Human

A nice question, and Answer Period. I must warn you for anyone about to sit down, and read this "It is a Long Read". ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.noticias.info/asp/aspComunicado...id=168706&src=0 /noticias.info/ SECRETARY RICE: Thank you very much. Thank you. Well, thank you very much, Lester, for that kind introduction and I also want to thank Marshall Bouton and everyone at the Council on Foreign Relations here in Chicago for inviting me to speak today. Now I have to tell you that I just did a radio interview and I want to be the first to tell you that I was asked to make a prediction. I was asked what would be the number associated with the Chicago Bears this year. (Laughter.) And I said 11 and 5. (Applause.) So if I'm right, I'll come back. If I'm wrong, you won't see me for a while. (Laughter.) Thanks for giving me the opportunity to get out of Washington, if only for one day or so. And I'm really honored to be here and I want you to know that I just had a wonderful experience at the airport. I met some young sailors from the Naval Station, Great Lakes. They greeted me there at the airport. These young men and women arrived in northern Illinois as patriots. Soon, they're going to say goodbye to their families and join thousands of Americans like them who are protecting our nation across the globe. And ladies and gentlemen, these men and women are more than patriots. They are heroes. And America owes them and all of our young men and women in uniform an enormous debt of gratitude. (Applause.) SECRETARY RICE: Now I didn't come all the way to Chicago just to give a speech. I really want to have a discussion with you. I know that the Chicago Council is famous for deliberation and I thought that that's what we might do today. And we can talk about any of the many foreign policy challenges that we face. They are, in fact, many in this time of testing and in this time of history. But I wanted to start with just a few remarks about Iraq, because I know that there is deep concern in the country about the future course of Iraq and our policies in Iraq. I know that what you see on your TV screens every night has got to be somewhat disconcerting and that you have a lot of questions. So let me just start by saying the decisions about Iraq that we, as a nation, will make in the coming years will largely determine not just the future of Iraq, but the future of peace and progress in the Middle East as a whole. I ask you to remember the broader problem that we confront in that region. Decades of despair in this troubled region fueled an ideology of hatred so deep that people flew airplanes into our buildings on a fine September day. The status quo in the Middle East was unstable and it was unsustainable. But today, there are signs of hope in the Middle East. Democratic reform has begun in places like Jordan and Morocco and haltingly in Egypt and ever so slightly in Saudi Arabia. Citizens in Lebanon are securing their freedom from Syrian occupation and Kuwaiti women have won the right to vote. Now though we may not agree with every choice that the people of this region make, we must still defend their right to choose; for we have seen the consequences of authoritarian governments that deny people their liberty. The vision of a hopeful Middle East, however, will disappear if we do not succeed in Iraq. If we abandon the Iraqi people, we will show reformers across the region that America cannot be trusted to keep its word. We will embolden the enemies of democratic reform. We will leave the makings of a failed state in Iraq like Afghanistan in the 1990s and it could become a base of operation for terrorists yet again. And we should not assume for one minute that those terrorists will not come after us with renewed determination. This is why President Bush calls Iraq a central front in the war on terror. Now helping the Iraqi people to build an effective democratic government is the only way to secure victory and to enable our brave men and women in uniform, who perform so heroically and never let us down, to return home with the honor they deserve. Democracy in Iraq is actually easy to describe, but it's hard to achieve. And it's important for Americans to understand why. Democracy in Iraq is difficult because the country rests on the fault lines of religion and ethnicity in the Middle East. All too often in the past, Iraq's different groups settled their differences through violence and coercion. Now they're trying to do something completely different. They're trying to do it through politics and compromise. And for the first time in their history, Iraqis are wrestling with the idea of democracy, the idea that one person's gain does not have to come at the expense of others. Democracy in Iraq is also difficult because for three decades, Saddam Hussein sowed the seeds of strife, civil strife in that country. To maintain his hold on power, Saddam pitted Iraqis, many tribes, and sects against one another, forcing different groups to rely only on themselves and to trust no one else. To keep Iraqis divided, Saddam's regime engaged in every form of evil imaginable: torture and genocide and rape and ethnic cleansing, even the use of chemical weapons. The shadow of Saddam Hussein still looms over Iraq today, even as he himself stands in the dock to be tried. It is felt most acutely in the deep suspicion and mistrust that still pervades much of Iraqi society. And it explains why nearly every Iraqi faction maintains its own militia, just in case. This is not the culture of the Iraqi people. It is the legacy of Iraq's tyrant. Finally and most importantly, democracy in Iraq is difficult because it faces determined and ruthless enemies, enemies that seek to provoke civil strife by exacerbating Iraq's divisions. We know this because the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq said so himself in a letter to Usama bin Laden's deputy. Now, unfortunately, in the face of these horrific attacks like the recent bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, some Iraqis have been tempted to take justice into their own hands. The sectarian violence that we see today is extremely worrying and there can be no place in a democracy for armed militias operating outside the law. Yet time and time again whenever Iraqis have been drawn to the edge of the abyss, cooler heads have prevailed. Iraq's fragile democratic institutions have so far managed to contain popular passions and the country's political and religious leaders have united to stay the hands of vengeance in their communities. In the face of this overwhelming adversity, the vast majority of Iraqis are sending a clear message that they wish to live together in peace and freedom. Millions of Iraqis braved the threat of violence to vote, not once, not twice, but three times, each time in greater numbers and with greater representation of all Iraqis. And last January, nearly all of Iraq's Sunnis boycotted the election, choosing to hedge their bets with support for the insurgency. But by the end of the year, most Sunnis saw their future in the democratic process and a vast majority of them voted in the December elections. And lest we forget, in just one year the Iraqi people drafted and ratified the most impressive constitution in the Arab world. Now Iraqis are working to form a government and Americans are right to want to know why this process is taking so long. I myself went to Baghdad a couple of weeks ago and I asked that question. President Bush and I share your concern. Iraq needs an effective government that can act decisively to meet the momentous challenges that that country now faces. And this is a message that Iraq's leaders are hearing from not just our government and not just our coalition partners, but from the Iraqi people themselves. The citizens of Iraq want a government and they now have the freedom to express their frustration with those elected leaders that have not yet given them one. Recently, in newspaper articles, in satirical cartoons, even in internet blogs, Iraqis -- men and women -- have been saying things about their leaders that literally would have gotten them killed in the old Iraq. They are urging their leaders to put the good of the nation above the narrow interests of one individual or one party. But in fairness to Iraq's elected leaders, it is important for us to understand that the process of forming a government is difficult and time-consuming because Iraqis have set the bar very high. They want a government of national unity, one that is agreeable to all of Iraq's many different factions. But that's not all. Iraqis also want their unity government to be strong. They want it to be effective. And far from being idle, Iraq's leaders have taken three important steps to empower the government they will create. First, Iraq's leaders have agreed to form a national security council. This body will represent all of Iraqi society and ensure that decisions concerning the country's security reflect national interests, not sectarian ones. Iraq's leaders have also approved a ministerial security committee which will give stability to the policy-making process among Iraq's senior officials. And finally, Iraq's leaders have drafted important by-laws to regulate how their different cabinets will work together and make decisions effectively. It is these kinds of small but essential steps that will now determine Iraq's success. And once formed, the new Iraqi government must lay the foundations of a democratic state, building institutions that can function transparently, accountably and effectively. Iraq is now entering the most critical phase of its democratic development and I want the American people to be prepared for a few things. Americans must be prepared for violence to continue in Iraq even after a government is formed. There will be no Iraqi equivalent of VE Day or VJ Day. Rather, peace will be secured as more and more Iraqis recognize that the democratic process is open to them and that politics, not violence, is the best way to achieve their interests and redress their grievances. This is how democracy will conquer terrorism, but it will do so gradually. Americans must also be prepared for the fact that another election in Iraq is a long way off. The moving and highly visible images of ink-stained fingers and joyful voters will now give way to the less colorful but no less important stories about the slow and subtle work of governing. Progress in Iraq will now emerge incrementally through negotiation and compromise. But all Americans must also know that their government, our government, is pursuing a clear strategy for success in Iraq. Ours is an integrated political-military strategy that seeks to empower our Iraqi partners to control their own country and to solve their own problems. We call this strategy, in part, clear, hold and build because, first, America's men and women in uniform are training Iraqi security forces and fighting by their side to systematically clear Iraq's cities of terrorists and insurgents. Next, we are helping Iraqis to hold those areas that we have cleared together, extending both the material benefits of reconstruction and the legitimate control of the Iraqi government. And lastly, we are working with our Iraqi partners to build the institutions of a free economy and an effective democracy. Now I'd like to update you on some of the steps that we're taking to advance this part of our strategy. An idea which we began implementing late last year is one of provincial reconstruction teams. We have deployed these teams of people, or PRTs as we call them, in specific parts of Iraq and along with our allies we plan to expand them across the country. These are small, agile teams composed of U.S. and coalition members, who are vital to empowering Iraq's young democracy. They're military and civil affairs workers, aid workers, rule of law experts and political and economic officers. They don't sit in the Embassy in Baghdad; they go out to Mosul and to Irbil and to other parts of the country. The PRTs are important because they can adapt to the unique challenges of each province, helping our Iraqi partners to take ownership of their democracy and to deliver benefits to their constituents. You see, under the old regime the provisional leaders had little -- the provincial leaders had little power, authority or capacity. Decisions and resources were concentrated in Baghdad. The Iraqi constitution, the new constitution, gives more authority to the provinces and to the localities. This will place many decisions and the delivery of services closer to the people. But these local and provincial leaders will need to develop the capability to deliver these benefits. We will help them. At the same time, we are working to build a capacity and increase the effectiveness of central government ministries. Under Saddam, cabinet ministries were dominated by one faction and run by patronage, not on the basis of performance. Today, however, it is vital that Iraq's ministries, especially the ministries of defense and interior, function effectively along non-sectarian lines. That is why we launched our ministry assistance program and have requested from Congress $125 million this year to strengthen our Iraqi partners with training and assistance. We're focusing on everything from how to manage a budget to how to fight corruption and how to deliver real results. These two policies, as well as our overall strategy for victory in Iraq, I want to assure you, did not emerge over night. They were the result of adaptation to new circumstances. As facts on the ground changed, as we've learned the lessons of some things that did not go so well, we have had to adapt. We've had to rethink our assumptions, correct our course and we're better off for it. The result is a not a perfect strategy but it is a realistic strategy; one that is now ensuring success in Iraq. I understand how hard it can be to believe that there is real progress in Iraq and that one day there will be a stable and democratic Iraq. I see the same tragic images, the violence and suffering that you do, and like you, I mourn all of the 2,372 of our fallen heroes, as well as the dedicated individuals of our State Department family and other civilians who have been lost. I know what many Americans are saying to themselves right now: Will Iraq ever become peaceful and democratic? Do the Iraqis really value freedom like we Americans do? Maybe, just maybe, they don't. But I want to close with two stories: one about Iraqis and one about America. I have in the last three days made phone calls to two Sunni leaders in Iraq; people who are heavily involved right now in trying to form a nonsectarian government. And the reason that I called them is because both of them have lost their brothers to assassination in the violence in Iraq. The personal sacrifice that Iraqi leaders are making is one that you should know. Both of these leaders said to me, "I mourn my brother. Yes, I will take care of his widow and his children. But I will continue my work toward a unified democratic Iraq because that is what my brother died for." Iraqis are sacrificing in large numbers for their own future. They are facing down terrorists for their own future and they, like human beings across the world, want a future of peace and security and the dignity that comes with democracy. Now, for them and for us, these are trying and testing times. And sometimes in trying and testing times, it is good to look to history to gain a little sense of perspective. I was very fortunate in 1989 to 1991 in that I was the White House Soviet specialist at the end of the Cold War. It doesn't get much better than that. I got to participate in the liberation of Eastern Europe, the unification of Germany and the beginnings of the peaceful breakup of the Soviet Union. Those are things that I, as a student of international politics, would never have dreamed possible, let alone that I might have been a part of it. But as I reflect on those heady times, I realized that we were really only harvesting good decisions that had been taken in 1945 and 1946 and 1947 and 1948, when the victory of freedom and liberty in Europe and Asia did not seem so assured. After all, as I walk the halls of the State Department, when I look at the portrait of Marshall or Acheson or I think of Truman and Churchill and others, I think of what they faced every day. In 1946, the communists won large minorities in Italy and in France. In 1947, there was a civil war in Greece and civil strife in Turkey. In 1947, Europeans were still starving because the reconstruction and relief effort had not succeeded. In 1948, there was a coup in Czechoslovakia, removing the last free government in the communist world. In 1948, the Berlin crisis permanently divided Germany. In 1949, the Soviet Union exploded a nuclear weapon five years ahead of schedule and the Chinese communists won. Those could not have seemed like days that would lead to the victory of a Europe whole, free, democratic and at peace in 1990 and '91. In fact, these were not just small setbacks. These were huge strategic reverses for liberty and for freedom. And yet somehow, the people who were responsible for American policy stayed true to their values and they came up with answers and they created great institutions like NATO and they believed that democracy could take hold in Germany and Japan, where it had never taken hold before. And they believed that if America stood by these then-fledgling democracies, there would be a day when war was not thinkable in Europe. Now, I can assure you in 1947 or 1948, the idea that France and Germany would never war again did not seem possible, let alone probable. And for those people, they still believed. That suggests to me that when you look back on periods of great turbulence, periods of great history, historical change, that it all seems much more orderly in retrospect. And it suggests to me, too, that things that at the time seemed impossible, in retrospect seem inevitable. And so as we look at the difficult times ahead in Iraq, as we look at the struggles of the Middle East to come to terms with the relationship between Islam and politics, as we look at an entire region trying to break out of years of authoritarianism, let's remember that we all know historical examples of that which seemed impossible but now seems inevitable. And I do believe that if we do our work well, that if we do not lose our will, that if we stay true to our values, we will look back someday and ask why did we ever doubt the triumph of democracy in the Middle East, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Palestine? Why did we ever doubt it? And that those who look back will also say it was always inevitable. Of course, it would not have been inevitable. It would have been human agency and human will that made it so. Thank you very much. (Applause.) MODERATOR: Thank you very much for the information and the insights that you brought to us today. The Secretary has graciously agreed to answer questions. The rules of the road are if you would just stand, a portable mike will be brought to you, and if you'd be good enough to state both your name and your affiliation for the benefit of the Secretary and then present your short question. SECRETARY RICE: Sir. QUESTION: Do you want me to wait for the mike? SECRETARY RICE: Yes, I think one is coming right there. QUESTION: Thank you. My name is John Ryan (ph). Madame Secretary, could you explain U.S. policy, when the United States might take military action otherwise and pursuant to UN mandate or UN resolution to enforce a UN resolution? SECRETARY RICE: Well, I think that it's difficult to state a principle in the abstract. Obviously, the President keeps open his options and we have always said that the right of self-defense does not necessarily require a UN Security Council resolution. I would note that, for instance, we went to war in the Balkans without a -- war action without a Security Council resolution. We did in the case of Iraq, of course, have multiple resolutions that constituted Iraq as a peace to -- a threat to international peace and security and a final resolution, Resolution 1441, from the 2002 that said that there would be serious consequences if Iraq did not go forward. And so it's been a mixture of how the United States has -- or the President of the United States has decided to use military force. We believe that in the current case that's on everybody's mind, and let me just go to the bottom line and then -- and sort of go to the underlying question here. That in the current case, which everyone asks about, Iran, because of all of the speculation that there has been in the paper, that it is important to note that the President doesn't take his options off the table, yet we're on a different course with Iran. The issue here is to mobilize the international community, to unify the international community around the view that Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon, that is agreed, and that in order to turn the Iranians back from what has been behavior that has been contrary to all of the wishes of the international community, that we are prepared to use measures at our disposal -- political, economic, others -- to dissuade Iran from the course that it's on. Now I want to be very clear. We don't have any problem, any quarrel with the Iranian people; quite the opposite. We want the Iranian people to be a part of the international community. This is a great culture and a great people. We want to reach out for exchanges with the Iranian people. We want their students and their musicians and their sports stars to be with us all. The problem is that the Iranian leadership, the regime, is isolating itself with its behavior. You can simply read the statements of any government in response to what the Iranians just did to see that the Iranians are isolating themselves. By being in the Security Council, we have a number of diplomatic and other tools at our disposal to persuade the Iranians that they really need to come back to negotiation. And just finally, the Iranians say that they want to make this, or they want to make this about their right to civil nuclear power. We are not questioning their right to civil nuclear power. They can have civil nuclear power. But because of a track record of 18 years in which they were not clear and not transparent with the International Atomic Energy Agency that civil nuclear power cannot include the ability to enrich and reprocess on Iranian territory, because when you learn to do that you've learned the key technology to making a nuclear weapon. And so the Iranians have been offered ideas by the Russians, ideas by the Europeans, it's time that they take those ideas, suspend their enrichment and reprocessing activities and return to the table. But Iran is not Iraq, these are two very different circumstances and we believe that the remedies before us are quite robust. QUESTION: My name is (inaudible). In the paper this morning it was said that President Bush is going to be discussing with the president of China about natural resources and oil in particular. In light of the fact that the Chinese have made great inroads into Africa, both signing contracts for oil and natural resources, the same thing in South America, the same thing in parts of the Middle East, the same thing with their trade agreements with India and in light of the fact that they are building a navy with the apparent object to exert hegemony over the Middle East and the oil resources of the Middle East, what is the United States foreign policy with regard to China and the capturing of oil and other natural resources around the world and what will President Bush will be saying to the Chinese President today? SECRETARY RICE: Thank you. Well, of course, China is a rapidly growing economy. And just to keep it in perspective, the Chinese leaders will tell you that they need to create 25 million jobs a year in order to simply keep pace with the population pressures in China -- $25 million a year. That explains why they have to have in part very rapid economic growth, and very rapid economic growth has to be fueled by something and that's why you have the all-out drive for energy that the Chinese are engaged in. That is a discussion the President and President Hu will have, but they, I think will also discuss what kinds of energy cooperation can reduce some of the pressures on hydrocarbons and the sort of all-out search for oil that is going on around the world. For instance, we are very interested in -- the Chinese are very interested in nuclear energy cooperation. The Chinese are a part of a group that we have, the Asia-Pacific Partnership for climate and energy that is trying to explore new technologies that will be greener technologies, so that at the same time that you are able to fuel your economy you can reduce greenhouse gases. And so I think that the conversation that they will have will be one about cooperation on energy issues. Now that said, let me be very clear about the search for oil. It is distorting international politics in a very major way. It's distorting it because there are places that have oil that are using oil as a weapon, or using oil as a carrot for certain policies and that's troubling. And it only underscores what the President has emphasized, which is the need to find a way to diversify our own, America's own, energy mix so that we can begin to rely on something other than oil. But we recognize that it can't just be us. That that diversification has got to be take place worldwide and I think that will be part of their discussion. We also want to encourage the Chinese to allow markets to work rather than the way that this is sometimes thought about in places that are not accustomed to market economies, which is sewing up contracts around -- in a way that is non-transparent to the market. We would also like to talk to them about that. Let's see, I promised the lady in the blue. Yes. QUESTION: First, I wish there were a piano here so you could play for us. I know how wonderful you play. My name is Kathy Posner (ph). In today's Washington Post there was a story about Karen Hughes, Under Secretary of State, head of public diplomacy, and while it was a positive story it still spoke of the problems we have in disseminating positive messages about the United States around the world. In July, my sister will become special assistant to Karen Hughes -- SECRETARY RICE: Oh. QUESTION: Yes, she's in the Embassy in Budapest now and is moving back to America. I know she'll be so embarrassed when I tell her that I asked her boss any advice for when she comes back to America to sit in the office of public diplomacy. SECRETARY RICE: Well, thank you. First of all, I'm sure she's doing out in the field what we believe is the front line, which is to get our embassies out more talking to populations. We are encouraging our ambassadors to get out and do radio interviews, do television interviews. We can't simply sit in our embassies and talk to governments. Increasingly, talking to populations is important, particularly with democratic governments where they have to have the support of their populations for the policy that they are pursuing to support American foreign policy and Hungary would be an example of that. Hungary's been a very good ally, but it's a democratic state. It has to keep its population with it and we have to help the Hungarians with that. Secondly, I would tell her that she's coming back to a Department that is absolutely committed to the public diplomacy mission. It is in part a mission of trying to undo what are sometimes malicious and propagandistic reports about us. People just say anything and we have to be, particularly with the internet, and you have to be able to respond to that in a very quick fashion, because once a piece of propaganda gets out or a story is told about us that isn't true, I can ensure you it becomes part of the urban legend and then it's very hard to deal with. Third, we're not just about messaging. You know, public diplomacy has to be a conversation, not a monologue. And we Americans are perhaps not as good at understanding other cultures and other languages as we might be. Now that is partly we are continental size and so forth. But we are encouraging students to come here from abroad and our students to go abroad. We are encouraging universities -- we had a University Presidents Summit where we're encouraging them to be involved in more -- the study of international issues, more international exchanges. And we have a major critical language initiative that the federal government is partnering with others around the country to try to improve our language capabilities. When I was a young scholar coming up, a young student coming up, it was the patriotic thing to do to learn Russian. And so the government had all kinds of projects and fellowships if you wanted to learn Russian and become a Soviet specialist. And yet we have a tremendous dearth of people who can speak Dari or Arabic or Persian or any of the languages, Farsi, any of the languages that are so critical now, let alone Chinese; one of the languages that will be most used. So that's another part of the public diplomacy. But let me just say a word to all of you, this isn't something the U.S. Government can achieve on its own. America's great strength in engaging other countries is actually not what we do in the State Department or what we do in the U.S. Government. It is the contacts between business leaders. It's the contacts between civic society. It's the contacts that nongovernmental organizations have with one and other. It is, as a university professor, I think it's the engagement of young minds across borders that really is our strength. And so I would ask you, because you have an interest in foreign policy, you have an interest in our doing well in the world, to think about what can be done through communities, your communities and through your businesses and through your organizations to reach out particularly to young people around the world and to let them know what America's really like. QUESTION: Madame Rice, my name is (inaudible) and my question is regarding the Indo-U.S. nuclear peace civil agreement. My question is that how this agreement, if ratified, will bring more prosperity to the world and why is it in the beneficial interest of the United States to go for this agreement? And has the White House taken any initiatives to ensure that this treaty is ratified when placed before the House? Thank you. SECRETARY RICE: Thank you. The gentleman is referring to an agreement that President Bush and Prime Minister Singh signed on the President's recent trip to India, which is an agreement between the United States and India for civil nuclear cooperation. This agreement is a path-breaking and really very important agreement because India is an anomaly in international politics. It is a country that never signed the Nonproliferation Treaty, did develop nuclear weapons but did so, of course, having never signed the NPT, by not having violated the NPT, but it has been cutoff as a result of those decisions from any kind of civil nuclear cooperation with the rest of the world. And so we want to change this anomaly. Why do we want to change this? First of all, because the United States needs good strategic partners around the world who are democratic and India is a huge multiethnic, multi-religious democracy that is transparent and that can play an extremely important role in the world as a strategic partner, a responsible strategic partner. And so we see this broad relationship that is now burgeoning in agriculture and in military-to-military cooperation, and across the board cooperation between the private sector and business. We see this agreement in that context. Secondly, I was referring to China and energy; India needs energy. And India is also a country that is desperate to fuel economic growth at 8 percent, 9 percent, and it's going to need an energy supply and it needs to diversify its energy, too, to clean technologies like nuclear energy. We cannot begin to share those technologies with India without an agreement of this kind. Third, and here people have criticized the agreement by saying, well, isn't this harmful to the Nonproliferation Treaty since India didn't sign the Nonproliferation Treaty? India has lived up to its obligations not to transfer nuclear technology around the world. It has a really very good record. Moreover, no less than Mohamed ElBaradei, who is the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is the agency that protects, in a sense, the NPT, supports this agreement, because while it doesn't bring India into the Nonproliferation Treaty, it does bring India into the broad nonproliferation regime. India has agreed to put its civilian reactors under international safeguards. A question I am also asked is, "Well, if you will do it for India, doesn't that make your argument weaker for North Korea or Iran? Isn't there a double standard?" And I say absolutely, there's a double standard and Iran and North Korea created it by cheating on their obligations to the NPT, by being nontransparent, closed societies where everybody worries what they're doing. Here, you have a democracy in India that is trying to move closer to the nonproliferation regime and we ought to support that. I believe that we will -- I hope that we will get Congress' support. I, myself, testified a couple of weeks ago and we're continuing to seek support for it, but you have to understand it in that broad framework, not just as an agreement on civil nuclear power, but it's a very important agreement in the broader sense as well. Yes, sir. QUESTION: My name is B. Herbert Martin. I'm Pastor of the Progressive Community Church in Chicago. I'm interested in American foreign policy toward the continent of Africa. Could you, Madame Secretary, share a little bit about the improvement and the progress in American foreign policy toward the continent of Africa, especially in light of Rwanda, since Rwanda, and now in light of the crisis in Sudan? SECRETARY RICE: Yes, thank you. Let me make a couple of points. First of all, on our broad policies toward Africa, we have tried to see the potential of this continent and to treat African leaders as partners, strategic partners as well as partners in the development of their own countries. That means that we have had very forward-leaning trade policies like the African Growth and Opportunity Act, which allows for the ease of the entry of goods into the American market, African goods into the American market. We have, with the African leaders, had a deep political engagement on a variety of issues and as well, we have tripled development assistance, official development assistance to Africa. Now we have done that broadly for humanitarian reasons, but for some special countries in Africa which are democratic and governing wisely, they are becoming part of something called the Millennium Challenge Corporation program, which the President announced, which means that we give fairly large grants to a country if they can come up with a project that will help alleviate poverty and increase development. But they have to be governing wisely, fighting corruption, if there's no need to put more money into a place where it's just going to go down the drain to corruption. So on the economic side, we have been very active in Africa. On the security side, we have also been very active in Africa. We've been part of the reason that there is a more hopeful picture in what's called the Great Lakes region. We were very involved in helping the Democratic Republic of the Congo come to a resolution of its civil war. We were instrumental, along with the African states, in bringing peace to Liberia, where you now have -- and I attended her inauguration, a very fine new president of Liberia, the first woman on the African continent. And we are going to support Liberia so that West Africa is beginning to become a place that is no longer given to conflict. And in Sudan, the United States led the international effort to end the North-South conflict through the efforts of Ambassador John Danforth, Former Senator John Danforth, to get an agreement between North and South, ending a decades-old civil war that had cost millions of lives. Now we have the problem that has also emerged in Sudan of Darfur. And make no mistake about it; this is a horrible humanitarian moral crisis. The President is focused on it personally and we are determined to lead the international effort to help the UN get a more robust security force in Darfur. There is an African Union mission there. They're doing a good job. But it's too small, it's not mobile enough, it's not capable of getting to the outer reaches. Darfur is the size of Texas. And so a small force of 7,000 people is not going to be able to provide security. We want a more robust force, at least twice that size. We want it to be a UN force. Secondly, we are taking the lead on the humanitarian side. I was in Darfur. I saw what the nongovernmental organizations are doing out there to support women, to support children, to support the refugee camps. We are the largest donor, by far, to that effort. And third, we are very actively engaged in a process in Abuja and Nigeria to try to bring peace between the rebels and the government. Now to be sure, this is a difficult government to deal with, because it is -- it has caused most of these problems. It is, however, a government that somehow has to be part of the solution, but we have not been shy about using other tools that we have gotten through the UN. We have a Security Council resolution that allows us to bring sanctions against members of the Khartoum Government and we are doing that as we see fit. So it's a very comprehensive program on Darfur. There is good support from the international community and NATO is providing some of the logistical support to the current mission and is prepared to help with the UN mission as well. Let's see, I'm going to come back to this side. The lady all the way in the back -- yes, microphone? QUESTION: Alice Alavastro. I was wondering, you had presented a very utopia view of the democratization of Iraq and also a very logical approach to our entrance into a possible war with Iran. But considering the muddied and controversial approach that the Bush Administration took to going -- to invading Iraq and going to war, how is the American people supposed to trust the Bush Administration and their spokesmen on their approach to going to this controversy with Iran and other different policies that the Bush Administration speaks of? SECRETARY RICE: Yes, thank you. Well, first of all, let me just say that I don't think that the road to democracy in Iraq is at all utopian. I think it's tough and it's heart-slogging and it's violent and it looks like the road to democracy that any number of countries have had to face. Sometimes, I think here in the United States, we need to engage ourselves, and I try to do it personally, in a little bit of humility about what it took to build democracy in this country. After all, when the founding fathers said "We The People," they didn't mean me. My ancestors were three-fifths of a man in Mr. Jefferson's first constitution. (Applause.) SECRETARY RICE: So when we think about what the Iraqis are struggling with, we need to recognize that democracy is hard. It just happens to be the only system of government that's worth it, when you get to the end of it. By the way, dictatorship is hard too, except for the dictator. (Laughter.) And so when we think about what the alternative is to democracy in Iraq, let's remember the 300,000 people in mass graves or the killing fields of chemical weapons against the Kurds and against Shia. We need to keep perspective on what it is they're doing. Now as to the issue, I know that it's controversial. The decision to have gone to war in Iraq was controversial. I would just note that when the President spoke to the UN Security Council in September of 2002, he said what we would do. He said that we would give Saddam Hussein time to answer the just demands of the international community about the multiple resolutions that have been passed in the UN. And after Resolution 1441 was passed in November, the Council said that there would be serious consequences if he didn't. Now serious consequences can mean almost anything, but in this context, given Saddam Hussein and given the only way that he was going to change his ways or be brought down, that meant the use of military force. And let's remember that it was not just the United States that supported that action, but also Great Britain and Spain and Italy and Australia and a number of other countries. This was a broad coalition. Not everybody supported it, but a lot of countries did. Now I know too -- and again, I'm going to go right at the -- kind of the assumption or the underlying question here. I know too that there is controversy about the issue of the weapons of mass destruction. But I can tell you that everybody who had worked on this -- well, let me not say that. Most people who had worked on this issue thought Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. If we didn't think he had weapons of mass destruction, what was the UN doing in keeping the most severe sanctions on the Iraqi people that have ever been kept on any population? What were we doing? If we didn't think he had weapons of mass destruction, we were being awfully unfair to the Iraqi people. And by the way, those sanctions, of course, were having an effect on the Iraqi people, but we now know that Saddam Hussein was gaming the system through the oil-for-food program so that he could continue all of his activities and, in fact, increasing his take. So yes, we thought he had weapons of mass destruction. He clearly had an appetite for them. He clearly had infrastructure for them. He clearly had used them before. But no, we did not find stores of weapons of mass destruction, but it was not because anybody said something they didn't believe or didn't have very good reason to believe. It was because in a nontransparent government like Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, it was not possible to know precisely what the state was of those weapons of mass destruction until we overthrew him. That's the real truth of the case. So I would hope that the American people would go back and they would look at this history and they would remember that we had multiple resolutions in the UN Security Council that said he was a threat to peace and security. There wasn't disagreement in the international community that he was a threat to peace and security. There wasn't disagreement that he still coveted Kuwait, which he refused to recognize as an independent state. There wasn't disagreement that he was firing at our aircraft that were trying to keep him from harming his own people and his neighbors. That was all agreed. And there wasn't disagreement that he refused to answer very clear questions about the state of his very dangerous weapons of mass destruction programs. Those things were all agreed. The only disagreement was, was it time to deal with that issue and to take him out of power and there, there were disagreements. The President made a judgment that I fundamentally agreed with then and I fundamentally agree with now. Having done that, it is the obligation of the United States to leave that country better than it was. Given our values and given our experience, that says leave it with a foundation for democracy and then it can become a pillar in a different kind of Middle East, because the Middle East was not stable. I've heard people say, "You disturbed the Middle East." No; any place that could produce al-Qaida wasn't stable and we needed a different kind of Middle East. I think we will get one. On Iran, it is not just the United States that believes that Iran is on a dangerous course. I would ask you to read the comments of the Russian Government or the British Government or the German Government on this. The world wants Iran to adhere to its obligations and that's why the United States, in coordination with its allies, is seeking and probably will have to seek Security Council resolution to that effect. QUESTION: Thank you. SECRETARY RICE: Yes, all the way back here. QUESTION: Thank you, Madame Secretary. My name is Chris Robling (ph.). I want to ask you, as a Russian expert, if you could speak with us for a couple of minutes about the way in which you personally believe Vladimir Putin relates to the evolution of democracy in Russia and the basis on which he approaches that issue. SECRETARY RICE: All right. Thank you. Well, there's one thing that I want to say about President Putin. I have no doubt of his commitment to his country and of his desire to see Russia prosperous and stable. I also have no doubt that he is not -- he and the Russians are not in the Soviet Union any longer. Russia is a very different place and as we look at Russia's evolution, we have to remember where it came from. It is not -- this is not the Soviet Union. That said, I think the most troubling thing about the evolution of politics in Russia over the last couple of years is not that the state has become stronger. I think the state had to become stronger. It was really dangerously weak in the 90s. I think that most of us who knew the place thought that it was dangerously weak in the 90s, the Russian state. But the problem for Russia has been that it has tended to swing then too far to the other side. And the absence of a truly free press, the absence of a legislature that is really able to check the presidency, the absence or the seeming absence of an independent -- truly independent judiciary presents you with a circumstance in which most power is now held in the Kremlin and that -- quite apart from Vladimir Putin and what his personal predilections may be. And I don't -- I frankly don't think he is the problem. The problem is that when you have that much concentration of power in the Kremlin, in the hands of a president, you are going to have more authoritarian tendencies. That's why the founding fathers recognized the need for balance of power. That's why, in parliamentary systems, you have the ability to remove the executive if things go wrong. And so what we've been trying to do with the Russians is to talk to them about the institutions of a free society and encourage them to build those institutions. And I have to tell you that I think it's not gone in a very good direction over the last couple of years. That said; we're working with the Russians on a number of important issues. I think we need to continue to work with them. And I've read the articles and the stories that say, "Well, exclude them from the NATO-Russia Council, exclude them from the G-8," and so forth and so on. I don't see any outcome -- good outcome for Russian democracy that comes from excluding Russia from institutions that have democratic values at their core. And so I continue to believe that the engagement of Russia in these institutions is a net-plus, but we also have to challenge the Russians that their own domestic development is troubling and that it is troubling to the world because a truly deep relationship with the United States or with the West rests on common values. And Russia's adherence to those common values and the institutions that represent them is in question at this time. Yes. You, sir, you were standing earlier. QUESTION: Ronald Emberman (ph.). Thank you, Madame Secretary. Everyone is waiting to see the Iraqi army replace our soldiers and yet, the Iraqi soldiers, I understand, have no continuing obligation to serve. They can just relieve themselves of any service with no consequences. Could you amplify that and perhaps even talk about the deflection rate that's involved with the Iraqi army? SECRETARY RICE: Well, the Iraqi soldiers do undertake an obligation to serve and they don't have the ability just to walk away. In the early days, the first time that we trained the Iraqi army, we frankly didn't do it very well. It was a kind of false start and yes, there were lots of defections because we tried to create an army without really a chain-of-command that was Iraqi, without a defense ministry that could support them. And now, you're getting that chain-of-command and that defense ministry in a way that makes it truly an Iraqi army, not Iraqi soldiers serving under American commanders. And that has worked considerably better. The Iraqi army is actually an institution in which Iraqis have considerable pride. When you talk to Iraqis about their army, they do believe that the army is an institution of pride. A lot of Iraqi army officers are, in fact, putting their lives on the line -- Iraqi soldiers are putting their lives on the line every day. They are taking more control of their own territory; for instance, the highway from the airport into the international zone, which has always been a very dangerous highway, has been less dangerous since Iraqis took control of that highway. There are towns in which the Iraqis are the presence and so, they are making progress. There's been a bigger problem with the police and we are intensifying our efforts this year on police training, because as you might imagine, it's somewhat harder when you have police who kind of live in the community, go home at night, and are not subject to the same kind of discipline that you get in an army barracks circumstance. That's why we've had trouble with the police. But the Iraqi army, if you talk to our soldiers, our people who work with them, they are very pleased with the development of the Iraqi army. Yes. QUESTION: My name is Greg Friend (ph.) and I'll be going to Northwestern in the fall. My question deals with the NSA wire taps that were uncovered by the New York Times in December. As far as I understand by reading the DOJ's recently published white paper, it seems that there are two sources for Bush's claims that he has authority to conduct these warrantless wiretaps without probable cause, the first being the invocation of the Inherent Powers Doctrine, which, during the 70s with the Nixon Administration, the Supreme Court ruled that the President's invocation of -- or such an invocation of the Inherent Powers Doctrine was unconstitutional, in violation of the protection of -- the Fourth Amendment protections guaranteed by the Constitution. The second source that the white paper outlines is the AUMF, the Authorization for the Use of Military Force passed by Congress, I believe, in relation to use of force in Afghanistan, which, as far as my reading of, doesn't explicitly contain language about the use of things like wiretaps or warrantless surveillance. It just talks about the need to be able to use any necessary force. Those given, I guess my question is, where does Bush actually have this authority? And if it's true that he can meld interpretations of either of the Inherent Powers Doctrine or the AUMF, then where do we draw the line on how far the President can go in unilateral actions that seem scarily dictator-like? SECRETARY RICE: Thank you. Well, I defer to the Justice Department white paper. I'm not the Attorney General and I don't try and tell -- give the President legal advice. (Applause.) SECRETARY RICE: But let me answer your question from my perspective as a National Security official and as the National Security Advisor at the time. This is a very difficult war in which we find ourselves. It is a war that is not law enforcement, to be sure. Because if you wait to let people commit their crimes, so-called probable cause, and then wait to allow them to commit their crimes, then 3,000 people die or dozens die at a stop in London or wherever. Remembering that for the terrorists, the purpose is to kill innocents. That's not collateral damage for the terrorists. That's the purpose, is to kill innocents. And so you have a different kind of circumstance in which what you try to do is to get as much information as you can, as much intelligence as you can to stop the attack before it happens. You cannot wait until it happens. That makes intelligence and information the long pole in the tent in the fight against terrorism every day. And the United States faced a particular problem in terms of our inability to cover the conversation of somebody outside of the country who was plotting, potentially plotting a terrorist attack, and somebody in the country who might be a part of that plot. And there was a wall at which the United States was not able to hear what was going on inside our own country. We know that there were people in this country before September 11th that were having conversations with Afghanistan, people that later on turned out to be hijackers. We know that. We had no way to know that they were in San Diego. That's a problem if you're trying to protect the American people. And for the President and for those of us who lived September 11th, and by the way, also lived the inquiry afterwards, when the people asked, did you do everything you could have to prevent this attack, you are absolutely determined to use all of your powers within the law to try to prevent that from happening again. We talked often about the wall between -- what went on in the United States and what went on outside the United States. Because of the way we had grown up with no internal threat for so long in this country, the fact that there were people inside the country plotting was something that was very difficult for us to connect up with what people were doing outside the country, who were part of the same plot. And so this was one of the efforts to bridge that divide. Now, the President got the rulings from his -- from the Justice Department, from his lawyers that he was within his powers to do this. He would not have done it if he did not believe that he had the inherent powers and the statutory powers to do it. But having been told that, I think he had an obligation to do it. Now we're having a debate about the very delicate balances between civil liberties and national security on a whole range of fronts. And I think that's only appropriate in a great democracy like ours. And by the way, when I went to Europe, I said to them we should have the same debate with our democratic allies around the world, because we do face another kind of threat and we have to protect who we are and protect our civil liberties. We also have to protect innocent life. And I think we're going to be having this debate for a long time. But I hope that as we have it, we keep in mind the fact that there are people in this country who talk to people out of this country about how to kill innocent Americans. And the President has an obligation to use every power available to him to stop that from happening. We're not talking about political enemies here; we're talking about people who want to kill innocent Americans. That's their goal. That is what they're after and they have to be stopped. (Applause.) Sorry, this lady right here and then I'll get you. QUESTION: Madame Secretary, my name is Kelly Rasok (ph) and I'm a law student at (inaudible) University and I will be doing an internship with the State Department this summer. SECRETARY RICE: Good. By the way, I was a State Department intern. (Laughter.) QUESTION: Wow, good to know. SECRETARY RICE: I'm telling everybody in the Department, be good to your interns, you never know what might happen. (Laughter.) QUESTION: A few weeks ago, a gentleman in Afghanistan was to be tried for his conversion from Islam to Christianity and you were instrumental in securing his freedom and urging for the Universal Declaration of Human Right to be upheld. And my question is: As Afghanistan is a young democracy, do you see this as setting a precedent that may lead the way to wider-spread freedom in that country? SECRETARY RICE: It's a really good question and the way that you put it is very important because it is a young democracy. Afghanistan and many of the Muslim countries that are going through democratic transitions are having to deal with one of the most difficult issues that confront any political system, and that's the relationship between religion and religious law and individual rights and liberties. And we have been through it, although we were founded on separation of church and state; not everybody was founded on separation of church and state. And so it has been a very important evolution as these countries try to deal with this issue. Now, I do believe that what happened in the Rahman case was a bit of a wake-up call to us and, frankly, to Afghanistan because it immediately brought international expectations into play in Afghanistan for what is understood to be the course of democracy. And I think that was a very good thing. The Afghanistan constitution does have protections for individuals in terms of their religious practice. And so as these countries go through this evolution, I think you're probably going to have more cases, some of them are going to end up in their courts. You know, we have to remember, again referring to our own experience, that our own evolution was one in which the Constitution has been interpreted time and time and time again as individuals come to the courts and say, you're violating my constitutional rights. And then we have a case about it and things evolve. Again, as I said to the lady, we've had some pretty awful cases. You know, the Dred Scott decision was a pretty awful decision, and we've evolved out of those over time. The same thing will happen in Afghanistan. The same thing will happen in Iraq and there will be decisions that we do not like and that we will have to call to attention the international obligation. I think there will be victories for individual liberties as well. But this is the natural process of democratic evolution and it's going to take some time. The good news is it's not the Taliban. Because the Taliban could have carried out that sentence and nobody would have been able to do a thing about it, and that's what we have to keep in mind. Even when it's a young, troubled, struggling democracy it's far better than a dictatorship or an authoritarian regime that does not respect rights nor respects the will of the international community. There is a gentleman all the way in back who was trying to ask a question. Yes. QUESTION: Hi, I'm Michael Sand (ph). I just wanted to ask are we going to be able to hold accountable ever the governments or militaries, or at least members of the governments and militaries of Syria and Iran for terrorist attacks, like our base in Khobar Towers, the Jewish Community Center in Argentina or marines in Beirut or the French peacekeepers in Beirut and hold the members of those militaries -- or the assassination of Hariri for that matter? SECRETARY RICE: Yes. Well, it is something that we are constantly cognizant of because those who commit atrocities of that type need to be brought to justice. When they are protected by authoritarian regimes or when they are themselves members of authoritarian regimes that are still in power, it is of course more difficult. Saddam Hussein and his henchmen are being held to account now because there's a democracy in Iraq. In Lebanon, you mentioned the Hariri assassination, the international community is going to hold those accountable who participated, planned, did whatever they did to plot the assassination of Rafik Hariri and so that will be held accountable. Charles Taylor is before the court of Sierra Leone; that's a good step forward. And so the trial of war criminals in the Balkans is another example of this. I do think there is very little appetite around the world any longer to let those who commit these kinds of atrocities simply go free. Rather there is a very strong view and it's one that we share, that until you can hold them accountable, hold these people accountable, it's very hard to have reconciliation in the countries where they've done their terror. I think I can take one more, I'm told. Okay, two more. Yes. QUESTION: Thank you very much, Madame Secretary. My name is Kemal Abraham (ph) and I'm going (inaudible) another question related to the other two questions before that, is to do with human rights and equality in Egypt. Egypt is a friendly country to our country is getting the biggest aid after Israel for the last 20-some years. But as you know, Egyptian Government discriminate against minority Christians in Egypt and it is always a chain of violence. Last one -- last few days, they attacked churches in Alexandria, Muslim fanatics, and killed a Christian there. My question to you is two-folds. One, what is the American Government going to do about our friend, the Government in Egypt, since we gave them the biggest aid and since it's a human right issue and equality issue and democracy issue? And my second question is, why the State Department opened dialogue with Muslim brotherhood in Egypt after they won the -- some of the election and we know that their extreme fanatic Muslim group -- which related to Hamas as well? SECRETARY RICE: Well, on the latter question, we actually do not, as a rule, maintain contacts with Hamas. As you know, they're listed as a terrorist organization. And we have not -- we don't have contact with the Muslim brotherhood at this point. It's complicated because, of course, this is a growing force in Egypt, but our view is that the organizations that are really committed to democracy ought to be the ones that are supported by contact with the United States. As it comes to the broader problem in Egypt, though, you know that I gave a speech at Cairo University. We talked about the need for Egypt to lead -- this great country of Egypt to lead the democratic revolution that is going on in the Middle East. And some good things have happened. I think the multiparty, multi-candidate elections that took place were a good thing. It opened a political debate in Egypt that had never been seen before and I think it will be hard to reverse that ever again. On the other hand, we were disappointed in the way that the last round of parliamentary elections was conducted. It certainly was not conducted in a way that was free and fair and that was a great disappointment. And we continue to tell Egypt that this is an extremely important part of our relationship and it's going to continue to be the democratic dialogue. As to the

For me I have no problem with it, as long as it is NOT at Official Government Functions. Other then that go for it, do it in Russian , African or what ever.

Maybe Nasa should ban Shuttle flights do to the effects on the Environment. lol ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cf...jectID=10379336 Nasa to cull vultures for shuttle safety 28.04.06 12.20pm FLORIDA- Nasa is trying to rid the Kennedy Space Centre of vultures after the shuttle struck one of the large birds during lift-off last year on the first flight after the Columbia disaster. The space centre has set up what it calls a "road kill posse" to quickly clear as many carcasses as possible from the 2400-hectare site, in hopes of encouraging the vulture population to relocate by cutting off its food supply. When shuttle Discovery lifted off the launch pad last July on the first flight since the 2003 Columbia accident, it hit a vulture during its climb to orbit. Discovery did not suffer any damage that time, from the vulture or from the chunks of foam that fell off its fuel tank during launch. But Nasa fears collisions with the large, carrion-eating birds could damage shuttle heat shields, leaving the spacecraft vulnerable to an accident like the one that killed Columbia's seven astronauts. "We need everyone's help," the agency wrote in newsletters distributed to the space centre's work force last week. "A crew will be sent to quickly remove the carrion before the vultures are attracted to the free meal." About 250kg of animal carcasses have been removed since the programme began two weeks ago, the centre said. In addition to picking up dead animals, the space centre said it was employing other tactics to discourage the vultures, including testing a sound system that would broadcast loud noises and spraying a noxious chemical. The centre said it would also try to trap and remove the birds. The agency is preparing to resume shuttle launches this summer from the space centre, which lies within a wildlife preserve. Its roads are dotted with the bodies of possums, raccoons, feral pigs, squirrels, birds and other animals fallen victim to traffic. The centre is asking anyone who sees dead animals to call a "roadkill" hotline to report the location. - REUTERS

With 16 million Undocumented workers in the United States, whose Social Security numbers are they using??????? CAN ANYONE HERE ANSWER THIS QUESTION THAT I JUST ASKED???????????

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nati...66_kurds24.html Troops at border concern Baghdad By LEE KEATH The Associated Press Border troops alarm Iraq President Jalal Talabani. BAGHDAD, Iraq — President Jalal Talabani expressed his concern Sunday over reported Iranian and Turkish troop concentrations on those countries' borders with Iraq. Turkey has moved thousands of troops to the border region in what its military said was an offensive against Turkish Kurd guerrillas. Iran also reportedly has moved forces to the border, and last week shelled a mountainous region inside Iraq used by Iranian Kurd fighters for infiltration into Iran, according to Iraqi Kurd officials. No casualties were reported from Friday's barrage. Talabani said Iranian and Turkish forces have stayed on their sides of the border. But "I have expressed my concern over these concentrations ... Iraq is a sovereign independent nation that won't let other nations interfere in its internal affairs," he said at a news conference with U.S. ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad in the northern city of Irbil. Turkey has called on the United States to crack down on rebel bases in northern Iraq. But U.S. commanders, struggling to battle Iraqi insurgents elsewhere, have been extremely reticent to fight the rebels, who are based in the remote mountain areas in one of the few stable parts of the country. Meanwhile, Khalilzad said planned talks between the United States and Iran over stabilizing Iraq must wait until an Iraqi government is formed. Talabani said he would participate in any talks. "We see it as good that after an Iraqi government is formed, this issue can take shape," Khalilzad said. "If the United States holds talks alone with Iran without an Iraqi government being formed, that would certainly be a problem for the Iraqi government," the Afghan-born Khalilzad said. Once the government is formed, "we have no problem with meetings with Iranian officials," he said. Prime Minister-designate Jawad al-Maliki was tapped Saturday to put together a government and has 30 days to do so.

http://ogj.pennnet.com/articles/article_di...E_ID=253202&p=9 4/21/2006 Offshore staff (Paris)-Technip has been awarded a contract by BG Trinidad and Tobago for flowlines, risers, and umbilicals for the North Coast Marine Area (NCMA) Development, offshore Trinidad. The monetary value of the contract was not disclosed. The contract calls for Technip to provide engineering, procurement, fabrication, installation and pre-commissioning services for the insulated riser, flowline and umbilical systems that will link the Eastern Hibiscus and Chaconia subsea wells to the Hibiscus platform. The wells are located 25 mi northwest of Trinidad in NCMA Block 01 in 500 ft of water. Technip will be responsible for additional engineering, fabrication and installation work on two insulated steel flowlines with two flexible risers and two hydraulic control umbilicals. Technip's operations and engineering center in Houston will perform the detailed design engineering for the project. Flexi France, one of Technip's flexible pipe plants, will manufacture the high-pressure flexible risers at its Le Trait, France location, while the hydraulic control umbilicals will be manufactured by Technip's UK subsidiary, Duco, in Newcastle, England. The rigid flowline will be fabricated at Technip's poolbase in Evanton, UK. Technip will employ two vessels from its fleet for the offshore installation. The Apache will lay the flowlines, while The Wellservicer will install the flexible risers and umbilicals and additionally offer diving and ROV support for completion of the work.

http://thestaronline.com/news/story.asp?fi...704&sec=apworld Bolivia seeks debt relief from IDB for poor Latin American nations BELO HORIZONTE, Brazil (AP)- Bolivian President Evo Morales headed to a key economic forum Sunday to push the Inter-American Development bank to forgive at least some of the US$3.5 billion (euro2.9 billion) owed by the Andean nation and four other poor Latin American countries. But Latin America's two biggest powerhouses - Brazil and Mexico - won't support the debt relief package for Bolivia, Haiti, Honduras, Guyana and Nicaragua unless richer nations foot the bill, Brazilian Planning Minister Paulo Bernardo said. "This has to be talked about and negotiated because the question is, 'Who is going to be responsible in financial terms?''' Bernardo told reporters before the IDB's annual meeting. Bolivian Finance Minister Luiz Alberto Arce said Morales, a leftist and Bolivia's first Indian president, will push for the debt relief package at the event for top Latin American and Caribbean economic officials in this southeastern Brazilian city. Morales was expected to arrive in Belo Horizonte late Sunday and to attend the event's official opening ceremony Monday. Arce did not say how much IDB debt Bolivia would seek to have forgiven, but the proposal is sure to be a major theme at the meeting, which ends Wednesday. Bolivia owes US$1.6 billion (euro1.3 billion), and Bernardo said Bolivia wants all of its obligations forgiven. The 47-nation bank is owned by its member countries, mainly from the Western Hemisphere, but also including some from Europe, as well as Japan and South Korea. Mexico supports the debt relief idea but doesn't want to pay for it through its IDB ownership stake, said Mexican Finance Minister Francisco Gil. He and Bernardo suggested that the United States and other rich countries - possibly European - foot the bill. Delegates at the meeting agreed Sunday to form a special committee chaired by Brazil that will be charged with coming up with a financing solution for a debt relief package by the end of the year, said Clay Lowery, the Treasury Department's assistant secretary for international affairs. Lowery said the U.S. delegation is proposing a complicated structured-financing arrangement that will lead to debt relief while not negatively affecting the IDB's balance sheet. "We think it can be done in a way that is a win-win situation for the IDB, all its member countries, and the entire region,'' he said. Another prickly topic expected to come up at the meeting is Bolivia's plan to nationalize its vast natural gas resources and how that will affect Petroleo Brasileiro SA, Brazil's state-owned petroleum company. Morales won the presidency last year after campaigning on a platform to wring more profits from the gas producers operating in Bolivia. Petrobras is a major producer in Bolivia, where production was privatized in the 1990s, and Brazil is Bolivia's biggest gas client. But Petrobras chief executive Sergio Gabrielli said months of negotiations over the company's future in Bolivia haven't resulted in an understanding of what nationalization will mean. Gabrielli told reporters he hopes to meet with Morales. Delegates at the IDB meeting, one of Latin America's most important annual economic forums, were also discussing how the bank can improve the region's crumbling infrastructure, boost economies and promote regional integration. Luis Alberto Moreno, a longtime Colombian ambassador to Washington elected last year to a five-year term as head of the bank, is overseeing the meeting for the first time. Moreno wants to maintain the Washington, D.C.-based bank's role as a key source of funding for government projects while expanding loans to the private sector. He also advocates small-scale Latin American development projects for the region's poor that can serve as examples for more expensive efforts. New projects that could come up at the meeting are Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez' multibillion-dollar idea to create a vast natural gas pipeline spanning South America, and a US$810 million (euro669 million) highway project to connect Brazil's Atlantic coast to Peru's Pacific ports before the end of the decade. Police on Saturday detonated a leather briefcase that had been left in a women's bathroom at the convention center where the meeting is taking place. Officials said it did not contain anything dangerous.-AP

-Just so everyone knows" I am against illegal immigration". For ALL of us who came here legally having OPEN BORDERS is a smack in the face. Also what must be mentioned in which no one is talking about is the Impact of Illegal immigration on Black America. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentD...ay.asp?aid=7592 Written by Robert Klein Engler Wednesday, May 26, 2004 A goblin is haunting Barack Obama's election campaign to become the Democratic senator from Illinois. That goblin is in the shape of illegal immigration and its impact on Black Americans. The Democrats need the votes of both Latinos and Blacks to win in November, yet this victory may be brought at the expense of Black Americans. Barack Obama cannot talk about this, because to do so he will have to alienate one group or another. The fact of the matter is, illegal immigration, especially illegal immigration from Mexico, is hurting Black Americans. If Democratic candidates ever getting around to speaking the truth, they will have to tell Black voters that illegal immigration is taking jobs away from Black Americans, cutting into resources available for welfare, and restructuring public schools and many urban areas. In short, the votes of Latinos are brought by the Democrats at the expense of Black America. Tony Brown, author of What Mama Taught Me, knows all too well how Black Americans are injured by illegal immigration. He writes, '''The U. S. Census Bureau reported in the New York Times...the poor Black and Latino communities lose the most income of any group of Americans, including all Americans who did not finish high school and all Americans who are paying higher taxes to subsidize welfare benefits for illegal immigrants and businesses that hire them. Illegal immigrants overuse welfare benefits and services and underpay income taxes for a net loss to local, state and federal taxpayers.'' The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) http://www.fairus.org, has also documented the detrimental impact of illegal immigration on Black Americans. In California, Blacks are being forced out from communities like South Central, Los Angeles, where they have long lived. ''This once predominantly Black neighborhood is becoming largely Hispanic. South Central is being transformed. Here we talk about 'Black flight.' People are leaving neighborhoods where they have lived for years because they don't feel like they belong any more reports Terry Anderson in the San Francisco Examiner, (Feb. 3, 1999.)" The Federation for American Immigration Reform continues in its report that, ''Other statistics are also sobering: a GAO study found that a decade of heavy immigration to Los Angeles had changed the janitorial industry from a mostly native Black, unionized workforce to one of non-unionized Latinos, many of whom were illegal aliens. According to the Census, the employment of Black Americans as hotel workers in California dropped 30 percent in the 1980s, while the number of immigrants with such jobs rose 166 percent. A similar story can be told of the garment industry, the restaurant business, hospital work, and public service jobs.'' One can expect Blacks in Illinois to suffer the same declines as illegal immigration from Mexico continues. Immigration researcher and commentator Roy Beck noted in his 1996 book, The Case Against Immigration that: ''To review the Black side of our nation's immigration tradition is to observe African Americans periodically trying to climb the mainstream economic ladder, only to be shoved aside each time. It is to see one immigrant wave after another climb onto and up that ladder while planting their feet on the backs of Black Americans....The most racist policy in this country for the past 25 years has been our immigration policy, because it has been the worst thing that has happened to Blacks from the federal government since slavery.'' The Harvest Institute also documents the impact of illegal immigration on Black Americans. ''Dr. Claud Anderson, president of The Harvest Institute, a Black research and education organization, announced that The Harvest Institute does not support President Bush's recently proposed amnesty for illegal immigrant aliens and has released an Information Alert (available at www.harvestinstitute.org). Dr. Anderson said, ''Despite the stance of many civil rights groups, immigration's impact on native Blacks and their communities is disproportionate, direct and devastating. Blacks are losing faith because the government continues a pattern of bestowing the rights that should first go to native Blacks to immigrants from foreign countries. Native Blacks are ignored and patronized with symbolic and ceremonial actions by both political parties. The issue of immigration is roiling within Black communities and has become...divisive.'' As the Democrat's ''multicultural'' candidate, Barack Obama has little to say about this multicultural issue. You can read his position papers and look at his website and find no recognition that illegal immigration from Mexico is hurting Black Americans. One has to wonder what kind of immigration policy Obama will vote for if he ever becomes a U. S. Senator. One has to wonder even more why Black Americans continue to vote Democratic, when the Democrats are not looking out for their interests. The Obama campaign has been silent too long on the issue of illegal immigration and its impact on Black Americans in Illinois. Nor have other prominent Democrats like Mayor Daley of Chicago, or Jesse Jackson and his son spoken out about the impact of this issue. Black Americans like basketball player Michael Jordan, who gave $10,000, also contribute money to the Obama campaign without questioning Obama's stand on illegal immigration. Don't expect a critical voice anytime soon, however, from the Democrats. When it comes to illegal immigration and Black Americans, the Democrats want to have it both ways.

FDA Announces Plans for Nanotechnology Public Meeting The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will be holding a public meeting in the fall of this year, designed to gather information about current developments in uses of nanotechnology materials in FDA regulated products. In a Federal Register notice displayed today announcing the meeting, FDA asks that those interested in presenting at or attending the meeting inform the agency of their interest. Nanotechnology is described by the National Nanotechnology Initiative as the understanding and control of matter at dimensions of roughly 1 to 100 nanometers, where unique phenomena enable novel applications. Essentially, nanotechnology is a branch of science devoted to the design and production of extremely small matter. Due to the small size and special properties of nanotechnology materials, they have great potential for use in a vast array of FDA-regulated products. These small materials often have physical or chemical properties that are different than those of their larger counterparts Differences include altered magnetic properties, altered electrical or optical activity, increased structural integrity, and enhanced chemical and biological properties. These differences have the potential to lead to scientific advances. For example, this technology could be used to create new drug formulations and routes of delivery to previously inaccessible sites in the body. FDA is holding this meeting to further its understanding of developments in nanotechnology and, more specifically, to hear: About the new types of nanotechnology products under development in the areas of foods (including dietary supplements), food and color additives, animal feeds, cosmetics, human and animal drugs and human biologics and medical devices; About any specific scientific issues related to the development of these products relevant to FDA’s regulation of them; Any other issues about which regulated industry, academia, and the interested public may wish to inform FDA concerning the use of nanotechnology in FDA-regulated products; and If there are opportunities for the agency to address hurdles that may be inhibiting the use of nanotechnology in medical product development. While the agency is not accepting registrations at this time, it would appreciate receiving expressions of interest from those intending to attend or present at the meeting. This information will help FDA prepare and plan for this meeting. Information can be provided to Poppy Kendall at Poppy.Kendall@FDA.HHS.GOV, or 301-827-3360. Based on the level of response, FDA will obtain a venue and structure the meeting to accommodate the audience and range of topics discussed. Details about the venue, specific date, time, and registration will be provided in a Federal Register notice closer to the meeting. You may also look for updates at www.fda.gov/nanotechnology. Comments may be submitted electronically at http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/oc/d...CID=&AGENCY=FDA or mailed to the Division of Dockets Management (HFA), Food and Drug Administration, 5630 Fishers Lane, Room 1061, Rockville, MD 20852. All comments should be identified with Docket Number 2006N-0107.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12421143/ MSNBC staff and news service reports Updated: 1:38 p.m. ET April 21, 2006 SACRAMENTO - President Bush will focus on the potential of pollution-free fuel cells on this Earth Day, visiting the top industry research hub in the world on Saturday. Bush promoted hydrogen fuel cell cars in his State of the Union address in January, calling for stepped-up research in that area as well as with hybrid gasoline-electric vehicles and alternative fuels. The president will tour the California Fuel Cell Partnership, which brings together various industry players at its Sacramento facility. That stop also will allow Bush to talk about government efforts to address rising gas prices, though most experts say fuel-cell vehicles probably will not be ready for widespread use for two or three decades. The auto industry adopted California as a research hub because of its history of trying to battle smog with policies and technology. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is also bullish on fuel cells, and wants to build hydrogen fueling stations along the state’s major highways as a way to kickstart the technology. Obstacles to a shift from the internal combustion engine to fuel cells include the lack of a hydrogen infrastructure and the cost of making hydrogen. In addition, the fuel cells themselves are still significantly more expensive to build than a traditional engine. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Some good news for once. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/st...ml?surround=lfn Chevron Corp. and Exxon Mobil Corp. have found oil off the coast of Gabon in West Africa in a deposit that could hold as much as 1 billion barrels of oil and gas. The discovery could be the largest find so far this year. San Ramon-based Chevron (NYSE: CVX) operates the field and owns 51 percent. It bought its stake in 2004, and started exploratory drilling in January. Exxon Mobil (NYSE: XOM) owns a 40 percent stake, with the remaining 9 percent stake held by Dangote Energy Equity Resources. Dangote is partly owned by Aliko Dangote, a wealthy businessman from northern Nigeria. He was a big fund-raiser in the 2003 re-election of Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo. The well was drilled in the Nigeria Saõ Tomé and Principe Joint Development Zone, in the deep waters of the Gulf of Guinea, approximately 190 miles north of the island of Saõ Tomé. Chevron said it was reviewing the drilling results from the Obo-1 well to determine the next steps in its exploration program. Chevron also found oil this month south of Saõ Tomé, off the coast of Angola, where it is the largest oil producer. The enclave of Cabinda, a bit of Angolan territory north of the Congo river and separated from the rest of the country by the Democratic Republic of Congo (fomerly known as Zaire), has many offshore oil deposits. Cabinda is close to Gabon. On March 7, Chevron CEO David O'Reilly outlined a plan to grow annual production more than 3 percent a year for the next five years.

It seems that illegal immigration is just a one sided issue for Mexico. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/04/...s.ap/index.html TULTITLAN, Mexico (AP) -- Considered felons by the government, these migrants fear detention, rape and robbery. Police and soldiers hunt them down at railroads, bus stations and fleabag hotels. Sometimes they are deported; more often officers simply take their money. While migrants in the United States have held huge demonstrations in recent weeks, the hundreds of thousands of undocumented Central Americans in Mexico suffer mostly in silence. And though Mexico demands humane treatment for its citizens who migrate to the U.S., regardless of their legal status, Mexico provides few protections for migrants on its own soil. The issue simply isn't on the country's political agenda, perhaps because migrants make up only 0.5 percent of the population, or about 500,000 people -- compared with 12 percent in the United States. The level of brutality Central American migrants face in Mexico was apparent Monday, when police conducting a raid for undocumented migrants near a rail yard outside Mexico City shot to death a local man, apparently because his dark skin and work clothes made officers think he was a migrant. (Full story) Virginia Sanchez, who lives near the railroad tracks that carry Central Americans north to the U.S. border, said gunfire is common in Tultitlan. "At night, you hear the gunshots, and it's the judiciales (state police) chasing the migrants," she said. "It's not fair to kill these people. It's not fair in the United States and it's not fair here." Undocumented Central American migrants complain much more about how they are treated by Mexican officials than about authorities on the U.S. side of the border, where migrants may resent being caught, but often praise the professionalism of the agents scouring the desert for their trail. "If you're carrying any money, they take it from you -- federal, state, local police, all of them," said Carlos Lopez, a 28-year-old farmhand from Guatemala crouching in a field near the tracks in Tultitlan, waiting to climb onto a northbound freight train. Lopez said he had been shaken down repeatedly in 15 days of traveling through Mexico. "The soldiers were there as soon as we crossed the river," he said. "They said, 'You can't cross ... unless you leave something for us.' " Jose Ramos, 18, of El Salvador, said the extortion occurs at every stop in Mexico, until migrants are left penniless and begging for food. "If you're on a bus, they pull you off and search your pockets and if you have any money, they keep it and say, 'Get out of here,' " Ramos said. Maria Elena Gonzalez, who lives near the tracks, said female migrants often complain about abusive police. "They force them to strip, supposedly to search them, but the purpose is to sexually abuse them," she said. Others said they had seen migrants beaten to death by police, their bodies left near the railway tracks to make it look as if they had fallen from a train. The Mexican government acknowledges that many federal, state and local officials are on the take from the people-smugglers who move hundreds of thousands of Central Americans north, and that migrants are particularly vulnerable to abuse by corrupt police. The National Human Rights Commission, a government-funded agency, documented the abuses south of the U.S. border in a December report. "One of the saddest national failings on immigration issues is the contradiction in demanding that the North respect migrants' rights, which we are not capable of guaranteeing in the South," commission president Jose Luis Soberanes said. In the United States, mostly Mexican immigrants have staged rallies pressuring Congress to grant amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants rather than making them felons and deputizing police to deport them. The Mexican government has spoken out in support of the immigrants' cause. Interior Secretary Carlos Abascal said Monday that "Mexico is a country with a clear, defined and generous policy toward migrants." The nation of 105 million has legalized 15,000 immigrants in the past five years, and many undocumented migrants who are detained are deported. Although Mexico objects to U.S. authorities detaining Mexican immigrants, police and soldiers reportedly cause the most trouble for migrants in Mexico, even though they aren't technically authorized to enforce immigration laws. And while Mexicans denounce the criminalization of their citizens living without papers in the United States, Mexican law classifies undocumented immigration as a felony punishable by up to two years in prison, although deportation is more common. The number of undocumented migrants detained in Mexico grew from 138,061 in 2002 to 240,269 last year. Forty-two percent were Guatemalan, 33 percent Honduran and most of the rest Salvadoran. Like the United States, Mexico is becoming more reliant on immigrant labor. Last year, then-director of Mexico's immigration agency, Magdalena Carral, said an increasing number of Central Americans were staying in Mexico, rather than just passing through on their way to the U.S. She said sectors of the Mexican economy facing labor shortages often use undocumented workers because the legal process for work visas is inefficient.

Just want to make CLEAR on who stopped immigration reform. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/op-ed/n...e12navarre.html Who killed immigration reform? The autopsy shows it was Senate Democrats. It's tempting to put a pox on both parties. But it wouldn't be fair. Republicans were tireless in search of comprehensive, and bipartisan, reform. Sen. John McCain of Arizona joined with Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., to draft the guest-worker legislation, and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter made that legislation central to what his committee sent to the full Senate. Sens. Lindsay Graham of South Carolina and Sam Brownback of Kansas were vocal in their support. Sens. Mel Martinez of Florida and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska offered a helpful compromise. And Republican Majority Leader Bill Frist showed leadership by reaching out to the other side. Too bad you can't say the same for Democratic leader Harry Reid, who was the villain in this drama. Hector Flores, president of the League of United Latin-American Citizens, told me that he tried to impress upon Reid's office that it was important to get immigration reform done. “Apparently, it fell on deaf ears,” Flores said. Reid claims it was GOP hard-liners who killed reform by running roughshod over Frist. Baloney. The hard-liners had – by all accounts – no more than 30 votes, including those of conservative Democrats. On the other side, you had – according to McCain – as many as 70 votes. A deal was at hand that would have offered legal status to some illegal immigrants. It would have made the GOP seem more Latino-friendly, but it would also have infuriated organized labor, which opposes something that was in the mix: guest workers. After the Senate Judiciary Committee put out a guest-worker bill, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney issued a statement saying: “Guest-workers programs are a bad idea and harm all workers.” That did it. Senate Democrats sided with labor and sold out Latinos. The deal came undone because Reid refused to allow the legislation to go through the amendment process. Republicans had come up with as many as 400 amendments but whittled the list to 20. Reid agreed to proceed with debate on just three. It was a masterstroke by Democrats. Labor is happy. And while Latinos are angry, there's always the chance that Democrats can fool them into channeling that anger toward Republicans. Remarkably, it's working. At a protest in Washington Monday, one Latina held up a sign that read: “The GOP is losing my Latino vote.” At another protest in Dallas, someone handed out registration leaflets urging demonstrators to vote Democratic. Some Latino leaders don't think it'll be that easy. Cecilia Munoz, vice president of the National Council of La Raza, told me: “I don't believe that it's wise for Democrats to come to our community and ask for votes by saying: 'Hey, we kept an immigration bill from going forward.' ... People understand when they're being used.” Even so, it looks like Reid and the Democrats orchestrated the perfect deception. Trouble is, they left fingerprints. The Washington Post said in an editorial: “Democrats – whether their motive was partisan advantage or legitimate fear of a bad bill emerging from conference with the House – are the ones who refused, in the end, to proceed with debate on amendments, which is, after all, how legislation gets made.” Frank Sharry, the executive director of the liberal National Immigration Forum, said in a statement: “We cannot escape the conclusion that the Democratic Senate leadership was more interested in keeping the immigration issue alive in the run-up to midterms than in enacting immigration reform legislation.” And Sen. Kennedy told The Associated Press: “Politics got ahead of policy on this.” He then refused, according to the article, to defend Reid's performance. The story noted that, “Outside the Senate, several Democratic strategists concluded that the best politics was to allow the bill to die.” The moral: Marches and Mexican flags don't equal power. Labor uses millions of dollars in political contributions to take care of Democrats, and so Democrats take care of labor. After the bill died, Democrats rubbed salt in the wound by insisting that Latinos had no choice but to stay on the liberal hacienda. Susan Estrich, who served as campaign manager for Michael Dukakis in 1988, told Fox News that Republicans had blown their chance to win Latino votes and predicted that Latino support would help Democrats win both houses of Congress. You see, in a twist on the famous words of one of their icons, Democrats no longer ask what they can do for Latinos, only what Latinos can do for them. Navarrette can reached via e-mail at ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com.

I'm speechless. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Iran Elected to UN Disarmament Commission Julie Stahl Jerusalem Bureau Chief Jerusalem (CNSNews.com) - Under threat of United Nations Security Council sanctions for its own nuclear program, Iran has been elected to a vice-chair position on the U.N. Disarmament Commission, whose mission includes preventing the spread of nuclear weapons. The commission's deliberations began last Monday and are scheduled to continue until April 28. On the first day of the commission meeting, Iran along with Uruguay and Chile was elected as one of three vice-chairs. It happened on the same day that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad promised his people "good news" about the country's nuclear program. The following day, Iran announced that it had managed to enrich uranium, a key ingredient in the production of a nuclear bomb. On Monday, former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said that his country would continue to enrich uranium, and dismissed the idea that the U.S. might attack nuclear facilities in Iran. "We are certain that Americans will not attack Iran because the consequences would be too dangerous," Rafasanjani was quoted as telling the Kuwaiti parliament. Dr. Dore Gold, former Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. said that electing Iran to a leadership position on the UN Disarmament Commission was like asking the "cat to guard the milk." "Clearly the Iranians have an interest in establishing disarmament rules that protect their clandestine nuclear weapons program," said Gold, author of Tower of Babble: How the United Nations Has Fueled Global Chaos. "For the last decade and a half, Iran has appointed a very large diplomatic mission to the U.N. and has sought to obtain appointments to as many U.N. bodies as possible," said Gold in a telephone interview. It is not a surprise, therefore, that Iran would find a place at the table of even the most sensitive committees, he said. According to Gold, the various commissions at the U.N. establish the "background noise" and "international norms" that are adopted for dealing with problems worldwide. "They have a way of penetrating the judgments of the U.N. secretariat and other U.N. bodies," he said. The Disarmament Commission's new chairman, Joon Oh from South Korea, said prior to the group's meeting that it was not intended to be an isolated event but should be considered an integral part of worldwide disarmament efforts. According to a release on the Disarmament Commission's website, the agenda items include recommendations for achieving nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation and "practical confidence-building measures in the field of conventional weapons." The commission was established by a U.N. General Assembly resolution in 1952 to pursue "effective international control of atomic energy" and make sure that atomic energy was used only for peaceful purposes. While Iran's election to the commission is not a "decisive development," Gold said, it is "one link" in the chain that helps Iran use multi-lateral organizations to serve its interests. Prof. Anne Bayefsky, who edits the Eye on the U.N. website, quoted U.N. Undersecretary-General for Disarmament Affairs, Nobuaki Tanaka, as saying that the commission "played a unique role" with "the advantage of being a fully universal deliberative body." "This is the U.N. fiction, which brings us close to nuclear war with each passing day," Bayefsky said. "The allusion is to universal democracy, though the majority of voters is non-democratic and include thugs, racists and war-mongers." As tensions grow over the situation in Iran, Washington has not ruled out the idea of a military option in dealing with Iran, though it has downplayed the idea. The U.N.'s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, recently referred Iran to the Security Council, where the U.S. is pushing for sanctions to be leveled against the Islamic Republic. But Gold said that if the U.N.'s dealings with Iraq set a precedent for its dealings elsewhere in the world, then it is not likely that the U.N. would be an effective body in dealing with Iran. "The U.N. has long ago forfeited its role as an international body safeguarding international peace and security and this is just the latest proof of why the U.N. doesn't work," Gold said of Iran's election to vice chair the Disarmament Commission. Iran says its nuclear development is for a civilian energy program but the U.S., Israel and other Western nations believe Iran is really developing nuclear weapons. The Institute for Science and International Security, a U.S. think tank, released satellite images on Sunday showing that Iran had expanded its uranium enrichment site at Isfahan and has reinforced its underground site at Natanz. London's Sunday Times quoted unnamed Iranian officials as saying that Iran had recruited and trained 40,000 suicide bombers, who were ready to attack American and British targets. "We are ready to attack American and British sensitive points if they attack Iran's nuclear facilities," said Dr. Hassan Abbasi, head of the Center for Doctrinal Strategic Studies in the Revolutionary Guards.

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/world/st...0f53c6f&k=49595 Pregnant robot gaining in popularity Paul Elias, Associated Press Published: Friday, April 14, 2006 VALLEJO, Calif. -- Noelle's given birth in Afghanistan, California and dozens of points in between. She's a lifelike, pregnant robot used in increasing numbers of medical schools and hospital maternity wards. The full-sized, blond, pale mannequin is in demand because medicine is rapidly abandoning centuries-old training methods that use patients as guinea pigs, turning instead to high-tech simulations. It's better to make a mistake on a $20,000 robot than a live patient. The Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, estimates that as many as 98,000 U.S. patients die annually from preventable medical errors. "We're trying to engineer out some of the errors," said Dr. Paul Preston, an anesthesiologist at Kaiser Permanente and architect of the hospital chain's four-year-old pregnancy-care training program, in which Noelle plays a starring role. "We steal shamelessly from everybody and everywhere that has good training programs." Noelle, from Miami-based Gaumard Scientific Co. Inc., is used in most of Kaiser's 30 hospitals nationwide, and other hospitals are putting in orders. The Northwest Physicians Insurance Co. is sponsoring similar training programs in 22 hospitals in Oregon and Idaho, rolling out Noelle initially at five of them. Other companies make lifelike mannequins to train paramedics in emergencies, but Noelle appears to be the only high-tech, pregnant model available. Noelle models range from a $3,200 US basic version to a $20,000 US computerized Noelle that best approximates a live birth. She can be programmed for a variety of complications and for cervix dilation. She can labour for hours and produce a breach baby or unexpectedly give birth in a matter of minutes. She ultimately delivers a plastic doll that can change colours, from a healthy pink glow to the deadly blue of oxygen deficiency. The baby mannequin is wired to flash vital signs when hooked up to monitors. The computerized mannequins emit realistic pulse rates and can urinate and breathe. "If she is bleeding, there will be ample blood in evidence everywhere," Preston said one rainy day recently as he put Noelle through her paces at Kaiser Permanente's Vallejo hospital. About 50 doctors, nurses and others involved in caring for pregnant women attended the training session, which started with Noelle hooked up to standard delivery monitoring machines and tended to by nurses and doctors. David Isaza, an engineer with Gaumard, sat in a corner with a laptop, sending wireless signals to Noelle. With a keystroke, he can inflict all sorts of complications, overriding any preprogrammed instructions. As Noelle's heart rate increased, a nurse examined her under the sheets. An umbilical cord was visible -- not a good thing. Immediately, the nurse called a "code 777." Several more medical personnel burst into the room and wheeled Noelle off to the operating room where she gave regular birth to twins after a frenzied 20-minute operation. Then it was time for the debriefing back in a conference room. "We wheeled her through the hallway with her gown open," complained one nurse. "It was too loud," another said of the chaotic scene that included more than 30 people jammed into a small operating room. And so it went for another 30 minutes until it was a second group's turn with Noelle. "The mannequins are cool," Preston said. "But it is only one training tool." Nobody knows this better than Robbie Prepas, a Laguna Beach midwife who is a consultant to Gaumard. In 2004, Prepas was working for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on a $1 million Gates Foundation grant to train Afghan medical personnel in the care of women and children. Afghanistan has the world's second-highest infant mortality rate, according to the U.S. State Department. Prepas and her colleagues hauled three different models of Noelle, including one that worked by hand crank to move the mechanical parts, for medical training at the only women's hospital in Kabul. But while the Noelle mannequins were helpful, power failures and other technological glitches hindered the mannequins' effectiveness. Still, Prepas said Noelle is becoming standard issue in the United States. "It's a really effective way to teach people how to take care of patients without harming actual patients," Prepas said. © Associated Press 2006

So Which search engine do you favor? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/nation/200...16594211990.htm By Jung Sung-ki Staff Reporter The country's weapons acquisition agency announced Wednesday that it will start a $625 billion project to develop middle-range surface-to-air missiles, code-named ``M-SAM,'' this June. The procurement deliberation committee of the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) approved the project, which will enter service in 2010, a spokesman of the agency said. The missile will be co-developed by about 15 Korean defense firms and Russia which will give technological help in such areas as electronic guidance, he said. The M-SAM program, initiated in 1998, is aimed at developing a missile capable of hitting a target of 30 to 60 kilometers away, replacing aging Hwak missiles. Hawk missiles with a striking range of 150 kilometers, have been the backbone of South Korea's anti-aircraft system against the growing threat posed by North Korean ballistic missile. The committee, headed by Defense Minister Yoon Kwang-ung, also approved the Korean Helicopter Program (KHP) to develop advanced utility helicopters in partnership with Eurocopter, a Franco-Germany consortium, under a $1.3 billion deal.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle....RU-ELECTION.xml By Patricia Zengerle AREQUIPA, Peru (Reuters) - Thousands of brightly clad Peruvians rallied to mark the formal end of campaigning on Thursday as pollsters said nationalist Ollanta Humala remained ahead in the presidential race but was unlikely to win in the first round. In Arequipa, in southern Peru where the front-running retired army commander's support is strongest, the central Plaza de Armas was so crowded with thousands of Humala supporters that some hung in trees and from lampposts. Bands played and speakers exhorted people to give Humala a big victory on Sunday, removing the need for a second round. "The first round, the first round!" they chanted and cheered, many dressed in red T-shirts reading: "For love of Peru," similar to those in which Humala campaigns. Right-of-center Lourdes Flores, the business favorite whom polls put in second place, and center-left former President Alan Garcia, in third place, both closed their campaigns in the capital, Lima, where police said they were deploying more than 7,000 officers to keep order. Peruvian law mandates that Thursday must be the last day of campaigning before the election. Pollsters said on Thursday that Humala still led, but remained below the 50 percent support he would need on April 9 to avoid a second round next month. Alfredo Torres, director of Apoyo, considered Peru's most reliable polling company, told Reuters exact figures would be released on Saturday, but the latest survey showed a similar trend to an Apoyo poll released on Sunday that gave Humala 31 percent versus 26 percent for Flores and 23 percent for Garcia. Torres suggested that Garcia, who heads the center-left APRA party, was gaining on Flores. A separate survey by polling firm CPI showed Flores had gained ground on Humala to statistically tie for the lead and that Humala would likely be defeated in a second round. Flores, who was the front-runner in the polls until mid-February, saw her voter support rise slightly to 27.6 percent, just ahead of Humala, CPI said. Humala, who has campaigned to restrict private investment in Peru, slipped 5.6 points since the last CPI poll a week ago, dropping to 25.9 percent, the survey found. "Humala's support has fallen because of a barrage of attacks against him these last few days ... That has generated a fear of voting for the unknown," CPI director Manuel Saavedra told Reuters. But in Arequipa, Humala's supporters were as enthusiastic as ever about their hero. Many were indigenous Peruvians, and there were more rainbow-striped Incan flags than those of Peru. Many said one reason they adore their candidate, who is of mixed race in a country long dominated by a European-descended elite, is that he respects them. "He will do more for our children than the others. He wants dignity for us," said Fida Huamani, 40, an Amerindian woman selling Incan flags and cheering at the rally. (Additional reporting by Maria Luisa Palomino and Teresa Cespedes in Lima)

http://thetrack.bostonherald.com/starTrack...rticleid=133786 VIN DIESEL has chosen the Dominican Republic as a location for “Hannibal,” a flick about the 3rd-century conqueror who led an elephant-riding army across the Alps in an assault on Rome. The “Fast and Furious” actor will direct and star in the title role of the film based on Ross Leckie’s fictionalized memoir of the Carthaginian leader. The crew of “Hannibal” will film in the Caribbean nation for a month. Other scenes will also be shot in Spain and California.

Just wanted to add this to the article so everyone knows'. http://www.lib.msu.edu/harris23/grants/3specpop.htm <~~~~~~~~ educational grants directory. It's extensive. Add to that www.grants.gov and it's all right here at D.C. Pages. For the kids who read these posts? Before you decide to get into politics, do us adults a favor first and get an education first, THEN if you want to get into politics later you can do so. By the way; those links I posted in here are GOOD for US ADULTS as well. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Program on Vouchers Draws Minority Support April 6, 2006 Diana Jean Schemo The New York Times WASHINGTON, April 5 — As a student at Shaw Junior High School here, Amie Fuwa strained to shut out the distractions of friends cutting up. She struggled through math, and used photocopies or the library when textbooks were scarce. Now Amie, 14, a child of immigrants from Nigeria and the Dominican Republic, attends Archbishop Carroll High School, a Catholic school near a verdant hill of churches nicknamed the Little Vatican. When algebra confounds Amie, her teacher stays with her after school to help, and a mentor keeps her on course. "It's a lot of people behind my back now," Amie said. Before, she said, she "felt like it didn't really matter to different people I know, like my teachers, if I failed." Amie is one of about 1,700 low-income, mostly minority students in Washington who at taxpayer expense are attending 58 private and parochial schools through the nation's first federal voucher program, now in its second year. Last year, parents appeared lukewarm toward the program, which was put in place by Congressional Republicans as a five-year pilot program, But this year, it is attracting more participation, illustrating how school-choice programs are winning over minority parents, traditionally a Democratic constituency. Washington's African-American mayor, Anthony A. Williams, joined Republicans in supporting the program, prompted in part by a concession from Congress that pumped more money into public and charter schools. In doing so, Mr. Williams ignored the ire of fellow Democrats, labor unions and advocates of public schools. "As mayor, if I can't get the city together, people move out," said Mr. Williams, who attended Catholic schools as a child. "If I can't get the schools together, why should there be a barrier programmatically to people exercising their choice and moving their children out?" School-choice programs have fervent opponents, and here, public school officials worry that the voucher program will diminish the importance of the neighborhood school, though the program serves only a relative few of the district's 58,000 students. National critics of school choice like Reg Weaver, president of the country's largest teachers' union, the National Education Association, accused voucher supporters of "exploiting the frustration of these minority parents to push for a political agenda" intended to undermine public schools. "They're really about subsidizing private schools, not about improving schools for all children," Mr. Weaver said in an interview. But the interest in school choice is strong, even without consistent evidence that low-income children do better in charter or private schools. The largest one-time study of student achievement recently compared math scores of pupils from similar backgrounds on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, and found neither private school nor charter students doing better than those in public schools. In the mostly minority Dayton, Ohio, school district, for example, 28 percent of schoolchildren have opted out of public schools in favor of charter schools, which are publicly financed but privately operated. In Houston, 12 percent have done the same; in Oakland, Calif., 9 percent of public school children attend charter schools. In New York City, 12,000 children, 1.2 percent of the school population, attend charter schools, but the number of such schools is capped. In Washington, in addition to those children opting for private schools, many others are flocking to charter schools, which have siphoned off about 25 percent of children, and $37 million in revenue this year alone. The Washington program is being watched closely because when Congress must tackle reauthorizing President Bush's signature education law, No Child Left Behind, in 2007, the program could become a model for Republican efforts to extend vouchers nationally. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings said Wednesday in an appearance in New York City that the Bush administration wanted "to help spread this experiment." As part of the pilot program here, researchers will compare the academic progress of students who won vouchers through lottery drawings with those who tried but failed. "There is a lot at stake," said Joseph P. Viteritti, a professor of public policy at Hunter College. "It's an issue that's not going to go away." For minority parents in Washington, the implications for national policy are distant ripples. For them, and for their children, vouchers offer a way out of one of the nation's most dysfunctional public school systems, and open a window into worlds that few would otherwise know. Although white children do better here than in any state, the odds appear stacked heavily against the 85 percent of students in public schools who are black. Their reading and math skills are among the poorest of blacks in any city or state, with two in three fourth graders, and more than half the eighth graders, lacking even basic reading skills, according to the national assessment. Latinos do not fare much better; 63 percent lack basic reading skills in the fourth grade; 41 percent are still missing them by eighth grade. More than half of the students in the program use the vouchers to attend religious schools, mostly Catholic. Among secular schools, Rock Creek International School, a language-immersion school that teaches French, Spanish and Arabic, has been the most generous in subsidizing students. In accepting 29 students this year, officials said Rock Creek committed itself to helping the children fit into a middle and upper-class environment. Last year, the school raised enough donations for all the voucher students who wanted to go to join class trips to Greece, Costa Rica and Qatar, said Josh Schmidt, the admissions director. Like many other voucher students, Breanna Walton, 8, rises before dawn for the long bus ride from Northeast Washington, "amongst the crime and drugs and all that," in the words of her mother, April Cole Walton, to Rock Creek International, near Georgetown University. There, she learns Spanish with the children of lawyers and diplomats. Ms. Walton said that her neighborhood school "has broken down," and that she would have done just about anything to keep Breanna from going there. "Every child here should be able to say I'm going to set my sights high," she said. "I refuse to let my child be cheated." Patricia William, a single mother, said that at first she liked her son Fransoir's public school, John Quincy Adams Elementary School, a tall sprawling building in the Adams Morgan neighborhood. Teachers seemed good, but overwhelmed. It was other parents, not teachers, Ms. William said, who told her that Fransoir was hyperactive. "I was not getting quality information from them on time," she said. "For some reason, it was not working." Fransoir is one of 62 students with vouchers attending Sacred Heart Elementary, a Catholic school of 210 students, where he learns prayers along with five-digit multiplication and long division. He takes medication for his hyperactivity. Last year, he teamed up with another child to research the sinking of the Titanic. This year, he is interested in reptiles. Ms. William said her son today has nothing in common with the boy who once lay on the floor, turning in circles like a clock wound too tight. Now she is learning from him, about more than just math or reading or a sinking ship. "All the effort he's making every night makes me want to sit with him and study," said Ms. William, a high-school dropout. "I'm learning academically, but also about making an effort." A thoughtful, small boy, Fransoir, 9, is impatient to grow up. In his classroom recently, he talked about his new passion, dinosaurs, explaining how the triceratops, a small dinosaur with three horns — "like a triangle has three sides," he said — would win a fight with the bigger Tyrannosaurus rex. "The first time the T. rex attacks, the triceratops ducks," Fransoir said. "Then the second time, when the T. rex runs at him again, the triceratops picks up his head and sticks him with his horns." In traditional schools, the competition from vouchers and charters is felt keenly, as principals struggle to retain not just enrollment, but also the role of the neighborhood school. At Turner Elementary School in the hard-edged Anacostia neighborhood, Marcia Parker, the principal, picked up candy wrappers from the stairwells as she toured classrooms equipped with computers and books. She insisted that private and charter schools had nothing on Turner. Four students had returned from charters this year, some expelled for misbehavior, she said. "We're about educating everybody," Ms. Parker said, dismissing vouchers and charters as "a way of raping the public schools of students and resources." At Fransoir's old school, Adams Elementary, the principal, Pedro A. Cartagena, said that about 70 students had left for charters, and with just 200 students remaining, Adams was one of many public schools designated an "underutilized school" at risk of being closed. To survive, Dr. Cartagena said he was exploring the possibility of teaming up with a popular dual-language public elementary school, the Oyster School, to transform Adams into a dual-language middle school. But the pressure of competition is inescapable. In one sixth-grade classroom, two of six students said they would probably go to charter schools next year, unless Adams could get its seventh grade started. "I'll probably go to Washington Latin," said Jhontelle Johnson, setting her sights on a new charter school opening in August. If not, she said, "I'd probably be home-schooled." A teacher's aide, Sheonna Griffin, looked askance. "You don't like public schools?" she asked the child. Jhontelle turned back, her young eyes flashing. "You can't make me go," she said.

http://www.manilastandardtoday.com/?page=news06_april05_2006 THE United Nations yesterday denied reports that pirates have hijacked an oil tanker with 19 Filipinos off the coast of Somalia. “They have no reports of this hijacking incident,” Joe Gordon, chief security adviser of the UN Field Security Coordination Office in war-torn Somalia, told chargÈ d’affaires Bernadette Muller of the Philippine Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, which has jurisdiction over Somalia. The Al Jazeer news network and an international piracy watchdog reported on Monday that Somali gunmen had seized a United Arab Emirates-registered oil tanker, reportedly named Lin 1, off Mogadishu after it left on March 29. Muller coordinated with the UN office to clarify the reported hijacking and to check on the condition of the possible Filipino hostages, and was told there had been one. Hijacking is prevalent in the Somali territorial waters, prompting the United States and Britain to escort commercial vessels entering and leaving the port of Mogadishu. Located in Eastern Africa and bordering the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean, Somalia has been in civil war since 1991, when the regime of Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted. Since then, the warring clans have divided the country into the Republic of Somaliland and Putland, with warlords fighting to control the capital city of Mogadishu. In 1993 UN forces tried to intervene to restore order, but were forced to withdraw two years later after suffering heavy casualties. Ferdinand Fabella

Good, it barks. I haven't been to dogpile in ages, and I can't remember the owner’s name, but when the search engine was just starting out I remember the owner posting on the web page that "there are some sick people out there". I never replied to him, but I just smiled and thought to myself "Yeah!!! Welcome to the Internet". ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yeap Nelson, I am kinda hoping that the supporters for which ever side of the democrat debate get the message that most folks are tired of seeing over, and over again this going on. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.yubanet.com/artman/publish/article_33146.shtml By: University of Arizona Published: Mar 21, 2006 at 06:27 The Amazon rainforest puts on its biggest growth spurt during the dry season, according to new research. The finding surprised the researchers. "Most of the vegetation around the world follows a general pattern in which plants get green and lush during the rainy season and then during the dry season, leaves fall because there's not enough water in the soil to support plant growth," said lead researcher Alfredo R. Huete of The University of Arizona in Tucson. "What we found for a large section of the Amazon is the opposite. As soon as the rains stop and you start to enter a dry period, the Amazon becomes alive. New leaves spring out, there's a flush of green growth and the greening continues as the dry season progresses." The finding holds true only for the undisturbed portion of the rainforest. Areas where the primary forest has been converted to other uses or disturbed, "brown down" in the dry season, said Huete, a UA professor of soil, water and environmental science. Huete suggests the deep roots of trees in the undisturbed forest can reach water even in the dry season, allowing the trees to flourish during the sunnier, drier part of the year. In contrast, plants in areas that have been logged or converted to other uses cannot reach deep water in the dry season and therefore either go dormant or die. Figuring out the metabolism of the Amazon rainforest, the largest old-growth rainforest on the planet, is crucial for understanding how rainforests and other tropical biomes function and how deforestation affects biodiversity and sustainable land use in the tropics. It will also help scientists better understand the global carbon cycle, which affects the natural sequestration and release of carbon dioxide, a major greenhouse gas. The finding that converted forests grow differently from undisturbed forests has implications for understanding fire regimes in the tropics, including the fires that sometimes rage in tropical areas during El Nino years, which bring drought to many tropical areas, including the Amazon. The research team figured out when the intact forest grows by analyzing five years of satellite images from the MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) instrument mounted on NASA's Terra satellite and by cross-checking with information from local sites on the ground. The research was funded by NASA and is part of the Brazilian-led Large Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazônia (LBA). The paper by Huete, Scott Saleska, UA assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, and their colleagues, "Amazon Rainforests Green-Up with Sunlight in Dry Season," is scheduled for the March 22 issue of Geophysical Research Letters. NASA funded the research. A complete list of authors can be found at the end of this release. The MODIS instrument began collecting data in 2000. Once a day, MODIS takes a picture of each spot, a square of about 820 feet (250 meters) on a side. If it's too cloudy at one spot one day, the next day's picture may be fine. Five years' worth of pictures means the scientists have at least one good image of every spot for every month of the year. To be able to figure out when the Amazon rainforest is growing, Huete's lab used a new measure, called Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), for detecting greenness in MODIS images of very highly vegetated rainforests. Greenness is an indicator of active plant growth. Plants are green because they contain the photosynthetic pigment chlorophyll. Growing plants generate more chlorophyll and therefore look greener. The greenness can also be translated to a measure of plant growth called "gross primary productivity." Ecosystems with higher gross primary productivity take up and store more carbon in the form of carbon dioxide, a major greenhouse gas. "We can look at this increase in greenness as a measure of Amazon health, because in the disturbed areas we don't see the greenness increase during the dry season," Huete said. " A lot of people are interested in the rainforest because of the humongous amount of carbon it stores. A very slight change in the forest's activity will make a tremendous change in the global carbon cycle." Saleska and his colleagues and other research teams had conducted studies at local sites in the Amazon that suggested the intact rainforest grows more during the dry season. Those studies analyzed data from flux towers, which measure the seasonal gas exchange by vegetation. The new research confirms the local studies and indicates that the greener-in-the-dry-season pattern is basin-wide. "With the satellite, we can say the whole Amazon basin is doing something," Huete said. The team's next step, Huete said, is to see if other tropical rainforests behave the same way and how the rainforests behave in El Niño years. He added, "We also want to look harder at the transition zones at the edge of the rainforest to see whether different kinds of disturbance cause different growth patterns."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ http://www.itv.com/news/index_1602532.html Soyuz spacecraft docks 8.15PM, Sat Apr 1 2006 A Soyuz spacecraft has delivered Brazil's first astronaut and a Russian-US crew to the orbiting International Space Station (ISS), two days after blasting off from earth. Marcos Pontes, a 43-year-old Brazilian Air Force pilot, had spent the journey hunched inside the capsule with Russian cosmonaut Pavel Vinogradov and US astronaut Jeffrey Williams, both off whom are starting a six-month rotation in space. Dozens of Brazilian, Russian and US space officials at Mission Control watched on a big screen as the outgoing team, American Bill McArthur and Russian Valery Tokarev, welcomed the newcomers aboard. "Is Marcos all right?" was the first question asked by Tokarev when the hatch was opened. Within seconds, a joyful Pontes could be seen floating in, waving the Brazilian flag. Pontes, who also packed a Brazilian soccer team shirt, will return to earth in just over a week with the outgoing crew. "The docking was smooth and the crew are now preparing to open the hatches to enter the ISS," a spokesman for mission control, situated outside Moscow, said. The departure of the 13th expedition to the ISS on Thursday was marred by a brief communication glitch soon after the Soyuz blasted off from Baikonur cosmodrome. Russian space officials have said that the glitch did not threaten the mission.