The CIA's National Archives "reclassification" scheme is of
particular interest because it generated an investigation and a
re-evaluation of the documents that the CIA had removed. If
secret removal of public documents isn't shocking enough, then
how about one-third of those public documents -- "re-
classified" by the CIA which found they included information
that could damage national security -- being reviewed and found
by the National Archives to contain no sensitive information.
In short, for one third of the documents the CIA took the
exceptional step of withdrawing from the public had no reason
to be classified in the first place. Bets are now open as to
what percent of "ordinarily-classified" CIA documents would be
considered non-sensitive if the National Archives were allowed
to review them: not many specialists are betting below fifty
percent.

0418 NYT, National Archives Pact Let CIA Withdraw Public
Documents, Scott Shane: The National Archives signed a secret
agreement in 2001 with the Central Intelligence Agency
permitting the spy agency to withdraw from public access
records it considered to have been improperly declassified, the
head of the archives, Allen Weinstein, disclosed on Monday.

0428 NYT, Archives audit criticizes re-classification of public
papers, Scott Shane: An audit by the National Archives of more
than 25,000 historical documents withdrawn from public access
since 1999 found that more than a third did not contain
sensitive information justifying classification, archives
officials said.

On 21 April, the press reported that senior CIA officer, Mary
McCarthy, had been fired for her alleged role in leaking
information about CIA secret prisons to the Washington Post's
Dana Priest (0421 ERRI, CIA Officer Fired for Leaking
Classified Info to Media). But one of her former colleague,
Larry Johnson, found the case smelled a little fishy (0422 TPM
Cafe, The Firing of Mary McCarthy, Larry Johnson). He argued
that, from his experience of working with Ms. McCarthy, she
never was in a position where she would have had first-hand
operational knowledge about secret prisons. Other colleagues of
McCarthy have also backed her:

0423 NYT, Colleagues Say CIA Analyst Played by Rules, David S.
Cloud: In 1998, when President Bill Clinton ordered military
strikes against a suspected chemical weapons factory in Sudan,
Mary O. McCarthy, a senior intelligence officer assigned to the
White House, warned the president that the plan relied on
inconclusive intelligence, two former government officials
said.

0424 Newsweek, Secrets of the CIA - A former colleague says the
fired Mary McCarthy "categorically denies" being the source of
the leak on agency renditions, Mark Hosenball and Michael
Isikoff: A former CIA officer who was sacked last week after
allegedly confessing to leaking secrets has denied she was the
source of a controversial "Washington Post" story about alleged
CIA secret detention operations in Eastern Europe, a friend of
the operative told "Newsweek".

0525 TruthOut, McCarthyism: Mary and Joe, Ray McGovern: As
additional information on the firing of CIA official Mary
McCarthy just ten days short of her retirement becomes
available, what is afoot is becoming quite clear. We are
witnessing a Stalinesque show trial sans the actual trial and
inevitable execution. The purpose is intimidation, not
extermination. We should be thankful for small favors, I
suppose.

0426 Creators Syndicate, Top Spy's Story on Pre-War Intel Is
Finally Told, Robert Scheer: In fall 2004, during a crucial
presidential election campaign, I made the mistake of playing
by corporate media rules that amount to self-censorship.
Specifically, I joined other journalists in denying the public
the right to learn of a definitive investigative report by CBS'
"60 Minutes" on President Bush's disregard for the truth
concerning the weapons of mass destruction threat allegedly
posed to the United States by Iraq. Having received an advance
copy of the devastating segment, I honored CBS' proprietary
request not to write about the news it carried until after it
aired.

0420 WP, Intelligence Director's Budget May Near $1 Billion,
Report Finds, Walter Pincus: The budget next year for National
Intelligence Director John D. Negroponte's office and the
several agencies attached to it may be near $1 billion or more,
according to language buried in the report of the House
intelligence committee on the fiscal 2007 intelligence
authorization bill.

0427 NYT, European Inquiry Says CIA Flew 1,000 Flights in
Secret, Dan Bilefsky: Investigators for the European Parliament
said Wednesday that data gathered from air safety regulators
and others found that the Central Intelligence Agency had flown
1,000 undeclared flights over European territory since 2001.

0428 FAS, Disfavored CIA Reports Placed Online: "US News and
World Report" reported last January that at least three
publications of the CIA's Center for the Study of Intelligence,
all critical of the agency, had been withheld from the CIA web
site ("A Tangled Web Woven," by David E. Kaplan, US News,
January 30, 2006). Now two of those disfavored publications are
available on the Federation of American Scientists web site.
The third will follow.

On 6 April, a court filing disclosed that President Bush
specifically authorized Vice President Cheney's chief of staff
"Scooter" Libby to disclose classified information in an effort
to discredit Iraq-invasion critique Joseph Wilson, the husband
of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson whose classified
identity was thus revealed. A few days later, Special Counsel
Patrick J. Fitzgerald for the first time described a "concerted
action" by "multiple people in the White House" - using
classified information - to "discredit, punish or seek revenge
against" a critic of President Bush's war in Iraq. On 19 April,
a grand jury in Washington was told it would soon receive a
list of criminal charges against Karl Rove and be asked to
return a multi-count indictment.

0407 Progress Report, National Security - Leaker-In-Chief; Bush
Authorized Leaking Despite Repeated Assurances to the Contrary;
Bush Was Involved in the Campaign to Smear Wilson; NIE
Bolstered Wilson's Argument; Bush Administration's Defense Full
of Leaky Holes; Case Against Libby Not Affected.

0407 REU, White House Does Not Dispute Bush Leak Allegation,
Steve Holland: The White House on Friday chose not to challenge
a prosecutor's disclosure that President George W. Bush
authorized top official Lewis "Scooter" Libby to disclose
intelligence on Iraq in 2003, as Libby alleges.

0408 TruthOut, Bush and Cheney Not in the Clear Yet, John Dean:
Despite Libby's implications of Bush, John Dean argues that he
is still protected by Cheney by dissecting Libby's statements
regarding the president as clearly hearsay: Libby was repeating
to the grand jury what he claims Cheney told him.

0409 WP, A "Concerted Effort" to Discredit Bush Critic -
Prosecutor describes Cheney, Libby as key voices pitching Iraq-
Niger story, Barton Gellman and Dafna Linzer: Special Counsel
Fitzgerald drew back the curtain this week on the evidence
against Vice President Cheney's former top aide.

0410 TruthOut, Bush and Cheney Discussed Plame Prior to Leak,
Jason Leopold: In early June 2003, Vice President Dick Cheney
met with President Bush and told him that CIA officer Valerie
Plame Wilson was the wife of Iraq war critic Joseph Wilson and
that she was responsible for sending him on a fact-finding
mission to Niger to check out reports about Iraq's attempt to
purchase uranium from the African country, according to current
and former White House officials and attorneys close to the
investigation to determine who revealed Plame-Wilson's
undercover status to the media.

0411 NYT, With One Filing, Prosecutor Puts Bush in Spotlight,
David E. Sanger and David Johnston: From the early days of the
CIA leak investigation in 2003, the Bush White House has
insisted there was no effort to discredit Joseph C. Wilson IV,
the man who emerged as the most damaging critic of the
administration's case that Saddam Hussein was seeking to build
nuclear weapons. But now White House officials, and
specifically President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney,
have been pitched back into the center of the nearly three-year
controversy, this time because of a prosecutor's court filing
in the case that asserts there was "a strong desire by many,
including multiple people in the White House," to undermine Mr.
Wilson.

0420 TruthOut, Grand Jury Hears Evidence Against Rove, Jason
Leopold: The grand jury session yesterday in federal court in
Washington, DC, sources close to the case said, was the first
time this year that Special Prosecutor Fitzgerald told the
jurors that he would soon present them with a list of criminal
charges he intends to file against Karl Rove in hopes of having
the grand jury return a multi-count indictment. In an interview
with Jason Leopold on Wednesday, Rove's attorney, Robert
Luskin, confirmed that Rove remains a "subject" of Fitzgerald's
two-year-old probe.

0427 AP, Judge Won't Dismiss Case Against Libby, Toni Locy: A
federal judge refused Thursday to dismiss charges against I.
Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the former top White House aide who was
indicted on perjury and obstruction charges last year in the
CIA leak scandal. In a 31-page opinion, US District Judge
Reggie B. Walton turned down a motion by lawyers for Vice
President Dick Cheney's one-time top assistant, who challenged
the authority of Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald to handle
the case.

The Bush White House's "snoopgate" warrantless eavesdropping on
US citizens now has two active Republican adversaries in
Congress. The House of Representatives, it's chairman of the
House Judiciary Committee Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and
in the Senate it's Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen
Specter. On 6 April, Sensenbrenner pointedly criticized
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for "stonewalling" by
refusing to answer questions about the Bush administration's
eavesdropping program. On 27 April, Specter said he was
considering legislation to cut off funding for the Bush
administration's wiretapping program until he gets satisfactory
answers about it from the White House. As if this were not
enough, in San Francisco, a a former AT&T worker, Mark Klein,
is cooperating in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's lawsuit
against the company and claiming that AT&T secretly worked had
in hand with the NSA in "snoopgate".

0406 AP, Gonzales Draws Criticism From Panel Chief: Rep. James
Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., said Gonzales was frustrating his
panel's oversight of the Justice Department and the
controversial surveillance by declining to provide information
about how the program is reviewed inside the administration and
by whom.

0407 Wired News, Whistle-Blower Outs NSA Spy Room, Ryan Singel:
AT&T provided NSA eavesdroppers with full access to its
customers' phone calls, and shunted its customers' internet
traffic to data-mining equipment installed in a secret room in
its San Francisco switching center, according to a former AT&T
worker [Mark Klein] cooperating in the Electronic Frontier
Foundation's lawsuit against the company.

0412 Wired, AT&T Seeks to Hide Spy Docs, Ryan Singel: AT&T is
seeking the return of technical documents presented in a
lawsuit that allegedly detail how the telecom giant helped the
government set up a massive internet wiretap operation in its
San Francisco facilities.

A British government's "narrative" of the 7 July 2005
coordinated attacks on London's transport system, in which 56
people died, including the four suicide bombers, was compiled
by a senior civil servant on the instructions of the Home
Secretary, Charles Clarke. The first draft of that report was
recently leaked to the press. According to the report, the
attacks were a "simple and inexpensive" plot, carried out by
four alienated British Muslims with no international terrorist
connections.

The narrative, which is due to be published within the next
month with the Commons Intelligence and Security Committee
(ISC) report (INT, n. 477 21) rejects initial media claims that
a "Qaida mastermind" had played a key role in planning the
attacks on the three underground commuter trains and the No. 31
double-decker bus. A VTR of Mohammed Siddique Khan, the Leeds-
born ringleader of the operation, was released after the
attacks and contained footage of Ayman al-Zawahri, an
individual often described as Osama bin Laden's "deputy".
However, the Home Office believes the video tape was edited
after the bombings and rejects it as "evidence" of a Qaida
connection. The bombers had no bomb-making training; what they
knew they learned after trawling the Internet for information
on home-made explosive devices, and their rucksack bombs cost
only a few hundred pounds. The narrative also rejects the
existence of a fifth bomber, despite a nationwide manhunt after
a unused rucksack bomb was found in a car left at Luton, from
where the four men traveled by train to London's King's Cross
station.

The bombers were inspired by Mohammed Khan's trip to Pakistan,
which was described as "ideological rather than fact-finding".
The suicide quartet -- Khan, Shehzad Tanweer, Hasib Hussain and
Jermaine Lindsay -- enjoyed a "Western lifestyle", but they
were radicalized and motivated by Western foreign policy in the
Muslim world, including Britain's role in the invasion and
occupation of Iraq -- a view which Prime Minister Tony Blair
has consistently tried to undermine and discredit -- and were
also driven "by the promise of immortality."

The Home Office narrative -- based on psychological profiling
and intelligence compiled over a nine month period since last
July -- doesn't address the issue of why MI5 failed to keep
track of Mohammed Khan after he had been identified months
before the attacks in the company of radical Islamists
suspected of planning acts of terrorism in Britain, one of the
criticisms made by MPs in the ISC report. This omission is
likely to be one of the points raised when Clarke presents his
narrative to Parliament before the first anniversary of the
attacks, accompanied by details of how security has been
tightened since then, including extra MI5 and MI6 officers,
increased uniform patrols, CCTV cameras and scanning technology
at several of London's underground stations, and a more
transparent official public warning system for the threat posed
by a terrorist attack. Under the current system, the threat
level is set on the advice given by MI5 and appears in the
entrance halls of public buildings, government departments and
the transport network. In future, the threat level will be
determined by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC).
"Clear and concise" details will be made available to local and
national media, will be posted on government Web sites, and
will cover the complete UK infrastructure.

MI5 has also carried out a "terrorist audit" of Britain
following last July's bombings, and the figure of 400 terrorist
suspects at large in the UK is double the number which the
former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, John Stevens, claimed
had the potential to carry out attacks, prior to his retirement
in January 2005. Details of the assessment were given by the
City of London Police Commissioner, James Hart, a member of the
security committee responsible for protecting the capital from
attack, who warned that the shortage of trained surveillance
teams was undermining attempts to keep London safe.

The City of London -- also referred to as the "financial square
mile" -- was a prime target for the Provisional IRA which
managed to breach tight security on several occasions in the
1990s with spectacular results, causing few civilian casualties
(because adequate warnings had been given to the authorities)
but billions of pounds in blast damage and loss of trade.
Commissioner Hart is not optimistic that no-warning Qaida
attacks can be prevented: "With about 400 terrorist suspects it
required a great deal of resources to investigate them. You
simply have to make intelligence guesses about who to watch.
It's a bit of a lottery."

COMMENT -- Despite increased funding to open regional offices
in Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Birmingham and Glasgow, and to
recruit several hundred additional personnel, MI5 still claims
it hasn't the resources to adequately monitor the "hard core"
of trained fighters who have returned from bomb-making courses
and training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan, or the
potential Islamic extremists "on the fringes" of the 400 who
could become "active terrorists" at any point. The Association
of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) also claims that police forces
throughout Britain are being "hindered" by the lack of money
being put into counter-terrorism.

A new British Army unit, the 1,200-strong Special Forces
Support Group (SFSG), became fully operational in mid-April.
The unit, consisting of Royal Air Force (RAF) freefall experts,
Royal Marine commandos, and members of the Parachute Regiment,
was commissioned to support the Special Air Service (SAS) and
the Special Boat Squadron (SBS). It will be based at RAF St.
Athan, near Cardiff in Wales, and will be under the control of
Hugh Kernohan, Director of Special Forces Section, at the
Ministry of Defence (MoD), in London. The SFSG will train with
the SAS and the SBS, and will specialize in diversionary
tactics, supporting firepower and defensive cordon protection
around SAS and SBS operations. It will also support the
Metropolitan Police and regional police forces in anti-
terrorist situations considered "so physically dangerous that
[the police] need assistance from the Army", according to the
MoD.

The SFPG is the fifth British special forces unit. The four
others are the SAS, the SBS, the Special Reconnaissance
Regiment (SRR), which carries out covert intelligence-gathering
operations using HUMINT sources, and the 18 (UKSF) Signals
Regiment, which specializes in SIGINT and ELINT tasks. The SFSG
will have high-tech computerized satellite communications
equipment allowing it to download GCHQ and MI6 intelligence. It
will also have SOFLAM laser marking systems designed to direct
the RAF to designated targets. All serving SFSG personnel will
be allowed to retain the cap badges of their original
regiments. However, the new shoulder emblem, a silver dagger
(also used in SAS and SBS badges) pierced by a red-lined black
lightening flash on a green background, bears more than a
passing resemblance to the insignia of Reichsfuhrer Heinrich
Himmler's Schutzstaffel - more commonly known as the SS.

COMMENT -- The selection process for the SFSG is expected to
be far more strict and intrusive than that for the SRR, which
was created by the former Defense Secretary, Geoff Hoon, in
2004. Based in Hereford, the SRR initially used personnel --
many of whom were veterans of the Northern Ireland campaign --
from the Intelligence Corps, the SAS, and 14th Intelligence
Company. In less than 18 months, the regiment has been involved
in two politically controversial incidents. Last July, SRR
officers were among the plain-clothes "watchers" who followed
Brazilian electrician Jean Charles de Menezes to Stockwell
Underground station in London where he was shot dead by SAS-
trained SO19 police officers after being wrongly identified as
a suspected suicide bomber (INT, n. 464 1).

On 19 September, following a gun battle in Basra, Iraq, in
which two Iraqi policemen died, two SRR operatives (initially
identified as members of the SAS), using an unmarked civilian
vehicle and dressed as local Arabs, were arrested by Iraqi
police after being caught in possession of weapons and bomb-
making equipment. What began as a "special forces covert
operation" quickly deteriorated into a high-profile
international fiasco when the O/C of British forces in southern
Iraq, Brigadier John Lorimer, ordered soldiers to storm the
jail where the SRR men were being held after negotiations to
secure their release failed. The two "covert operatives" have
since returned to Britain, despite an arrest warrant issued by
Judge Raghib Hassan al-Muthafar in connection with the death of
the (British-trained) Iraqi police officers (INT, n. 466 29).

The British Defence Secretary, Dr. John Reid, has ordered the
Royal Military Police (RMP) to investigate the leaking of a
classified tactical document from the Permanent Joint
Headquarters in Northwood, Middlesex, which was published in
the "Sunday Telegraph" on 16 April. Titled "Deep Manoeuvre
Effect", the document formed part of a presentation to Royal
Marine officers due to be deployed in October to Helmand
province, the Taliban stronghold near the Afghanistan border
with Pakistan, where there are currently just under 1,000
British troops (plus about 70 members of the SAS working
alongside US Special Forces in the hunt for the elusive Osama
bin Laden). This figure will increase to 3,300 when the army
base, Camp Bastion, is completed. A further 1,000 military
personnel are based in Kabul under the command of General Sir
David Richards.

According to the Sunday Telegraph's report, British troops will
be expected to "find and track insurgents, interdict and
disrupt opposition sanctuaries and locations and (eventually)
defeat (the enemy)." This, according to a defense sources
quoted by the newspaper, is an accurate description of a "seek
and destroy" mission. The problem for the British government is
that this description is at odds with the assurances given by
Reid in the House of Commons that British troops are not going
to Afghanistan to "wage war or carry out seek and destroy
operations" [as part of "Enduring Freedom", the US-led anti-
terrorism mission], but to be involved in the "reconstruction
of Afghanistan by multinational forces." British soldiers will
not take part in counter-terrorist operations but will take
part in counter-insurgency operations to defend themselves
against attack, according to Reid.

The Conservative Party has now threatened to withdraw
bipartisan political support for the British mission because
the Defence Secretary's statements to MPs are at "variance with
the nature of the mission being carried out by British troops",
according to the Tory defence spokesman, Liam Fox, MP. The
"Sunday Telegraph", which is the "publication of choice" for
serving and retired Army officers, claims that personnel at
Northwood HQ are now "confused" as to the exact difference
between an insurgent and a terrorist. According to a senior
Royal Marine officer, the government may choose to "draw a
distinction" between an insurgent and a terrorist, "but to us,
they are all the same" and all commanders going to Afghanistan
over the next 18 months "are training their troops to conduct
offensive operations against insurgents."

Reid's parliamentary and public statements about helping to
reconstruct the Afghan economy and build democracy -- which he
repeated when he arrived at Kabul Airport on 23 April -- are to
reassure the electorate that Britain's mission is benign and
altruistic. He has also been accused of trying to "hide the
truth" about attacks on British troops because, if the Afghan
mission "turns sour", it will "bring down" Prime Minister
Blair. There have been two unreported attempted suicide attacks
on the British provincial reconstruction unit in Lashkar Gar,
the capital of Helmand province. This surge of violence against
British troops began in early April with the wounding of three
soldiers by a roadside IED (improvised explosive device)
similar to those first used by the Provisional IRA in South
Armagh in the late 1980s, and more recently (using improved
technology) by insurgents in southern Iraq.

Even without the full British contribution of 3,300 to the
9,000-strong NATO International Special Assistance Force (ISAF)
-- including the Royal Marines, the 16th Air Assault Brigade,
the 3rd Battalion Parachute Regiment, a recce squadron of
Household Cavalry Scimitar and Spartan armored vehicles, a
battery of light guns from the Royal Horse Artillery, supported
by Apache attack helicopters and Desert Hawk UAVs from the 32nd
Regiment, Royal Artillery -- a request for an addition 600
troops has been rejected by Reid who has been accused by
Ministry of Defence (MoD) officials of trying to micro-manage
the Afghan operation. An MoD civil servant, quoted in a recent
"Sunday Times" report, refers to an "arrogance and control-
freak mentality that has resulted in the military hardly being
able to move without the minister's team knowing about it and
approving it first."

On 25 April, after MPs on the cross-party Commons Select
Defence Committee expressed "deep concern" at plans to withdraw
six RAF Harrier GR7 jump jets, the MoD announced that the
aircraft, from No. 1 (Fighter) Squadron, at RAF Cottesmore,
which are currently based at Kandahar and were due to be
replaced next month by Dutch F-16 fighters, will remain in
Afghanistan for at least a year. Defense analysts had told the
committee that "inaccessible areas" of Helmand province
(approximately 9,000 square kilometers of mountains, desert,
and plains) can be reached far quicker by the Harriers than by
Dutch or US fighters.

A former SAS commander, Lieutenant General Sir Cedric Delves,
has been asked to take charge of intelligence operations
carried out by the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) and to
provide "a structured leadership" following reports that
tensions have arisen among the 4,200 personnel, which include
detectives from the National Criminal Intelligence Service
(NCIS) and the National Crime Squad (NCS), MI5 officers and HM
Customs & Excise (HMCE) drug investigators and Immigration
Service (IS) staff. Other senior military officers who are
close to retirement have also been asked by the Home Office to
provide management expertise, according to a Ministry of
Defence (MoD) source, who described the move as "a sign of
desperation" by the Home Secretary, Charles Clarke, because
SOCA -- one of the Labour government's flagship law-and-order
reforms -- cannot find the experts within its own ranks.

On 5 April, a report published by Amnesty International in
London, titled "Below the Radar: Secret Flights to Torture and
Disappearance", has called on the British government to set up
an independent inquiry into more than 200 CIA "extraordinary
rendition" flights which have used British airports over the
past five years. The airports listed include Gatwick, Stansted,
and Luton in the south east, Glasgow, Preswick and Edinburgh in
Scotland, Derry and Belfast in Northern Ireland, RAF Brize
Norton in Oxfordshire and Biggin Hill in Kent, RAF Leuchars in
Scotland, as well as facilities at the British overseas
territory, the Turks and Caicos islands, in the Caribbean. The
British Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, has claimed that the US
administration would not transport detainees through the UK
without permission. On two occasions, requests for rendition
clearance from the Clinton administration had been refused by
the Foreign Office, and there was no evidence that the Bush
administration had asked.

Flight Lieutenant Malcolm Kendall-Smith, the RAF doctor who
refused to return to Iraq last year for a third tour of duty,
because he considered the 2003 invasion and occupation a
"campaign of imperial conquest" by the US after reading legal
opinions and international law on conflict while on home leave
INT, n. 477 6), has been jailed for eight-months, and dismissed
from the air force. On 13 April, he was found guilty by a court
martial panel of five RAF officers, presided over by Judge
Advocate Jack Bayliss, at Aldershot military base, of
"calculated and deliberate disobedience" of five direct orders
regarding deployment to Basra. He was also ordered to pay a
fine of $20,000 towards the defense costs. He was taken to
Colchester military prison for a medical examination and a
"period of demilitarization" before serving four months in a
civilian prison and the remainder under licence. Passing
sentence, Judge Advocate Bayliss said: "Those who wear the
Queen's uniform cannot pick and choose which orders they obey
and those who do so must face the consequences."

A 50-year-old Dutch businessman and alleged drugs trafficker,
Thomas van der Bijl, became the latest victim of the
internecine feud which has decimated the Dutch hardcore
criminal fraternity. He was shot dead by gunmen in De Hallen, a
cafe he owned on the corner of Willem de Zwijgerlaan and Jan
van Galenstraat in West Amsterdam, at 08h45 on 20 April. Van
der Bijl had been released from custody a week earlier after
being held in connection with the distribution of cannabis,
shipped from Morocco, and locally-manufactured XTC, which was
stored in containers in several warehouses throughout Holland
before being transported to Britain, France and Scandinavia.

According to the Criminele Inlichtingen Eenheid (CIE) criminal
intelligence unit, the illegal drug traffic involved two
organizations: one supplying the European market from North
Africa; and Van der Bijl's European distribution network which
included Dutch, French, Spanish and Moroccan dealers. Following
a 28 March series of coordinated raids, the police arrested 11
people, including Van der Bijl, and seized more than 32,000
kilos of cannabis resin in polythene-wrapped packages and worth
approximately 100 million euros, including 7,000 kilos hidden
in a French-registered HGV in south Holland, and 23,000 kilos
in a warehouse in Bavel, near Breda.

Van der Bijl was a "known associate" of property developer Kees
Houtman, shot dead outside his villa in Osdorp, near Amsterdam,
on 2 November 2005, and also of Houtman's business partner,
John Mieremet, who has murdered the same day at his office in
Bang-Lamung, a seaside resort near Pattaya, Thailand. (INT, n.
468 21). Both killings were linked to the murder of Willem
Endstra, one of the Holland's wealthiest businessmen (INT, n.
441 19), once described as "the banker to the underworld", who
reinvested/white-washed "dirty money" for some of the country's
top crime bosses, including Willem Holleeder, the convicted
kidnapper of brewery Freddy Heineken. Van der Bijl, according
to "Intelligence" sources, supplied the vehicles used by
Holleeder and his accomplice, Cor van Hout, who was eventually
shot dead in Amstelveen on 24 January 2003 after two
unsuccessful attempts on his life in March 1996 and December
2000.

Willem Holleeder, who is currently in police custody on
extortion charges, is now regarded as the key figure in
Europe's most enduring drug war which dates back to the 27 June
1991 contract killing of Klaas Bruinsma outside the Hilton
Hotel in South Amsterdam. The fact that Holleeder is the "last
man standing" among the major crime bosses suggests, according
to police sources, that he ordered many of the twenty-five
contract killings dating back to the mid-1990s. This allegation
was first made by Endstra in a statement to detectives in 2003,
which was leaked to the Amsterdam newspaper, "Het Parool", in
mid-March. Holleeder's lawyer, Bram Moszkowicz, has dismissed
the allegations as an attempt by the authorities to "close the
files" on more than two dozen unsolved killings.

0414 IND, Prisoner of Conscience - RAF Doctor Who Refused Iraq
Service Is Jailed - Doctor, RAF officer, And now war criminal,
Flt. Lt. Malcolm Kendall-Smith was yesterday jailed for
refusing to serve in Iraq, Kim Sengupta
- REU, Crunch Weeks Ahead for Europe's CIA Probes

0428 NYT, Blair cabinet wobbles under trio of troubles, Sarah
Lyall: Three embarrassing problems; Home Secretary Charles
Clarke's release of 1,023 convicted foreign nationals; Deputy
Prime Minister John Prescott's affair with his secretary,
Tracey Temple; Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt's failing
National Health Service and two public meetings during which
she was shouted down.

On 11 April, the Russian Defense Minister, Sergei Ivanov told
members of the Cabinet that he was in possession of a Defense
Ministry list of 1,152 foreign companies in 51 countries,
suspected of contributing to the proliferating of weapons of
mass destruction. He warned Russian companies to be
"particularly cautious and circumspect when it comes to
communications and trade" with the firms identified.

The person and the timing of this warning are noteworthy.
Ivanov is the man most likely to succeed President Vladmir
Putin in 2008 following his appointment, by presidential
decree, as head of Permanent Defense Industry Commission (INT,
n. 477 7). As for timing, Ivanov's statement came two days
before the 13 April meeting in Moscow of the G-8 working group
on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Ivanov's list was compiled by senior Defense Ministry officials
from information provided by the Foreign Ministry, the
Federalnaya luzhba Bezopasnosti (FSB) federal security service,
the Sluzhba Vnesheny Razvedki (SVR) foreign intelligence
service and the Glavnoye Razvedyvatelnoye Upravleniye (GRU)
main military intelligence directorate. Ivanov, who is also a
deputy prime minister, told the Cabinet meeting, attended by
President Putin, that Russian firms will have to obtain a
licence from the PDIC if they intended to do business with the
foreign companies on the Defense Ministry list. There will also
be increased controls on end-user certificates and on the
export of dual-use technologies and products.

The list will also help PDIC officials compile a report on
Russia's efforts to tackle WMD proliferation, ahead of the G-8
summit which will be held in St. Petersburg in July. Ivanov
rejected as "nonsensical" criticism that the list and the
forthcoming PDIC report were a part of a "damage limitation
exercise" to counter US and EU criticism that Russian companies
have been exporting sensitive technologies to "rogue states"
for more than a decade -- in particular Iran, where Russian
technology and technicians have played a crucial part in Iran's
nuclear program.

0421 RFE, Primakov Warns of Troubles Ahead for Russia, Paul
Goble: Yevgeny Primakov, a man with many years of experience at
or near the top of the Soviet and Russian governments, warns
that demographic trends, the upcoming electoral cycle, and
declining Western interest in Moscow point to serious problems
ahead for his country.
- RFE, Russian Minister Warns NATO

0408 AP, Venezuelans Pelt US Ambassador's Car: The US
ambassador to Venezuela has grown used to facing protests and
shouts of "Yankee go home!" But supporters of President Hugo
Chavez appeared to cross the line when they pelted his car with
eggs and tomatoes, then chased after his convoy on motorcycles.
- ERRI, US accuses Venezuela over Assault; Motorcyclists Chased
the US Embassy Convoy For at Least 10 minutes

0409 ERRI/WT, Venezuela Courting Iran on Nuclear and Weapons
Deals [Washington Times and Rowan Scarborough]
- IND, Women and Jobless Armed by Chavez to Resist "US
Invasion", Andrew Buncombe: The President of Venezuela, Hugo
Chavez, is recruiting and training a people's militia to help
lead a "war of resistance" against what he claims is the threat
of a US invasion. Housewives, students, construction workers
and the unemployed are being recruited for the country's
Territorial Guard.

0418 IND, Death Squad Allegations Threaten to Derail Bush's
Last Latin Ally - Colombia's leader denies using death squads
to wipe out opponents, Daniel Howden: Alvaro Uribe's procession
to a second term as Colombia's President hit a stumbling block
yesterday as he responded wildly to allegations that his
government colluded with paramilitaries to kill civilians.

AFRICA - Sudan, Algeria & Nigeria.
0404 UN, Sudan blocks Egeland tour of Darfur [United Nations
Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland]
0408 ERRI, Algeria - At Least 13 Dead Following Ambush of
Customs Convoy
0418 ERRI, Fourteen Killed at Robbers Roadblock in Nigeria

0310 London Review of Books, The Israel Lobby, John Mearsheimer
and Stephen Walt: For the past several decades, and especially
since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centerpiece of US Middle
Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The
combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related
effort to spread "democracy" throughout the region has inflamed
Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardized not only US security
but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has
no equal in American political history.

0409 TomPaine.com, Colonization of Palestine Precludes Peace,
Jimmy Carter (Former US President Jimmy Carter led The Carter
Center/National Democratic Institute observation of the
Palestinian elections in January): "For more than a quarter
century, Israeli policy has been in conflict with that of the
United States and the international community," writes Jimmy
Carter. "Israel's occupation of Palestine has obstructed a
comprehensive peace agreement in the Holy Land, regardless of
whether Palestinians had no formalized government, one headed
by Yasir Arafat or Mahmoud Abbas, or with Abbas as president
and Hamas controlling the parliament and cabinet."
- ERRI, Hamas Complains of "Blackmail" as Diplomats Try to
Temper Their Violence

0413 TruthOut, The Lobby and the Bulldozer: Mearsheimer, Walt
and Corrie, Norman Solomon: "For several decades, to the
present moment, Israel's treatment of Palestinian people has
amounted to methodical and despicable violations of human
rights. Yet criticism of those policies from anyone (including
American Jews such as myself) routinely results in accusations
of anti-Jewish bigotry," writes Norman Solomon.

0417 AP, Suicide Bomber Kills 8 in Tel Aviv, Daniel Robinson:
Eight people were killed and dozens wounded in Israel's
capital, Tel Aviv, when a Palestinian militant blew himself up
in the deadliest suicide bombing of the last 20 months.
- ERRI, Suicide/Homicide Bomber Strikes in Tel Aviv: A
Palestinian suicide bomber has killed at least seven people
along with himself and injured around 50 at a Tel Aviv falafel
restaurant. The bomb went off at lunchtime on a busy street
near a bus station in the Israeli city's Neve Shaanan area.
- UN/IPS, UN stance on Hamas under scrutiny

0418 Salon.com, Breaking the silence - The overwrought response
to John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt's brave paper only
confirms its thesis [Israel lobby in the US], Juan Cole: John
Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of
Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government have put
their hands into a hornet's nest with their paper in the
"London Review of Books", titled "The Israel Lobby and US
Foreign Policy." As political scientists who routinely analyze
US foreign policy, they have gained a reputation for lucid and
principled argument, but outside the halls of academia are not
exactly household names. In daring to simply describe the well-
known operations of the Israel lobby, however, they have made
themselves targets of a massive smear campaign. Ironically,
this reaction is just what their paper predicted.

SAUDI ARABIA - Co-financing Pakistani Nuclear Program. For the
past decade, Saudi Arabia, with the help of Pakistani
scientists, has been working secretly on a nuclear program,
according to an article in the 31 March edition of "Cicero", a
German current affairs magazine. The report, based on Western
security and intelligence sources, claims that cooperation
between the two countries began in the mid-1990s when Saudi
scientists worked in Pakistan under Abdul Qadeer Khan. Since
then, Pakistani nuclear scientist have travelled to Riyadh on
several occasions (during the Haj pilgrimages to Mecca) to work
at al-Sulaiyil, a secret underground city south of Riyadh.
Saudi engineers have also built dozens of missile silos, which
house long-range, Pakistani manufactured Ghauri missiles, and
Saudi bar codes can be found on half of Pakistan's nuclear
weapons, according to US military analyst John Pike, "because
it is Saudi Arabia which ultimately co-financed the Pakistani
atomic nuclear program."

Even before "shock and awe" got started in Iraq, the American
military had been criticized by specialists for its more-or-
less exclusive reliance on brutal force and firepower to reach
its objectives. The failure of the Vietnam war doesn't seem to
have changed that approach and "Intelligence" recently
mentioned a senior French general's criticism of this American
attitude and its impending consequences in the Iraq war ("USA -
Military Force Won't Work, So Try More"; INT, n. 477 16): "Why
did the American Army lose the stabilization phase of the Iraq
war? After the [initial] force phase had achieved its
objectives, the US Army did not change its methods vis-a-vis
the population, continuing to rely on force and failing to seek
the population's acceptance. If it behaved that way, it's
because the entire American military culture and the training
accorded every soldier push that logic" (0324 Le Monde,
American Military Strategy Explains the Failure in Iraq,
Laurent Zecchini). But those are the French... Now it's George
W. Bush's only major military ally in Iraq, the British Army,
which has criticized this US military attitude.

Senior British Army officer, Brigadier Alan Sharpe, served with
the US Military Command in Baghdad in 2004 and was awarded the
OBE (Order of the British Empire) and the American Bronze Star
for writing the "Coalition Campaign Plan" for Iraq. He recently
accused American officers of trying to portray themselves as
Hollywood film stars when dealing with the press. Brig. Sharpe,
currently O/C of British forces in the Balkans (where he works
alongside US military personnel) made his comments in a paper
on Britain's influence on US foreign relations, written during
a one-year course at the Royal College of Defence Studies
(RCDS) and attended by senior military figures from around the
world.

According to Brig.Sharpe -- whose high-flying career may be
stymied by his comments on the military aspects of the so-
called "special relationship" between London and Washington --
an important part of being a successful US Army officer was the
ability to combine the "real and acted heroics" of Audie Murphy
with the "newsreel antics of General Douglas MacArthur" and the
"movie performances" of Sylvester Stallone and John Wayne. The
"strong streak of Hollywood" might look good on US TV,
according to Brig. Sharpe, But "loud voices, full body armour,
wrap-around sunglasses, air strikes and daily broadcasts from
shoulder-holster wearing brigadier-generals proudly announcing
how many Iraqis have been killed by US forces" was not a
"hearts-and-minds winning tool."

Brig. Sharpe believes the British Army's "500 years of
experience" in insurgency operations gave it an advantage over
US forces, and argued that the most effective way of passing on
Britain's experience and the "moderate influence" was to place
"capable officers with a feel for the British way of doing
business" alongside their American colleagues where they could
"practically influence the decisions, plans and conduct on the
ground of US adventures in world policing". He also criticized
Prime Minister Tony Blair for trying to secure influence with
Washington by providing "hollowed-out formations with little
real capacity."

He concluded his thesis by referring to an exchange between an
Iraqi detainee, a member of Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist Party,
who was "loudly lectured" to by an American officer about his
"previously nefarious ways" prior to his release from US
military custody. The Iraqi responded: "Hey Mr. American, next
time before you shout so much you should speak to him [Brig.
Sharpe]. He is British -- they know how to invade a country."
Indeed, perhaps someone should ask the Irish for a comment on
the subject.

Brig. Sharpe's critique suggests nothing much changed since a
year ago when Blair's personal envoy to Iraq, John Sawers, sent
several classified memos from Baghdad to London, over an eight-
week period, following the March 2004 invasion. Sawers referred
to the "disastrous mishandling" of the occupation caused mainly
by a series of failures on the part of the US military.
Britain's most senior officer serving with US land forces,
Major General Albert Whitley, also warned his political and
military superiors in a mid-July 2003 memo that the US/UK
coalition was "in danger of losing the peace" because of the
lack of proper leadership on the part of the overall US
commander Gen. Tommy Franks, who had taken little interest in
the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq following the fall of
Baghdad (INT, n. 476 29).

COMMENT -- The RCDS was founded in 1927 on the recommendation
of a Cabinet committee chaired by then Secretary of Sate for
the Colonies, Winston Churchill. Formerly known as the Imperial
Defence Collage, its original membership of twenty-five
representatives from Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand
were chiefly concerned with the defence of the British Empire.
Following WW II, the college relocated from Buckingham Square
to Seaford House, Belgrave Square, London. In 1970, it was
renamed the Royal College of Defence Studies with an increased
membership from over 33 countries, including the US, and more
recently Russia, China, Ukraine, Poland, Hungary, the Slovak
Republic and Nepal. The current RCDS Commandant is Admiral Sir
Ian Garnett KCB and the senior staff are high-ranking officers
from the British Army, the Royal Navy, the RAF and the civil
service.

Candidates from member states who attend the RCDS one-year
course are selected on their potential to achieve a senior
position in their profession. There is a maximum of 88 persons
selected for each course, one-third from Britain and two-thirds
from overseas, of which 75 percent are senior serving military
personnel, and twenty-five percent are diplomats, civil
servants, police officers and representatives from the private
sector, particularly the security and defence industries.

Former members of the RCDS include senior German Army officer,
General Klaus Naumann, chairman of NATO Military Committee from
1996 to 1999, and the current Pakistan President, General
Pervez Musharraf, the former head of the Pakistan Army who led
a successful coup against his former political mentor, Prime
Minister Nawaz Sharif, in October 1999.

In his thesis, Brig. Sharpe referred to Audie Murphy, the
Hollywood actor who died in May 1971 in a plane crash in
Virginia and was buried with full military honors at Arlington
National Cemetery. Murphy served for three year (1942 to 1945)
as an US Army infantryman, and became the most decorated
American soldier of WW II. He received every US decoration for
valor in ground combat, including the Medal of Honor for
"conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life
above and beyond the call of duty", as well as awards from
France and Belgium.

0407 NYT, Bomb Explodes Inside a Shiite Mosque in Baghdad, Kirk
Semple: The bombing came at a time of increasing violence
between Shiite and Sunni Muslims, and of increasing conflict
between Mr. Sadr and American officials in Iraq. The bomb
exploded inside a Baghdad mosque linked to the largest Shiite
political party today, a day after a car bomb killed 10 people
near a mosque in a part of Najaf that Shiites consider the
heart of their religion.

0409 NYT, Car Bomb Kills 6; Top Iraqi Shiite Seeks Unity to
Deter Terror, Kirk Semple: A car bomb tore through a street
crowded with pedestrians and vendors in Musayyib, a
predominantly Shiite town, on Saturday, the authorities said,
killing at least 6 people, wounding 21 and stoking sectarian
tensions in Iraq. The attack followed two others this week
against major symbols of Shiite Islam that killed more than 80
and prompted political leaders to appeal for calm and unity.

0412 AP, 20 Killed in Car Bombing at Iraq Mosque, Sameer N.
Yacoub: A car bomb exploded Wednesday as worshippers were
leaving a Shiite mosque northeast of Baghdad, killing at least
20 people and injuring 32 others.
- BBC, Baghdad Market Bomb Kills 13
- ERRI, Five US Soldiers Die in Iraq

0416 AP, Iraq Unity Talks Set Back; 4 Marines Die, Qassim
Abdul-Zahra: Efforts to form a unity government suffered a new
setback Sunday when Iraqi leaders postponed a parliament
session after failing to agree on a prime minister. Bombs
targeted Shiites near a mosque and on a bus as attacks
nationwide killed at least 35 people. Four more Marines were
reported killed in fighting west of Baghdad, bringing the US
death toll for this month to 47 - compared with 31 for all of
March.

0418 REU, Baghdad Street Battle Smacks of Open Civil War, Omar
al-Ibadi: Snipers held rooftop positions as masked Sunni Arab
insurgents said they were gearing up for another open street
battle with pro-government Shi'ite militiamen in Baghdad's
Adhamiya district on Tuesday. The Arab Sunni stronghold is
still feeling ripples from overnight clashes on Monday that
appeared to be the closest yet to all-out sectarian fighting.
- ERRI, Eighteen Tortured Bodies Found in Baghdad

0419 WP, US Contractor [Philip H. Bloom] Admits Bribery for
Jobs in Iraq - Occupation officials got cash and gifts for
deals, Griff Witte: An American businessman who is at the heart
of one of the biggest corruption cases to emerge from the
reconstruction of Iraq has pleaded guilty to conspiracy,
bribery and money-laundering charges.

0420 WP, Al-Jafari to Give Up Iraqi Prime Minister Post, Nelson
Hernandez, Bassam Sebti and K.I. Ibrahim: Iraq's prime minister
will give up his nomination for a new term as head of the
country's new government, a senior member of his Shiite party
announced, only a few hours before a long-delayed parliament
meeting scheduled for Thursday was ultimately postponed by two
more days.

0423 BBC, Mortar Attacks Kill 6 in Baghdad: Mortar rounds have
exploded in Baghdad killing at least six civilians and wounding
two, say Iraqi police. Three mortars exploded near Iraq's
Defence Ministry while others landed near the interior ministry
and Shaab stadium. The attacks came one day after Iraq's
parliament endorsed Shia politician Jawad al-Maliki as prime
minister.

0424 AP, 7 Car Bombs Explode in Baghdad, Killing 6, Thomas
Wagner: Seven car bombs exploded across the capital Monday,
killing at least six people and wounding dozens, as politicians
met to try to finalize a new Cabinet. Police discovered the
bodies of 20 Iraqis - apparent victims of sectarian killings
the United States hopes the new government can end.
- ERRI, Seven Car Bombs Claim Lives in Baghdad
- WP, Inspectors Find More Torture at Iraqi Jails - US pledge
to protect prisoners "not being followed", Ellen Knickmeyer:
Last Nov. 13, US soldiers found 173 incarcerated men, some of
them emaciated and showing signs of torture, in a secret bunker
in an Interior Ministry compound in central Baghdad. The
soldiers immediately transferred the men to a separate
detention facility to protect them from further abuse.

0425 NYT, Dozens of Security Force Recruits Are Killed by Iraqi
Insurgents, Richard A. Oppel Jr.: At least 40 Iraqi civilians
and security force recruits were either killed or found dead on
Monday, the Iraqi authorities said, as insurgents unleashed a
wave of car bombs across Baghdad. Throughout the capital, seven
car bombs struck, killing at least 10 people and wounding 76
others. Their targets were the back gate of Mustansiriya
University, two Iraqi police patrols and a busy intersection at
rush hour. All of the dead were civilians. At least 15 other
Iraqis died across the country, the victims of by drive-by
assassinations, bombs and mortar fire, according to an
Associated Press tally from the police.

0406 TomDispatch.com, Cutting and Running in Baghdad, Robert
Dreyfuss: As usual, President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and
their stalwart secretaries of state and defense, are johnnies-
come-lately in their ability to understand how far gone Iraq
is. Perhaps, as has been the case in the past, that is because
they continue flagrantly to disregard what they are told by
analysts in the US intelligence community.

0407 Northwest Indiana Times, Former Diplomat - Iraq War Made
World Less Safe, Bob Kasarda: Ann Wright, former Deputy Chief
of Mission at the US Embassy in Mongolia for the US Foreign
Service, feels as long as the US remains in Iraq, the violence
there will continue. Wright said the US needs to leave as soon
as possible and leave it up to the Iraqi people to decide if
they want an international presence and, if so, whom.

0408 IND, Iraq Three Years On: Don't Look Away, Patrick
Cockburn: Three years after the toppling of Saddam, Iraq is a
bloody mess. Yesterday 70 people were killed in an attack on a
Baghdad mosque. Patrick Cockburn reports on three years of
broken promises in a blighted land

0410 IND, Three Years After Saddam's Fall, US Report Says Iraq
Is in Turmoil, Andrew Buncombe: A confidential assessment of
the security situation across Iraq carried out by US officials
has portrayed a country beset by violence and sectarian
division and where the stability of six of its 18 provinces is
considered "serious" and one is said to be "critical".

0412 NYT, Deaths of US Soldiers Climb Again in Iraq, Edward
Wong: The American military on Tuesday announced the deaths of
five soldiers, bringing the number of troops killed this month
to at least 32. That figure already surpasses the American
military deaths for all of March.

0414 AP, US Building Massive Embassy in Baghdad, Charles J.
Hanley: The fortress-like compound rising beside the Tigris
River here will be the largest of its kind in the world, the
size of Vatican City, with the population of a small town, its
own defense force, self-contained power and water, and a
precarious perch at the heart of Iraq's turbulent future.

0415 IND, US Colonel [John Coleman] Offers Iraq an Apology of
Sorts for Devastation of Babylon, Rupert Cornwell: In an act of
at least partial contrition, an officer in charge of the US
military occupation of Babylon in 2003 and 2004 has offered to
make a formal apology for the destruction his troops wrought on
the ancient site; Colonel John Coleman, former chief of staff
for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force in Iraq.

0416 Boston Globe, US Firms Suspected of Bilking Iraq Funds -
Millions missing from program for rebuilding, Farah Stockman:
American contractors swindled hundreds of millions of dollars
in Iraqi funds, but so far there is no way for Iraq's
government to recoup the money.

0416 NYT, A Bad Leak: President Bush says he declassified
portions of the prewar intelligence assessment on Iraq because
he "wanted people to see the truth" about Iraq's weapons
programs and to understand why he kept accusing Saddam Hussein
of stockpiling weapons that turned out not to exist. This would
be a noble sentiment if it actually bore any relationship to
Mr. Bush's actions in this case, or his overall record.

0417 Knight Ridder, US Knew Shiite Militias Were a Threat but
Took no Action Largely Because They Were Focused on Sunni
Insurgency, Tom Lasseter: US officials were warned for more
than two years that Shiite Muslim militias were infiltrating
Iraq's security forces and taking control of neighborhoods, but
they failed to take action to counteract it.

0420 AFP, 20,000 Kidnapped in Iraq Since January: Nearly 20,000
people have been kidnapped in Iraq since the beginning of this
year alone, according to a report released on Wednesday. The
survey, which underscores the massive social upheaval caused by
rebel activity and increasing sectarian conflict, does not give
the number of people killed. However, it says that 15,462
people have been wounded. The 19,548 people kidnapped includes
4,959 women and 2,350 children, according to the report
prepared by a group of 125 non-governmental organisations and
made public in the Shia holy city of Karbala.

0421 BBC, UN Damns "Illegal" Iraq Detention: The UN's human
rights official in Iraq has said the Iraqi authorities are
illegally holding thousands of people. Gianni Magazzeni said
that of the 15,000 people held under Iraqi control, little more
than half were under the jurisdiction of the justice ministry.
This is the only body with the right to detain suspects for
more than 72 hours.

0424 GUA, Bush Ignored Intelligence on Iraqi Weapons, Says Ex-
CIA Officer [Tyler Drumheller], Dan Glaister: A former leading
CIA official said yesterday that the White House deliberately
ignored intelligence that showed that there were no weapons of
mass destruction in the run-up to the war in Iraq.

0424 TomPaine.com, A Paper Lid On Iraq's Volcano, Robert
Dreyfuss: The civil war in Iraq won't end with the naming of a
hard-line Shiite fundamentalist as Iraq's next prime minister.
President George W. Bush, desperate to find some progress in
the violent chaos of Iraq, calls the designation of Jawad al-
Maliki "awesome." Zalmay Khalilzad, putting on his game face,
says of Maliki: "He is a tough guy," before adding, hastily,
that he meant "tough-minded." But a man in Baquba, the war-
battered city north of Baghdad, had a far more appropriate
comment on Maliki. He told the "Guardian": "He is a hateful
sectarian who has made venomous comments about Iraq and Arabs.
Jawad al-Maliki is the final nail in Iraq's coffin." And so he
is. The Bush administration hopes that Maliki will lead a
government of national unity. But in fact Maliki is just a
paper lid on the volcano that is Iraq.

A Tehran-based group called the Committee for the Commemoration
of Martyrs of the Global Islamic Campaign (CCMGIC) claims to
have recruited hundreds of potential suicide bombers during a
19 April recruitment fair for "martyrdom seekers" held in the
compound of the former US Embassy in the Iranian capital. The
group is targeting potential martyrs among disaffected Muslims
in Britain because of the relative ease which Iranian asylum-
seekers have been able to obtain British passports and then
enter Israel, which remains the primary target for attacks.
According to the group's spokesman, Mohammad Samadi, that is
the battlefield: "All the Jews are targets, whether military or
civilian. It's our land and they are in the wrong place. It's
their duty to pay attention to the safety of their own families
and move them away from the battlefield." Recruits would not be
ordered to carrying out attacks in the UK "unless it was to
kill Salman Rushdie".

According to Mossad, there is no evidence that Samadi's group
as been involved in suicide attacks in Israel. However, in
April 2003, two British Muslims, Asif Mohammed Hanif and Omar
Sharif, entered Israel on British passports posing as peace
activists and carried out an attack at Mike's Place, a bar in
Tel Aviv, killing three Israelis and wounding dozens of others.
Hanif died at the scene, Sharif fled and later drowned in the
Mediterranean.

The CCMGIC was formed in 2003 and claims to have more than
50,000 recruits who are instructed in target reconnaissance,
military discipline, urban guerrilla warfare, bomb-making and
the use of explosive body-belts. The group also claims to be an
"independent organization", but Western intelligence sources
believe it is linked to the Revolutionary Guards' Special Unit
of Martyr Seekers of whom 30 percent are women. The unit
marched in an official military parade in Tehran last month,
attended by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The
President was a former member of the Revolutionary Guards in
the late 1970s during the seizure of the US Embassy following
the return from France of the Ayatollah Khomeini and the flight
into exile of the last Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

On 19 April, the US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, made
a barely veiled threat that Iran could face a conventional
military assault if diplomacy, supported by the UN Security
Council and aimed at enforcing IAEA controls on Iran's disputed
nuclear program, fails. In response, General Adbolrahim
Moussavi, the head of the Iranian Army, issued a statement
through the semi-official Mehr news agency, saying any
aggressor will suffer an "unforgettable" response "regardless
of who they are or what position they are in."

COMMENT -- While the sabre-rattling continues in Washington,
Tel Aviv, London and other EU capitals, John Negroponte, the
head of the US Intelligence Directorate, has described Iran's
nuclear enrichment breakthrough, with a cascade of 164
centrifuges at the Natanze nuclear facility, as "clearly
troublesome", but pointed out to journalists at the National
Press Club, in Washington, on 20 April, that the issue should
be "kept in perspective." While the enrichment program for a
civilian nuclear power program can be extended to make the
fissile core of a nuclear bomb, "we believe that it is still a
number of years off before they have enough fissile material to
assemble into, or to put into a nuclear weapon, perhaps into
the next decade."

Negroponte was appointed head of the newly-created Intelligence
Directorate by President Bush a year ago, following the CIA's
failure to locate Iraq's WMD arsenal. Negroponte's organization
has a staff of almost 1,000, and has been accused by
intelligence professionals and analysts of becoming another
"bloated bureaucracy." His assessment, in a speech to mark his
first year in office, has been dismissed as "armchair analysis"
by unidentified sources described as being "close to the White
House administration."

0328 IPS, "Cabal" Blocked 2003 Nuclear Talks With Iran, Gareth
Porter: The Bush administration failed to enter into
negotiations with Iran on its nuclear program in May 2003
because neo-conservatives who advocated destabilization and
regime change were able to block any serious diplomatic
engagement with Tehran, according to former administration
officials.

0407 FT, Iran Ready for High-Level Talks, US Resists, Guy
Dinmore: Iran has prepared a high-level delegation to hold
wide-ranging talks with the US, but the Bush administration is
resisting the agenda suggested by Tehran despite pressure from
European allies to engage the Islamic republic, Iranian
politicians have told the Financial Times.

0410 Progress Report, Iran - The Nuclear Option: High-Ranking
[US] Military Officials Threatening to Resign Over [US] Nuke
Plans, Costs of War: Iran Terror Force "Makes Al Qaida Look
Like Kindergarten" Costs of War: Air Strike Would "Almost
Certainly Speed Up" Iranian Nuke Program Costs of War: "What
Will 1.2 Billion Muslims Think the Day We Bomb Iran?" A Nuclear
Regime Crisis, Not a Nuclear Weapons Crisis; Show US the Intel

0410 Proliferation News, Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace, Special Iran Edition: The Iran Plans, Seymour M. Hersh,
"New Yorker", Monday, April 10; US Is Studying Military Strike
Options on Iran, Peter Baker, Dafna Linzer and Thomas E. Ricks,
"Washington Post", Sunday, April 9; Yes He Would, Paul Krugman,
"New York Times", Monday, April 10; Reports Raise Possibility
of US Strike on Iran, Joseph Cirincione on NPR's "All Things
Considered", Sunday, April 9; The Nuclear Power Beside Iraq,
James Fallows, "Atlantic", May 2006; We Are Not Going to Nuke
Iran, ArmsControlWonk.com, Sunday, April 9; IAEA Chief to Visit
Iran, CNN, Sunday, April 9; Fool Me Twice, Joseph Cirincione,
"Foreign Policy", Monday, March 27; Making the Right Call: How
the World Can Limit Iran's Nuclear Program, Charles D. Fergusun
and Ray Takeyh, Arms Control Association, March 2006.
- IND, Target Iran: US Hints At a New Battlefront - Tensions
are rising over Tehran's alleged nuclear weapons programme as
the Pentagon considers its military options, Anne Penketh
- New Yorker (dated 0417), The Iran Plans - Would President
Bush go to war to stop Tehran from getting the bomb? Seymour M.
Hersh

0411 Progress Report, No Good Military Options in Iran: From
the Heritage Foundation to the Council on Foreign Relations,
from Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) to former top Bush State
Department official Richard Haass, the experts agree -- there
are no good military options in Iran. ThinkProgress has created
a graphic database featuring quotes from prominent analysts and
officials weighing in on the prospects of preemptive war in
Iran.
- TomPaine.com, Mind Games Over Iran, Jim Lobe: Three years
after the fall of Baghdad to US forces, Washington is abuzz
about new reports that the administration of President George
W. Bush is preparing to attack Iran, possibly with nuclear
weapons.
- UN, Bolton: Iran crisis will show UN's worth
- NPR, Options Limited for Military Attack on Iran - Joseph
Cirincione
- NYT, [US] Military Fantasies on Iran
- NYT, Bush Insists on Diplomacy in Confronting a Nuclear Iran,
Jim Rutenberg
- Progress Report, Iran - Recent Coverage Fails to Note
Administration's Creation of Secretive Iran Group

0412 Democracy Now!, Seymour Hersh: Bush Administration
Planning Possible Major Air Attack on Iran, Amy Goodman: We are
joined today by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Seymour
Hersh. In the latest issue of the "New Yorker", Hersh reports
that the Bush administration has increased clandestine
activities inside Iran and intensified planning for a possible
major air attack. Sources told Hersh that Air Force planning
groups are drawing up lists of targets, and teams of American
combat troops have been ordered into Iran, under cover, to
collect targeting data and to establish contact with anti-
government ethnic-minority groups. One of the military's
initial option plans calls for the use of a bunker-buster
tactical nuclear weapon against suspected underground nuclear
sites.

0412 FT, US Ex-Official [Richard Armitage] Urges Talks With
Iran, Demetri Sevastopulo: Richard Armitage, deputy secretary
of state during President George W. Bush's first term, has
urged the Bush administration to hold talks with Iran over its
nuclear programme.
- NPR, The US and Iran -- What Next? Joseph Cirincione and
Michael Rubin

0413 Asia Times, The war on Iran, Pepe Escobar: President
George W Bush issued a "wild speculation" non-denial denial
that the US was planning strategic nuclear strikes against
Iran, but Iran considerably upped the ante on Tuesday with
President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's announcement that Iran had
enriched uranium for the first time.
- ERRI, Rice Urges Security Council to Take "Strong Steps"
Against Iran
- Weekly Standard, To Bomb or Not to Bomb, Reuel Marc Gerecht
- WSJ, Concerns Mount Over Iran's Nuclear Ambitions, Carla Anne
Robbins

0415 REU, Key Senator Bucks Bush, Urges US-Iran Talks: The
United States should hold direct talks with Iran on its nuclear
program and go slow on pressing for sanctions, contrary to Bush
administration strategy, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
chairman said on Sunday.
- ERRI, Iranian Rhetoric on Israel Adds to Nuclear Concerns:
State Department spokesman says latest anti-Israeli comments by
Iran's president are "reprehensible".
- ERRI, Military Options Against Iran Potentially Carry Big
Risks

0421 The Nation, Attack Iran, Ignore the Constitution, Jeremy
Brecher and Brendan L. Smith: During the 2004 election, George
W. Bush famously proclaimed that he didn't have to ask anyone's
permission to defend America. Does that mean he can attack Iran
without having to ask Congress? A new Congressional resolution
being drafted by Representative Peter DeFazio, a Democrat from
Oregon, can be a vehicle to remind Bush that he can't.

0423 LAT, Been There, Done That - Talk of a US strike on Iran
is eerily reminiscent of the run-up to the Iraq war, Zbigniew
Brzezinski: Iran announcement that it has enriched a minute
amount of uranium has unleashed urgent calls for a preventive
US air strike from the same sources that earlier urged war on
Iraq. If there is another terrorist attack in the United
States, you can bet your bottom dollar that there also will be
immediate charges that Iran was responsible in order to
generate public hysteria in favor of military action. But there
are four compelling reasons against a preventive air attack on
Iranian nuclear facilities.

0425 Asia Times, Tehran Insider Tells of US Black Ops: A former
Iranian ambassador and Islamic Republic insider has provided
intriguing details to "Asia Times" Online about US covert
operations inside Iran aimed at destabilizing the country and
toppling the regime - or preparing for an American attack.

0412 juancole.com, Iran Can Now Make glowing Mickey Mouse
Watches, Juan Cole: The ability to slightly enrich uranium is
not the same as the ability to build a bomb. For the latter,
you need at least 80% enrichment, which in turn would require
about 16,000 small centrifuges hooked up to cascade. Iran does
not have 16,000 centrifuges. It seems to have 180. Iran is a
good ten years away from having a bomb.
- ERRI, Iranian President Announces Successful Uranium
Enrichment Program
- Progress Report, Iran - Uranium Enrichment Announcement
Called "Political Theater"
- RFE, Russia Says Iran Headed "In Wrong Direction"
- UN, Iran crosses uranium enrichment threshold

0413 NYT, Analysts Say a Nuclear Iran Is Years Away, William J.
Broad, Nazila Fathi and Joel Brinkley: Western nuclear analysts
said yesterday that Tehran lacked the skills, materials and
equipment to make good on its immediate nuclear ambitions, even
as a senior Iranian official said Iran would defy international
pressure and rapidly expand its ability to enrich uranium for
fuel. The official, Muhammad Saeedi, the deputy head of Iran's
atomic energy organization, said Iran would push quickly to put
54,000 centrifuges on line - a vast increase from the 164 they
said Tuesday that they had used to enrich uranium to levels
that could fuel a nuclear reactor.
- Carnegie, Iran's Long Nuclear Road: How long will it take for
Iran to produce a nuclear weapon? The best estimates indicate
that Iran is 5-10 years away from the ability to enrich enough
weapons-grade uranium for a nuclear weapon.
- RFE, Russian Minister [Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov] Warns
against "Exaggerating" Iranian Nuclear Issue; As Experts Call
Iran's Claims "Fairy Tales".

0426 NYT, Senior Iran Cleric Tells Sudan That Nuclear Aid Is
Available, Nazila Fathi: Iran's supreme leader said Tuesday at
a meeting here with the Sudanese president that Iran was ready
to share its nuclear technology with other countries.
- ERRI, Iran Threatens to Hide Nuclear Program

MIDDLE EAST - Turkey, Egypt & Saudi Arabia.
0407 ERRI, Female Suicide Bomber Hits Turkish Mosque
0417 ERRI, At Least Thirty Wounded in Turkish Explosion
0423 ERRI, Alleged Bin Laden Tape Aired On Arab TV Network; Al-
Qaida Head Attempts to Justify "Clash of Civilizations"
0424 AP, Blasts Kill 18 in Egyptian Resort City, Steven R.
Hurst: Three nearly simultaneous explosions rocked the Egyptian
resort city of Dahab on Monday, killing at least 22 people and
wounding more than 150 in a terror attack at the height of the
tourist season.
0425 ERRI, Triple Bombing in Egyptian Resort Leaves 23 Dead
0426 ERRI, Two Suicide Bombers Strike Multinational Force in
Egypt
0426 LAT, Iraqi Strife Seeping Into Saudi Kingdom, Megan K.
Stack: The conflict in Iraq has begun to spill over onto this
hardscrabble, sunburned swath of coast, breathing new life into
the ancient rivalry between the country's powerful Sunni Muslim
majority and the long-oppressed Shiite minority in one of the
most oil-rich areas of the world.

0410 LAT, US Military Secrets for Sale at Afghan Bazaar, Paul
Watson: No more than 200 yards from the main gate of the
sprawling US base here, stolen computer drives containing
classified military assessments of enemy targets, names of
corrupt Afghan officials and descriptions of American defenses
are on sale in the local bazaar.

0413 WP, New Attacks Foment Fear in Afghanistan - Weak
governance beyond capital is blamed, Pamela Constable: A spate
of terrorist attacks, from the murders of five medical workers
in Badghis province in the north to bombings in the opium poppy
region of Helmand in the south, is expanding a climate of
insecurity across Afghanistan as NATO forces prepare to take
over most military duties from the US-led coalition.

0417 BBC, US Kills Seven Afghan Civilians: The US military has
admitted killing seven civilians during a battle with
insurgents in Afghanistan. A statement regretting the "loss of
innocent life" and announcing an investigation was released by
the US. "Whether our direct fire was responsible or close-air
support or if the victims were caught in the crossfire we just
don't know right now," the spokesman said.

0419 NYT, Afghan Battles See Higher Toll for Civilians,
Carlotta Gall: More than 20 Afghan civilians have been reported
killed or wounded in the last three days by Afghan and American
security forces as the troops have fought an outbreak of
insurgent activity.
- AP, Blast Hits Near US Embassy in Kabul, Paul Garwood: A
massive explosion believed to have been caused by a rocket
shook the Afghan capital late Wednesday near the US Embassy
compound, wounding an Afghan security contractor.

0424 IPS, Pakistan Stressed by US Designs on Iran, MB Naqvi: As
the crisis around Iran over its alleged nuclear ambitions
assumes an ugly shape, Pakistan finds itself once again, under
enormous political pressure because of aggressive United States
policy towards a Muslim country in its immediate neighbourhood.
Already, the Pakistan government is under fire from powerful
Islamist groups and political parties for supporting the US-led
"war-on-terror" in Afghanistan, especially in the border areas
of North West Frontier Province. And now the US is pressing
both Pakistan and India to forego the economically advantageous
Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project and think of other
ways of meeting their energy requirements.
- Progress Report, Afghanistan - Violence Continues "In the
Shadows" of Iraq

0409 BBC, Clashes Erupt at Nepal Protests: Police in Nepal have
used teargas in clashes with hundreds of protesters who defied
a curfew for a second day to rally against King Gyanendra's
rule. At least three people have been killed since police first
opened fire on mass rallies on Saturday. They have been ordered
to shoot anyone who violates the curfew in Kathmandu and other
cities.

0412 AP, Violence Leaves 16 Dead in Sri Lankan Town, Krishan
Francis: Two explosions and subsequent violence Wednesday
killed 16 people in a restive town of northeast Sri Lanka that
the military has placed under curfew, authorities said. Army
and navy units were patrolling the streets of Trincomalee to
enforce the curfew.
- GUA, Karachi Bomb Attack Leaves at Least 45 Sunni Worshippers
Dead, Declan Walsh: A powerful bomb ripped through a crowd of
Sunni Muslims in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi
yesterday evening, killing at least 45 and raising fears of an
escalation of tit-for-tat sectarian atrocities.
- ERRI, 55 People Killed in Karachi Bombing
- ERRI, 12 Sri Lankan Naval Personnel Killed in Attack

0414 AP, 2 Bombs Explode at Main New Delhi Mosque: Two bombs
exploded at New Delhi's main mosque shortly after hundreds of
worshippers offered Friday prayers, injuring at least six
people, the mosque's chief cleric said.
- ERRI, Multiple Explosions Strike India

0421 REU, Nepal King Says to Hand Over Power, Gopal Sharma:
Nepal's King Gyanendra, facing sweeping anti-monarchy protests,
said on Friday he was handing over political power to the
people and asked a seven-party alliance to choose a new prime
minister.
- Scout Report, US Intelligence and the Indian Bomb
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB187/index.htm

0424 NYT, Nepal's King Orders Parliament Reinstated, Somini
Sengupta and Tilak P. Pokharel: An ashen King Gyanendra went on
television late this evening to concede to the demands of the
angry pro-democracy demonstrations roiling his country and turn
over the government to the elected parliament that was
dissolved four years ago.

0426 Bloomberg, Sri Lanka Fighting Kills 100, Displaces
Thousands, UN Says, Bill Varner: Fighting in Sri Lanka during
the past two days has killed at least 100 people and driven
thousands from their homes, the United Nations said after the
Indian Ocean nation's military bombed Tamil Tiger positions
again today.
- ERRI, Sri Lanka Launches Air Strikes Following Suicide
Bombing