation of the court, says it should consist of reputable judges and lawyers who have extensive knowledge of criminal, international and humanitarian law.

In addition to the general prosecutor and at least two assistants, the court will have a staff of 100 to 200 employees in the first two years.

The number of agents will double by the end of the first five years of operations, estimate the human rights NGOs.

Pace said the parameters for the calculations were based on the special courts set up for the Yugoslavia and Rwanda cases, which have approximately 400 and 900 employees, respectively.

The budget for the ICC could reach $29 million, he said.

For perspective, Pace pointed out that the members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) spent $11 billion in 1999 on overseas military operations.

In comments directed at the United States, the EU has said that the ICC would make “the costly and cumbersome process of creating new ad hoc tribunals unnecessary.”

However, Pace reckons that the US opposition to the court is based on factors beyond money. Washington is “willing to have a strong treaty as long as the United States is exempt and the United States can control the treaty,” he said.

The NGO coalition chief cited the US precedents in withdrawing from international environmental treaties, disarmament treaties, children’s rights treaties -- “Across the board it is abandoning multilateralism.” The US Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Marc Grossman, criticized the new tribunal, saying it “undermines the role of the UN Security Council in maintaining international peace and security.”

Pace commented that such opinions reflect the fact that the United States would only recognize a treaty that exempts it due to that country’s “extraordinary military and political role in the world.”

The other option that Washington would agree to is the subordination of the International Criminal Court to the UN Security Council, where it holds veto power.

If that were the case, the United States “would be able to restrict the court to cases that it and the other four permanent members (Britain, China, France and Russia) and the ten elected members of the Council determine need to be investigated and prosecuted,” said Pace.

The United States says it would never grant an international organization the legal authority to try US soldiers arrested for war crimes, for example, unless the court existed under the auspices of the UN Security Council.

“When we control it, we will agree do it,” is the guiding principle of the Bush government, commented the coordinator of the Coalition.

That approach is not acceptable to most other governments, he added. “Most countries see the court as an extension of their national legal systems for the purposes of trying these crimes, not as the creation of a supranational organization.”

Over the last five years, as the court was being debated, NGO and civil society delegates in favor of the initiative visited countries around the world, with particular attention to Latin America, Africa and Asia.

“The first thing that parliamentarians would say to us was ‘we cannot support it because it is going to be controlled by the United States’,” recalled Pace.

However, he pointed out a positive sign in that the ICC has been created by democratic nations.

The Freedom Foundation, a Washington-based human rights group with conservative tendencies, rated 63 of the 66 countries that ratified the Rome Statute as democratic regimes.

According to the study, it said that 74 percent of those countries are “completely free.”

EU representatives have said that when the International Criminal Court becomes operational and proves that it delivers effective and impartial administration of justice, other states not yet parties to the Rome Statute will be convinced to ratify the treaty.

Afghanistan women still
under threat

New York, New York, May 9— Afghan women continue to fear physical violence and experience insecurity even after the end of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, Human Rights Watch said today.

Sexual violence by armed factions and public harassment tied to repressive Taliban-era edicts continue to restrict women in their movement, expression and dress, Human Rights Watch said in a new briefing paper released today.

“Women can only participate in the reconstruction of Afghanistan if they can be physically safe,” said LaShawn R. Jefferson, executive director of the Women’s Rights Division of Human Rights Watch. “The international community must act now to end violence against women.”

The 11-page briefing paper, “Taking Cover: Women in Post-Taliban Afghanistan,” documents cases of attacks and threats against women that include rape and other acts of sexual violence and their effect on women’s participation in civil society.

Since the end of Taliban rule in Afghanistan in November 2001, women and girls have had growing access to education, health care, and employment. At the same time, many Afghan women still live in an environment in which personal physical security is constantly under threat. The Human Rights Watch briefing paper documents a number of cases of sexual violence in the northern city of Mazar-i Sharif, including gang-rapes.

Many women continue to limit their movements and to wear a burqa, the head-to-toe enveloping garment, for their physical security, even though the Taliban-era edict requiring women to wear the burqa is no longer in force. Human Rights Watch called on the international community to support the expansion of the mandate and duration of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan (ISAF), increase funding for human rights monitoring in Afghanistan, and provide direct financial and programmatic assistance to the Afghan Ministry for Women’s Affairs.

In addition, Human Rights Watch called on the Interim Administration, including local authorities, to take all possible steps to protect women from sexual and other gender-specific violence, and bring perpetrators to justice. Human Rights Watch also recommended that the Justice Ministry should repeal those laws that discriminate against women and are inconsistent with customary international law and international treaties to which Afghanistan is a party.

Source: Human Rights Watch

Israel’s ‘evidence’ against Arafat ‘riddled with omissions, falsehoods’

By Robert Fisk

Ramallah, Occupied Territories, May 9— Israel’s so-called Book of Terror — designed to prove that Yassir Arafat is a master of terror involved in suicide attacks on Israel — is riddled with errors, omissions, and deliberate misinformation.

The dossier, which was presented to President George Bush by the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, characterizes Arafat as an evil, scheming warlord funded by Iran and Saudi Arabia.

But in some cases, translations of Palestinian documents allegedly seized by Israeli troops in the West Bank have been doctored to “prove” Arafat’s responsibility for anti-Israeli attacks. At least one “translation” of a Palestinian document posted on the Israeli army’s website is a palpable falsehood.

In reality the documents portray Arafat’s military impotence. The papers the Israeli intelligence service have so far produced – assuming that most of them are genuine – paint a vivid, pathetic picture of his loss of power within the Palestinian community over the past 12 months, the suborning of his lieutenants and the gradual recruitment of his men by Hamas and Islamic Jihad opponents.

The original Arabic documents reveal just how the Israelis, in an exercise in black propaganda, have manipulated their true meaning. On Mar. 20, this year, “Hamdi,” one of Yassir Arafat’s senior intelligence officers in the West Bank town of Tulkarem, wrote a report about a suspected Israeli collaborator called Jihad Ilayan.

“Further to our letter… about the [Israeli] helicopter strike on the chicken farm at Anabta and after arresting the young man mentioned above, interrogating him and then releasing him, we wish to inform you that he is now with a relative named Riyadh Ilayan from the Jalazoan [refugee] camp and he [Riyadh] works in General Intelligence,” Hamdi’s report said. The implications are obvious. Riyadh Ilayan works for Arafat’s own intelligence organization but his relative Jihad is suspected of collaboration with Israel.

Just 17 days earlier, another intelligence report from Tulkarem, this time written on unheaded notepaper and unsigned, informs Arafat’s men that the al-Aqsa Brigades in the city are planning “an operation inside Israel.” The brigade’s modus operandi, says the document, includes offering suspected Israeli collaborators forgiveness if they kill Jewish settlers or Israeli soldiers or intelligence officers. The forthcoming “operation” had been planned, the report states, by Ghanem Ghanem of Force 17, Hani Abu Laimoon, “a previous operative of ours,” and an unnamed man who is referred to as a “drug dealer.” The same group, the document notes, had previously arranged the attack on a banqueting hall in the northern Israeli city of Hadera. It does not mention the results of that attack: six Israeli civilians dead and another 35 wounded.

These reports – and many others – show just how far Yassir Arafat had lost control of the militant organizations flourishing among the Palestinians on the West Bank. But Israel’s reaction was to go public with accounts of their contents that were deliberately misleading and, in at least one case, untrue. They claimed that the report on Ilayan detailed his role in a failed suicide attack – when in fact it recorded his suspected collaboration with Israel – while presenting the second document as proof that Arafat’s own intelligence men were involved in the al-Aqsa suicide squads. All references to the drug dealer and the inducement to collaborators to seek forgiveness were excised.

The Arabic texts suggest that Israel is fighting against men who have long ago passed outside Arafat’s control, who are better funded than his Palestinian Authority and whose anti-Israeli attacks can only occasionally be foiled by Arafat’s still-loyal intelligence officers.

Typical is the case of Mahmoud Freih, a 17-year-old Palestinian schoolboy who was born in Kuwait and lived in Tulkarem. A report from Arafat’s “Preventative Security” Office in the city, dated Dec. 26 last year, informed his intelligence operatives that Freih had originally been a member of the Democratic Front (a Marxist, pro-Arafat group) but had since joined Islamic Jihad at the instigation of a Tulkarem resident called Ayman Mahdawi. Arafat’s men demanded to talk to Freih about his change of allegiance. But he was already planning to plant a makeshift mine on a road used by Israeli tanks near Shweikeh. The attack was aborted because of the presence of Israeli soldiers. So he moved the bomb, ran a wire from the explosives to a citrus tree in an orchard. Again, his attack failed. Next day, Freih attended school but returned to the bomb’s location – only to find that the wire had been cut. Waiting for him there were an official of the Palestinian Authority and an explosives expert named Samir Abu Naser. He later confessed his activities to Arafat’s men. A later note on the report says Freih was released after questioning on condition he had been recruited – presumably by the Palestinian Authority.

The story of how a 17-year-old schoolboy could involve himself in Islamic Jihad and head off after classes to try to destroy an Israeli tank casts a revealing light on the militancy of Palestinian youth. The Israeli account deleted all reference to the role played by the Palestinian Authority in foiling the attack on the Israelis. The full text shows clearly that Arafat’s men did just what the Israelis would wish: they stopped the attack and persuaded the boy to change sides.

In other cases, however, Arafat’s intelligence officers woefully failed to maintain the loyalty of their own men. Far from controlling the powerful militias springing up in the West Bank who were intent on an open conflict with the Israelis, Arafat was simply marginalized. A long report, dated Feb. 4, again written on unheaded notepaper, details for Arafat’s intelligence men how the Palestinian security apparatus in Jenin – along with local members of Arafat’s own CIA-trained General Intelligence operation – had been infiltrated and bought over with large payments of cash. One of the disloyal intelligence men is now paid by the Islamic Jihad group and “sometimes wears a mask in demonstrations and chants against the Authority.” Another man, an officer in the CIA-trained Preventative Security known as “Al-Rikh,” is described as “the source of most of the weapons of Jihad and Hamas.” The Fatah movement in Jenin, the document adds, is “playing on both ropes ... they are with the Authority but, when the Authority arrests someone, they are against it.” Money obviously plays a large part in the suborning of Arafat’s men.

Israel’s attempts to pin Arafat’s name to payments for Palestinians who had committed anti-Israeli attacks rest on a few documents which bear – or appear to bear – Yassir Arafat’s signature. One of these, dated Sept. 19 last year, is a request for payments of $2,500 to Raed el-Karni, Ziad Daas and Amar Qadan. The Israeli version of this document fails to point out that both el-Karni and Qadan were assassinated by Israeli forces four months later. Daas, who is still alive, is believed to have planned the Hadera massacre in retaliation for the Israeli murder of el-Karni. But the Hadera killings took place on Jan. 17 this year, four months after – not before – the request to Arafat. In any event, each man received $600. Another document on “State of Palestine” letterhead, records payments of $800 to 15 men, including Bilal Abu Aamsheh, who was later accused by Israel of killing an Israeli on May 31, 2001 and two border guards on Sept. 11 the same year. Again, the payments were authorized not after the murders but almost two months before. An account of money apparently needed for weapons

production carries the legend “Al-Aqsa Martyrs Troops” on the top of the page. According to the Israelis, it is addressed to Fouad Shabaki, one of Arafat’s confidants. But on the printed Arabic original, Shabaki’s name does not appear. What the paper does show – yet again – is the huge amount of money available to the men who run the suicide squads. It includes $80,000 for lathes, milling machines, welding machines and wiring. Another paper, entitled “Financial Report” but again showing no Arafat connections, details costs of bullets and chemicals for explosive charges and bombs for al-Aqsa. It provides a startling contrast between the cash available to the suicide squads and the penny-pinching amounts that Arafat apparently doled out.

The documents do provide a rare glimpse into the powerlessness of Arafat, the infiltration of his subordinates, the attempts to suborn his own intelligence officers – one of them loyally tells Arafat’s spooks that he has refused advances from Islamic Jihad. The last thing they prove is that Arafat is behind the wave of suicide bombings that have continued in Israel.

Source: Times (UK)

DU-poisoned air remains widespread in Yugoslavia

Depelted uranium particles continue to contaminate the air throughout Yugoslavia three years after NATO bombing.
Photo courtesy of World Factbook 2001

By Vesna Peric Zimonjic

Belgrade, Yugoslavia, May 7 (IPS)— Three years after North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) air strikes against Yugoslavia, people in the area are still breathing in particles of toxic depleted uranium (DU), according to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).

The latest UNEP report, presented in Belgrade last week, said persisting contaminations were recorded at the locations targeted by NATO during the 11 weeks of the air campaign against Yugoslavia.

Pekka Haavisto, chair of the DU Assessment Team, said shells with DU ammunition (known as ‘penetrators’) have corroded “amazingly fast” and as a result, DU continues to be constantly released into the air and is spreading -- in the form of particles -- all around the areas that were hit.

“The new findings show that the contamination remains widespread, although with low level risks for the population,” said Haavist. “Constant monitoring of water quality is needed, while the site decontamination and construction work could potentially stir up DU dust from the ground surface in the future,” he added.

DU is a waste product of the process used to enrich natural uranium ore for nuclear reactors or nuclear weapons. It is used in the tips of bullets or warheads to pierce armor plating. DU breaks into tiny particles on impact and these can be easily ingested or inhaled.

Some 31,000 warheads with DU landed in Yugoslavia during the 1999 NATO campaign.

NATO officials insist that there are no clear links between DU ammunition and the different types of cancer appearing among soldiers who served in the contaminated areas, or among the population. Health experts warn that the effects become visible five years after the contact with DU particles.

Last week, Italian RAI television showed footage of 23 children born with serious defects after their fathers took part in military operations in the Balkans and Somalia.

Last January 11 European countries published a list of 22 soldiers who died of cancer or leukemia after serving in the Balkans. NATO used DU weapons while bombing Bosnian Serb sites during the Bosnian war in 1994 and 1995. International peacekeeping troops arrived there at the end of 1995.

UNEP and local teams have marked five locations hit by DU weapons in southern Serbia and one in Montenegro, where the quick additional decontamination is due to start by the end of May.

The decontamination of two of the biggest sites in Serbia will cost up to $500,000 each.

One of the recommendations of UNEP is to collect the layers of contaminated soil and put them in barrels, while the penetrators should be recovered from the ground and stored in safe places.

However, 112 locations where DU ammunition was used in the now UN- administered province of Kosovo have not even been marked. Experts warn that Kosovo Albanians are almost completely unaware of hazards that surround them.

UNEP is running a separate operation in Kosovo, which is not under the jurisdiction of Belgrade since the end of NATO air raids in June 1999.

“It is our obligation to complete this task in Yugoslavia,” said Miroslav Nikcevic, assistant of federal health minister. “We can not become accomplices in an experiment against our people,” he added.

According to the experts of the Belgrade Oncology Center, the rise in occurrence of cancer and leukemia can be expected in 2004 and 2005.

“The rise in occurrence could be up to 30 percent,” says Miodrag Djordjevic from the Center.

In the meantime, the authorities in Yugoslavia have not done much to make the public aware of the health hazards. One of the reasons might be the change of regime in October 2000, when anti-NATO and anti-Western politics of Slobodan Milosevic were defeated.

“Yugoslav authorities are now in a strange situation,” analyst Aleksandar Ciric said. “On the one hand, admitting the real dangers could mean stirring again anti-Western feelings among people. On the other, giving much publicity to the problem could distract potential badly needed foreign investors. It’s a thin line no one wants to cross.”

South America up in arms over US farm bill

By Raúl Pierri

Montevideo, Uruguay, May 10 (IPS)— The congressional passage of a new farm bill increasing agriculture subsidies by nearly 80 percent in the United States, self-proclaimed champion of free trade, has unleashed a wave of indignation in South America and Europe.

Argentina and Brazil announced that they would seek action in the World Trade Organization (WTO), while Uruguay, another agricultural exporter and their partner in the Mercosur (Southern Common Market) trade bloc, is still deciding what steps it will take.

The farm bill, which replaces the 1996 Freedom to Farm Law, designed to wean farmers off federal subsidies, will increase agricultural spending by close to 80 percent, to a total of around $170 billion over the next 10 years.

The bill, approved May 3 by the House of Representatives, made it through the Democratic-controlled Senate Wednesday by a vote of 64-35.

According to WTO limits, the United States can shell out no more than $19.1 billion a year in federal aid to farmers. The new bill authorizes the Department of Agriculture to keep subsidies within that limit.

The farm bill guarantees US farmers more stable incomes by increasing price supports for grain and cotton producers, reviving subsidies for honey, mohair, and wool, and adding new ones for milk, peanuts, lentils, and chickpeas.

It also boosts spending on soil conservation programs by 80 percent, to benefit livestock and fruit and vegetable farms, which have historically received little federal support.

President George W. Bush said he would sign the bill into law, despite protests from Australia, Canada, the European Union, and South America’s agricultural producers, whose development prospects largely depend on farm exports.

Agricultural commodities account for 52 percent of Argentina’s exports. That proportion stands at 39 percent in Bolivia, 33 percent in Brazil, 15 percent in Chile, 37 percent in Colombia, 67 percent in Ecuador, 24 percent in Peru, and 55 percent in Uruguay.

A number of governments have complained about the contradiction between Washington’s free-market rhetoric and its policies.

In September, the United States backed a call issued by the Cairns Group, made up of 18 agricultural exporting countries, for a profound reform of the international trade system, and the elimination of all forms of trade-distorting subsidies.

US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said Tuesday that the farm bill should not throw into question the Bush administration’s intention to eliminate export subsidies and improve market access.

Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Lafer announced that his country “won’t hesitate to use all possible options of commercial defense to nullify the harmful effects of subsidized products,” and that it would file a complaint against the farm bill in the WTO, due to the harm it will inflict on Brazil’s exports, especially soy beans.

Brasilia estimated the losses it would suffer over the next four years as a result of the farm bill at $9.6 billion, since the new US law will drastically boost US exports and lead to the loss of market share for South American exporters, while driving down commodity prices.

Argentine Agriculture Secretary Rafael Delpech said Wednesday that Buenos Aires “is not going to just sit back doing nothing if our farm revenues plunge as a result of the huge US agricultural subsidies.”

Delpech said the farm bill would cause “profound damages to international trade,” and added that his country would also take the case before the WTO.

Uruguayan Agriculture Minister Gonzalo González said he was still studying the new US law.

But Uruguay’s farmers have complained loudly. “The law makes us very skeptical regarding the negotiations that the United States was carrying out with Uruguay on a free trade agreement,” said the vice-president of the Uruguayan Association of Rice Farmers, Hugo Manini Ríos.

“They can’t just close the door on a country that wants to work in the area where it is able to work. That shows a lack of sensitivity towards emerging economies, whose main chance for development lies in agricultural production. We must not be governed by the law of the strong,” he added.

Manini Ríos said the US law would hurt Brazilian soy bean and cotton farmers, who may start growing rice instead, which would compete with Uruguay’s production, thus triggering “a vicious circle that will produce a disaster” in the Southern Cone region.

US Nobel Economy Prize-Winner Joseph Stiglitz described the farm bill as “the perfect illustration of the Bush administration’s hypocrisy on trade liberalization.”

The law has also irritated the United States’ closest allies, like Canada, its main partner in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

WORLD BRIEFS

$2 million in Colombia
anti-drug aid missing
The head of Colombia’s antinarcotics police, Gen. Gustavo Socha, was reassigned on May 10 after about $2 million in US drug war aid allegedly vanished into the pockets of some of his officers.

Last week the US Embassy said it had suspended some aid to the counter-narcotics police after discovering two months ago that a “significant amount of money” was missing. A US Embassy official said about 20 members of the police are believed to have taken money “for personal ends.”

Socha’s police unit receives about $4 million in US aid per year-- part of Washington’s “Plan Colombia” drug-fighting effort.

The US Embassy said Washington’s confidence in the Colombian anti-narcotics police remained “unshaken” despite the lost funds. (Associated Press)

Mexican indigenous challenge new law
Mexico’s highest court began hearing challenges to the controversial Law on Indigenous Rights and Culture, which was approved by Congress in April 2001.

Dozens of representatives from Indian and leftist organizations, as well as Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) supporters, are in the Mexican capital to challenge the law before the Supreme Court.

The EZLN and most Indian groups oppose the law, which went into effect in August 2001, because it does not recognize the Indian communities as part of the state nor include fundamental principles such as the right to autonomy or the “use and enjoyment” of their land and natural resources. (Agencia EFE)

3,000 protest police brutality in Ireland
“Ramble free zone. Roll up. Roll up. Crack a skull, win a desk job” read one of the placards outside Pearse Street Garda (police) Station in Dublin, Ireland as thousands gathered May 9 in protest over police violence at a Reclaim The Streets (RTS) rally earlier in the week. Up to 3,000 protesters marched to Dublin’s Civic offices.

Civil Rights leaders and representatives of numerous political and anti-capitalist groups condemned the violent action of gardai to the May 6 RTS rally-- fourteen people received hospital treatment after having been beaten by gardai.

Representatives from the Dublin Council of Trade Unions, the Anarchist Workers Solidarity Movement, and Sinn Fein made a list of demands ranging from an independent investigation into the incident to the removal of Dublin Police Commissioner Pat Byrne. (The Irish Examiner)