2008 January 17

Passengers escaped unharmed today after a British Airways jet crash landed at Heathrow Airport.

The aircraft appeared to have landed several hundred yards short of the southern runway - and just yards from a busy perimeter road.

The aircraft’s emergency chutes were deployed but Scotland Yard said there were no reports of serious injuries. A spokesman also said there was no suggestion that terrorism was involved.

The incident happened as Prime Minister Gordon Brown was due to leave Heathrow for China and India.

His flight was delayed because of the incident, but his jet was not involved directly.

Witnesses said around six fire engines were at the scene of the incident and the stricken jet was surrounded by a sea of firefighting foam.

A spokeswoman for London Ambulance Service said three passengers were assessed for minor injuries following the incident.

Six ambulances, two fast response cars and a hazardous response team were scrambled to the scene.

Scotland Yard said: “Police were called at 12.43pm to reports of an incident involving an aircraft on the southern runway at Heathrow Airport.

“There is nothing to suggest at this stage that the incident is in any way terrorist-related.”

A Heathrow airport spokesman said: “A British Airways flight arriving from Beijing carried out an emergency landing at 12.42pm. Passengers have been evacuated and there are currently no reported injuries.

“The Heathrow southern runway has been closed, but the northern runway remains open.”

The incident left the Prime Minster’s chartered British Airways 747 stranded by its departure gate.

Mr Brown was being accompanied by 25 leading businessmen in the official visit including Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson. Around 30 political journalists were also flying with Mr Brown.

Also on the plane bound for Beijing was Olympic gold medallist Dame Kelly Holmes.

Passengers on the Prime Minister’s aircraft were told that because of the runway incident there was no fire cover for the rest of the airport, meaning all take-offs and landings were halted.

But an announcement on Mr Brown’s plane said that additional fire cover should be available within “20 minutes or so”, allowing take-off to resume.

There was no smoke visible from the crashed plane, which was surrounded by emergency vehicles.

A spokesman for air traffic control company Nats said planes were still taking off and landing at Heathrow under a single runway operation using the northern runway.

There were 136 passengers on the crashed plane, a British Airways spokesman said.

In statement, BA said: “A British Airways Boeing 777 operating as flight BA038 from Beijing to Heathrow has been involved in an incident at Heathrow today.

“Cabin crew have done an excellent job evacuating all 136 passengers on board with three minor injuries.

“A telephone helpline for friends and relatives has been set up on 0800 3894193.”

How the Pentagon Planted a False Story

Senior Pentagon officials, evidently reflecting a broader administration policy decision, used an off-the-record Pentagon briefing to turn the Jan. 6 U.S.-Iranian incident in the Strait of Hormuz into a sensational story demonstrating Iran’s military aggressiveness, a reconstruction of the events following the incident shows.

The initial press stories on the incident, all of which can be traced to a briefing by deputy assistant secretary of defense for public affairs in charge of media operations Bryan Whitman, contained similar information that has since been repudiated by the Navy itself.

Then the Navy disseminated a short video into which was spliced the audio of a phone call warning that U.S. warships would “explode” in “a few seconds.” Although it was ostensibly a Navy production, IPS has learned that the ultimate decision on its content was made by top officials of the Defense Department.

The encounter between five small and apparently unarmed speedboats, each carrying a crew of two to four men, and the three U.S. warships occurred very early on Saturday Jan. 6, Washington time. But no information was released to the public about the incident for more than 24 hours, indicating that it was not viewed initially as being very urgent.

The reason for that absence of public information on the incident for more than a full day is that it was not that different from many others in the Gulf over more than a decade. A Pentagon consultant who asked not to be identified told IPS that he had spoken with officers who had experienced similar encounters with small Iranian boats throughout the 1990s, and that such incidents are “just not a major threat to the U.S. Navy by any stretch of the imagination.”

Just two weeks earlier, on Dec. 19, the USS Whidbey Island, an amphibious warship, had fired warning shots after a small Iranian boat allegedly approached it at high speed. But that incident had gone without public notice.

With the reports from 5th Fleet commander Vice-Adm. Kevin Cosgriff in hand early that morning, top Pentagon officials had all day Sunday, Jan. 6, to discuss what to do about the encounter in the Strait of Hormuz. The result was a decision to play it up as a major incident.

The decision came just as President George W. Bush was about to leave on a Middle East trip aimed in part at rallying Arab states to join the United States in an anti-Iran coalition.

That decision in Washington was followed by a news release by the commander of the 5th Fleet on the incident at about 4:00 a.m. Washington time Jan. 7. It was the first time the 5th Fleet had ever issued a news release on an incident with small Iranian boats.

The release reported that the Iranian “small boats” had “maneuvered aggressively in close proximity of [sic] the Hopper [the lead ship of the three-ship convoy].” But it did not suggest that the Iranian boats had threatened the boats or that it had nearly resulted in firing on the Iranian boats.

On the contrary, the release made the U.S. warships handling of the incident sound almost routine. “Following standard procedures,” the release said, “Hopper issued warnings, attempted to establish communications with the small boats, and conducted evasive maneuvering.”

The release did not refer to a U.S. ship being close to firing on the Iranian boats, or to a call threatening that U.S. ships would “explode in a few minutes,” as later stories would report, or to the dropping of objects into the path of a U.S. ship as a potential danger.

That press release was ignored by the news media, however, because later that Monday morning, the Pentagon provided correspondents with a very different account of the episode.

At 9 a.m., Barbara Starr of CNN reported that “military officials” had told her that the Iranian boats had not only carried out “threatening maneuvers,” but had transmitted a message by radio that “I am coming at you” and “you will explode.” She reported the dramatic news that the commander of one boat was “in the process of giving the order to shoot when they moved away.”

CBS News broadcast a similar story, adding the detail that the Iranian boats “dropped boxes that could have been filled with explosives into the water.” Other news outlets carried almost identical accounts of the incident.

The source of this spate of stories can now be identified as Bryan Whitman, the top Pentagon official in charge of media relations, who gave a press briefing for Pentagon correspondents that morning. Although Whitman did offer a few remarks on the record, most of the Whitman briefing was off the record, meaning that he could not be cited as the source.

In an apparent slip-up, however, an Associated Press story that morning cited Whitman as the source for the statement that U.S. ships were about to fire when the Iranian boats turned and moved away – a part of the story that other correspondents had attributed to an unnamed Pentagon official.

On Jan. 9, the U.S. Navy released excerpts of a video of the incident in which a strange voice – one that was clearly very different from the voice of the Iranian officer who calls the U.S. ship in the Iranian video – appears to threaten the U.S. warships.

A separate audio recording of that voice, which came across the VHF channel open to anyone with access to it, was spliced into a video on which the voice apparently could not be heard. That was a political decision, and Lt. Col. Mark Ballesteros of the Pentagon’s Public Affairs Office told IPS the decision on what to include in the video was “a collaborative effort of leadership here, the Central Command, and Navy leadership in the field.”

“Leadership here,” of course, refers to the secretary of defense and other top policymakers at the department. An official in the U.S. Navy Office of Information in Washington, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue, said that decision was made in the office of the secretary of defense

That decision involved a high risk of getting caught in an obvious attempt to mislead. As an official at 5th Fleet headquarters in Bahrain told IPS, it is common knowledge among officers there that hecklers – often referred to as “Filipino Monkey” – frequently intervene on the VHF ship-to-ship channel to make threats or rude comments.

One of the popular threats made by such hecklers, according to British journalist Lewis Page, who had transited the Strait with the Royal Navy is, “Look out, I am going to hit [collide with] you.”

By Jan. 11, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell was already disavowing the story that Whitman had been instrumental in creating only four days earlier. “No one in the military has said that the transmission emanated from those boats,” said Morrell.

The other elements of the story given to Pentagon correspondents were also discredited. The commanding officer of the guided missile cruiser Port Royal, Capt. David Adler, dismissed the Pentagon’s story that he had felt threatened by the dropping of white boxes in the water. Meeting with reporters on Monday, Adler said, “I saw them float by. They didn’t look threatening to me.”

The naval commanders seemed most determined, however, to scotch the idea that they had been close to firing on the Iranians. Vice-Adm. Kevin Cosgriff, the commander of the 5th Fleet, denied the story in a press briefing on Jan. 7. A week later, Cmdr. Jeffery James, commander of the destroyer Hopper, told reporters that the Iranians had moved away “before we got to the point where we needed to open fire.”

The decision to treat the Jan. 6 incident as evidence of an Iranian threat reveals a chasm between the interests of political officials in Washington and Navy officials in the Gulf. Asked whether the Navy’s reporting of the episode was distorted by Pentagon officials, Cmdr. Robertson of 5th Fleet Public Affairs would not comment directly. But she said, “There is a different perspective over there.”

The Thought Police “Protect” the Constitution

Allyson VillarsYesterday, I was ecstatic to be able to surprise John by being at the end of his march from Boston to Washington. But my excitement suddenly turned to shock when we went with a few rally participants to view the actual Constitution. Upon entering the National Archives building I was stopped and told that I could not enter wearing my yellow rain poncho. When I asked ”Why,” I was told that they don’t allow anyone in the building wearing a protest slogan on their clothing. My poncho read “Save the Constitution” and continued with “Impeach Bush/Cheney…Tell Speaker Pelosi (202) 225-0100.” Finally it listed the web address: www.marchinmyname.org.

I was pulled from the security line. The guard said, “Step over here,” and unhooked the cordoning rope so I could move aside. The man behind me, Larry, was wearing a light jacket over a green t-shirt that said “Impeach Bush.” He made Larry move out of line as well.

I tried to talk to the guard about my goal in being in the building – simply to see the Constitution of the United States. He wasn’t convinced and kept repeating his mantra, “Just take off the poncho and you can go in.” I asked him what was wrong with my poncho. He replied that they do not allow protests inside the building. I said that I was not protesting, that I was just an American citizen visiting the most important document of our country.

He kept talking over me. I said I wanted to speak to his supervisor and asked a friend in line to call the press and tell them that I was being barred from visiting our Constitution because of a message on my clothing.

Captain Judd and C. Bethea arrived quickly and identified themselves as supervisors and made an effort to explain to me why I could not wear my poncho. I calmly but forcefully asked them, “How it is that I was denied my freedom of expression if I was not actively protesting, or carried a sign, or in any way disturbed others?” I also mentioned that other people went into the archives with protest t-shirts and baseball caps saying, for example: “Stop the War for Oil,” and “Vote for Hillary.” Apparently those people were allowed in by mistake and officer C. Bethea said he would make certain they would be found and escorted out. But Captain Judd corrected Bethea and said that those wearing election campaign garments like “Elect Edwards” or “pro solar power” t-shirts were okay since they were “for” something. I responded, “Well I am for Saving the Constitution.” That did not convince him. He was now in mantra mode and simply repeated his command, “Just take off the poncho and you can go in or leave.”

Larry, with the green “Impeach Bush” t-shirt, buttoned his thin jacket, moved back into line and proceeded through the security checkpoint. I asked for the guards’ names. They wrote them down and when asked to tell me who their boss was so I could call him or her on Monday, “I was told to look it up on the Archives website.”

Then, I asked for a copy of the policy that mandated I remove my objectionable clothing in order to see the Constitution. They would provide nothing. They were unmoved. I asked them to tell me what they would have done if Larry didn’t have a jacket. Would they require him to take off his shirt and then go into the building half naked? They basically said they wouldn’t respond. Larry’s shirt was not an issue anymore…I asked them how the policy is practiced - that knowing how they interpret and implement the policy might help me understand the policy or law I was violating. They simply and finally said, “You will have to leave if you do not remove your garment.”

I chose to leave. I chose to leave because I refused to give up my rights to see the very document that provided those rights. I told Captain Judd that he might want to consider the good Germans who were part of the 3rd Reich machinery that took away the freedoms of Jews, and ultimately their lives. And, as I was turning to leave, I told him he was part and parcel of the reason that I found it necessary to articulate my point of view to “Save the Constitution,” on my clothing. “You might want to read the Constitution before you leave work today to find out what this is all about.” I said as I left.

I learned that a woman who cleared security wore a t-shirt that said “Impeach Bush.” Security guard C. Bethea later found her and made her borrow a jacket or leave the building. He also found my husband who was wearing a baseball cap that said “Impeach Cheney?” and made him take it off.

My thoughts go to those of you who see this as a small thing…perhaps even trivial. To those who believe this was just a ridiculous over-escalation in response to a security guard doing his job, let me tell you that our Constitutional rights are being stripped away one at a time and that it seems that most Americans who take these protections for granted will not “get it” until they, too, have their rights denied. Our being denied our rights is happening with more mind-numbing frequency than ever, and gets worse with each one of these new “trivial” moves.

I suppose I shouldn’t expect people to be upset about this is they are not upset about having lost their right to know what they are being charged with when they are arrested, possibly tortured and denied a speedy trial.

It may be just one more, sad instance of our rights being denied us, but remember, as it says on the outside wall of the National Archives, “Eternal vigilance in the price of liberty.” I hope you will take this seriously and decide where you will draw the line, what you will stand up for, what you will stand up for.

Big Business Is Even More Unpopular Than You Think

The U.S. public holds Big Business in shockingly low regard.

A November 2007 Harris poll found that less than 15 percent of the population believes each of the following industries to be “generally honest and trustworthy:” tobacco companies (3 percent); oil companies (3 percent); managed care companies such as HMOs (5 percent); health insurance companies (7 percent); telephone companies (10 percent); life insurance companies (10 percent); online retailers (10 percent); pharmaceutical and drug companies (11 percent); car manufacturers (11 percent); airlines (11 percent); packaged food companies (12 percent); electric and gas utilities (15 percent). Only 32 percent of adults said they trusted the best-rated industry about which Harris surveyed, supermarkets.[1]

These are remarkable numbers. It is very hard to get this degree of agreement about anything. By way of comparison, 79 percent of adults believe the earth revolves around the sun; 18 percent say it is the other way around.[2]

The Harris results are not an aberration. The results have not varied considerably over the past five years — although overall trust levels have actually declined from the already very low threshold in 2003.

The Harris results are also in line with an array of polling data showing deep concern about concentrated corporate power.

An amazing 84 percent told Harris in a poll earlier in 2007 that big companies have too much power in Washington. By contrast, only 47 percent said that labor unions have too much power in Washington (as against 42 percent who said labor has too little power), and 18 percent who said nonprofit organizations have too much power in Washington.[3]

These results have proven durable. At least 80 percent of the public has ranked big companies as having too much power in Washington since 1994. In 2000, Business Week and Harris asked a broader question: Has business gained too much power over too many aspects of American life? Seventy-four percent agreed.[4]

The November 2007 poll also asked about support for measures to control corporations. These results are eye-opening as well, though perhaps not in the expected way.

Harris asked which industries “should be more regulated by government — for example for health, safety or environmental reasons — than they are now?” Only oil companies (53 percent), pharmaceutical companies (53 percent) and health insurance companies (52 percent) crossed the 50 percent threshold. Even the tobacco industry managed to escape in the survey with only 41 percent favoring greater regulation. These data trend significantly negative — against greater regulation — over the last five years.

Does this show that while people distrust Big Business, they equally distrust the government to constrain corporate power?

The U.S. skepticism to regulation is only skin deep. When polls present specific regulatory proposals for consideration, U.S. public support is typically strong and often overwhelming — even when arguments against government action are presented.

What the Harris findings on attitudes to regulation do show is that the business campaign against regulation as an abstract concept has been very successful.

It highlights the need for consumer, environmental, labor and other corporate accountability advocates to defend the concept of regulation, and to connect the rampant corporate abuses in society with the deregulation and non-regulatory failures of the last three decades. There’s little doubt that the general public attitude toward regulation significantly affects the willingness of politicians — none to eager to offend business patrons in the first place — to take on corporate power.

Councillors oppose identity card scheme

NORTH Ayrshire Council are to officially oppose government plans for identity cards.

Councillors voted by a majority of three to reject the controversial documents on Wednesday.

Only Labour councillors voted against an SNP-led motion calling on the council not to co-operate with the National Identity Scheme.

Ardrossan SNP councillor Tony Gurney — who proposed the motion, seconded by Kilwinning Lib Dem councillor Andrew Chamberlain — said ID cards were an attack on civil liberties.

“It is vitally important that every citizen in Scotland lets Labour know this is an attack too far.

“This decision is the first part of that message that we are sending to the London government.”

The motion went to a vote after Labour’s Peter McNamara pleaded for an amendment which would have seen the issue referred to the Council’s Executive and Scrutiny Committees.

He said it was an opportunity for the council to prove that the cabinet committee system worked and rival councillors could trust each other.

He also said the process would also allow councillors time to thoroughly research the arguments for and against ID cards before any decision was taken.

But Councillor Gurney refused to back down, adding that recent events had shown the government could not be trusted with personal data and that the estimated £18bn it would cost to set up the scheme would be better spent on local services.

Former US congressman indicted

An ex-congressman is indicted for his part in an alleged terrorist fundraising and accused of sending $130,000 to a Taliban supporter.

A US grand jury indicted ex-Republican congressman from Michigan, Mark Deli Siljander, with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice.

It is alleged he lobbied for a charity that sent funds to al-Qaeda and Taliban supporter Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

Siljander was a congressman from 1981-1987 and served one year as a US delegate to the United Nations.

The 42-count grand jury indictment alleges Siljander lied about lobbying senators on behalf of the Missouri-based Islamic American Relief Agency (IARA).

The indictment alleges the charity sent about $130,000 (£66,000) in 2003 and 2004 to accounts in Peshawar, Pakistan, that Gulbuddin Hekmatyar had access to.

It says Siljander “engaged in money laundering and obstruction of a federal investigation in an effort to disguise IARA’s misuse of taxpayer money that the government had provided for humanitarian purposes”.

The US justice department says he has “vowed to engage in a holy war against the United States and international troops”.

Lawmaker: CIA tape destruction unauthorized

The CIA official who gave the command to destroy interrogation videotapes apparently acted against the direction of his superiors, the top Republican House Intelligence Committee member said Wednesday.

“It appears he hadn’t gotten authority from anyone,” said Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., speaking to reporters after the first day of closed testimony in the committee’s investigation. “It appears he got direction to make sure the tapes were not destroyed.”

Hoekstra said that raises the troubling prospect that there’s a thread of unaccountability in the spy culture.

“I believe there are parts of the intelligence community that don’t believe they are accountable to Congress and may not be accountable to their own superiors in the intelligence community, and that’s why it’s a problem,” he said.

‘I told the truth’
Hoekstra spoke after the CIA’s acting general counsel, John Rizzo, testified behind closed doors for nearly four hours as the first witness in what committee officials have said will be a long investigation.

The man at the center of the controversy, Jose Rodriguez, had been scheduled to appear Wednesday, but his lawyer’s demand for immunity delayed his testimony. Rodriguez was the head of the CIA’s National Clandestine Service, the CIA branch that oversees spying operations and interrogations. He gave the order to destroy the tapes in November 2005.

The tapes, made in 2002, showed the harsh interrogation by CIA officers of two alleged al-Qaida terrorists, both of whom are known to have undergone waterboarding, which gives the subject the sensation of drowning.

The White House approved waterboarding and other “enhanced” techniques in 2002 for prisoners deemed resistant to conventional interrogation. The CIA is known to have waterboarded three prisoners and has not used the technique since 2003. CIA Director Michael Hayden prohibited it in 2006.

‘Very close to a direct order’
A congressional official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation said the document trail the committee is following strongly suggests Rodriguez knew destruction would be against the advice and wishes of his superiors.

“If you look at the documents, you get very close to a direct order (not to destroy the tapes) without it being, ‘Jose, you’re not going to do this,’” the official said.

The official said the committee will try to determine whether any CIA officials suggested “with a wink and a nod” that the tapes should be destroyed.

Rizzo told the committee that CIA lawyers had concluded destroying the tapes would be legal but that he advised against it, the official said. Then-CIA Director Porter Goss also recommended against the tapes’ destruction, said the official, information confirmed by several former intelligence officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because of an ongoing Justice Department criminal investigation into the matter.

Rizzo, who has been acting general counsel since 2004, participated in at least two key meetings about the tapes.

After Goss took over as CIA director in 2004, Rizzo asked him whether he opposed destroying the videotapes. He said he did, according to one of the former intelligence officials. Goss’ objection was primarily informed by his political career; he thought destroying the tapes would look suspicious, the official said.

Rizzo was also at a meeting in early November 2005 when Rodriguez told Goss that the tapes had been destroyed.

At the meeting it was decided that Rizzo would inform White House counsel Harriet Miers, Rodriguez would tell the leaders of the intelligence committees on Capitol Hill, and Goss would inform the director of national intelligence, according to former intelligence officials.

Committee leaders didn’t know
But intelligence committee leaders said they were not informed until more than a year later. Few committee members even knew the tapes had existed until CIA Director Michael Hayden announced their destruction to CIA employees in an e-mail on Dec. 6.

“I don’t have any indication Mr. Rodriguez has talked to Congress about the tapes,” committee chairman Sylvestre Reyes, D-Texas, said following Wednesday’s hearing.

Reyes said the CIA has given the committee access to more than 300 pages of documents, but that there are many more to review.

Hoekstra said Rodriguez must testify to the committee to determine on whose authority the tapes were destroyed, and he said the panel will consult with the Justice Department on whether granting Rodriguez immunity would undermine its own investigation.

“If there appears to be any criminal activity taking place, the last thing we would want to do is get in the way of a successful prosecution,” Hoekstra said.