US Casualties in Iraq by State, as of July 9, 2005
Top 10
California: 191
Texas: 162
New York: 83
Pennsylvania: 82
Florida: 73
Illinois: 72
Ohio: 69
Virginia: 53
Michigan: 52
Louisiana: 45
Total for these 10 states: 882
Total US Caualties: 1753
Percentage of total US casualties from these 10 States: 50.3%
Source (plus some calculation):
The Iraq Coalition Casualties website:
http://icasualties.org/oif/
USA TODAY
Feds want 'don't ask, don't tell' challenge dismissed
BOSTON (AP) — A federal prosecutor urged a judge Friday to dismiss a legal challenge to the U.S. military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gay service members, arguing that only Congress can change it.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Quinlivan said the rule, passed in a bipartisan vote in 1993, was debated extensively before being approved by Congress and signed by President Clinton.
"To say the case should be dismissed is not to say the debate on Congressional policy ends," Quinlivan said, noting there is pending legislation to repeal the law. "It is only to say it should be returned to the branch of government where it should be appropriately decided."
But a lawyer for the 12 former service members dismissed from the military for being gay said the deference courts traditionally give lawmakers on military matters isn't required when constitutional rights are being violated.
"Don't ask, don't tell" denies gay service members their rights to privacy, free speech and equal protection under the law, attorney Stuart Delery said.
The plaintiffs argue that the matter should be revisited in light of a 2003 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down a Texas anti-sodomy law. That ruling extended a right to privacy to consensual adult sexual relationships. Quinlivan, however, says the Texas case is irrelevant to a rule that has no criminal penalty and is unique to military life.
The "don't ask, don't tell" policy forbids the military from asking about the sexual orientation of service members. But it requires the discharge of those who acknowledge being gay or engaging in homosexual activity if the person can't prove he or she is unlikely to engage in homosexual behavior again.
U.S. District Judge George O'Toole did not immediately rule on the government's request.
Plaintiff Megan Dresch, 22, of Phoenix, was discharged from the Army in September 2002, six months after she told an officer she was a lesbian.
"This is my country and I want to serve," Dresch said. "I want to be able to go out and defend the freedom that I enjoy so much."
Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-07-08-lawsuit-militarygays_x.htm?csp=34
USA TODAY
Bush's judges already making their mark
WASHINGTON (AP) — No need to wait until President Bush appoints a Supreme Court justice to see how he will make his mark on the federal judiciary. One level down, dozens of conservative appeals court judges appointed by Bush already are helping to shape the law in ways that ultimately could have as much, and in some ways even more, impact than the nine justices of the nation's highest court.
Since Bush's appellate judges have only gradually taken their seats on benches around the country, and the cases that they draw run the gamut, it's still early to chart their impact on specific issues. But already it is clear that these judges make up a solidly conservative crowd that tends to lean Bush's way on the big issues of the day.
So far, Bush's appointees to the appeals court are showing patterns very close to judges of his Republican predecessors in ideologically contested cases, according to law professor Cass Sunstein at the University of Chicago, where the Chicago Judges Project is tracking the federal judiciary.
"There's no discernible rightward shift by the Bush appointees compared to the Reagan and Bush I appointees," said Sunstein. Still, he rejected Bush's contention that the president looks solely for judges — and Supreme Court justices — who will strictly interpret the Constitution rather than parsing their views on hot issues such as abortion.
"There may be no litmus test, but the president will appoint someone who is in the conservative mold," said Sunstein. "When the president talks about strict construction, everyone knows what he's talking about."
Because appeals courts rule on thousands of cases each year, compared to only about 75 a year decided by the Supreme Court, the impact of Bush's appellate judges could be far-reaching.
"There's a tremendous amount of space for circuit judges to interpret Supreme Court decisions," said Frank Cross, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin. For example, he said, they have considerable latitude in interpreting the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion.
And according to NARAL Pro-Choice America, appeals court judges appointed by President Reagan and the two Bushes have been four times more likely to issue "anti-choice rulings" than judges appointed by other presidents.
On another matter, two of Bush's nominees to the D.C. Circuit are poised to have significant impact on a pair of cases involving challenges to the U.S. military's detention of foreign nationals at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Janice Rogers Brown and Thomas B. Griffith, both just placed on the bench last month, were picked at random to sit on a three-judge panel that will hear the cases this fall.
Overall, in his four-plus years in office, Bush has pushed a Republican-leaning federal judiciary farther to the right with more than 200 appointments to appellate and district courts.
His district court appointees have been "dramatically conservative but not off the board — not so bizarre that the other judges wouldn't know them or speak to them," said Robert A. Carp, a political scientist at the University of Houston who has studied the federal judiciary extensively. Bush's district appointees stand out as particularly conservative on civil liberties cases such as abortion, freedom of speech and gay rights, Carp found.
On these matters, Bush's district judgeships were rated 28% liberal in Carp's study. That put them well to the right of jurists appointed by Presidents Nixon, at 38%, and Ford, at 40%, and slightly to the right of Reagan and the first President Bush, both of whom were rated 32% liberal.
By the end of his second term, Bush could eclipse Presidents Clinton and Reagan in the number of judges selected — and leave an ideological imprint on the courts for generations to come.
Since 1968, when Nixon was elected, Republican presidents have appointed 1,040 judges; Democrats have named 625. While many of the Bush appointees are replacing jurists named by previous Republican presidents, toward the end of his term Bush could have more opportunities to replace some of the Clinton judges, which would have even greater impact.
The cumulative effect, said political scientist Donald Songer of the University of South Carolina, is that "the last three Republican presidents' nominees control virtually the whole judiciary."
Interest groups on the left and right, predictably, have alternately cast Bush's judicial appointees as either ideological extremists or principled jurists untainted by politics.
People for the American Way, a liberal advocacy group, titled its 2004 study of Bush's judicial appointees "Confirmed Judges, Confirmed Fears." It concluded that Bush appointees already have moved to limit significantly congressional authority and protection of individual rights.
"For many, many of the nominees in the lower courts, the Bush administration has been decidedly pushing toward judges with a pretty firm right-wing ideology," said Elliot Mincberg, the group's legal director.
On the other end of the ideological spectrum, conservative groups have credited Bush for selecting judges who "adhere to an apolitical, non-results-oriented way of reading the law," in the words of Sean Rushton of the conservative Committee for Justice. Liberals, Rushton said, look at judges' rulings "through the lens of results rather than asking is it good law."
Wendy Long, counsel for the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network, said that when it comes to the courts, Bush "gets it" in a way that even his father and Reagan did not. His nominees "understand the problems with the way the Constitution has been interpreted and will go about fixing that in their own decisions," she said.
Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/judicial/2005-07-10-bush-new-judges_x.htm?csp=34
Reuters
U.S. forces release American held in Iraq
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. forces in Iraq said they had freed an American citizen on Sunday whom they had been holding as a suspected insurgent.
[Besides the brief information in this article, more detailed information can be found in other articles posted earlier today on this subject.]
Iranian-born filmmaker Cyrus Kar was detained by Iraqi troops in May after a search of the taxi he was being driven in uncovered washing machine timers, a common component in improvised bombs, the military added in a statement.
The Pentagon disclosed last week they were holding five U.S. citizens, apparently including the Los Angeles-based U.S. Navy veteran Kar, among more than 10,000 detainees in Iraq.
Kar's relatives told U.S. newspapers that he had gone to Iraq in mid-May to work on a documentary. He was arrested when he was stopped in a taxi in Baghdad by Iraqi security forces.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California had said it had filed a writ of habeas corpus on his behalf.
"Kar was detained as an imperative security threat to Iraq under the authority of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1546," the military said on Sunday.
He was freed after an FBI investigation, which helped determine he was not an "enemy combatant."
"This case highlights the effectiveness of our detainee review process," Brigadier General Don Alston, a U.S. military spokesman, said in the statement. "We followed well established procedures and Mr. Kar has now been properly released."
Kar's cameraman was also released while the taxi driver was still in custody.
Alston said: "We understand this has been difficult for Mr. Kar and his family. However, we owe the coalition forces, Iraqi security forces and Iraqi civilians a thorough investigation."
Reuters
Democrats seek court nominee with 'big heart'
By Thomas Ferraro
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid urged President Bush on Saturday to say "no to the far right" and nominate to the U.S. Supreme Court someone who will rule with "an open mind and a big heart."
"We need an independent thinker who will follow the Constitution, not a knee-jerk conservative crusader who will march in lock-step to the tune of partisan pressure groups," Reid of Nevada said in his party's weekly radio address.
Bush intends to confer on Tuesday with Reid and other key Senate Democratic and Republican lawmakers as he moves toward naming a nominee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor before the nation's highest court meets for its new term in October.
With the ideological balance of the court at stake, special-interest groups from the right and left have begun multimillion-dollar campaigns that will seek to shape public opinion and thus Senate votes on Bush's nominee.
A simply majority will be needed in the 100-member Republican-led Senate to confirm a Supreme Court nominee, but 60 votes would be required to clear a procedural roadblock known as a filibuster that Democrats could raise.
The announced resignation of O'Connor on July 1 cleared the way for Bush to make his first nomination to the nine-member Supreme Court, and there is widespread speculation that ailing Chief Justice William Rehnquist may soon also step down.
With one and possibly two nominations, the conservative president will have an opportunity to shape the nation's highest court. And he and his aides are getting ready by reviewing a list of potential candidates and creating a team for the Senate confirmation process.
"On many important questions, Sandra Day O'Connor has been the deciding vote in favor of moderation and in defense of our basic rights," Reid said in his radio address.
"I hope that President Bush and the Senate can work together to nominate and confirm ... someone with enough common sense to know that Supreme Court justices should not impose a narrow partisan ideology, but make rulings with an open mind and a big heart."
Reid urged Bush to select "a mainstream justice who won't use their judicial robe as a cloak to impose their political ideology on the country."
"That's what (President) Ronald Reagan did (in 1981) when he chose Sandra Day O'Connor," Reid said. "Both parties cheered the decision. That can happen again if President Bush says 'no' to the far-right and instead follows in the footsteps of Ronald Reagan to choose a Supreme Court justice who will unite the country."
Former Republican Party Chairman Ed Gillespie, a skilled communicator, will serve as "the public advocate on behalf of Bush's nominee," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters on Friday. "He will coordinate our efforts."
Reuters
Governor Bush gives up pursuit of Schiavo case
By Michael Peltier
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (Reuters) - Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has dropped his pursuit of an investigation into the 1990 collapse of Terri Schiavo after a prosecutor said there was no indication of foul play that led to her irrevocable brain damage.
Bush, who worked hard to keep Schiavo on a feeding tube before her March 31 death, had ordered the probe after an autopsy confirmed she had been in the persistent vegetative state.
Gov. Bush, brother of President Bush and a devout Catholic convert, said there were indications of a 40- to 70-minute gap between the time Michael Schiavo discovered his wife after she collapsed 15 years ago and the time he called for medical assistance.
But Pinellas County State Attorney Bernie McCabe, who conducted the probe, wrote Bush on June 30 that there were explanations "far more likely and logical than any involving criminal wrongdoing" surrounding Schiavo's collapse.
In a reply to McCabe dated July 7, Bush said he would stop the investigation. "Based on your conclusions, I will follow your recommendation that the inquiry by the state be closed," Bush wrote. The letter was distributed on Friday.
Schiavo died of dehydration 13 days after her feeding tube was removed. She was 41.
Her death came after years of legal battles between Michael Schiavo and her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, over whether to remove the sustenance that was keeping her alive.
The Schindlers' cause was joined by the Vatican and by conservative U.S. politicians, anti-abortion campaigners and pro-life groups.
The autopsy conducted after Schiavo's death did not find what caused her heart to stop and starve her brain of oxygen. At the time of her death, her brain was half the size of a normal brain.
McCabe based his recommendations to Gov. Bush on a report by investigators that found that there was no indication of culpability and that Michael Schiavo's actions following her collapse appeared consistent with a distraught spouse trying to save his wife's life.
"Without proof of criminal agency, there can be no hope of prosecution," the investigators concluded.
BBC NEWS
Missing people sought after bombs
Relatives and friends of those missing since the London bomb attacks are continuing their desperate searches.
The Scotland Yard casualty hotline on 0870 156 6344 has received more than 120,000 calls.
A 24-hour Family Assistance Centre has opened at the Queen Mother Sports Centre on Vauxhall Bridge Road, near Victoria station in London.
Police have confirmed that 49 people died in the four blasts, 700 were injured and at least 25 are missing.
The reception centre opened in central London on Saturday afternoon to assist those still looking for friends and family members and for them to provide additional information to aid identification of the missing and dead.
It is staffed by social services, the Red Cross, the Salvation Army and WRVS to give practical and emotional support to concerned friends and relatives.
Posters have appeared around the capital and people searching for news have gone to the four blast sites, displaying photos of the missing.
Nearly 60 family liaison officers have been allocated to the relatives of some of the missing and dead throughout the UK.
Metropolitan Police Chief Sir Ian Blair said those who had been killed and injured included people from Australia, China, Portugal, Poland and Sierra Leone.
Hospital search
The families and friends of those missing have been going to hospitals, hoping doctors and nurses would recognise their pictures.
BBC News correspondent Jane Hughes reported that there are only a couple of people being treated at the Royal London Hospital who have not been identified.
She said that fewer people are now making "the awful pilgrimage from one hospital to another" in their search for loved ones.
The family and friends of Laura Webb, 29, have looked for her at various hospitals.
Her brother David Webb, 38, said: "We are very upset about her disappearance, and all the options go through your mind."
Her boyfriend, Chris Driver, 28, said she would have taken a train from King's Cross to the Paddington area.
For relatives of Martine Wright, 32, who is thought to have been on a Liverpool Street to Aldgate Train at about 0900 BST, the search paid off when she was located in a London hospital, although in a critical condition.
But for many others the agony of not knowing goes on.
Yvonne Nash, 30, of Enfield, north London, fears partner Jamie Gordon, 30, was killed by the bomb that destroyed a bus in Tavistock Square.
"I just have to find him. I have to know what happened. You cannot sleep, cannot eat when you are that worried about somebody," she said.
Nazmul Hasan, 25, was trying to find his niece Akhter Islam, 20, from Plaistow, east London, saying she was on the Circle line going through Liverpool Street at the time of the blasts.
"Her mother and father have fallen to pieces over this," he said.
Meanwhile Trevor Ellery, from Southampton, Hampshire, has travelled to London with his 19-year-old son Timothy and their local vicar in a bid to find his son Richard.
Richard had texted his parents at 0830 BST on Thursday as he travelled from Ipswich into Liverpool Street Station on his way to work Kensington.
I just hope that everyone is praying for her wellbeing and that she will return home in good health
Shamsul Hasan, Shahara's father
In a statement the family said: "We have tried all means of getting in touch with Richard and would welcome news from anyone who may have seen him or knows where he is."
Friends' bid
And friends of Anthony Fatayi-William have been searching hospitals since he disappeared on his way to work in central London.
He is thought to have tried to make his way to work by bus after delays on the Northern Line prevented him getting to his job near Liverpool Street station.
His friend Amrit Walia said: "We understand the police have a job to, but it is agonising to sit and wait, which is all they have advised us to do."
Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell has been put in charge of government support for the families of victims of the London bombings.
Mrs Jowell, who was made responsible for supporting British victims of the September 11 attacks and the Asian tsunami, has already liaised with the Metropolitan Police and voluntary agencies as part of her role.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke said people were desperately trying to help.
Meanwhile floral tributes have been laid at King's Cross station, where at least 21 people have lost their lives.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/england/london/4666679.stm
BBC NEWS
Police appeal for bombing footage
Police are appealing to the public to hand over mobile phone images, video footage or photographs taken after Thursday's bomb attacks on London.
They believe the footage could provide vital clues as the search for bodies and forensic evidence continues.
As prayers were said for the 49 killed and 700 injured, police insisted "London is open for business".
Three people were arrested at Heathrow Airport under anti-terror laws, but no link to the attacks has been made.
Scotland Yard has set up a special e-mail address images@met.police.uk for the public to send their footage.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Brian Paddick said: "We believe these images could contain vital information to assist us in the investigation."
He spoke as police revealed 1,700 people had already contacted the anti-terrorist hotline since Thursday's bombings.
Mr Paddick said some of the calls were "proving to be very, very valuable".
As for the police hunt for the perpetrators, Deputy Chief Constable Andy Trotter said: "Forces from across the country and the world are united in the effort to catch these murderers."
Meanwhile a number of bodies have been removed from the Russell Square site, but more could be found as officers work through the train, Scotland Yard said.
"We hope and pray that they don't find any more under there," said Andy Trotter, Deputy Chief Constable of the British Transport Police.
'Challenging and demanding'
It is an evil that cannot be justified and that we utterly condemn and reject
Sheikh Dr Zaki Badawi
Forensic teams are continuing their search of the sites of the three underground bombs and Tavistock Square where a bomb tore apart a bus.
Referring to the Russell Square blast site, Mr Trotter said: "Because of the difficult circumstances it is a slow painstaking and methodical task."
Despite tube closures around the affected lines and road closures around Tavistock Square, police said most transport would be working normally on Monday and urged people to return to work.
Responding to claims by former Metropolitan Police chief Sir John Stevens the bombers were "almost certainly" British, Mr Paddick said no lines of inquiry had been ruled out.
Lord Stevens had said the attackers would not "fit the caricature al-Qaeda fanatic from some backward village in Algeria or Afghanistan".
Earlier on Sunday religious leaders issued a statement condemning the bomb attacks.
Sheikh Dr Zaki Badawi, head of the Council of Mosques and Imams, said the assault was "totally contrary to Islam".
The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams said: "It is a huge fallacy to suppose that one community is somehow more intrinsically prone to violence or outrage than any another."
EMERGENCY NUMBERS
Anti-terrorist hotline: 0800 789 321
Missing relatives: 0870 156 6344
A service at St Pancras parish church, held near King's Cross underground station where at least 21 people died and Tavistock Square where 13 people were killed by the bus bomb, was attended by hundreds of people.
Father Paul Hawkins said: "This will only make us more determined to live in peace and respect each other and we can all play our part in that."
Meanwhile, it is understood the UK's threat assessment has been returned to its highest level, having been lowered soon after the general election.
Overnight, up to 20,000 people were evacuated from Birmingham city centre following what West Midlands Chief Constable Paul Scott Lee called "a real and very credible threat". The area has now been fully re-opened
Other developments:
* A two-minute silence will be held at noon on Thursday to remember the victims
* A national memorial to the victims could be built, Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell has said
* Hospitals are treating 65 victims, 15 of whom are in intensive care or described as "critical"
* More than 100 London schools are to reopen on Monday
* Passengers on public transport in London have been warned it is "intolerable" to leave unattended packages or parcels
* British Transport Police has dealt with 22 malicious bomb threats and 150 reports of suspect packages since the attacks
* A reception centre has been opened at the Queen Mother Sports Centre in Victoria, to help the families of people not seen since the explosions
* An emergency call centre has taken more than 120,000 calls.
Blasts occurred:
Between Aldgate and Liverpool Street tube stations
Between King's Cross and Russell Square tube stations
At Edgware Road tube station
On bus at Tavistock Square
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/4668675.stm
Two articles on this subject follow.
-----
Family sues to gain freedom of Los Angeles filmmaker detained in Iraq by U.S. military
By JEREMIAH MARQUEZ Associated Press Writer
(AP)—LOS ANGELES—Cyrus Kar’s family says his passion for a documentary film he was making about an ancient Persian ruler brought him to Iraq in May. Potential bomb parts found inside a taxi hired by the filmmaker have kept him there, locked up in a U.S. military jail outside Baghdad.
Now relatives of the 44-year-old Iranian-American have sued the U.S. government to gain his freedom. They contend his detention tramples his constitutional rights, and that FBI officials have cleared him of suspicion.
“I’m here to beg President Bush. . .to release an innocent boy,” Kar’s aunt, Parvin Modarress, said at a news conference Wednesday to announce the filing of the lawsuit in Washington, D.C. “He went to Iraq to do his dream work, to make a documentary.”
Born in Iran, Kar became as thoroughly immersed in American culture as any native-born citizen after immigrating here as a child, according to his family. The Los Angeles resident served in the Navy for several years. He studied marketing at San Jose State University, business at Pepperdine University, and worked in the computer industry during Silicon Valley’s tech boom.
And several years ago Kar decided to try his hand at filmmaking. With help from independent director-producer Philippe Diaz, he began working on a documentary about Cyrus the Great, a Persian king during the 500s B.C. He interviewed experts and scholars and shot up to 60 hours of footage at archaeological sites in Afghanistan, Iran and Tajikistan, according to his family and Diaz.
Diaz, chairman of the Los Angeles studio Cinema Libre, said Kar had spent close to $90,000 in savings and loans so far to shoot the film. The studio had paid about $10,000 and planned to put up another $100,000 or more in post-production.
Diaz thought Kar’s detention was a mistake. A staunch supporter of the Iraq war, Kar was far more right of center than many left leaning colleagues and relatives, Diaz said. “It was always a joke because Cyrus is much more conservative,” Diaz said. “He always believed in everything which is American.”
Among Kar’s final tasks was shooting in and around the ancient city of Babylon, one of Cyrus the Great’s conquests.
On May 17, officials and family say, he was traveling with an Iranian filmmaker after leaving a Baghdad hotel when their taxi was stopped at a checkpoint. Iraqi security forces allegedly seized several dozen washing machine timers found in the taxi—components frequently used in terrorist bombs.
“I think most people would agree that’s somewhat suspicious,” said Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. John Skinner. “All of the facts need to be thoroughly questioned. . . . These are life and death situations, and when it comes to issues of security you need to be extremely cautious.”
Kar’s relatives say that FBI agents searched his home and that Agent John D. Wilson in Los Angeles told them weeks ago that Kar’s story had checked out. The agent allegedly told the family that Kar had passed a polygraph test, been cleared of any charges, and that the washing machine timers belonged to the taxi driver, who was transporting them to a friend.
FBI spokeswoman Cathy Viray declined to comment.
Kar is among five Americans detained for suspected insurgent activity by the U.S. military in Iraq, according to his family and government officials. Others include three Iraqi-Americans and a Jordanian-American.
Incarcerated at Camp Cropper, near Baghdad International Airport, Kar spoke several times with his family during monitored 10-minute conversations. He sounded tired in the first call in May, irate in the second. He was frustrated that the military could hold him, saying “they had all the power,” according to his family.
When his aunt asked why he was detained, Kar said, “It’s because of the taxi driver,” when an eavesdropping American official told him not to discuss the case.
“I’m hurt by our government,” said Kar’s cousin Shahrzad Folger. “I’m hurt that they would do this to one of their own citizens, to one of their veterans.”
==============
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-captive6jul06,0,5027890.story?coll=la-home-headlines
July 6, 2005
U.S. Holds Filmmaker in Iraq
Family drafts suit to free L.A. man working on a Cyrus the Great project. Pentagon plans hearing to determine if director is a security threat.
By Henry Weinstein, Times Staff Writer
Cyrus Kar’s family says he left his Los Feliz apartment for Iraq to make a documentary film about a Persian king who wrote the world’s first charter of human rights. But now they fear he may never get home.
On May 17, Kar was stopped at a Baghdad checkpoint in a taxi allegedly packed with a common component for improvised explosive devices, according to a Defense Department spokesman. Since then, he has been in U.S. military detention outside Baghdad.
Kar’s family says the detention is a mistake. Kar, 44, a U.S. citizen and Navy veteran who was born in Iran and came here during his childhood, is a patriotic American who supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq, they said Tuesday. He has not been charged with a crime, the Defense Department spokesman confirmed.
“A search of the vehicle the men were traveling in revealed a large number of washing machine timers, a device frequently used to make improvised explosive devices,” said the Pentagon spokesman, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The Pentagon official said Kar would have a hearing to determine “whether he is a security threat, involved in the insurgency, has committed a crime or is found innocent after a thorough investigation…. In that environment, where you have frequent suicide bombings and frequent improvised explosive devices going off, one can understand the need to be extremely cautious any time you come across anyone with components that could be used to make IEDS.”
Kar’s relatives say they cannot understand why authorities won’t let him go, because they say Los Angeles FBI Agent John D. Wilson told them weeks ago that Kar’s story had checked out, that he had passed a government polygraph test and that he had been cleared of any charges. They say Wilson told them that the cameraman and the taxi driver also had been cleared.
During an interview Tuesday, Kar’s aunt, Parvin Modarress, and his cousin Shahrzad Folger played a voicemail they said Wilson left at their home weeks ago. On it the voice says Kar is “in custody. He’s fine. It’s just that we’re trying to get his release. . . . Be patient.”
Wilson acknowledged in a brief telephone conversation Tuesday that he had met with the women but said he could not speak further. Cathy Viray, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles FBI office, said she could not comment on the matter.
Today, the frustrated relatives, who say they have not been able to get answers from any U.S. government agency, plan to file a federal lawsuit in Washington challenging Kar’s continued confinement in Iraq.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California and other civil liberties lawyers are representing Kar, Modarress and Folger against President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Army Maj. William H. Brandenburg, overseer of military detention operations in Baghdad.
Mark D. Rosenbaum, the ACLU’s Southern California legal director, said the suit seeks Kar’s release on a writ of habeas corpus, the legal vehicle used in this country since its inception to seek release of an individual illegally confined by authorities.
“Mr. Kar is now imprisoned by the United States military in Iraq without the slightest hint of legal authority,” Rosenbaum said. “His arbitrary military detention is unaccompanied by any charge, any warrant, any writ or any process. So far as either the civilian or the military court system is concerned, Mr. Kar has simply disappeared into detention without a trace.”
According to a draft of the lawsuit, Kar has lived in the U.S. since he was 9. He attended high school in San Jose, served in the U.S. Navy for years, eventually attaining the rank of petty officer third class. He attended San Jose State, where he received an undergraduate degree in marketing, worked in the computer industry in Silicon Valley and in the mid-1900s received a master’s degree in technology management from Pepperdine University. He occasionally taught business courses for an online university.
About three years ago, Kar became interested in the history of ancient Persia, particularly the story of King Cyrus the Great, founder of Persia. He went to Iraq, over his family’s objections, to film near Baghdad. He also filmed in Iran, Tajikistan, Turkey and Afghanistan and consulted with scholars.
David Stronach, professor of Near Eastern archeology at UC Berkeley, has signed a sworn declaration to be filed with the lawsuit, stating that he has known Kar for more than two years and has “assisted him in making his documentary” about Cyrus the Great, whom he described as “one of history’s most extraordinary figures.”
Stronach said Cyrus “is mentioned many times in the Bible, not least because he liberated the captive Jewish community in Babylon—an event that allowed the Jews to return to Jerusalem, rebuild the temple, and arguably, provide the conditions that permitted the birth of Christianity.
Both articles originally published July 6, 2005
BBC NEWS
Mass arrests made in Milan swoops
Italian police have arrested 142 people as part of a two-day anti-terror operation in and around Milan.
One and a half kilos (3.3 pounds) of explosive were found, reports say.
Some 2,000 Carabinieri police took part in the raid, aimed at boosting security at sensitive locations such as underground and train stations.
An internet claim of responsibility for the London bombings threatened Italy and Denmark with similar attacks, but its credibility has been questioned.
Gen Antonio Girone, the regional Carabinieri commander, said security forces had concentrated on Milan because it was a "prime target for possible terrorist action".
Some 7,000 people are said to have undergone preventive police checks.
Partial pullout
Police reportedly raided several Gypsy camps and other deprived areas.
Of those arrested, 83 are said to be non-EU citizens. Deportation orders have already been issued for 52 of them.
"Charges are mainly related to crimes like burglary, theft, evading home arrest and infringement of drug laws," Col Cosimo Piccinno was reported by daily Corriere della Sera as saying after the arrests.
In a separate development, police evacuated part of Rome's Fiumicino airport after a false alarm sparked by an unattended bag earlier this morning.
Speaking from the G8 meeting in Gleneagles, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said Italy would start withdrawing 300 troops from Iraq in September.
But he underlined that the partial pullout had already been announced and that Italy's presence in the region would continue until the Iraqi authorities will be able to replace it with their own security forces.
"Commitments must be met," he said.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/4667513.stm
BBC NEWS
Tube bombs 'almost simultaneous'
The three bombs on London underground trains "exploded almost simultaneously", say police.
Scotland Yard said the attacks took place within 50 seconds of each other despite previously saying they had taken place over a longer time period.
British Transport Police have also warned that the recovery of victims could take "days more."
Meanwhile, the government is to announce a two minute silence for 1200 BST on Thursday.
Technical data from London Underground disproved the earlier wider range of timings between explosions, Scotland Yard Deputy Assistant Commissioner Brian Paddick said at a press conference on Saturday.
And there was still no certainty about the number of people whose bodies remain trapped in wrecked train carriages below King's Cross, it was announced.
This would be a "slow, methodical, meticulous process" in very difficult circumstances, said Deputy Chief Constable Andy Trotter.
It would take "as long it takes", he said later.
Missing
There have been 49 confirmed fatalities in the bomb attacks on tube trains and a bus - and concerns remain for a further 25 missing people.
So far no victims have been formally identified - and police warn that the process, due to begin on Saturday, could take weeks to complete.
A 24-hour reception centre has been opened at the Queen Mother Sports Centre in Victoria, central London, to help the families of people not seen since the explosions.
The police say that timings show that the explosions took place at 8.50am - and that the synchronisation could suggest that bombs used in the attack were triggered using timing devices.
High-explosives were used in the attacks and were not home-made, say the police.
Mr Paddick denied reports that investigators were looking "for any specific individual".
Prime Minister Tony Blair warned that security and surveillance will not be enough to stop such attacks - and that there has to be an ideological struggle in which terrorism is "pulled up by the roots".
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Mr Blair commended the "inner resilience" of Londoners - as the capital's transport system began to return to a close-to-normal service. There are now services running on sections of all lines on the London Underground.
A book of condolence has been opened - which was signed by Prince William in Auckland, New Zealand.
Terrorism experts have been arriving from Spain to support the inquiry in London, bringing expertise from the investigation into the train bomb attacks on Madrid.
Forensic search
A claim for the attacks has been made in the name of al-Qaeda - by a group calling itself the Abu Hafs al-Masri brigade.
I saw three bodies on the track - I couldn't look, it was so horrific
Scott Wenbourne
But the BBC's security correspondent Gordon Corera has urged caution over the credibility of the claim.
Forensic teams working in Tube tunnels and at the other scenes of the blasts are taking swabs to try to determine the type of explosives used.
The roof of the number 30 bus, which was ripped off in the blast at Tavistock Square, has been removed from the scene for forensic examination.
Police are also involved in one of the UK's biggest searches of CCTV footage to see if there are any clues as to the identity of the bombers.
BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner said there were a number of key questions which investigators were analysing.
"One of the most important is were the bombers home-grown British terrorists or was this a hit team that came in from abroad?" he said.
One possibility being investigated was that the bomb maker was an expert who came and instructed the bombers.
Another area was to see if they were "linked directly" to what was left of the core of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan or acting alone.
Search for missing
Anxious family and friends are continuing their search for loved ones who have not been heard from since the bombings.
EMERGENCY NUMBERS
Anti-terrorist hotline: 0800 789 321
Missing relatives: 0870 156 6344
The emergency call centre in London has taken more than 120,000 calls from the public.
Those looking for missing people have been contacting hospitals, as well as taking photos and posters to the four blast sites.
Scotland Yard confirmed seven people died in the Liverpool Street explosion, another seven at Edgware Road, a further 13 in the Tavistock Square bus blast and at least 21 at the King's Cross blast. A 49th person died in hospital later.
Some 700 people were hurt, about 69 are being treated in hospital and 15 remain in a critical condition.
Blasts occurred:
Between Aldgate and Liverpool Street tube stations
Between King's Cross and Russell Square tube stations
At Edgware Road tube station
On bus at Tavistock Square
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/4666591.stm
Reuters
Army gives $5 bln of work to Halliburton
By Sue Pleming
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military has signed on Halliburton
Linda Theis, a spokeswoman for U.S. Army Field Support Command in Rock Island, Illinois, said the military signed the work order with Halliburton unit Kellogg Brown and Root in May.
The new deal, worth $4.97 billion over the next year, was not made public when it was signed because the Army did not consider such an announcement necessary, she said.
"We did not announce this task order as this is really not something we ever really thought about doing," said Theis.
Halliburton, which was run by Vice President Dick Cheney from 1995-2000, has been under scrutiny for its contracts in Iraq and several U.S. government agencies are looking into whether it overcharged for some work.
A Halliburton spokeswoman said the new spending package was approved by the Army after the company submitted estimated costs for the year based on services requested.
The $4.97 billion figure represented the maximum under the contract, and the actual amount could be lower since the Army doled out the work on an incremental basis, she said.
The new contract is about $1 billion more than the company earned under last year's services contract.
In March, a former KBR employee and a Kuwaiti citizen were indicted for defrauding the U.S. government of more than $3.5 million by inflating the cost of fuel tankers.
The new work order, called Task Order 89, is valid until April 30, 2006, and went ahead despite critical military audits released last week by Democratic opponents of KBR's Iraq work.
A top U.S. Army procurement official said last week Halliburton's deals in Iraq were the worst example of contract abuse she had ever seen, a claim KBR strongly rejected as "political rhetoric."
KBR was awarded the logistical contract with the military in December 2001, covering tasks from feeding U.S. troops to delivering mail, doing laundry and building barracks.
U.S. Senate critics of Halliburton were quick to denounce the new deal.
"At this point, why don't we just hand Halliburton the keys to the U.S. Treasury and tell them to turn off the lights when they are done," Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg said in a statement.
GIANT DEAL
Called LOGCAP, KBR had by May 31 been paid $9.1 billion under the deal, which has nine option years that have been renewed three times. They are up for renewal each December.
Of this amount, $8.3 billion was for work in Iraq and the remainder for Afghanistan and elsewhere. Money obligated for future work amounted to $11.4 billion, said Theis, pointing out not all of this money would necessarily be spent.
The Pentagon has been looking into whether to contract out some services done by KBR, but Theis said she had not heard of any decisions to make changes.
Halliburton has received bonuses for some of its work. Theis said a decision on possible further bonuses will likely be announced this month.
Much of Halliburton's work for the U.S. military is on a cost-plus basis, which means the company can earn up to 2 percent extra depending on its performance.
Halliburton shares slipped 1.5 percent, or 75 cents, to $48.87 per share on the New York Stock Exchange, tracking the decline in the energy services sector on Wednesday.
Halliburton shares have rallied 13 percent since the beginning of June, bolstered by high crude oil prices.
Despite the drop in the stock price, analysts said the latest news was positive for the company and indicated "the government has no issue with Halliburton's performance," said Kurt Hallead, analyst with RBC Capital Markets.
(Additional reporting by Matt Daily in Houston)
Reuters
Pentagon denies medically abusing detainees
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military on Thursday denied charges that health workers were broadly complicit in alleged abuse of terrorism suspects by the military in Cuba, Iraq and Afghanistan.
The charges first surfaced in The Lancet, a British medical journal, in an article last year by a University of Minnesota professor that said some U.S. military doctors falsified death certificates to cover up killings and hid evidence of beatings.
It said U.S. military medics revived a detainee who had collapsed after a beating so that abuse could continue.
Defense officials said a study, carried out by the Army's own surgeon general Lt. Gen. Kevin Kiley, did not support the charges.
"The bottom line conclusion is that there was no evidence of systematic problems in detainee medical care," Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.
He declined to be more specific or to deny that there might have been isolated cases of improper cooperation between doctors and intelligence personnel questioning prisoners in the war on terror.
"That's not suggesting that he (Kiley) didn't find some things that he wants to make some suggestions on," Whitman said.
Rights groups have charged that military medical workers cooperated with interrogators by revealing physical or psychological problems of their patients and, in some cases, even failed to report knowledge of physical abuse.
But Whitman said the study found no widespread problems "in the way in which medical people, medical professionals, are carrying out their duties in the field with respect to detention operations."
The study is scheduled for release at a Pentagon news conference later on Thursday.
Assistant Defense Secretary for Health Affairs William Winkenwerder in June issued updated guidelines for medical personnel growing out of Pentagon investigations into physical abuse and sexual humiliation of prisoners at Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq.
The four-page Winkenwerder memorandum stressed that health care personnel charged with the medical care of prisoners "have a duty to protect their physical and mental health and provide appropriate treatment for disease."
But the guidelines do not prohibit military medical personnel from helping to shape interrogations by using knowledge of a prisoner's medical or mental condition. Nor do they bar them from helping in interrogations defined by the government as illegal.
The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Physicians for Human Rights group has charged that the Winkenwerder memo is riddled with loopholes that open the door to possible abuses. It called the guidelines, "a major affront" to the good role that military physicians historically have played.
Dr. Burton Lee III, the physician of former President Bush, said in an article last week in the Washington Post that he was deeply disturbed by "evidence that military medical personnel have planed a role in this abuse" of detainees.
"These new (Winkenwerder) guidelines distort traditional ethical rules beyond recognition to serve the interests of interrogators, not doctors and detainees," wrote Lee, a member of Physicians for Human Rights.
The American Psychological Association says that its members can help in military interrogations, but only to ensure "that such processes are safe and ethical for all participants." It forbids them to hurt patients safety or well-being.
The American Psychiatric Association says it is planning a similar policy statement specifically applying to situations such as Guantanamo.
huffingtonpost.com
Arianna Huffington
London: Bush’s “Flypaper Theory” is Blown to Pieces
Well, there goes that theory...
Odds are we probably won’t be hearing for a while the Bush mantra that the reason we're fighting them over in Iraq is so we don't have to fight them here at home. For the last few months, this ludicrous shibboleth has been the president’s go-to line -- his latest rationale for slogging on in Iraq.
Here he was on July 4th: "We're taking the fight to the terrorists abroad so we do not have to face them here at home."
And during his primetime speech to the nation on June 28th, there he was again, this time quoting the commander on the ground in Iraq: “We either deal with terrorism and this extremism abroad, or we deal with it when it comes to us."
The attacks in London proved how absurd this either/or logic is when fighting this kind of hydra-headed enemy.
Not only was this “flypaper theory" empirically disproved by the London carnage, it directly contradicts the president’s other most often used justification for the war -- that we invaded to liberate the Iraqi people. So let me get this straight: we invaded them to liberate them... and to use them as bait to attract terrorists who we could fight on the streets of Baghdad rather than the streets of London and New York?
Of course, it didn't take the London bombings to reveal this premise as a sham. The presence of American forces in Iraq didn’t keep the enemies of western culture from attacking Madrid. And it didn’t keep them from planting explosives in London’s tubes. And it won’t, in and of itself, keep them from striking here. Indeed, it’s helping terrorists recruit new followers -- and hone their deadly skills.
How pathetic is it to keep arguing that fighting Baathist Sunni insurgents in Iraq is keeping us safe from Al Qaeda terrorists and their offshoots on our soil?
It’s still not clear who was responsible for the London bombings, but let's assume for a moment that the initial reports turn out to be true, and that it was an offshoot of Al Qaeda. No one can seriously argue that if the U.S. and Britain had spent the last 46 months -- and over $200 billion -- focusing on Al Qaeda rather than Iraq these attacks would not have happened. But we can say without a doubt that spending that time and money in Iraq did not prevent them.
If Iraq is like flypaper, it unfortunately looks like we’re the ones who are stuck there. Any predictions of what Bush’s rewrite boys will come up with next?
huffingtonpost.com
Time for Robert Novak to Feel Some Chill
Jay Rosen
"As the judge said Judy Miller can escape her jail cell by finally choosing to talk, so could Novak restore his column and TV appearances by finally talking about his part in the story. Novak is said to have lots of friends in the press. Friends would let him know the time is here."
Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report. The CIA says its counter-proliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him. "I will not answer any question about my wife," Wilson told me. -- Robert Novak, "Mission to Niger," July 14, 2003.
I, for one, have had it with Robert Novak. And if all the journalists who are talking today about "chilling effects" and individual conscience mean what they say, they will, as a matter of conscience and pride, start giving Novak himself the big chill.
That means if you're a Washington columnist maybe you don't go on CNN with him-- until he explains. If you're a newspaper editor you consider suspending his column until he explains. If you're Jonathan Klein, president of CNN/US, you take him off the air until he decides to go on the air and explain. If you're John Barron, editor of the Chicago Sun-Times, you suspend your columnist (with pay, I should think); and if Barron won't do it then publisher John Cruickshank should.
If Novak says he can't talk until the case is over, then he shouldn't be allowed to publish or opine on the air until the case is over. He should know the rage some of his colleagues feel. Claiming to be "baffled" by Novak's behavior may have been plausible for a while. With Miller now sitting in jail, and possibly facing criminal charges later, "baffled" is sounding lame.
After the decision yesterday someone asked Bill Keller, top editor of the New York Times, if this was really a whistle-blowing case. Keller answered: "you go to court with the case you've got." I understood what he meant, but that answer was incomplete.
For in certain ways the case that sent Judith Miller to jail is about a classic whistler blower: diplomat Joseph Wilson. Those "two senior administration officials" in Novak's column had a message for him: stick your neck out and we'll stick it to your wife. (They did: her career as an operative is over.) Might that have some chilling effect?
We're not entirely in the dark about how the conversation might have gone. Yesterday Walter Pincus of the Washington Post posted this recollection:
On July 12, 2003, an administration official, who was talking to me confidentially about a matter involving alleged Iraqi nuclear activities, veered off the precise matter we were discussing and told me that the White House had not paid attention to former Ambassador Joseph Wilson’s CIA-sponsored February 2002 trip to Niger because it was set up as a boondoggle by his wife, an analyst with the agency working on weapons of mass destruction. I didn’t write about that information at that time because I did not believe it true that she had arranged his Niger trip.
Pincus didn't take the "information," Novak did. Why? Did it occur to Novak that this could be retribution against a critic of the White House? Pincus thought the leaker was "practicing damage control by trying to get me to stop writing about Wilson." What did Novak think? The New York Times in an editorial today:
It seemed very possible that someone at the White House had told Mr. Novak about Ms. Plame to undermine Mr. Wilson's credibility and send a chilling signal to other officials who might be inclined to speak out against the administration's Iraq policy. At the time, this page said that if those were indeed the circumstances, the leak had been "an egregious abuse of power." We urged the Justice Department to investigate.
Tell me: how can journalists say with a straight face that they are concerned for future whistle blowers if one of their own, Robert Novak, together with sources made possible an act of retribution against an actual whistle blower?
We do not know enough to say of Novak, "he should be the one in jail." But we do know enough to keep him off the air and the op ed pages until he makes a fuller statement. (Times editorial: "Like almost everyone, we are baffled by his public posture.") It may be that he betrayed the principles for which his colleague Judy Miller is in jail. The editor who decides to drop Novak's column until such time as he explains himself would be listening to the voice of professional conscience, in my view.
As the judge said Judy Miller can escape her jail cell by finally choosing to talk, so could Novak restore his column and TV appearances by finally talking about his part in the story. Novak is said to have lots of friends in the press. Friends would let him know the time is here.
Secret 'gas' test staged at Grand Central
BY PETE DONOHUE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
The Federal Department of Homeland Security released gas in Grand Central Terminal last month in a secret study of how dangerous chemicals might flow through the landmark in a terrorist attack.
Nontoxic "tracer gases" were released into the terminal between June 26-30, as scientists from four national laboratories observed, including physicists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.
"If there was some kind of emergency - smoke or who knows what - released in Grand Central Terminal, we want to know how it's going to move around and how best to evacuate it," Metro-North spokeswoman Marjorie Anders said. "Everybody knows that some kind of biological, chemical or radiological threat is something we have to plan for, and this is part of that planning."
The colorless, odorless gas was released at different times to determine, among other things, how the movement of people through the landmark building would affect the path of potentially harmful substances.
The information gathered from the tests was in part designed to improve emergency response planning for the terminal and provide data that could be used when assessing the security of other transportation hubs in the country. It also might be used to make protective alterations to the heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system at Grand Central or lead to the use of technological devices under development, authorities said.
There are several devices in Grand Central that would detect the release of potentially deadly agents.
Approximately 750,000 people pass through Grand Central a day, including commuter rail riders, subway riders, shoppers and tourists.
Officials have long tagged Grand Central as a potential target because of its prominence as a landmark and the number of people who use it.
Police in March revealed that a simplistic drawing of Grand Central was found on the computer of a suspected Madrid train bomber, but officials described it as an amateur sketch and said they didn't believe it was part of a plan to launch an attack.
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