>> WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE IRAQI REGIME'S SHIPS?
New al-Qaida threat:
15-ship mystery navy
U.S., Brits fear high-seas terror posed by bin Laden's vessels
Posted: September 29, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
? 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network has purchased at least 15 ships in the last two years - creating, perhaps, the first terrorist naval force, reports Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.
Lloyds of London has reportedly helped Britain's MI6 and the U.S. CIA trace the sales made through a Greek shipping agent suspected of having direct contacts with bin Laden, the online intelligence newsletter reported.
The ships fly the flags of Yemen and Somalia - where they are registered - and are capable of carrying cargoes of lethal chemicals, a "dirty bomb" or even a nuclear weapon, according to G2 Bulletin's sources. British and U.S. officials worry that one or more of these ships could hit civilian ports on a suicide mission.
The freighters are believed to be somewhere in the Indian or Pacific oceans. When the ships left their home ports in the Horn of Africa weeks ago, some were destined for ports in Asia.
The U.S. Department of State Friday warned citizens overseas that the threat of terror attacks did not end with the passing of the September 11 anniversary - specifically mentioning the threat of maritime terrorism.
"We are seeing increasing indications that al-Qaida is preparing to strike U.S. interests abroad," said the State Department's "Worldwide Caution."
"It is being issued to remind U.S. citizens of the continuing threat that they may be a target of terrorist actions, even after the anniversary date of the September 11 attacks and to add the potential for threats to maritime interests."
"Looking at the last few months, al-Qaida and its associated organizations have struck in the Middle East in Riyadh, in North Africa in Casablanca and in East Asia in Indonesia," the State Department said.
The report continued: "We expect al-Qaida will strive for new attacks that will be more devastating than the September 11 attack, possibly involving non-conventional weapons such as chemical or biological agents. We also cannot rule out the potential for al-Qaida to attempt a second catastrophic attack within the US. US citizens are cautioned to maintain a high level of vigilance, to remain alert and to take appropriate steps to increase their security awareness," the warning said.
G2 Bulletin sources say other potential targets of the al-Qaida armada, besides civilian ports, include oil rigs. Another threat is the ramming of a cruise liner.
Some British navy officials have expressed concerns about not being able to patrol its coasts adequately against such a threat.
If a maritime terror attack comes, it won't be the first. In October 2000, the USS Cole, a heavily armed ship protected with the latest radar defenses, was hit by an al-Qaida suicide crew. Seventeen American soldiers died. Two years later, following the attacks on the Twin Towers, a similar attack was carried out against a French supertanker off the coast of Yemen.





>> KUWAITI TROUBLES?

2 Kuwaiti Firms Win New Iraq Fuel Deals
Both Were Halliburton Subcontractors
By Mary Pat Flaherty and Jackie Spinner
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, March 17, 2004; Page A18
Two Kuwaiti companies involved in the Pentagon's criminal investigation of possible overcharges in a previous Halliburton Co. contract to import fuel into Iraq have been awarded new contracts for the same purpose.
Altanmia Commercial Marketing Co. yesterday won a $39.9 million contract to transport gasoline and diesel fuel to southern Iraq. Altanmia was the lowest of 19 bidders, said Lynette Ebberts, a spokeswoman for the Defense Energy Support Center.
The support center took over the job of finding fuel suppliers from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which gave the original contract to KBR, a Halliburton subsidiary. The Pentagon is investigating possible overcharges of $61 million in that contract and has referred the matter to the Justice Department.
Altanmia will transport fuel on behalf of Kuwait Petroleum Corp., which yesterday won an $80 million contract to supply fuel to southern Iraq -- and was also the supplier under the KBR contract. Kuwait Petroleum is a private corporation that manages Kuwait's state-owned oil sector.
An Altanmia spokesman could not be reached last night and a spokeswoman for Kuwait Petroleum in Washington declined to comment, referring questions to headquarters in Kuwait, where offices were closed.
Kuwait Petroleum will charge $1.08 a gallon for gasoline and Altanmia will charge 42 cents a gallon to transport it, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post. The deal under investigation included a price of $1.17 a gallon for gasoline and $1.21 a gallon for transportation, according to U.S. Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.). With Halliburton's markup, the price rose to $2.64 a gallon, said Waxman, who has been a strong critic of Iraqi contracts awarded to Halliburton, which Dick Cheney headed from 1995 until 2000.
The Corps of Engineers yesterday declined to comment on the original contract because it is under investigation. The new contract is for three months, while the original was month-to-month.
"Altanmia dramatically reduced its transportation prices to win this contract. This raises many questions about why Halliburton was charging taxpayers so much more for the very same services," Waxman said in a written statement yesterday. "The new contract shows that real competition can save the taxpayers millions of dollars."
In a separate deal yesterday, the Shaheen Business and Investment Group (SBIG) won a $71.8 million contract to purchase and transport gasoline to southern Iraq from Jordan, at $1.18 a gallon. Headquartered in Amman, Jordan, SBIG is a multinational set of companies that includes Cemex Global Inc. of Washington. It also has a contract to train Iraqi police.






>> THE OTHER GPS?

Israel Signs Up for EU Satellite Navigation Project
Wed Mar 17,12:40 PM ET
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Israel agreed on Wednesday to take part in the new multibillion-dollar satellite navigation system being developed by the European Union (news - web sites), the European Commission (news - web sites) said.
Galileo, which will be a European version of the already existing U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS), will become operational in 2008. China has already agreed to take part.
"This lays the basis for Israel's active participation in the (Galileo) program," the Commission said in a statement after an agreement was initialed in Jerusalem.
The EU in February reached a landmark agreement with the United States on radio frequencies to enable Galileo to work alongside GPS, dispelling severe reservations in the Defense Department and NATO (news - web sites).
Galileo's planned system of 27 satellites has a range of potential uses from guiding cars and ships or landing military aircraft to precision positioning in engineering projects.
Neither European Commission nor Israeli officials could immediately give a figure for how much Israel would invest in the project. Sources on both sides have suggested it would be tens of millions of euros, although one said Israel might contribute a maximum of $100 million.
China has put up 230 million euros ($283.7 million) and India, which is negotiating to join, has spoken of 300 million euros. ($1=.8106 Euro)
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>> BUZZ WATCH...

-Kim Jong-Il for first time acknowledges famine to military but vows they will eat well...
-N. Korea builds massive database on its 23 million citizens as market reforms begin...
-CIA: N. Korea ready to test missile 'capable of reaching' California...
-Report: N. Korea, Iran secretly met for talks on uranium enrichment in January...
-Mobile phone ties S. Korean to major drug deal between N. Korea and Japan...
-China silent on evidence of its key role in Libya, Khan's nuke network...
-Chinese commander pushes to develop bases on disputed Spratlys...
-Jiang comeback: Former president seen as force behind military buildup - Former Chinese President Jiang Zemin, who left office last year but continues to hold power as chairman of the Central Military Commission, is growing in power, U.S. official said. Jiang is believed to be the driving force behind the secretive Chinese communist leadership structure for building up the armed forces. Last week Jiang called for speeding up the military buildup of Chinese forces. Jiang spoke at a conference of National People's Congress deputies. In his remarks Jiang called for China to initiate a "revolution in military affairs" using advanced weaponry and modern warfare tactics and strategy...
-Drug smugglers dressed as clerics flourish on Iraq-Iraq border...

-------------------------------------------------------
>> SAUDI CONVERSATIONS - one step forward, two steps back?


Saudi Press Seen as More Free
http://www.npr.org/rundowns/segment.php?wfId=1775704
?
from All Things Considered, Wednesday, March 17, 2004
Journalists in Saudi Arabia appear to be enjoying more freedom than at any other time in the history of the desert kingdom. Articles advocating political reform and women's rights and criticizing the conservative religious establishment are now commonplace in Saudi newspapers. NPR's Mike Shuster reports.


washingtonpost.com
Saudi Arabia Detains Reformers
Reuters
Wednesday, March 17, 2004; Page A17
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, March 16 -- Saudi Arabia detained several prominent reformers Tuesday in a move their supporters described as a major setback to democratic change in the conservative Islamic kingdom.
An Interior Ministry source, quoted by the official Saudi Press Agency, said the men were being questioned for issuing announcements that "do not serve national unity or the cohesion of society based on Islamic sharia law."
Sources close to the detainees said eight people had been taken in by police, including former university professors Abdullah Hamid and Tawfiq Qussayer. Hamid was one of more than 800 people who signed a letter to Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Abdullah, urging that a timetable for political reforms be implemented in the Persian Gulf state, which is under pressure to open up its absolute monarchy.
Also detained were Matrouk Faleh, a professor of politics at King Saud University in Riyadh, and Mohammed Said Tayyib, a retired publisher. Four others, including poet Ali Dumaini, were also being held.
"This will make people lose trust in the government and their promises. It contradicts 100 percent what they have been promising," said one academic with ties among the detainees.
Saudi Arabia has come under pressure from Washington to reform following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, which were carried out mainly by Saudis. The government has promised to hold municipal elections by October, and this month the country's first independent human rights organization won royal approval.
The country has also introduced changes to its educational and religious institutions, which promote an austere version of Sunni Islam and are blamed by critics for creating a fertile environment for militants.
On Monday, Saudi security forces killed a Yemeni man believed to be a leading al Qaeda figure in the kingdom, officials said.
The Saudi Press Agency quoted an Interior Ministry source as saying Khaled Ali Ali Haj, reported to be a senior al Qaeda figure, was killed in a shootout in Riyadh along with another suspected militant, Ibrahim bin Abdulaziz bin Mohammad Muzainy.
Haj had been wanted by Saudi authorities since May, when his name was published along with those of 18 other suspected al Qaeda operatives. Days later, suicide bombings blamed on the al Qaeda network killed at least 35 people in Riyadh, including several Americans.

? 2004 The Washington Post Company

----------------------------------------------------
'Liberating' Saudi's Shi'ites (and their oil)
By Ashraf Fahim
If the rulers of Saudi Arabia held out any hope that the post-September 11, 2001, demonization of their kingdom was finally waning, then someone in Riyadh should pick up a copy of An End to Evil, a recently published neo-conservative roadmap for "winning" the "war on terror". In it, David Frum, an ex-speechwriter for President George W Bush (and inventor of the term "axis of evil"), and Richard Perle, the eminence grise of the neo-con fraternity, suggest that the United States should bring Saudi Arabia to heel by threatening to support independence for the country's Eastern Province or Al Hasa (also known as Ash Sharqiyah), where much of Saudi Arabia's minority Shi'ite population and, coincidentally, most of its oil is situated.
While the continuing turmoil in Iraq might inhibit lesser souls even to consider tinkering with the map of the world's most important oil producer, Frum and Perle are made of sterner stuff. Lamenting the discrimination suffered by Saudi Arabia's Shi'ites at the hands of the Sunni elite, whose power base lies in Najd and Hijaz in the center and west of the Arabian Peninsula, they deduce that "it is not bigotry alone that explains these Saudi actions, but also their fear that the Shi'ites might someday seek independence for the Eastern Province - and its oil". If this fear were somehow brought to fruition it "would obviously be a catastrophic outcome for the Saudi state. But it might be a very good outcome for the US."
There is, of course, nothing new in the suggestion that, in extreme circumstances, the United States might seize strategically important oilfields in the Persian Gulf region. Such a step was contemplated at an advanced level by the administration of president Richard Nixon during the 1973 Arab oil embargo. But some observers believe that the events of September 11, as well as the frailty of the House of Saud and the Shi'ite awakening in Iraq, have given this contingency new life.
Dr Sa'd al-Fagih, head of the London-based Saudi opposition group the Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia (MIRA), says the military plan to "liberate" Al Hasa is already in place but would only be considered if the US-friendly House of Saud falls. In that event, he claims, the US "has made preparations to isolate the Eastern Province militarily". US bases in Qatar and Kuwait are aimed, he says, "at the north end of the Eastern Province and at the south end of the Eastern Province. So the scenario is, America will take over in a line extending from Kuwait, down to Dammam [the capital of Al Hasa] or down to Qatar." With the oilfields secure, they will "leave Najd and Hijaz to their fate".
Whether or not al-Fagih's claims are accurate, other observers of the situation in the Gulf are dismissive of neo-con fantasies about partitioning Saudi Arabia. Professor Gary Sick of Columbia University, who served on the National Security Council staff under presidents Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan, calls the idea typical of the kind of "irresponsible dreaming about the types of changes that can be brought about in the Middle East" now commonplace. However, he says, "admittedly some of those dreams have come true in these last few years".
The current plan to "liberate" Al Hasa has its genesis in the post-September 11 bipartisan Washington consensus that Saudi Arabia is, to some degree, a problem in the "war on terror". Many in Washington allege that the kingdom has financed, offered ideological inspiration to and provided the manpower for al-Qaeda and its fellow travelers. The more extreme ideologues such as Frum and Perle say that Saudi Arabia "deserves its own place on the axis of evil", and have zeroed in on the ethnic peculiarities in the Eastern Province as a possible trump card in pressuring the kingdom.
That perspective gained voice at an April 2002 panel discussion at the Hudson Institute, an influential conservative think-tank, titled "Saudi Vulnerability: The Source of Middle Eastern Oil and the Eastern Province". On the panel were Ali al-Ahmed, head of the Saudi Institute, a Washington-based Shi'ite opposition organization, and Max Singer, co-founder of Hudson. No transcript was available for the event, but the tone can perhaps be discerned from an article Singer subsequently authored titled "Free the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia".
For Singer, the diffusion of Sunni Wahhabi "extremism" abroad could be eliminated by severing its source of funds - oil. A conference at Hudson in June 2002, titled "Oil, Terrorism, and the Problem of Saudi Arabia" and hosted by Republican Senator Sam Brownback, allowed various anti-Saudi luminaries to expand on that theme. "One has to think in terms of intervention in the oilfields, which are conveniently all on one side," noted panelist Simon Henderson, a British writer on Saudi Arabia. "And I dare say there are at least a few people in the Pentagon who plan this one day by day."
The neo-cons discover 'Petrolistan'
Though the Saudi Shi'ite grievance has been newly championed by the neo-cons for transparently realpolitik reasons, it does have a legitimate basis in the religious and political discrimination the Shi'ites have suffered. The Shi'ites have been excluded from positions of power and certain professions, hindered from fully practicing their faith and subject to hostility by some in the conservative Sunni religious establishment. In addition, though they make up a large part of the workforce at Saudi Aramco, Shi'ites have watched the oil wealth flow west to Najd and Hijaz. Thus intermittent uprisings have erupted since Al Hasa was incorporated into the Saudi realm in 1913, most recently after the Shi'ite Iranian revolution emboldened their co-religionists throughout the Persian Gulf.
Various estimates put the Shi'ite population at 5-10 percent of the 17 million native Saudis, and it is possible they constitute a majority in Al Hasa. Thus far, the priority for the Shi'ite opposition has been equal rights within the Saudi state, and it is not at all clear that they would welcome US intervention on their behalf.
The aspirations of the Shi'ite, however, are not the priority of the advocates of a "Muslim Republic of East Arabia", as Singer dubbed it. And this kind of neo-con grand strategizing, based largely on ethnic number-crunching, strikes Sick as foolhardy. The notion of disrupting a country "as important as Saudi Arabia requires a lot more serious thought than the idea that there are just a bunch of Shi'ite running around the Eastern Province", he says.
Neo-con scheming could also potentially stir sectarian strife inside Saudi Arabia. Crown Prince Abdullah, the country's de facto ruler, recently took the unprecedented step of accepting a petition from prominent Shi'ites, titled "Partners in the Homeland", calling for greater rights. Such attempts at reconciliation could be undermined if the Shi'ites, unjustly or not, are seen to be conspiring with outsiders to break up the Saudi state.
The Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia is not the only place where the Sunni-Shi'ite divide plays out atop large reserves of black gold. A sectarian power struggle simmers throughout the Gulf, and some see in the Shi'ite revival in Iraq the makings of a significant shift in power. "Now that the dust of the Iraq war has settled, it is clear the Shi'ites have emerged, blinking in the sunlight, as the unexpected winners," wrote Mai Yamani, a research fellow at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. "[The West has] also woken up to the accident of geography that has placed the world's major oil supplies in areas where they [Shi'ites] form the majority: Iran, the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and southern Iraq. Welcome to the new commonwealth of 'Petrolistan'."
The concept of an emerging "Petrolistan" feeds into the growing paranoia in the region that the Shi'ites are conspiring with the United States to dismantle Sunni hegemony across the Middle East. But Sick says such paranoia is misplaced. "I don't think there is a Shi'ite policy," he says. In fact "the US tends to be very nervous about Shi'ite governance". He notes, among other things, hostile relations between the US and revolutionary Iran, and the US failure to topple Saddam Hussein in 1991 precisely out of fear of a Shi'ite takeover of Iraq.
For the time being, the idea of liberating Saudi Arabia's Eastern Province remains on the fringes of US policymaking, and in fashion among the mandarins of think-tanks such as the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, the Hudson Institute and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). But, says Sick, it "has acquired no significant following in the administration".
Unfortunately for Riyadh, the fringes have become the nursery for future policy, and the fashions of the neo-cons often become conventional wisdom for the grown-ups in the Bush administration. Anyone who followed the policy prescriptions of AEI's "black-coffee breakfast" seminars prior to the invasion of Iraq, for example, would recognize a stunning similarity in the way US policy in Iraq has evolved.
At present, however, Al Hasa's would-be liberators appear cognizant of the limits of their influence and content to use the threat of partition to browbeat the Saudis into obeisance in the "war on terror" and the construction of a new Iraq. The threat is also intended to ensure that Saudi Arabia doesn't think about using its own oil as leverage in the Arab-Israeli conflict, the context in which invasion was first discussed in 1973.
Frum and Perle are frank about the strategic utility of their proposal. "We would want the Saudis to know that we are pondering [partition]. The knowledge that the US has options other than abjectly accepting whatever abuse the Saudis choose to throw our way might have a 'chastening' effect on Saudi behavior."
Some observers have suggested that the chaotic situation in Iraq signals the waning of the neo-conservative star that rose after September 11. Whether or not this is the case, political fortunes can change quickly in Washington. Another Bush term could easily embolden the neo-cons, and if, as so many predict, the House of Saud falls, they could undertake their grandest delusion yet.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for information on our sales and syndication policies.)
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Saudi chastises Arabs for blaming U.S.
'If I were a Shia and from Iraq, I'd pray ... that America remained'
Posted: March 17, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
? 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
Taking an unusual stance, a columnist for the Saudi English-language Arab News criticized Arabs for blaming the U.S. for recent terror attacks in Iraq.
Muhammad Al-Rasheed chastised Shia clerics in a column last Wednesday for blaming the U.S. for the recent attacks against Shia in Karbala and Baghdad, reported the Middle East Media Research Institute.
Arabs tend to "blame others and shun the facts," he said, pointing out prominent clerics, including some in Lebanon, have pinned responsibility on the U.S.
"Mind you, this America is the [same one] the Shia are now talking to so they can finally govern themselves for the first time in 1,400 years," al-Rasheed said.
"If I were a Shia and from Iraq, I'd pray to the Almighty that America remained in Iraq until the country was stable and on its feet again," he continued. "Otherwise, the Karbala massacre will be just a trailer for the full version of an unbelievable horror show."
Al-Rasheed said he found the reaction of the clerics "overwhelming" while "the blood is still hot and streaming down the streets of Iraq."
Bomb attacks March 2 in the Shia holy city of Karbala and in Baghdad killed more than 100 people as millions of pilgrims packed streets for the Ashura ceremony, one of the holiest in the Shia calendar.
Al-Rasheed challenged the clerics to "name names and point fingers in the right direction."
"We are sick and tired of this kind of behavior," he said. "We honestly have had enough of it and cannot blame the world for looking at us and wondering if we retain any shred of humanity. The creed that sanctions blowing up worshipers in mosques (or any other religious venue for that matter, including office buildings since Islam says that work is worship) should be declared the public enemy of humanity. The U.N. should vote on that publicly and let us count the votes and identify those who vote against the motion."
Al-Rasheed called the terrorists who carried out the attacks more barbarous than ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
"The perpetrators have an agenda more vicious than anything Saddam could have dreamed up," al-Rasheed said. "Saddam killed and maimed to maintain his rule by brute force. These people kill and maim to turn people against each other and to satisfy a bloodlust based on elitism in theological terms. In other words, they want to win in this world and go to heaven in the next. I don't think Saddam was that optimistic; otherwise, the Americans would not have found him alive in a hole."
Al-Rasheed said, "Just when we seem to have moved a step forward, something happens to make us take 10 steps back," said. "Sacrificial blood in Karbala and Baghdad is nothing new but the latest atrocity on the most sacred day for the Shia was a criminal act of monstrous proportions. The carnage and the spectacle were on a scale not seen since the last sacking of Karbala over a century ago."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Syria arrests hundreds as riots sweep the nation
Regime blames U.S. after American flags spotted in protests
SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Wednesday, March 17, 2004
Syrian military troops and police have arrested hundreds of Kurds suspected of being involved in the anti-regime riots in cities throughout Syria over the weekend.
Kurdish sources said Syrian intelligence arrested hundreds of suspected Kurdish separatists in Aleppo and surrounding communities. The unrest was sparked by a soccer riot on Friday in the town of Qamishli near the Turkish border.
Syrian officials have accused the United States of fomenting the Kurdish riots. They said the Kurds, who raised U.S. flags during anti-regime demonstrations, were connected to the U.S.-aligned Patriotic Union of Kurdistan in northern Iraq.
The unrest was termed as the worst in Syria since the Islamic insurgency against Damascus in the early 1980s.
The sources said Syrian troops, backed by main battle tanks and armored personnel carriers, patrolled towns and cities, including Damascus.
On Monday, Kurdish sources reported that Kurdish insurgents killed the son of a Syrian governor in the Aleppo district. They said the insurgents also raided an Aleppo prison and freed an unspecified number of inmates.
In the Qamishli area, government buildings and police cars were attacked and in one case, a security police headquarters was torched. At one point, the sources said, Kurdish unrest reached Damascus.
Syrian officials said six Kurds were killed, all of them trampled to death in the soccer match in Qamishli. Kurdish leaders aligned with the government said at least 19 Kurds were shot dead in clashes with Syrian forces.
But on Tuesday, the Turkish daily Hurriyet, quoting Kurdish sources, said more than 100 people have been killed in the clashes. Earlier estimates placed the casualty toll at 80.
On Monday, Kurds in the northern Iraqi town of Suleimaniya demonstrated in solidarity with Kurds in nearby Syria.
On Monday, Syria acknowledged the extent of the damage from the Kurdish unrest. Syrian authorities released footage of torched cars, damaged buildings and even defaced portraits of the late Syrian President Hafez Assad, father of the current president.
Syrian authorities has closed the border crossing of Nusaybin with Turkey. Kurdish sources said Turkish nationals in Qamishli were attacked during the unrest and their vehicles torched. They said the Turks have returned to Turkey.

------------------------------------------------------------
>> HEIMAT WATCH...

Homeland Security bureau studies lessons of Spain bombings
By Chris Strohm
cstrohm@govexec.com
In the wake of deadly bombings in Spain last week, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau is examining ways to beef up security, such as combing through databases for suspicious immigration patterns, protecting federal infrastructure or mobilizing explosives detection units, the agency's director said Wednesday.
Assistant Secretary Michael Garcia said ICE is waiting to receive initial results of the investigation into train bombs that killed 201 people last week in Madrid to determine how the bureau can help increase U.S. security efforts.
"We're going to have to look at what happened; look at what the vulnerabilities were, what the planning was, get the details on it and then look at that model and bring it back and go forward," Garcia said. "Right now, we're looking at rail security as [a border and transportation security] issue. Can we be of any help given our expertise in explosives detection?"
Garcia noted that ICE includes the Federal Protective Service, which guards about 8,800 federal facilities and uses canine explosives detection teams.
ICE is able to comb through databases to determine suspicious travel patterns in the United States, especially people who might have criminal records or be in violation of immigration laws.
"We can use our compliant enforcement systems very proactively to determine what the risk is, and [see if there is] information in our system that we can start to put together a picture emerging of a threat," Garcia said. "We've done that in the past and as we get information, we'll see if we can do that here."
He added: "You can take information, you can feed it into an ongoing investigation and look at geography, nationality, travel patterns and those types of things that we couldn't do in the past."
The federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks concluded in a January report that immigration and law enforcement agencies failed to share information and prevent some of the attackers from illegally entering and remaining in the country.
According to Garcia, immigration and law enforcement tactics have improved, especially in the areas of border security, sharing database information between agencies, and the initial deployment of a biometric identification verifications system at airports and seaports.
"We've come tremendously far," he said. "I do see almost on a daily basis concrete examples of that tightening that will prevent those kinds of things from happening again."
Garcia also testified Wednesday on the fiscal year 2005 budget request for ICE before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security.
Garcia said the Homeland Security Department estimates there are about 7 million illegal aliens in the United States. About 450,000 are evading deportation orders, Garcia said, and of those, about 40,000 also are wanted for criminal offenses.
The budget would fund 30 new fugitive operations teams, which would be dedicated solely to apprehending and deporting alien absconders. Garcia predicted that the additional teams would help the agency catch about 25,000 absconders.
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FBI should see improved technology in 2005, agency chief says
From National Journal's Technology Daily
FBI Director Robert Mueller on Wednesday said he hopes by next year the agency is on the "cutting edge" of technology.
Mueller made the remarks before a House committee responsible for appropriations for the Commerce, Justice and State departments. He also was responding to comments by Rep. Harold Rogers. R-Ky., that the panel has "pumped zillions" [of dollars] into the agency over the last 10 to 20 years for information technology, but only recently has seen progress.
Appropriators in recent years have cut the agency's budget for its anti-terrorism computer system known as Trilogy because of delays in its implementation.
Rogers also questioned Mueller about the Homeland Security Department's inability to access the FBI's fingerprint database system.
Mueller said Homeland implemented a two-print system at the nation's borders - rather than a 10-print system like the FBI -- as a "stopgap" measure to quickly roll out biometrics technology.
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TSA to require passenger data and issue privacy rules
By Drew Clark, National Journal's Technology Daily
The government will require airlines to provide passenger data so it can test a new computerized screening system, for which it will issue proposed privacy rules, the head of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said Wednesday.
The order to provide data for the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-screening System (CAPPS II) would come under a "security directive" within the next several months from TSA, said agency acting administrator Admiral David Stone in testimony before the House Transportation Aviation Subcommittee.
CAPPS II has been criticized on privacy grounds, and airlines are unwilling to provide passenger data to the TSA unless they are compelled or privacy protections are put in place.
Subcommittee Chairman John Mica, R-Fla., and ranking member Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., harshly criticized the agency for neglecting privacy rules and for the slow pace in testing the system. CAPPS II would use names, addresses, phone numbers and dates of birth to conduct background checks on all travelers.
Mica said it was "unacceptable" that TSA was behind schedule because it could not obtain airline data. "I believe TSA has sufficient authority under the authorizing law we passed to require airlines to provide data, and should do so promptly."
"It is our intent to use the [regulation] along with a security directive," Stone replied. That should address both the airlines' concerns and those of privacy advocates, he said.
Mica also criticized the agency for failing to integrate terrorist "watch lists." Stone replied that a preliminary version would be offered by March 31, and that the integration would be complete by year's end.
Lawmakers also hammered the agency on failing to address privacy concerns. But Stone said in his testimony: "There is an inherent goodness to CAPPS II that I believe will shine through as we examine the program more closely."
"CAPPS II seems to be collapsing before it is even testing," said District of Columbia Democratic Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton. "I can't imagine what it will take to get the public to accept the screening that CAPPS II is offering."
"The bottom line is assuring the American public that CAPPS II does not begin to look like Big Brother," said Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-N.J.
"I am a little bit troubled about the plan to implement" CAPPS II, said Rep. Bob Ney, the Ohio Republican who chairs the House Administration Committee. He said he was concerned about its privacy implications and how it dealt with errors. "This has got to be thought out to the nth degree."
"It is my understanding ... that we gave significant authority to issue security directives with no notice of rulemaking and no public comment," said DeFazio. "Why wouldn't you just use that criteria with the airlines?"
Stone replied that issuing proposed rules were important "to instill trust and confidence and to provide notice to passengers that we will be taking data and testing it." In a brief interview, Stone said the agency had not decided whether it would first issue the "security directive" or the proposed notice of regulation.

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