Global

NYT 20 July 2003 Peacekeeping Is Back, With New Faces and Rules By FELICITY BARRINGER UNITED NATIONS — Peacekeeping is no longer a dirty word in Republican Washington. The United States is appealing to other countries to share the military burden of the occupation of Iraq, and President Bush is also signaling his willingness to send American troops to West Africa to help pacify Liberia. But as peacekeeping, like bell-bottoms, comes back into fashion, it is now cut from a different fabric than before. The missions are longer, and the troops are more likely to come from developing countries. In its original missions, United Nations troops were likely to be the first force on the ground, after combatants had agreed to step back. But in the last four years, urgent humanitarian crises in the eastern Congo, Sierra Leone and East Timor have required new tactics. Military action is needed more quickly than a United Nations blue-helmeted force can be authorized and deployed. In these knotted conflicts, ad hoc multinational forces have taken the lead, with the United Nations' blessing, and they have been led by developed countries — the British in Sierra Leone and the French in the Ivory Coast, for example. Their tenure tends to be measured in weeks or months, while the tenure of United Nations' forces, which follow the multinational forces, tends to be measured in years. The United Nations' forces also tend to come from countries with less substantial economies, though they usually have substantial militaries. On June 30, the top contributors to peacekeeping missions were Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nigeria and Ghana. Together, they contributed 13,826 troops, military observers and policeman. The five permanent members of the Security Council — the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China — together contributed a total of 2,097, less than all the individual countries but Ghana. Does it matter? After all, the countries with the most robust economies are paying most of the bills. The United States, in the current fiscal year, is paying 27 percent of the United Nations peacekeeping budget of $2.17 billion. "There are countries that support peacekeeping in a big way, with a lot of money, and countries that support it with flesh and blood," said Jean-Marie Guéhenno, the United Nations under secretary general for peacekeeping operations, in a recent interview. While the movement in this direction has been going on since at least the mid-1990's, "I do hope we are in a trough, not a trend," he said. This divide "could create some resentment." Indeed, if the military intervention is to have any meaning, it must display international backing of all sorts, said David Rudd, the president of the Canadian Institute for Strategic Studies. "It's all well and good to support an operation financially," Mr. Rudd said, but "if you subscribe to the notion of some form of global community, this demands and equitable sharing of the risks." But Paul F. Diehl, a political science professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, said that the increasing dominance of developing countries is not a major issue if their forces have the military capability and are seen as legitimate, not interlopers with their own agenda. (Which makes Nigerian forces a problematic presence when it comes to West African peacekeeping.) For the major troop contributors, there are rewards — peacekeeping dividends, if you will. Pakistanis and Indians believe "that peacekeeping adds to the military experience," Mr. Guéhenno said. "To be able to hold fire in a difficult situation requires a lot of training." And then there is a more tangible dividend: Mr. Guéhenno's office reimburses the countries that provide troops at the rate of $1,100 per soldier a month. Often, the cost to the country providing the troops is significantly less. "Generally, it is a substantial and generous differential," said Tariq Chaudhry, a peacekeeping specialist at Pakistan's mission to the United Nations. "But that's not why we go into it. We are actually quite proud of our record, proud that we've got peacekeeping right." Economic incentives may become more explicit. In Iraq, the Pentagon is considering a plan to train private Iraqi security force to guard pipelines, government buildings and other sites. And now, most of the 500-strong police force the United States has serving in Kosovo are employees of a private firm, DynCorp. Indeed, the notion of privatizing peacekeeping is getting more attention. In the June and July issue of Policy Review, published by the Hoover Institution, P. W. Singer, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, wrote that the growing industry of private military firms could be tapped to protect humanitarian aid workers or to intervene "whenever recalcitrant local parties break peace agreements or threaten the operation." They could even take over the whole operation, as a coalition of private security companies offered to do in the Congo, for $100 million or more. Privatization, unsurprisingly, has many critics. In his article, Mr. Singer warned that "outsourcing also entails turning over control of the actual provision of service. For peacekeeping, this means the troops in the field are not part of national armies, but private citizens hired off the market, working for private firms. Security is now at the mercy of any change in market costs and incentives." For his part, Mr. Guéhenno said he was worried that privatization offered the wrong message. "With private troops, the first signal you send is: This is important, but not important enough to risk our own people," he said.

Refugees International Date: 30 Jul 2003 The power to protect: Using new military capabilities to stop mass killings Executive Summary In 1994, an estimated 800,000 people were slaughtered in Rwanda because the United Nations and its members, including the leading democratic powers, refused to intervene to stop the genocide. Since then, UN or coalition forces have intervened - with mixed success -- several times in the Balkans, Africa, Asia and the Middle East to stop the wanton killing of civilians or to topple repressive regimes. Even as this report is issued, a French-led effort is underway to prevent bloodshed from getting out of control in the Eastern Congo, and the United States is considering sending troops to support a ceasefire in Liberia. This study suggests that military capabilities that the United States and several of its allies are currently developing-light, highly mobile units linked by intelligence and communications networks to improve awareness, precision and effectiveness-could improve the capacity of armed international intervention at acceptable costs and risks. Responsibility and Right to Protect: Because of growing global consciousness, the concept of sovereignty is changing. It is no longer absolute, but increasingly qualified by the responsibility of the government to spare its citizens from violence. The UN and the world community are recognizing further that when a state cannot or will not protect its citizens, other nations have the responsibility to do so. Power to Protect: But the right and the responsibility to protect by intervening militarily are meaningless without the power to protect. This report highlights the ability of information technologies and related capabilities to deliver decisive combat power with fewer forces and logistical requirements, which would, in turn, reduce the costs of operations as well as many of the military and political risks associated with military deployments. Decision to Protect: Given these more favorable conditions, forcible humanitarian interventions might be a more palatable choice for national leaders as they weigh their choices when faced with threats of large-scale killings. This analysis is preliminary and is not meant to provide conclusive answers. However, several promising ideas emerge: The qualities of networked forces - especially speed of deployment and employment, awareness, precision, and tactical flexibility - appear to have value in interventions to stop at least low-quality forces from committing large-scale murders, circumstances permitting. With such forces, the risks and costs of such interventions could be lower than the perceived risks and costs of interventions to date, which could incline political leaders more toward action even when no vital or immediate interests are at stake. The United States is developing these capabilities in any case. NATO allies and other countries will or could, with US help, develop these capabilities as well, opening the way to multilateral intervention options. Such promising indications will not lead inevitably to an international "capability" to protect. In order to lay a strong foundation for policies and investments that could produce this capability, we recommend: That the United States government, the UN Security Council, and other interested governments examine individually and together whether emerging capabilities could increase the "capability to protect" and if so what should be done to develop them for this purpose. That NATO examine how its projected Response Force can be used in such contingencies (e.g., in Africa) as well as how to involve NATO "partners" and others (e.g., Africans) in such operations. That the US and international and regional alliances (NATO, UN, EU, ECOWAS, etc.) confer on how to transition from a forceful humanitarian intervention to more traditional peacekeeping operations. That interested foundations sponsor further study of these possibilities That humanitarian nongovernmental organizations take account of these possibilities in their agendas.

Reuters 30 Jul 2003 Tyrants Beware: Luxury Exile Days May Be Numbered Wed July 30, 2003 12:08 PM ET (fixing spelling of Stroessner in sixth paragraph) By Fiona O'Brien NAIROBI (Reuters) - Ugandans say former dictator Idi Amin, now on his deathbed in Saudi Arabia, used to keep the severed heads of rivals in his refrigerator and once placed some on his dining table to remind guests he was not to be crossed. Obese and ill after almost 25 years of comfortable exile in Saudi Arabia, Uganda's "butcher," who also fed the remains of victims to Lake Victoria's crocodiles at one point, appears likely to die unpunished for his crimes. Now in his late 70s, he is not the only tyrant to see out retirement unprosecuted. Haiti's Jean Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier, who fled his island in 1986 after an upsurge of popular protest against his brutal 15-year rule, has been seen driving his red Ferrari around the French Riviera. Ethiopia's Mengistu Haile Mariam, whose "Red Terror" was marked by purges, war and hunger, is on a ranch in Zimbabwe granted refuge by his friend President Robert Mugabe. Uganda's Milton Obote, accused by domestic opponents of being even more brutal than Amin, is in Zambia, while Paraguay's Alfredo Stroessner, who gained a reputation as an iron-fisted leader who sheltered Nazi war criminals, is in Brazil. Liberia's Charles Taylor, wanted for war crimes in Sierra Leone, has been offered asylum in Nigeria. Yet with Amin's death apparently imminent, many Ugandans are asking how such a man has been able to escape scot-free. "While he is calmly exhausting his life-span in the splendor of a Saudi Arabian hospital, our people are breathlessly struggling in the attempt to salvage some life out of the debris of his destruction," a comment in the New Vision newspaper said Wednesday. But while many former tyrants are unlikely ever to face criminal proceedings for their wrongs, analysts say the world today is more intent on trying those once considered immune. "There has been a real sea-change in the attitude of the international community," Amnesty International's Christopher Hall told Reuters. "In the past, crimes were seen as political or diplomatic problems, now they are seen as ordinary crimes of rape, murder, that all states have a duty to investigate and to prosecute." PINOCHET ARREST The 1998 arrest of Chile's Augusto Pinochet in London sent a message that the days of impunity for tyrants were ending, even though he was later released on grounds of poor health. United Nations tribunals for crimes committed in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda have also drummed that point home. More significantly still, analysts say the establishment of an International Criminal Court (ICC) may have set international law on an irreversible course. "Times are changing...exile is becoming harder to find," Human Rights Watch's Reed Brody wrote in a recent editorial. "It is unfortunate that Idi Amin will die in his "tent" without being brought to justice for his crimes, but the world is a smaller and smaller tent. One day the Idi Amins of this world will find they have nowhere to hide." But only about 90 countries -- with the notable exception of the United States -- have so far ratified the ICC, which will be a permanent tribunal to try individuals for the most serious international crimes such as genocide and war crimes. "There is a general movement toward international jurisdiction, but we still have a long way to go," Cambridge University legal expert Anthony Rogers said. He said that for the court to work effectively, states will also have to get over their deep-rooted reluctance to investigate the affairs of other states. In the meantime, Ugandans will have to find their own ways to reconcile the wrongs of Amin's 1971-1979 rule. While many wish they had seen him punished, others say it is best just to try and put the past behind them. "He should be accorded a state burial as a former president," Kampala shop owner Badru Mulongo said. "People say he killed many people but I think there is no leader who has not killed."

Africa

Algeria

BBC 31 Aug 2003 Berber breakthrough in Algeria Berbers want more autonomy The Algerian Government has agreed to include the language of the country's Berber minority, Tamazight, in its educational system. This fulfils one of the demands of Berbers who staged violent protests against the Algerian authorities in Kabylie two years ago, which left 60 people dead and about 2,000 injured. The language will now be included and promoted in the educational system and the institutional consecration of private education at all the levels. Tamazight was recognised as a national language last year after further unrest amongst radical Berbers who were pressing for greater cultural and political recognition, in the country where they claim they represent 25% of the population. Constitutional change However, the government of President Bouteflika said that the recognition of Tamazight, as an official language of the country will require a change in the constitution. The language, is spoken mostly by Berbers and by other ethnic groups in Algeria and Morocco, but at present Arabic is the only official state language. Since independence from France in 1962, the majority Arab community, backed by both the military and Islamist lobbies, have maintained that Arabic must be the sole language to be recognised by the state.

Burundi

AFP 25 Jul 2003 UN staff to return to Burundi capital BUJUMBURA, July 25 (AFP) - Non-essential staff employed by United Nations agencies are to return to the Burundian capital from which they were evacuated during a rebel assault earlier this month, official sources said Friday. The staff were moved out between July 14 and 17 after Hutu rebels launched a major offensive. When the attack began, the UN gave Burundi a "Phase Four" security rating, meaning that regular operations were suspended but emergency programmes were maintained. "The Phase 4 security rating announced on July 14 just for the capital has been reduced to Phase 3," Therence Sinunguruza, the country's foreign relations minister said. "This means all measures are being taken for the return of staff moved out to Nairobi and Kigali." No precise date was given for the return of the UN staff. The news was given at press conference given jointly with Sunil Saigal, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) representative and coordinator of UN agencies in the country. "The return to Phase 3 allows us to resume our operational activities and to continue to do our work, especially in development," Saigal said.

AFP 29 Jul 2003 Burundi rebels say no halt to fighting without overall deal BUJUMBURA, July 29 (AFP) - The leader of a rebel Burundian Hutu group said in Bujumbura Tuesday that there could be no final end to hostilities until a comprehensive deal had been reached with the government. "We cannot put into effect something that does not exist," Salvator Ntacobamaze, leader of a six-person delegation from the rebel Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD), said. "So during the weeks ahead of us we must reach a comprehensive political and military deal which will end fighting in Burundi for good," Ntacombaze, who represents the FDD in Dar-es-Salaam in Tanzania, said. The FDD delegation is made up of two civilians, one of them a woman, and four military personnel. It has been in Bujumbura since Monday to prepare for the FDD, the chief rebel Hutu movement, to take part in the work of the joint ceasefire commission (CMC). Another rebel Hutu group, the National Liberation Forces, which launched an attack on Bujumbura earlier this month, is not involved in the discussions. Burundi's civil war broke out in 1993 pitting rebels from the Hutu majority against their Tutsi rivals, who control the military and held sway over the government until the interim power-sharing regime was installed in November 2001. More than 300,000 people, mostly civilians, have died in the war. "If during two weeks of talks we do not reach agreement the leaders of the warring parties will meet in three weeks, take a decision and submit the final result to the summit of regional heads of state for final adoption," he said. "At that point we can enter the transitional government so the ceasefire agreement can be put into full effect." An apparent breakthrough was made on July 20 in talks in Dar es Salaam sponsored by regional leaders aimed at persuading the Burundian government and the FDD to put into effect the ceasefire agreed on December 3 2002 at Arusha in Tanzania. That agreement was signed by former Burundian president Pierre Buyoya and FDD leader Pierre Nkurunziza but never respected. The FDD has a military presence throughout the country and the two sides accuse each other of violating the ceasefire. "We are optimistic because our arrival in Bujumbura, enemy territory, was essential to give hope to the people of Burundi, the more so since the negotiations which had been stalled since January have been completely relaunched since July 20." "This is the first time we have seen a strict application of what was signed by the government and the FDD," said a diplomat in Bujumbura when the rebel delegation arrived. "It is symbolic but it is very significant and important because it is the first time that a signed agreement has been respected."

Côte d'Ivoire - Also read News Monitors for Côte d'Ivoire from 2002 and 2001

DR Congo

WP 24 July 2003 Massacre In The Congo Despite The UN Exclusive commentary by Frank Salvato Jul 24, 2003 Over 100 mutilated bodies in ten days and there wasn’t anything that could have been done about it. That was the brutal discovery of the French peacekeepers in Bunia and Tchomia in the African nation of Congo. The bodies were of refugees who were trying to flee the violence that has plagued the country for years. This is a perfect example of the impotency of the United Nations and their limited idea of mandated peacekeeping. And they want us in Liberia. The UN mandate limits the French peacekeeper’s role to defending the city, or by our standards the village of Bunia amid the massacres of refugees in areas just outside the mandated area. This isn’t the only French peacekeeping force in Congo; this is an additional peacekeeping force inside the country under the command of the European Union. Curiously, the Congolese have not piled up any mutilated bodies at the French Embassy gates unlike what is happening in Liberia. Meanwhile, the good Reverend Jesse Jackson has taken to his media pulpit preaching to his political flock. He is pontificating that the reason President Bush hasn’t sent our young men and women of the armed forces into action in Liberia is directly related to the issue of race in America. With the slaughters still fresh in the Congolese air we should look at that tragedy and take heed in understanding the lesson that it could teach us whether the good reverend likes it or not. The Congo massacres spotlight the problem of intervening in African civil war. Even with two separate peacekeeping forces in the country the slaughter goes on. One has to ask why? One would have to ask whether the UN resolution mandating the peacekeeping action was a poorly written mandate as was the case in Iraq, whether the intervention was unwelcome but for one side of a struggle between a nations people or whether there is another mass murderer being allowed to remain in power by a counsel of dreamers whose solutions to major problems seems to be mired in fantasy and too little too late. We learned a very painful lesson as a nation when we stood witness to the slaughter of our troops in Mogadishu. Heeding the call of the United Nations once again to be the world’s muscle while they employed another poorly thought out peacekeeping mandate, it became quite obvious that the warring factions in Somalia did not welcome our existence there. Armed with rules of engagement that wouldn’t even allow our troops to engage those who would murder villagers trying to access humanitarian food shipments we stood idly by witnessing the carnage while those under siege begged us to help. With each death they learned to hate the Americans. That hate was effectively placed onto Americans courtesy of the United Nations and their poorly thought out mandate. To make that mistake again would be to have not learned from a disaster experienced. Perhaps we should insist that peace, or some semblance of it, actually be attained before we assume the role of peacekeeper (what a novel idea – peacekeepers keeping the peace instead of having to achieve the peace). It would be more palatable to subject our young men and women to a situation devoid of rag-tag rebels driving SUV’s and toting rocket propelled grenade launchers than it would be to insert them into a situation where both sides want to kill them because of who they are, no matter the reason of why they are there, all to satisfy a UN mandate that won’t work due to its limitations. Either way, it looks as though the UN won’t be doing much of anything about it until at least September 1st when the current mandate expires. Never mind that hundreds more will probably die while the UN plods along on their diplomatic track, talking out the mundane as they feast on the culinary creations of New York’s eateries and exist among the beautiful people. They are quite the humanitarian group, the United Nations Ambassadors. I am sure they could explain it all to the families of those who were butchered outside of Bunia…that is until one of the family members puts a machete through one of their skulls for being an idiot! Frank Salvato is a political media consultant, a freelance writer from the Midwest and the Managing Editor for www.TheRant.us. He is a contributing writer to The Washington Dispatch. He has appeared as a guest panelist on The O’Reilly Factor and his pieces are featured various other sites. He can be contacted at feedback@washingtondispatch.com.

IRIN 31 Jul 2003 DRC: Massacres persist in Ituri, ministerial mission to be dispatched NAIROBI, 31 July (IRIN) - Six people were stoned to death on Wednesday by angry residents of Bunia, the main town of the troubled Ituri District of northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the UN mission in the country, known as MONUC, reported. "The Red Cross recovered the bodies of five men of Lendu ethnicity, and the body of one woman of Nande ethnicity," Leocadio Salmeron, the MONUC spokesman, said. He added, "While the precise reason for these stonings remains unknown, it could be because of their ethnicity." Economically-driven ethnic strife in natural resource-rich Ituri between Hema and Lendu militias caused between 200,000 and 350,000 people to flee when fighting worsened in May, humanitarian sources have reported. The latest killings follows a stream of recent reports from NGOs and local residents regarding massacres in the towns of Fataki, Nizi and Drodro during fighting between the Union des patriotes congolais (UPC), a predominantly Hema militia, and the Front des resistants pour la protection de l'Ituri (FRPI), a predominantly Lendu militia. UPC Secretary-General John Tinanzabo has accused Lendu combatants of the massacre of Hema populations, while Lendu community representatives have accused Hema combatants of mass killings of Lendus. "You cannot talk about massacres having been carried out by Lendus, as it was a question of Lendu combatants of the FRPI fighting against those of the UPC," Labu Mbuba, a Lendu community representative, said in Kinshasa on Wednesday following a recent visit to Ituri. "There have been victims on both sides, as well as among the civilian population," he added. Mbuba said arms continued to circulate freely in Ituri, as well as in Bunia, where a 1,500-strong EU-led multinational peace enforcement mission has banned the carrying of weapons publicly. Meanwhile, President Joseph Kabila and his four vice-presidents have decided to send to Bunia three ministers of the newly installed transitional government, in an effort to calm tensions, according to a communique issued in Kinshasa on Wednesday. Interior, foreign and defence ministers Theophile Mbemba Fundu, Antoine Ghonda Mangalibi and Jean-Pierre Ondekane are to "carry a message of peace and reconciliation", the communiqué said, "and to demonstrate the determination of the government to bring the peace process to every corner of the country". Due to prevailing insecurity, MONUC has been unable to deploy outside Bunia, while the EU-led mission sent to reinforce MONUC until 1 September is not mandated to act outside of the town. However, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted on Monday a resolution giving MONUC a stronger mandate and increasing its authorised strength from 8,700 to 10,800 troops. The council also extended the mission's mandate for another year, until 30 July 2004. In a statement from its New York headquarters, the UN said that in adopting Resolution 1493, the 15-member council also instituted a 12-months arms embargo against foreign and Congolese armed groups in the east of the country. The move was aimed at preventing "the direct or indirect supply, sale or transfer" of arms to armed groups and militias operating in North and South Kivu and in Ituri, areas that have been hit by heavy fighting in recent months.

AFP 30 Jul 2003 Five people killed in troubled DR Congo town of Bunia BUNIA, Democratic Republic of Congo, July 30 (AFP) - Five people were killed, including a man who was stoned to death by a crowd, in the northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) town of Bunia, a French military spokesman said Wednesday. Colonel Gerard Dubois, spokesman for the European Union's peacekeeping force in the DRC, said the stoning victim had died just before the arrival of troops from the UN observer mission (MONUC) on Tuesday. City officials also informed MONUC that four more bodies, some with head injuries, had been found on the streets of the eastern Lembabo area of the town. Dubois said the killings were unlikely to be the work of the militias expelled from Bunia by the French-led force, known as Artemis, which was sent to the northeast of the country as violence mounted in early June. He blamed a "settling of scores" as members of different ethnic and political groups returned to the town, as well as an "absence of police on the ground". The 1,850-strong force mounts patrols and checkpoints around the town day and night, and has thrown its weight behind UN efforts to engage political and community leaders in a meaningful peace process

english.aljazeera.net 16 July 2003 African writing prize goes to Kenyan Wednesday Yvonne Owuor: Wins prize for her short story Kenya’s Yvonne Owuor won the fourth annual Caine Prize for African Writing on Wednesday with a short story related to the aftermath from the 1994 Rwanda genocide. Yvonne, the second Kenyan to win the prize in two years, took the $15,000 prize money with "Weight of Whispers". The authoress said she felt "excited" and "stunned", and spoke of her personal obligation to encourage other people in Africa to write. Her story is narrated by an aristocratic Rwandan refugee who leaves his country because of the massacres that killed 800,000 people. Owuor has also written a screenplay for the Africa Script Development Fund and is currently an Executive Director of the Zanzibar International Film Festival. Oxford award The prize was announced by the chair of the judges, Zanzibari author Abd al-Razzaq Gurnah, at the UK's Oxford University. Gurnah said her story’s “great strength is the subtle and suggestive way it dramatises the condition of the refugee and also successfully incorporates so many large issues.” The story has already been published by a new Kenyan Internet magazine Kwani, set up by last year's Caine winner, Kenyan Binyavanga Wainaina. The prestigious prize is awarded annually for writing by an African author that is published in English. An "African writer" is taken to mean a writer born anywhere in Africa whose work reflects its cultural background. Caine Prize history The Caine Prize is named in memory of the late Sir Michael Caine, former chairman of the Booker Prize management committee for almost 25 years. The winner was announced in July at a dinner in Oxford, to which all the shortlisted candidates were invited. On the short list this year were two South Africans, a Congolese and a Zimbabwean. The point of the prize is not, however, to pigeonhole authors as regional interest writers, but rather to put the spotlight on skilled writers who normally might not get much attention. The story can be read at http://www.kwani.org/.

East African (Kenya) 21 July 2003 Caine Prize: Yvonne Owuor's Weighty Achievement The judges were in no doubt that for the second year in a row a Kenyan deserved to win, writes PAUL REDFERN For the second year in a row a Kenyan has won the prestigious literary Caine prize for African Writing, reflecting the growing stature of East African literature. The fourth Caine Prize for African Writing and a cheque for $15,000 was won by Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor for her story Weight of Whispers. The result was announced at a prestigious dinner held in the Bodleian Library at Oxford University in the UK on July 14. After receiving her award, Yvonne told The EastAfrican that she was "quite delighted," or "gleeful, more like it. But also a sense of responsible relief. And surprise. A mixed bag of emotions and underlying all these, gratitude. "To beloved and so supportive parents for whom this is a vindication, to siblings, my first readers and critics, to the incredible circle of friends in Kenya and abroad, to work colleagues in Zanzibar, and always, to the Caine Prize visionaries – both living and not. To life." Yvonne says that her future plans evolve around "enjoying the moment" and "surfing this wave." "Feel, think and make notes." "Finally complete the last chapters of 'The Novel,' successfully fulfil obligations to the Zanzibar International Film Festival (ZIFF). Also ask the ZIFF board of directors to consider adding a literary component in the Festival of the Dhow Countries 2004. And always, write with gusto." Commenting on the fact that Kenyans have now won the prestigious prize for two years in a row, Yvonne said that the result was "the outcome of a pent-up national need to express in so many different ways. An unanticipated but timely Zeitgeist?" But it was also, she suggested "probably a certain noticeable confidence among Kenyans about who they are and how they want to be given credit for all they have gone through. The literary underground which has been in existence in Kenya is emerging, daring to meet and talk, I guess." The judges, however, were in no doubt that for the second year in a row a Kenyan deserved to win. Dr Abdulrazak Gurnah, the chair of the judges said: "The shortlisted stories in this year's Caine Prize were all worthy winners in their own right. "Weight of Whispers is a story narrated by an aristocratic Rwandan refugee in the aftermath of the 1994 massacres. Its great strength is the subtle and suggestive way it dramatises the condition of the refugee and also successfully incorporates so many large issues." Gurnah, from Zanzibar, was also on last year's panel of judges and teaches literature at the University of Kent. He is the author of six novels, of which Paradise was shortlisted for the 1994 Booker Prize. Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor was born in Nairobi, Kenya, and has a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics in English and History from the Jomo Kenyatta University, Nairobi. She then attended the University of Reading, where she studied for an MA in TV/Video Development. Yvonne has written a screenplay for the Africa Script Development Fund and is currently an Executive Director of the Zanzibar Film Festival. She beat four other short-listed writers from South Africa, Congo and Zimbabwe. Last year, the Caine Prize was awarded to Kenyan writer, Binyavanga Wainaina, for Discovering Home, published online on G21Net (2001). Wainaina has since been accepted for a graduate course in creative writing at UEA and signed up by London agents Curtis Brown. He has set up an Internet magazine, Kwani? to publish work by new Kenyan writers, and one of its first stories was Owuor's. The Caine Prize is named in honour of the late Sir Michael Caine, the former chairman of Booker Plc, who was chairman of the Africa 95 arts festival in Europe and Africa in 1995 and for nearly 25 years, chairman of the Booker Prize management committee. www.nationaudio.com/News/EastAfrican/.

Liberia

AFP 29 Jul 2003 UN rights chief to press criminal prosecutions in Liberia GENEVA, July 29 (AFP) - The UN's top human rights official will ensure that anyone who commits human rights violations in Liberia is prosecuted, possibly using the new international war crimes tribunal, a spokeswoman said on Tuesday. "For the moment, we are rather powerless but we want to condemn everything that is going on there," Annick Stevenson, spokeswoman for the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights told journalists. "The High Commissioner reiterates that those who commit these crimes will each be taken to justice, and that he is ready to play his role in this respect," she added. Stevenson said the UN would turn to the International Criminal Court (ICC), which formally came into being in July last year, if Liberia's judiciary was unable to handle criminal prosecutions. Her comments came as Liberian rebels and government forces continued their bloody showdown in the capital Monrovia, while crowds thronged the streets in search of food and water. "Everything that happens there is a collection of very grave human rights violations, including the fact that civilians cannot find shelter and that food distribution is being stopped," Stevenson said. The fighting has claimed hundreds of lives in the two weeks since the rebel Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) launched its most intense siege of Monrovia since taking up arms against President Charles Taylor nearly five years ago. Up to 200,000 people are living without shelter in the city, and little food or clean water or medicines are available. UN Secretary Kofi Annan said Monday that rebels from the fighting for control of Monrovia were "disqualifying themselves" from playing a role in the country's future. The UN rights chief, Sergio Vieira de Mello, is currently in Iraq serving as the UN's top envoy there, while his deputy, Bertie Ramcharan, acts as High Commissioner.

SAPA 30 July 2003 Monrovians beg rebels to stay 30/07/2003 18:19 - (SA) Print article email story Related Articles Bush: Ball in Liberia's court Refugees caught in crossfire Ceasefire hopes fade Rebels declare ceasefire Taylor counterattacks Liberia: Life goes on Nigeria wants cash pledge New front setback for Taylor Monrovia faces 'serious starvation' US playing waiting game Monrovia - At least 1 500 Liberians held a peace rally Wednesday in Monrovia to urge rebels occupying parts of the city not to retreat until international peacekeepers arrived, several witnesses said. They confirmed by telephone that the rally was held in the rebel-controlled Bushrod Island in the north of the Liberian capital, with estimates of the crowd ranging from 1 500 to 4 500. Raymond Zarbay, a journalist living in the area, said the marchers waved banners saying "We want peace," "We are tired of this senseless war," and "Uncle Sam must come at once." They then marched on the local head office of the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (Lurd) rebel movement, pleading them to stay on as they feared retribution by government forces. Sekou Fofana, Lurd deputy general secretary of civil administration, told Logan Town - handed Lurd a memorandum saying they feared a genocide if the rebels "left them to the mercy of President Charles Taylor's forces". The residents said "the last two times we retreated, Taylor's renegade soldiers went on a violence spree, looting, raping and killing. They want us to stay until peacekeepers arrive to prevent a genocide," Fofana said, adding: "We will remain in order to protect them." Taylor's men will massacre civilians Zarbay said the show of support for Lurd was not under duress. "Some banners are saying that the deaths outside Monrovia attributed to the Lurd by the government are lies." Lurd's Fofana, meanwhile, said his forces would keep up an offensive on two strategic bridges linking northern Monrovia to the government-controlled heart of the city and eastern districts. "We will not leave the bridges. We know Charles Taylor's men. The civilians on our side will be massacred if we leave before foreign peacekeepers come," Fofana said. The United States has so far not responded to international appeals to lead a multinational force in Liberia but said it will send soldiers on a "limited" mission only if Taylor leaves the country. US President George W. Bush has however ordered three US ships to go to the region to act as a backup for a proposed west African peacekeeping force. - Sapa-AFP

CWS 31 Jul 2003 Church World Service www.churchworldservice.org Liberian Church Leaders Ready to Begin Rebuilding a Shattered Society By Chris Herlinger Church World Service ACCRA, GHANA - By turns angry and exasperated by the ongoing war in Liberia and the frustratingly glacial pace of international attention to the crisis there, Liberian church leaders in Ghana are also, by equal measure, ready to begin the work of humanitarian response and peace-building. They say they cannot do that without the assistance of the wider ecumenical Christian community. But they also believe that, ultimately, Liberians must take responsibility for rebuilding a shattered society. "The world has forgotten us, let's return back home and appeal to the conscience of our people," said Bishop John Innis of the United Methodist Church of Liberia and a vice president of the Liberia Council of Churches (LCC), a Church World Service partner. "It will be up to us to solve our problems." Church leaders representing CWS partner agencies in Liberia - some of whom left Liberia during the last week because of security concerns and others who have been in Ghana for nearly two months because of their ongoing participation in Liberian peace talks here -- have met with several CWS staff members this week in Accra to coordinate the next phase of an ongoing humanitarian response in Liberia by CWS and its member denominations. In their meetings with CWS staff, the church leaders have strongly, and often eloquently, made the following points: 1) The warring factions must end their fighting and some type of international peacekeeping force - in all likelihood, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) -- must be in place to guarantee both security for the Liberian people and for the flow of humanitarian assistance to Liberia. "The situation on the ground is now impossible," said Benjamin Lartey, LCC general secretary. "We can't do anything until ECOWAS stabilizes the situation." To say that the church leaders are, at the least, puzzled and, at most, angered by the measured response by the United States and the United Nations to the Liberian crisis is an understatement. "God is watching us," Innis said. "Where are the peace-loving countries, where are the peace-loving peoples? Who cares about Liberia?" Added Peter Kamei, head of the YMCA of Liberia, a CWS partner: "This is a disgrace in our modern era: watching people commit suicide and commit genocide," he said. "We've seen it in Rwanda; we've seen in Burundi. It has to stop." 2) Liberia is facing an unparalleled humanitarian crisis in which perhaps every one of its 3 million citizens will need some kind of emergency assistance in the coming months. One example of the scale of the problem: there are reports of only five doctors now working in the country. "The humanitarian situation is deplorable," Innis said. Based on both personal impressions before they left the country and from ongoing contact with family and colleagues still in the country, church leaders said there will be need of emergency food rations; medicines to curtail an expected cholera epidemic; and measures to clean water in the face of a severe water shortage, brought on in part by warning factions poisoning water wells. "People are drinking anything and becoming sick," said Kamei. Two concrete examples of humanitarian need: Kamei reported that 25 pregnant women were being sheltered at the YMCA in Monrovia and had no food to eat. Those with some food hardly fared better: the Rev. G. Solomon Gueh of the United Methodist Church's Liberia Annual Conference reported seeing one woman in Monrovia hold two handfuls of buckwheat in her hand -food for a group of 18 people for one day, she said. 3) The church must be involved both in current peace efforts and in long-term peace-building work. There is a palpable sense among the church representatives that Liberian political leaders have failed their people but that Liberians themselves must take responsibility for their country's future and emerge stronger and more committed to the work of peace and building stable, sustainable institutions. The church representatives believe that the church must take a central role in efforts to galvanize a shattered society, with particular concern for teen-agers and those younger who have fought in the current conflict. "There are children who aren't in school and are holding guns now; all they know is guns and violence," Innis said. In such an environment, he asked, "Who will be the leaders of tomorrow?"

Nigeria

AFP 29 Jul 2003 Nigeria wants promise of cash before sending troops to Liberia by Ola Awoniyi ABUJA, July 29 (AFP) - Nigeria and the United States are haggling over the cost of sending a west African peacekeeping force to wartorn Liberia, a senior Nigerian official told AFP on Tuesday. President Olusegun Obasanjo, on a visit to London, told reporters that the force's Nigerian vanguard would be in Liberia within a "few days". But in Abuja, officials said that the deployment had been held up by a dispute over who should bear the burden of paying for the deployment. "Nigeria is somewhat reluctant to send in troops without firm guarantees that the expenditure that will be incurred will at least in a substantial part be defrayed by other states and international organisations," an aide to Obasanjo told AFP. Nigeria has vowed to send two mechanised battallions totalling around 1,500 men Liberia, where rebels have closed in on the capital Monrovia in fighting that has claimed hundreds of civilian lives. Negotiators for the largest rebel group -- Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) -- said Tuesday they had called a unilateral ceasefire. But as the humanitarian crisis in the besieged Liberian capital deepens, and as fighting continues, both west African and US officials are dithering over deploying forces. The Nigerian presidential official, who asked not to be named, said Nigeria was unwilling to launch the force without a cast-iron promise that it would not lose out economically. The aide recalled "the painful experience of what happened in Sierra Leone, where Nigeria invested so much both in troops and in materiel on the firm understanding that the international community would recompense it in a substantial way. "Those expectations were not met ... and that is why Nigeria at the present time is reluctant to send in its troops before it receives a reliable guarantee from the international community concerning compensation," he said. Washington has pledged to support a west African force, and three US warships are on their way to the region, but the White House has said it will not put US boots on the ground until a ceasefire is in place and Liberian President Charles Taylor leaves power. Taylor has accepted an offer of asylum in Nigeria but says he will not leave until outside forces are deployed. Speaking at a reception for the outgoing US ambassador to Abuja, Nigeria's Vice President Atiku Abubakar said: "We will move into Liberia. We are ready but we cannot do that alone, we need the support of countries like the United States, Britain and others. "I think the sooner we resolve the problem the better," he added. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the 15-nation bloc that is setting up the proposed force and has called an emergency summit on Thursday, has estimated the total cost of deploying it to Liberia at 105 million dollars (90.6 million euros). So far the United States has promised 10 million dollars towards the cost of employing a private US engineering and logistics firm to bring the Nigerian troops into Monrovia. Sources in the Ghanaian capital Accra, where US and west African officers met Monday to discuss a timetable for sending in troops, told AFP that Nigeria was holding out for at least 50 million dollars. Obasanjo's aide said: "The offer that has so far been made by the United States government is presumed to be only an initial offer which Nigeria expects to be raised in the ongoing discussions." Previously Nigerian officials had insisted that the main reason for the delay in deploying the force was fears for its safety, as both Liberian government and rebel forces have ignored previous calls for a ceasefire. Nigeria contributed the bulk of the troops and commanders to two previous ECOWAS peacekeeping forces that deployed to Liberia and neighbouring Sierra Leone in the 1990s. Many in Nigeria have long claimed that their country -- the most populous in Africa and the continent's biggest exporter of crude oil -- had been left to pick up the tab for the multinational missions. Last year the former commander of the former ECOWAS force said that he had lost 800 men during the previous conflict in Liberia, and Nigerian leaders have long complained of having been saddled with the bill.

South Africa

BBC 2 July 2003 USA SUSPENDS MILITARY AID TO SOUTH AFRICA OVER IMMUNITY ISSUE Johannesburg, 1 July: The United States announced on Tuesday (1 July) that it has suspended military aid to South Africa because the country will not give Americans immunity from prosecution by the new International Criminal Court in The Hague. The announcement by the American State Department in Washington comes exactly a week before President George Bush's state visit to South Africa. South Africa is one of 35 countries blacklisted by US on Tuesday. It is the only one of the five countries on the itinerary for Bush's African tour to be blacklisted. Botswana, Uganda, Senegal and Nigeria (the other African countries to be visited by Bush) all retained military funding by signing immunity deals with the US. (Passage omitted) Approached for comment, South African Foreign Ministry spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa said the government was still studying the announcement. "We will comment later... (ellipsis as published) we are currently studying the implications of that decision," Mamoepa said. Bush, accompanied by his Secretary of State Colin Powell, is due to arrive in South African on 8 July for a two-visit. He is due to be given an official welcome by President Thabo Mbeki on 9 July at the Union Buildings ahead of talks with his South African counterpart.

Independent SA 21 July 2003 Family massacre sparks fears of vigilantism July 21 2003 at 02:10AM By Xolani Mbanjwa & Sapa Six members of one family, including an 18-month-old baby, were shot dead as they slept in their Empangeni home at the weekend. The killings are the latest in a string of violent onslaughts in the area and have sparked fears of vigilante attacks by a community fed up with escalating crime. Police spokesperson Musa Khaba said on Sunday that the Majola family were asleep around 11.30pm on Saturday when gunmen knocked on the door of their home in Mevamhlophe. 'We are not going to release the names of the other two survivors because we fear for their lives' Thinking the callers were police officers, a member of the family opened the front door. The attackers burst in and began firing at random. The dead include grandfather Muntungethuke Majola, 64, his daughters Sihle Majola, 22, and Sindisiwe Majola, 27, and his son Sipho Majola, 34. Muntungethuke's wife, Busisiwe Majola, 63, was admitted to hospital with a gunshot wound in the forehead and her son, Sipho, was shot in the back while trying to run away. Sihle's 18-month-old son, Qiniso Hlongwane, and Sindisiwe's 11-year-old son, Themba Manyathi, were also killed. Both children were sleeping in their mothers' beds. Sihle's youngest son, nine-month-old Nhlonipho, was not injured. 'At the moment it is a criminal matter until we prove the contrary' "We are not going to release the names of the other two survivors because we fear for their lives," Khaba said. The number of attackers and the motive for the attack was not known, but police were treating it as a criminal matter "until we prove the contrary", Khaba said. "We are busy with investigation and several clues are being followed." Khaba said the community of Empangeni had been shocked by the attack. "We fear that locals, who have vowed to avenge the attack, will take the law into their own hands through vigilantism." There have been five vigilante-type attacks in the area since May. The gunmen did not steal anything from the Majola home. Ten detectives from nearby Empangeni and at least 15 uniformed members of the town's Crime Combating Unit were at the scene on Sunday. A reward of R250 000 has been offered to anyone with information leading to the successful arrest and conviction of the assailants.

Daily News SA 24 July 2003 3 arrested over KZN family massacre July 24 2003 at 12:43PM By Bongani Mthembu Three men have been arrested in connection with the killing of six members of the Majola family at Mevamhlophe in Empangeni on Saturday evening. The massacre of the family members shocked the community and led to a major manhunt. Gunmen stormed into the family's home and randomly opened fire on the occupants. A nine-month-old baby escaped unscathed. Acting on information from the community, members of the KwaMashu Murder Unit launched an investigation and made three arrests in two separate areas this week. KwaMashu police communication officer Inspector Velaphi Zulu said two men from Nkandla and one from Mtubatuba were arrested. "One suspect was arrested at Richmond Farm taxi rank in town on Tuesday. And, when the operation continued on Thursday, two suspects were arrested in Richmond Farm, an informal settlement near KwaMashu, north of Durban. Two suspects were detained at KwaMashu police station and the other one in Phoenix cells," said Zulu. A reward of R250 000 was offered by police for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the gunmen. This article was originally published on page 1 of The Daily News on July 24, 2003

Americas

United States

AFP 2 July 2003 US suspends 47 million dollars in military aid to 35 nations over ICC, MATTHEW LEE, WASHINGTON, July 1 The United States on Tuesday put monetary muscle behind its vehement opposition to the International Criminal Court (ICC), suspending more than 47 million dollars in military aid to 35 countries for their failure or refusal to give US citizens immunity from the tribunal. The suspension affects US allies like Brazil, Colombia and South Africa, the Baltic states as well as NATO hopefuls such as Bulgaria, Croatia, Slovakia and Slovenia, officials said. However, they stressed that Washington would continue to press these nations to sign immunity deals, so-called "Article 98" agreements, with the United States so that the assistance could be restored. "Our hope is to continue to work with governments to secure and ratify Article 98 agreements that protect American service members from arbitrary or political prosecution by the international court," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said. "It remains an important part of national policy," he told reporters. "We have made this an issue. It's an important issue to the United States. It will continue to be an important issue." The United States fears the court, the world's first permanent international court to try cases of warcrimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, could become a forum for politically motivated prosecutions of US citizens and has been on a worldwide campaign to sign immunity deals. Under US law, most of the 90 countries that signed and ratified the Treaty of Rome, which created the ICC, had until July 1 deadline to ink Article 98 deals with the United States or face the sanctions. The 19 members of NATO, as well as the US-designated "major non-NATO allies" -- Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Egypt, Israel, Japan, Jordan, New Zealand, South Korea and soon, the Philippines -- were exempted from the threat of sanctions as was Taiwan. Those nations not receiving automatic exemptions that receive US military aid could avoid the suspension by signing Article 98 pacts, which some 51 nations have done, 44 publicly and seven secretly, according to officials. President George W. Bush on Tuesday granted Article 98 waivers to 22 nations that would have otherwise been penalized under the provisions of the American Service Members Protection Act. Those countries are: Afghanistan, Albania, Bolivia, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Botswana, Djibouti, Democratic Republic of Congo, East Timor, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Honduras, Macedonia, Mauritius, Mongolia, Nigeria, Panama, Romania, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tajikistan and Uganda. Countries not appearing on that list that receive US military assistance and have ratified the Rome treaty are subject to the aid suspension, officials said. The White House did not release the names of the countries affected by the sanctions, but Boucher said a total of 47.6 million dollars in funding allocated to 35 countries in fiscal 2003, which ends on October 1, had been suspended. According to a list sent to US lawmakers, those nations are: Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Benin, Brazil, Bulgaria, Central African Republic, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Dominica, Ecuador, Estonia, Fiji, Latvia, Lesotho, Lithuania, Malawi, Mali, Malta, Namibia, Niger, Paraguay, Peru, Samoa, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, St Vincent and Grenadines, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Zambia. The amount of suspended aid to each individual country was not immediately available. The United States provides more than four billion dollars a year in foreign military assistance so the total amount affected by the suspension is not particularly large. But the cut-off in funding, especially to US allies like Colombia, is expected to send a political message. Most US assistance to Colombia is designated for anti-narcotics programs but Washington has moved to increase the amount of counter-insurgency aid it gives to Bogota. About five million dollars of those funds has been blocked because of the sanctions, Boucher said. An international human rights watchdog accused the United States of using bullying tactics to force smaller countries to sign the Article 98 agreements. "US officials are engaged in a worldwide campaign pressing small, vulnerable and often fragile democratic governments," according to a letter from Human Rights Watch to US Secretary of State Colin Powell made public Tuesday.

AP 31 July 2003 Bond set for former Nazi guard An immigration judge on Thursday set bond at $50,000 for a man accused of serving as a Nazi guard at a World War II concentration camp and lying about it on immigration papers. The US Department of Justice intends to appeal Judge Larry Dean's ruling, said Gina Balaya, spokeswoman for the US attorney's office in Detroit. Authorities arrested Johann Leprich, 77, at his home in Macomb County's Clinton Township north of Detroit on July 1. The federal government is seeking to deport him. Leprich had been a fugitive since 1987, when his US citizenship was revoked because officials found he had misrepresented his military service on his application for naturalization, which was granted in 1958. Leprich served during the war in the Nazi Death's Head Battalion and worked as a guard at the Mauthausen concentration camp, officials said. Federal law forbids granting US citizenship to any concentration camp guard or worker. His attorney, William Dance, did not immediately return a telephone call seeking comment. Leprich will remain in custody until the appeal litigation is resolved.

KSFY, South Dakota 30 July2003 1890 Massacre Museum A new museum at Wall will try to educate people about the 1890 massacre that killed hundreds of American Indians at Wounded Knee. On the morning of December 29th, 1890, about 300 Lakota men, women and children were killed in a U.S. military operation at Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. The museum's working with the Wounded Knee community to encourage tourists to visit the actual massacre site.

Las Vegas Mercury 31 July 2003 Books: The other Sept. 11 By Geoff Schumacher The Mountain Meadows Massacre should be as familiar to Americans as Custer's last stand or the Donner Party tragedy, but it's not. Sally Denton and Will Bagley are trying to change that with excellent new books delving into one of the darkest episodes in U.S. history. On Sept. 11, 1857, at Mountain Meadows, just outside Cedar City, Utah, leading members of the Mormon Church brutally and systematically murdered more than 120 emigrants from Arkansas who were traveling to California to make a new life. Because the 17 survivors of the massacre were all very young children, the church at first was able to keep the incident a secret. When word began to leak out, the Mormon leaders concocted a story blaming the local Paiute Indians for the slaughter in retaliation for the emigrant party's supposed poisoning of their wells and cattle. That "clumsy" story, however, failed to hold up over time, and across the nation politicians, newspaper editors and an angry public demanded that the true perpetrators be punished. Mormon leaders, who controlled the Utah territory, worked to stymie and derail efforts to track down and prosecute the participants. In the end, 20 years after the massacre, just one of the conspirators, John D. Lee, was prosecuted for his role in the crime. The massacre was big news in the 1860s and 1870s as newspapers reported on emerging details about the incident and Lee's two trials and execution by firing squad. But today few people are aware of what happened at Mountain Meadows, in part because church leaders worked to suppress the story well into the 1930s. The event's lack of staying power in the public mind is reminiscent of the story of Seabiscuit, the amazing racehorse that was one of the most inspiring stories of the Depression era yet was largely forgotten for decades until the publishing of a recent best-seller and the release of a popular movie. One hopes Denton and Bagley's books will have the same effect with the Mountain Meadows Massacre. The authors have the same basic focus: what happened at Mountain Meadows, why it happened and who was involved. They both sift through evidence, hearsay and legend--lamenting censored and destroyed church records--and piece together a fascinating narrative of events leading up to the massacre, details of the horrible event and the convoluted aftermath. In the end, they reach roughly the same conclusion: Church leader Brigham Young either ordered the massacre or encouraged a "culture of violence" within the church hierarchy that made it an acceptable act. "Within the context of the era and the history of Brigham Young's complete authoritarian control over his domain and his followers, it is inconceivable that a crime of this magnitude could have occurred without direct orders from him," Denton asserts. "Virtually every federal officer who became involved in future investigations of the massacre would conclude that Young personally ordered the atrocity, used his position to shield the killers who had followed his instructions, and personally directed the elimination of all evidence incriminating himself and his closest advisers." Bagley's mission is even more directed to finding a link between Young and the massacre, yet, lacking a smoking gun, he stops just short of Denton's definitive conclusion. Still, he is no apologist: "Claiming that Brigham Young had nothing to do with Mountain Meadows is akin to arguing that Abraham Lincoln had nothing to do with the Civil War." Bagley focuses heavily on the church's practice of "blood atonement," which justified shedding the blood of sinful Mormons "as an atonement for their sins." Just before the massacre, Brigham Young had initiated a fiery reformation effort in an attempt to renew his flock's "commitment to righteousness and to the kingdom." And, Bagley notes, "nowhere did the fires of Reformation burn as brightly as in Iron County," home of Mountain Meadows. Denton, meantime, targets the "Danites," or "Avenging Angels," a secret group of Mormon loyalists organized under church founder Joseph Smith who intimidated dissenters and warred against anti-Mormon militias, as the primary perpetrators of blood atonement--and the Mountain Meadows Massacre. During the Reformation, she writes, they were responsible for a "reign of terror" that resembled the Salem witch trials. Both authors spend considerable time discussing how the massacre went down, leaving none of the gory details untold. They describe the mind-numbing double-cross in which the Mormons convinced the emigrants to accept a truce and give up their arms, only to subsequently shoot them at point-blank range. While sensational in nature, these details help us understand just how horrifying this event was, and why the church worked so hard to keep it quiet. Bagley writes of the harrowing butchery: "One witness `saw children clinging around the knees of the murderers, begging for mercy and offering themselves as slaves for life could they be spared. But their throats were cut from ear to ear as an answer to their appeal.'" Denton describes the gathering of booty afterward: "The meadow was a sea of mutilated bodies and bloody debris. Wagons were now dismantled and featherbeds ripped open in search of gold; utensils, tools, and home furnishings that had been strewn about were collected. The plunder proceeded with a strange quiet. Women from Cedar City and nearby settlements arrived to remove the calico dresses and lace pinafores of the women and children, pulling off their expensive shoes, and ripping earrings, brooches, and rings off the corpses. ... The bodies were piled in heaps with little or no attempt to bury them." Overall, Denton, who grew up in Southern Nevada and co-wrote the myth-piercing Las Vegas history The Money and the Power, does a better job of placing the massacre within the context of American history, succinctly outlining the church's founding and evolution and the nation's hostile response to the Mormons' unorthodox beliefs. She explains how the relentless persecution of Mormons in other states helped foster a strong "us vs. them" mentality among church followers. She outlines how various U.S. presidents reacted to and interacted with the Mormon leadership, and how the Civil War interrupted efforts to prosecute the killers. Bagley, a Salt Lake City journalist, is the detail man. While Denton provides an eloquent narrative, Bagley takes a more academic, investigative approach, exploring the numerous conflicting stories about the massacre and determining which are more credible. At times, Denton finds herself quoting Bagley to explain a nuance among conflicting accounts. I read the books in the wrong order. Denton's book should come first, giving readers a dramatic narrative to follow and a solid historical overview of the massacre. For those who wish to plunge more deeply into the subject, Bagley is your next stop. Denton and Bagley, both with family ties to the Mormon Church, do an admirable job of stressing that the Mountain Meadows Massacre should not serve as an indictment of all members of the Mormon faith, past or present. They note that many church members of conscience refused to participate in the massacre and condemned those who did. "It would be part of the larger historical tragedy of Mountain Meadows that the outside world would level collective blame and guilt at Mormons in general," Denton writes. "For there were untold members of faithful and believing Mormons profoundly disturbed by the church's role in the slaughter and the subsequent dissembling." The massacre is an important historical event, of value and interest to readers everywhere. But it is particularly poignant in this part of the country, where it occurred and where remnants of its bitter aftermath linger. It is haunting to think that the Arkansas emigrants who camped at Mountain Meadows were resting up before the arduous desert journey to their next major stop-off--the spring-fed meadow of Las Vegas. Nevada residents and officials also played ancillary roles in various aspects of the drama, including Mark Twain, who wrote extensively about the massacre for Virginia City's Territorial Enterprise. Mountain Meadows, like so many other tragedies, must not be forgotten or ignored. Just as we remember the Holocaust, the Oklahoma City bombing (which supplanted Mountain Meadows as the largest civilian atrocity in U.S. history) and the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, we must remember Mountain Meadows as a prime example of religious fanaticism gone terribly awry. "Mountain Meadows was a crime of true believers," Bagley writes in a sobering allusion to other crimes against humanity. Just as we should not condemn all Muslims for the 9/11 terrorist attacks, we must distinguish the zealous group of Mormons who perpetrated the Mountain Meadows Massacre from the millions of Latter-Day Saints then and now who lead virtuous, peaceful lives and would never even consider engaging in such savagery. Yet as much as Mountain Meadows is a painful blot on Mormon history, an incident many of the faithful would rather see buried, it must not be ignored or spun to put a better face on the church. It happened, and the task now is to learn from it. Denton, in a recent op-ed column for the New York Times, explains that the Mormon Church to this day refuses to claim responsibility for the tragedy. "At a time when religions around the world are acknowledging and atoning for past sins, the massacre has left the Mormon Church in a quandary," she writes. "Roman Catholics have apologized for their silence during the Holocaust, United Methodists for their massacre of American Indians during the Civil War, Southern Baptists for their support of slavery, and Lutherans for Martin Luther's anti-Jewish remarks. But unlike the leaders of other religions, who are believed to be guided by the hand of God, Mormon prophets are considered to be extensions of him." In other words, she says, the dilemma for Mormons is that questioning or condemning the actions of the prophet Brigham Young is the equivalent of questioning or condemning God. Still, as Denton notes, "without a sustained attempt at accountability and atonement, the church will not escape the hovering shadow of that horrible crime." Perhaps the serious, clear-eyed works of Denton and Bagley will spur a renewed movement to remove that shadow.

www.idahostatesman.com 29 July 2003 Worst massacre on the Oregon Trail involved attacks and a touch of cannibalism Fort Hall, reproduced in this painting by Bethel M. Farley, was a trading post for trappers and emigrants from 1834 to 1856. Photo courtesy of Idaho State Historical Society Fort Boise, erected in 1834 by the Hudson´s Bay Company, served as a post exchange for trappers and emigrants until 1856. California has its Donner Party. Idaho has its Utter Disaster. The Utter Disaster was the worst massacre emigrants suffered the entire length of the 3,000-mile Oregon Trail. It had all the angles that make for a chilling drama: Indians on the warpath, soldiers who failed in the call of duty … and a bout of cannibalism. The Utter party—or, the Otter party, as it is also sometimes called—started out innocently enough when a party of eight wagons left Wisconsin on a bright clear day in May in 1860. The party included Elijah Utter, his wife Abagal and their 10 children, their 16 head of cows, four yoke oxen and family dog. Indian attacks the year before near the City of Rocks and American Falls had spurred the U.S. Army to escort wagon parties over the Snake River Plains. And, indeed, an escort did accompany the Utter party from Fort Hall to what is now Rock Creek near Twin Falls. There, the escort told the emigrants they were out of danger. Four dragoons whose enlistment was up remained with the party, assuring them they could protect them, even though they had no horses or guns. At Three Island Crossing near Glenns Ferry they opted not to risk crossing the Snake River, even though it meant following a longer drier route. They were following this route on Sept. 9 in the vicinity of Castle Creek between Murphy and Grand View when they came upon a grave that Indians had plundered. A mile later a hundred Indians came over the hill cloaked in a cloud of dust. Elijah Utter and Alexis Van Ornum circled the wagons. When the Indians couldn´t stampede the livestock, they indicated they would let the party go in exchange for some flour, sugar and other foodstuff. But the train had hardly started up again than the Indians, led by a white man colored to look like an Indian, attacked a second time. Meanwhile, the dragoons fled—on the emigrants´ horses, no less. It was revealed later that one had deserted the army; the others were rank cowards. On the second day of fighting, the Indians killed Mary Utter, the eldest Utter daughter. Then they shot Elijah Utter as he tried to signal that they could have everything if they would just leave the emigrants alone. His wife and three of the couple´s children refused to leave his side as other emigrants fled. Emeline, at 13, headed out into the “pathless wilderness” with a nursing baby and four other siblings. With the Indians preoccupied, the 28 surviving emigrants—16 of them children— journeyed along the river hiding in willow clumps. Eventually, the survivors reached the vicinity of the Old Fort Boise trading post near Parma, which had been deserted following the 1854 Ward Massacre. Too weak to go further, they made camp at the mouth of the Owyhee River. On Oct. 2, two boys who had been cut off from the wagon train during the initial attack reached the Umatilla agency south of Fort Walla Walla. When the Army found the Utter party 12 days later, Emeline was three days from death. It was clear that the 12 who remained had eaten the remains of four children who had starved to death.

nbc5.com Bank 29 July 2003 Apologizes For Hitler Reference Online Newsletter Praises Hitler's Economics CHICAGO -- A suburban bank was apologizing to its customers and bank staff Tuesday night for a newsletter that many have called disturbing. The newsletter, reported NBC5's Phil Rogers, was written by the bank president and praised Adolph Hitler. The Glenview State Bank has tens of thousands of customers, Rogers said, and many are wondering about the motive behind the newsletter. "What everyone agrees was monumentally poor judgment," Rogers said, now has the bank not only talking about the mistake, but is offering to give their critics a forum. The newsletter, published by the Glenview State Bank, has unleashed a firestorm of emotions. "Unless this man is fired," said bank customer Kathy Posner, "I don't give any credence to anything that the bank is doing." The man in question is bank president David Raub. He wrote in his July newsletter on the bank's Web site about what Hitler had done for Germany's economy in the '30s. "He gave the German people an arrogant belief in their own superiority and destiny. That belief would eventually help to destroy them, but during the depression, it helped businessmen to cast aside their doubts, hire workers and invest for the future," Raub wrote. "And it led German workers to work harder than anyone else in Europe." The article went on to say, "Hitler knew that public confidence is a vital ingredient for economic growth." "This was simply a stupid error of monumental proportions," said Richard Hirschhaut (pictured, left), of the Anti-Defamation League. Hirschhaut wrote a response letter to the bank declaring that Hitler's economic policies cannot be separated from his other tactics of racism and genocide. He pointed out that his goal was not to build a stable economy, but to dominate the world. "To write of Hitler without the context of millions of innocents brutally murdered," wrote Hirschhaut, "is an insult to all of their memories." "How can one analyze, on an objective basis, Nazi economic policies or Hitler's economic policies without looking at those who were forced off the economic rolls -- the repression, the brutality?" Hirschhaut asked. A lot of companies faced with potentially damaging public relations like this would batten down the hatches, Rogers said, but that's not what they've done in Glenview. "In fact," he said, "they've done just the opposite." "My first full-time job was fighting Hitler. So, I know what a monster he was," bank chairman John Jones (pictured, left), Raub's boss, said. He told Rogers that the newsletter has been withdrawn and that, in its place, an apology has been posted on the bank's Web site. Jones is also posting the entire text of the ADL's critical letter, as well. "You make mistakes and you have to acknowledge them and learn by them and ask for forgiveness. And that's what we're doing," Jones said. The ADL says it accepts the bank's sentiments as sincere, Rogers said, calling incidents like this "teachable moments". Jones told NBC5 that "we know we made a mistake, and we know we're all one community."

Chicago Sun Times Bank apologizes for citing Hitler July 30, 2003 BY TAMMY CHASE Business Reporter Advertisement Glenview State Bank executives apologized to Jewish people on the bank's Web site Tuesday night, after a bank newsletter to customers praised Adolf Hitler as an economic leader of the 1930s. "We sincerely apologize for this error. We did not intend to offend anyone. Please forgive us for this mistake," the 83-year-old suburban bank said Tuesday. It said it received "many" letters and phone calls from upset people. The apology came after the Chicago chapter of the Anti-Defamation League started getting complaints about the bank's July newsletter and the bank president's depiction of Hitler as an economic leader--arguments that the author, who is the bank president, compared to the performance of today's U.S. economy. The bank pulled the Web site version of the newsletter Tuesday morning after the league said people had contacted the group to complain. Anti-Defamation League regional director Richard Hirschhaut said he requested the apology during a conversation he had Tuesday with the bank's main owners, which include bank holding company Chairman and Chief Executive John Jones and bank President Raub. "Hitler's economic policies cannot be divorced from his great policies of virulent anti-Semitism, racism and genocide," Hirschhaut wrote in a letter to the bank. "There are really no circumstances under which Hitler should be held as a good model." In the 1,500-word newsletter, Raub talks of how Hitler was the only major leader during the 1930s who successfully resuscitated his country's economy when others such as President Franklin Roosevelt could not, and "led German workers to work harder than anyone else in Europe." "The Great Depression of the 1930's saw falling prices, staggering unemployment and shattered stock markets all over the world, and the world's leading statesmen seemed helpless to defeat it. Except for one," the newsletter reads. "His name was Adolph Hitler. Unlike France and Britain, and unlike the United States, Germany spent most of the 1930's growing economically, not declining. If we can understand why Depression-era Germany resisted the disease, we may better understand how alarmed we should be today in the 21st century." Raub said Hitler avoided deflation unlike other European nations and reduced unemployment. This year, our economy has been beaten up by war, sluggish auto sales and stagnant business spending, Raub said. Yet consumers keep spending money, and the stock market has gone up, a sign that confidence is up in America. He suggests that confidence remains high because American companies "moved very, very quickly to fix their problems after the 'bubble' burst in the year 2000" and because taxes are falling. The point of the newsletter? Glenview's investment managers are confident, "and that's why we're buying and holding our favorite long-term growth stocks," the newsletter ends. In an interview, Raub said he's written monthly newsletters for 15 years, and always seeks to apply examples of economy history to current events. His July newsletter, he said, "was a miserable failure." The bank also apologized for a remark Raub made regarding Palestine. In the newsletter, he said "America is showing that it stands for something more than its most narrow self-interest by taking on thankless jobs in Palestine, Africa and Iraq." The bank's apology and the Anti-Defamation League's letter are posted at www.gsb.com. Jones said he didn't know if the bank would take any other actions after posting the apology, saying Tuesday he would take things "one step at a time." Raub said he'll continue to write newsletters. Glenview is owned by Cummins-American Corp., which is based in Mount Prospect. According to Hoover's Online, Mount Prospect-based Cummins-American has another division that makes coin sorters, scanners, check imprinters and paper shredders. It also produces computer software. The Jones family owns a majority of the company, Hoover's said. It ranked the 36th-largest bank in the Chicago metropolitan area as of June 2002, based on deposits of $621.4 million, according to SNL Financial.

ft.com 31 July 2003 History lesson? What bank president would want to praise Adolf Hitler to his clients? One in suburban Chicago. David Raub wrote in Glenview State Bank's monthly newsletter: "The Great Depression of the 1930s saw falling prices, staggering unemployment and shattered stock markets all over the world, and the world's leading statesmen seemed helpless to defeat it. "Except for one. His name was Adolph (sic) Hitler. Unlike France and Britain, and unlike the United States, Germany spent most of the 1930s growing economically, not declining. If we can understand why Depression-era Germany resisted the disease, we may better understand how alarmed we should be today in the 21st century." Understandably, this drew a response from the Anti-Defamation League. After pointing out how flawed the octogenarian Raub's economic analysis was, the ADL reminded him that economic growth was not Hitler's aim. "His ultimate goals as a fascist dictator were not to rebuild Germany as a stable economic powerhouse, but to dominate the world by unparalleled violence and order it to his vision of Aryan racial superiority," the ADL's Richard Hirschhaut wrote in a letter that was posted on the bank's website. What was the bank's response to the outcry? "We did not intend to offend anyone. Please forgive us for this mistake."

UPI 30 July 2003 Bank apologizes for praising Hitler GLENVIEW, Ill., July 30 (UPI) -- A suburban Chicago bank is apologizing for praising Adolf Hitler's economic policies in its July newsletter to customers. Glenview State Bank, the 36th largest in the Chicago metropolitan area, posted the apology on its Web site late Tuesday, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. "We sincerely apologize for this error. We did not intend to offend anyone. Please forgive us for this mistake," the 83-year-old bank said after receiving letters from a number of people upset by the reference. Richard Hirschhaut, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, told the Sun-Times the ADL had received a number of complaints and wrote the bank, saying, "Hitler's economic policies cannot be divorced from his great policies of virulent anti-Semitism, racism and genocide. There are really no circumstances under which Hitler should be held as a good model." The 1,500-word newsletter was written by the bank's president and praised Hitler for reviving the German economy when the other western economies still were floundering. It also compared the Germany economy of the '30s to the current U.S. economy.

Asia-Pacific

Sydney Morning Herald 2 July 2003 Muddle over genocide must be resolved July 2 2003 Confusion and differences over a legal definition compromise international law, writes Raimond Gaita. Some people believe the invasion of Iraq has severely damaged the prospects for international law. Others hope it will provoke a deeper and more broadly based discussion of the authority and integrity of institutions like the International Criminal Court. May the latter prove right. The world needs such institutions if, in the spirit of Nuremberg, the community of nations is to hold to account persons guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. Many of the activists - political and judicial - who have fought for the development of international law are driven by a passion to ensure that respect for sovereignty should not prevent the prosecution of political and military leaders who are guilty of such crimes. Unfortunately the passion to bring these criminals to account is not always matched by a passion to understand the nature of their crimes. This has, I suspect, undermined the credibility of international law. Who, for example, does not deplore the misuse of the word "genocide"? Muddle over what it means, and politically motivated exploitation of that muddle have played a large part in discrediting international institutions that would charge people with genocide and punish them if they were to be found guilty. Belief that genocide is the worst of crimes is almost universal and shows itself in political arguments over the application of the concept. We cannot hold that belief, however, if we accept the definition of genocide in the 1948 UN Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. It allows that genocide can be committed even though not one person is murdered in the service of genocidal intention. To be consistent, we must either abandon the belief that genocide is the gravest of the crimes against humanity or modify the convention more seriously than most jurists would contemplate. Two controversies about genocide run side by side, seldom engaging with each other. The first is among lawyers who accept the definition of the convention (more or less) but who argue about whether other groups should be included as possible victims - gays, certain categories of the disabled or political groups, for example. The second is among philosophers, social scientists, historians and political theorists and it is marked by the fact that they argue about whether there must be murder if there is to be genocide. When these groups meet to discuss genocide, lawyers often show bemused incredulity at the suggestion that the concept's application should be constrained by its adequacy to a morally saturated political experience, more than 50 years old, but which we have not yet understood. Confronted seriously for the first time with the crimes we have come to know collectively as the Holocaust, Winston Churchill was moved to speak of "a crime without a name". In 1943 Raphael Lemkin delivered the word "genocide" to the world, but it was Nuremberg, the successor trials in Europe and the trial of Adolf Eichmann, that gave us our deepest discussion of it. After the Holocaust many people were overwhelmed by a sense that they were confronted with a new crime which humanity needed to bring into the space of a common understanding even if aspects of it would always defeat attempts to do so. Not long ago Australians argued over whether genocide was committed when children of mixed blood were taken from their parents. Sometimes the policy was motivated by racist disdain for the Aborigines, enacted brutally and with the intention that the race should cease to exist. Volatile and often nasty, the argument was not - as the present argument over whether there was a Tasmanian genocide is - about the facts. Nor was it, in any narrow sense, about the law. The argument was philosophical and moral, enlivened by the question whether a criminal category whose paradigm is the Holocaust could apply to what was done to the children and their parents. If it could, then one would have to conclude that genocide was probably not the worst crime committed against the Aborigines. Some people find that too paradoxical to accept. Muddle over such a serious criminal category matters. If we stretch it beyond the moral reach of its horrific paradigms, then serious injustice will be done to those convicted of it. And - perhaps as importantly - our efforts to understand a critical and novel element of our political experience will be subverted, perhaps beyond redemption. Humanity understands itself partly by the crimes it knows itself to be capable of. We must strive, therefore, to give them their right names. The integrity of international law depends on it. Raimond Gaita is professor of philosophy at the Australian Catholic University, and professor of moral philosophy at University of London King's College. He is a keynote speaker at the Activating Human Rights and Diversity Conference, organised by Southern Cross University, being held in Byron Bay this week.

Cambodia

Kyodo JP 2 July 2003 Widow of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot dies at 83 Wednesday, July 2, 2003 at 08:30 JST PHNOM PENH — Khieu Ponary, the first wife of deceased Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, died Tuesday at age 83, the son of Ieng Sary, Pol Pot's brother-in-law, said. Khieu Ponary, who had suffered from mental illness and breast cancer, died in Pailin, the former Khmer Rouge stronghold in northwestern Cambodia, Ieng Vudh told Kyodo News by telephone. (Kyodo News)

India

29 July 2003 Blast rips through bus in Mumbai By Mahesh Vijapurkar The wreck of the bus after an explosion ripped through it in Ghatkopar, Mumbai, on Monday. — PTI MUMBAI JULY 28. A powerful explosive device went off on a local bus in suburban Ghatkopar at 9.12 tonight killing one person and injuring over 30 persons, four of them critically. (Agencies put the toll at three.) The blast forced the authorities to sound an alert in Nasik, 200 km away, where several lakh people are expected to come for a holy dip in the Godavari river during the Khumb Mela beginning on Thursday. The explosion on the moving bus was reminiscent of the one near the same place on December 2 last year, followed by three more the following weeks. It ripped through the bus, wrecking it and damaged an autorickshaw that was just behind. Traffic in the vicinity too felt the impact of the blast. The bus was making its routine trip between Ghatkopar and Andheri. Apparently, the device was placed under a seat at the rear. No one has so far claimed responsibility for the blast, but suspicion centred on the ISI of Pakistan and the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) which, according to authorities, has "close ties with subversive organisations across the border." Moments after the incident, residents of Ghatkopar who gathered at the spot expressed annoyance that blasts were occurring so frequently in the metropolis. In connection with the series of blasts — on December 6, 2002, on January 27 and March 13 this year — 23 persons have been arrested and judicial proceedings have begun against them under stringent legal provisions. The Shiv Sena and the BJP called a `Mumbai bandh' on July 30 to protest against the explosion.

The Hindu 30 July 2003 Kerala: 150 chargsheeted in Marad massacre Kozhikode, July. 30 (UNI): Rounding up the investigations into the May two massacre of nine people at Marad as a "revenge action" and denying any involvement of outside agencies, the Special Crime Branch team filed chargesheet against 150 accused before a local court today. The 44-page common chargesheet, under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, Arms Act, Explosives Substance Act and the Religious Institutions (Prevention of Misuse) Act, was filed before the First Class Judicial Magistrate Court-V this afternoon, in connection with the planned killings in the sensitive coastal belt of this district. Briefing newspersons, Inspector-General Mahesh Kumar Singhla, said the crime was conspired and committed mainly by relatives of the victims killed in a similar riot of January last year as most of the accused hailed from Marad and nearby places. T P Mohammedali (42), brother of Thekkepurath Aboobacker who was among the five killed last year, was framed as the first accused. Sakhir (24), Majid (55), Pallithodi Marsood (26), Noushad (25), Manaf (25), Bijili (22) who is the son of Aboobacker, Ali Akbar (32), Asis (35) and Rafiq (32), all hailing from in and around Marad area, were listed as the other nine prime accused respectively.

Indonesia

AFP 28 Jul 2003 Indonesia: Fifteen more Aceh rebels killed, military says BANDA ACEH, Indonesia, July 28 (AFP) - Fifteen more rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) have been killed during an army offensive against the guerrillas in Indonesia's Aceh province, the military said Monday. The rebels were killed in seven different skirmishes in five districts across Aceh on Sunday, military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Ahmad Yani Basuki said. Basuki told AFP that the biggest clash occurred in the village of Alue Bayu in Bireuen district and claimed the lives of four rebels, including a local rebel chief. Rebels also shot dead one civilian in the Idi Cut area of East Aceh district and troops also discovered a corpse bearing gunshot wounds in the Gandapura area of Bireuen district, Basuki said. Before the latest deaths, the military said that troops had killed 531 rebels and seized 255 weapons since the operation began, while more than 1,277 rebels had been captured or surrendered. Close to 40,000 soldiers and police are battling a GAM force the military estimated at about 5,000 when the operation began. An international thinktank, in a report last week, said the military assault was only alienating Acehnese and fuelling support for GAM, which has fought for independence since 1976. The International Crisis Group also questioned military figures for rebel dead, saying there was no way to verify whether the dead were really guerrillas.

Iraq

RFE/RE 7 Jul 2003 Iraq: Uncertainties Beset Investigations (Part 3) By Charles Recknagel Tens of thousands of people went missing in Iraq during Saddam Hussein's decades in power and are presumed to have been executed or imprisoned. Now, with mass graves being discovered and excavated, the fate of those who disappeared may finally be learned. In the third of a four-part series on Iraq's missing, RFE/RL looks at how much help Iraqis can expect from the international community in seeking to identify their dead and putting the executioners on trial. Prague, 7 July 2003 (RFE/RL) -- As Iraqis rush to learn the fate of the tens of thousands of people who vanished under Saddam Hussein, it remains uncertain how much the international community will help in the daunting task. So far, excavations of mass graves have largely been in the hands of local communities, which have sought to unearth the bodies as quickly as possible. But in their haste, many opportunities to identify the dead and collect evidence are being lost. In some cases, excavators have used backhoes to speed the digging but have inadvertently dug into many skeletons at once, confusing the remains. At the same time, the victims' Iraqi identity cards have been displaced and the bullets which prove their murders scattered. Margaret Cox of the Inforce Foundation at Bournemouth University in Britain recently led a team of forensic scientists and surveyors to Iraq to study the mass graves at the request of the British government. She says there is an urgent need for the international community to assist Iraqis with the kind of expertise and training needed to ensure that mass graves are excavated by qualified investigators. But no international groups have yet been tasked to begin training local experts, and most mass grave sites remain unguarded by authorities. Cox says the efforts to keep the sites intact rely mainly on trying to persuade Iraqis to stay away from them until help can arrive. "There are issues of how can you possibly secure all these sites when you know what they are and where they are because the resources to do that are not currently available," Cox says. "The only real way of achieving that security for sites is to persuade the Iraqi people that they shouldn't dig them up in such a hurry, that they should be patient and wait for assistance in order to make sure that they are investigated in a way that will procure evidence to go to court." The Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) has said U.S. and British forces are stretched too thinly in Iraq to provide security for all of the sites. Some 17 of the 100 mass graves found so far are secured by U.S. troops. The CPA has called on Iraqis to leave the mass graves alone, but some people are reported to be continuing to dig because they fear the former regime might return and that the time for recovering the remains of their loved ones is limited. The CPA has begun an effort to assess the extent of exhumation work required and to establish guidelines for the collection of evidence that meets normal standards for admission in court. But it is unclear who might pay for any large-scale effort. Another group that hopes to play a key role in amassing war crimes evidence is the New York-based International Center for Transitional Justice. Its program director, Paul van Zyl, tells RFE/RL the organization has experts in Iraq who are trying to arrange a major survey of the abuses committed by the regime. Van Zyl called for the appointment of an international commission of experts as soon as possible to provide advice on how to deal with the past, including prosecutions, truth commissions, and vetting programs for former members of the Ba'athist Party. "I don't think that there is widespread official acknowledgement and a public knowledge of quite the extent of the human rights abuse that [Hussein] was responsible for. And I think it's very important to create that sort of official record of what it was that his regime did, how they did it, and in what way they did it," van Zyl says. The UN -- which has collected evidence of crimes against humanity in Bosnia, Rwanda, and Kosovo -- has no mandate to do so in Iraq. The U.S. and Britain -- Iraq's governing powers -- have not said if they will compile evidence against Hussein's regime or whether any such trials would take place in Iraq or in some international venue, such as the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague. Late last month, the United Nations convened what it called Iraq's first national workshop on human rights, bringing together nongovernmental human rights activists with coalition experts and Iraqi jurists. The UN said in a press release that it would help carry out nationwide discussions "aimed at identifying further action required to address past violations." Also last month, on the day he was named the top British representative for Iraq, UN Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock signaled he would push the process forward. "The picture is gloomy and nasty, but we've got to investigate it, and I suggested to the [Security] Council this morning that, taking the lead from the people of Iraq, we should start discussing how what we call 'transitional justice' should be applied, how we can seek reconciliation in Iraq by bringing those responsible for crimes of genocide or crimes against humanity or war crimes to book [to be held accountable] in Iraq under a system that works under the control of the Iraqi people," Greenstock said. Prior to the Iraq war, U.S. and British-led efforts to interest the UN in setting up a war crimes court for Hussein's regime foundered in the face of opposition from France, Russia, and China -- the other three permanent members of the UN Security Council. Partly to build an argument for a UN court, Washington and London sponsored a nonprofit effort called Indict to collect evidence against Hussein and his top lieutenants. Indict, based in London and employing three full-time researchers, was funded by the U.S. Congress under the 1998 Iraq Liberation Act. Today, it is the only office publicly engaged in such work. Now that Hussein has been toppled, however, the Iraq Liberation Act has run its course and future funding for Indict is uncertain. Ann Clwyd, a member of the British Parliament and the head of the Indict effort, described the funding problem. "Indict was funded under the Iraq Liberation Act of the U.S. Congress," Clwyd says. "The Iraq Liberation Act has come to an end, so unless Indict receives funding in the next couple of months, then Indict cannot possibly continue. We also got 20 percent of our funding from Kuwait. I very much hope [Indict] can continue, but it really does depend on whether the people who were funding it in the past continue to fund it or whether other countries also chip in." As uncertainty grows over the role the international community will play in excavating Iraq's mass graves, some observers say valuable opportunities are being lost to collect police and prison records in Iraq -- records that could help identify victims and killers. Clwyd, who returned last month from a trip to Baghdad, says Indict researchers found prison floors still littered with police files rummaged through by looters. She says the former regime kept detailed records of who it imprisoned and executed but that such evidence is not being secured. Instead, Clwyd says, files are sometimes offered for sale in the Baghdad market, where Ba'ath Party members are reported to be buying evidence that incriminates them. In the meantime, some former Iraqi political prisoners have launched their own modest efforts to collect testimony against former officials -- just as villagers have started their own grassroots efforts to recover their dead. The group, called the Iraqi Free Prisoners Organization, has set up an office in central Baghdad and is trying to locate and preserve thousands of files about executions allegedly kept by the Iraqi secret services. One of the group's directors, Najaf al-Arajee, told RFE/RL recently in Baghdad that the security services removed many files to secret hiding places during the Iraq war in the spring -- in hopes of keeping them from being damaged and in expectation of returning to work soon. The former prisoners are now trying to track those files down. "Most of the files -- for example, the archive of the internal secret police service -- were hidden in the Al-Mansur shopping center. We received the information that the archives are located in this place, and we took them by force," al-Arajee said. The recovered files now await the scrutiny of judges in what former political prisoners hope one day will be extensive trials of their tormentors. But so far, the only announced new court in Baghdad is one being set up by the Coalition Authority to try Hussein loyalists who have committed crimes against U.S. and British forces. U.S. civil administrator for Iraq, Paul Bremer, has said that he will set up a special court "to try people, in particular senior Ba'athists...who may have committed crimes against the coalition [and] who are trying to destabilize the situation here." Bremer held out the prospect that the court could evolve into a tribunal to try people for crimes against humanity. But he said, "That is a decision that the Iraqi government should make." Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council, which began work in July, has said it will form a commission to create laws which would allow it to put suspected war criminals on trial. It has also said it is ready to try all 55 people on the U.S. most-wanted list of high-ranking Ba'ath party officials which Washington is tracking down. The list includes Saddam Hussein, his sons, and most of his top aides.

BBC 23 July, 2003 In Iraq's killing fields Up to 300,000 bodies may be buried in mass graves By Tim Whewell BBC Radio 4's Crossing Continents The stench of death does not scare Ian Hanson. He earns his living in killing fields. The mild-mannered archaeologist from Bournemouth University has investigated mass graves in Congo, Guatemala, and Bosnia. Now it is Iraq. He and his specialist forensics team - Inforce - were ordered into action by the Foreign Office after shocking footage on BBC News. It is very important to see how a ligature is tied around bones Ian Hanson, Inforce Images of bulldozers were shown ploughing through grave sites in search of bodies, possibly destroying crucial prosecution evidence. "We like to see the bodies in situ," Mr Hanson said, "because it is very important to see how a ligature is tied around bones to know whether or not the victims were executed here. "When local people do the exhumations themselves, they may show you a cloth afterwards that looks like a blindfold, but if it is not still around the face, that would not stand up in a court of law." Dangerous work Ian Hanson was standing in his flakjacket in the middle of a sandy desert south of Baghdad. The temperature was touching 50C and there was no shade for miles. Ian Hanson's team found more than 70 suspected mass graves Around him were the burly US marines who watch for possible guerrilla attack. Another member of the team was taking geophysical soundings of the site. And two young women anthropologists were recording and laying out bones found on the sand. "If this ends up being a crime scene," said one of them, "we cannot touch it. We can only look at what has already been disturbed." Mr Hanson's team has now left Iraq after a month of investigations. They arrived with a list of 27 suspected mass grave sites. By the end they had confirmed more than 70. No-one knows how many bodies may be buried in them all. The best estimate is 300,000. The 'disappeared' Many international lawyers class Saddam Hussein's crimes as genocide. His regime did not just murder people in the well-known campaigns of ethnic cleansing, such as the "Anfall" campaign against the Kurds in 1988, and the barbarous suppression of the Shia uprising in 1991. It murdered suspected opponents continuously, in every year he was in power. It is rare to find an Iraqi family who does not mourn a "disappeared" relative. It has to be clear to Iraqis and the world what is going to happen to justice Johanna Bjorken, Human Rights Watch Those atrocities were one of the justifications coalition leaders gave for going to war. Yet some say little preparation has been made for prosecuting those responsible. "There has to be a process," says Johanna Bjorken, researcher in Baghdad for the New York-based organisation Human Rights Watch. "It has to be clear to Iraqis and the world what is going to happen to justice, where the testimony is going to go. "The coalition knew this was going to be a huge issue - securing evidence from well before the war. Their failure to be prepared is inexcusable." Incriminating evidence Random digging has now stopped at most of the mass graves. But there is no knowing when relatives will get impatient to find their loved ones and start again. Ahmed al-Tamimi is seeking information on his executed brother And incriminating documents - the files of Saddam Hussein's secret police - are scattered across the country, often in private hands, after they were looted from burning ministries on the day Baghdad fell. Ahmed al-Tamimi has a stash in his house in the small town of Musaib. He is an Iraqi, recently returned from exile in the US, who is searching for information on his executed brother. The documents do not relate to his case. They relate to other families. But Ahmed says the authorities are not yet making any effort to gather any files in a central place - and no-one is handing them in. "The trust is not so good between the Americans and the people," Ahmed says. "In the beginning, they arrested people who are dangerous to their presence here. They did not arrest Baath Party members who killed Iraqis in 1991. "But for our people, this is the priority because they killed our loved ones. People now are afraid." Living with the enemy Iraq's new governing council has announced that it will set up a commission to try officials of the old regime within the country. But no-one knows yet what the process will be. In the meantime, Iraqis say mass murderers are still living in their midst. A few notorious suspects have even been captured by coalition forces and then released. When people see the man responsible walking on the street, they feel the regime is still there, they feel nothing has changed Judge Don Campbell For now, the man in charge of justice in Iraq is the American Judge Don Campbell - a reservist general. He told Crossing Continents: "I am not surprised people are frustrated. But if we face someone threatening the coalition we will arrest them first. "If they are not an immediate threat we will arrest them second. But very often you do not get past the first priority because it consumes an entire day." It is still early days. In Bosnia, it took years to bring war criminals to justice. But in Iraq, there is a growing impatience. "No-one can live without justice," says Ahmed al-Tamimi. "People did not just lose loved ones. They lost their future. "And when they see the man responsible walking on the street, they feel the regime is still there, Saddam is still there - they feel nothing has changed."

WP 7 Jul 2003 Digging For the Truth As Iraq's Mass Graves Are Slowly Unearthed, The Dead Speak Again By Sharon Waxman Washington Post Staff Writer Monday, July 7, 2003; Page C01 NEAR HINDIYAH, Iraq The year is 1988. Across the blistering plain of the southern Iraqi desert, a line of men stands under the silent sky. There is nothing and no one for miles as they file forward under the prod of their armed guards, hands cuffed behind their backs. Harsh desert winds whip at their feet, with the jinn, the tall funnels of swirling sand believed by some to contain the genie, the only shape to mark the horizon. There will be no magic genie for these men. They wear loose pants and matching tunics that identify them as Kurds, an ethnic group that does not live in the southern desert. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has brought them here, probably from hundreds of miles away in the north, to be killed. Who knows for what crime, what misdemeanor? One of the prisoners is still a teenager, 15 years old, or perhaps 16 or 17. His tunic is embroidered around the collar. Over an undershirt with green trim the bloodied cuffs of his white shirt stick to his metal handcuffs. A brown sash circles his waist, and he wears black leather shoes. Surely he is frightened. Surely he knows the inevitable will arrive. When it does come, death will be swift. It's 15 years later and forensic archaeologist Ambika Flavel has come to the same spot to reconstruct that day. The 27-year-old Brit reaches into a flour sack and rummages around. She pulls out several ribs, a femur, a clavicle, and places them neatly on a brown blanket spread on the dusty desert floor. She finds and assembles the spinal column, each vertebra fitting snugly against the next. Then comes a jumble of small bones. "Foot," she says, placing one at the bottom of the blanket. "Foot." Flavel separates the fingers, the toes, yellowed bits of calcium that click as she gathers each into a small pile. She fishes out two metal circles, once handcuffs, with scraps of white cloth stuck to them. The sun is punishingly hot -- 117 degrees -- but at least there is no stench today. The bodies at this mass grave have all skeletonized and Flavel does not wear gloves as she sorts through the bones. "It's like a jigsaw puzzle," she remarks, neatly placing the hip bones above the legs. She checks off each piece on a chart: femur, tibia. Sometimes she finds a piece she can't identify as human; she licks it to be sure -- bone is porous, stone is not. Here is the skull, not very large, with a small hole at the back and a slightly larger hole at the front. A bullet appears to have been shot into the back of the head at close range, and exited the front. An execution. She examines the teeth -- a wisdom tooth has not yet descended and the teeth are still white. She peers at the elbow and the base of the spine and notes that key joints have not yet fused. The man killed here, she concludes, was as young as 15, probably no older than 17. Observing this process, U.S. Army Col. Ed Burley walks over to scrutinize the skull. He places a pen through the hole to determine the trajectory of the bullet. "It looks like a classic gunshot wound," he says, and he ought to know. In addition to being the head of the U.S.-led effort to assess and identify mass graves in Iraq, Burley, 42, is a criminal prosecutor in the U.S. attorney's office in Washington, D.C. Burley and his group of six forensic experts, including Flavel, have been traveling the length and breadth of Iraq looking for where the bodies are buried. Guided by local tipsters and human rights activists who precede them, they dig up bones, uncover corpses and sift through sometimes-empty grave sites ransacked by families looking for missing relatives. They do not seek to provide families with closure. That is someone else's job. They are looking, instead, for evidence of a crime. If they do their work properly, someday someone may well have to answer for these deaths. And history will record what happened here. Which is why Burley is so enthusiastic about this new site near the tiny town of Hindiyah.