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AP photographer wins amnesty from Iraqi panel

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

BAGHDAD - An Iraqi judicial committee has dismissed terrorism-related allegations against Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein and ordered him released nearly two years after he was detained by the U.S. military.

A decision by a four-judge panel said Hussein’s case falls under a new amnesty law. It ordered Iraqi courts to “cease legal proceedings” and ruled that Hussein should be “immediately” released unless other accusations are pending.

The ruling is dated Monday but AP’s lawyers were not able to thoroughly review it until Wednesday. It was unclear, however, whether Hussein would still face further obstacles to release.

U.S. military authorities have said a UN Security Council mandate allows them to retain custody of a detainee they believe is a security risk even if an Iraqi judicial body has ordered that prisoner freed. The UN mandate is due to expire at the end of this year.

Also, the amnesty committee’s ruling on Hussein may not cover a separate allegation that has been raised in connection with the case.

AP President Tom Curley hailed the committee’s decision and demanded that the U.S. military “finally do the right thing” and free Hussein.

Under Iraq’s two-month-old amnesty law, a grant of amnesty effectively closes a case and does not assume guilt of the accused.

Hussein has been held by the U.S. military since being detained by marines on April 12, 2006, in Ramadi, about 110 kilometres west of Baghdad. Throughout his incarceration, he has maintained he is innocent and was only doing the work of a professional news photographer in a war zone.

The amnesty committee’s decision covers various allegations by the U.S. military against Hussein, including claims he was in possession of bomb-making material, conspired with insurgents to take photographs synchronized with an explosion and offered to secure a forged ID for a terrorist evading capture by the military.

The committee may still be reviewing a separate allegation that Hussein had contacts with the kidnappers of an Italian citizen, Salvatore Santoro, whose body was photographed by Hussein in December 2004 with two masked insurgents standing over Santoro with guns.

Hussein was one of three journalists who were stopped at gunpoint by insurgents and taken by them to see the propped-up body. None of the journalists witnessed his death, said Santiago Lyon, AP’s director of photography. The AP wrote a story about the incident at the time.

The AP said a review of Hussein’s work and contacts also found no evidence of any activities beyond the normal role of a news photographer. Hussein, 36, was a member of an AP team that won a Pulitzer Prize for photography in 2005, and his detention has drawn protests from rights groups and press freedom advocates such as the Committee to Protect Journalists.

“The Amnesty Committee took only a few days to determine what we have been saying for two years. Bilal Hussein must be freed immediately,” said Curley, the AP’s president.

“The U.S. military has said the Iraqi process should be allowed to work. It has, and the military must finally do the right thing by ending its detention of a journalist who did nothing more than his job. Bilal’s imprisonment stands as a sad black mark on American values of justice and fairness,” Curley added.

The U.S. military referred the case in December to an investigating judge, who reviewed the evidence and submitted his findings to the Central Criminal Court of Iraq to determine whether the case should go to trial.

In February, however, parliament approved a law providing amnesty to those held for insurgency-related offences - including detainees such as Hussein who have never been convicted.

The committee from the Iraqi Federal Appeals Court ruled Monday that allegations against Hussein were covered by the Anti-Terrorist Law and were subject to the amnesty law.

The order was sent to the Iraqi public prosecutor, but it was unclear if it had been received.

A lawyer for the AP was provided a copy of the order, but Wednesday was a public holiday in Iraq and government offices were closed.

The amnesty committee - or any Iraqi institution - cannot force the U.S. military to release or turn over any of the estimated 23,000 detainees it holds in Iraq.

But a provision in the amnesty law states that the Iraqi government “is committed to take the necessary measures to move the arrested people” from U.S. control.

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Olympic torch route changed and hidden

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

San Francisco - The symbolic Olympic torch was lit Wednesday in San Francisco in a bizarre event that saw it taken into hiding in a warehouse and among a convoy of buses and amphibious vehicles. The efforts were a bid to thwart thousands of protestors lining the expected route along the San Francisco waterfront. The flame eventually appeared about an hour later in the hands of two runners, far from the original route and surrounded by a cordon of police on motorbikes and Chinese security officers. The torch relay was preceded by minor skirmishes as Beijing supporters waving huge red flags confronted demonstrators protesting Chinese policies. “Liars, liars, liars,” shouted hundreds of ethnic Chinese at protestors who held a Tibetan flag and signs saying “Save Darfur.” Elsewhere, people draped in Tibetan flags lay in the streets in an attempt to disrupt the torch relay. Police were out in force to keep the opposing groups apart, and there were no immediate reports of arrests as thousands of demonstrators gathered along the San Francisco’s famous waterfront to cheer or jeer the passage of the Olympic flame. Many of the protestors condemned Beijing’s policies in Tibet and curtailment of freedom of speech in China, but there was also a group of nudists calling for a return to the way the ancient Greek games were played. Officials in the famously progressive city were anxious to avoid the scenes of mayhem that dogged the torch’s passage through Paris and London, conferring with French and British authorities to devise a strategy. Adding to the volatile mix is San Francisco’s large Chinese emigre community, many of whom see China’s hosting of the Olympic Games as a source of national pride. “This has been a dream for China to show the world what kind of progress we have made,” said Han Moy, who was born in China but has lived in the United States for 50 years. “We are trying to accomplish two goals here. One is to protect the right to free speech, and the other is to ensure public safety, and here in San Francisco we are good at both of those things,” said Nathan Ballard, a spokesman for Mayor Gavin Newsom. At the same authorities were preparing for the worst. Ambulances were stationed at strategic points along the planned thoroughfare, where police teams placed barriers to control crowds and secure the torch route. Police Chief Heather Fong said that officers, including some who will run with torchbearers, have watched events unfold in Europe and were adjusting their strategies. “What is most important is, at the end of the day the people are peaceful and safe, and it’s a successful situation,” Fong said. “If there’s violence and people get hurt, then it hurts every opinion that is out there.” Most protesters have pledged to act peacefully and not attempt to disrupt the passage of the torch as happened in London and Paris. The tone was set early Wednesday, when groups of Tibetan monks marched across the Golden Gate Bridge. On Tuesday night, actor Richard Gere and Nobel peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu led a peaceful human-rights vigil, after other demonstrators lit what they called the Tibetan Freedom Torch. “It is fantastic what people have been doing,” Tutu told reporters at the Candle Lights for Human Rights vigil at San Francisco’s United Nations Plaza. The scenes of mayhem prompted speculation that future legs of the global torch tour would be cancelled to avoid further anti-China protests. Members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said Wednesday that they have ruled out cutting short the protest-plagued international portion of the Olympic torch relay. Mario Vazquez Rana, president of the Association of National Olympic Committees, said after sharing dinner Tuesday night with Rogge that the IOC president was “100-per-cent convinced” not to make any changes to the international relay. IOC vice-president Thomas Bach said he expected “that it will continue,” and Swedish executive board member Gunilla Lindbergh also shared this view.”My opinion is that we have to do exactly what we planned,” she told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa. “The torch has to complete its international trip.”

DPA

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IPS wants ID card service pilots

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

The Identity and Passport Service is discussing a round of pilots that use identity cards to join up service delivery.

James Hall, chief executive of the Identity and Passport Service, told GC News the agency is talking to government departments about how the card may be used to support service delivery. He said the move has the enthusiastic support of the home secretary and that the IPS is aiming to run some early pilots.

So far none have progressed beyond discussions, but he likened the plan to last year’s trial with the Criminal Records Bureau on using passports and identity cards for online checks on people working with children and vulnerable adults. This showed the potential to speed up turnaround times and reduce data inputting errors.

Using the card as an enabler for joined up services is an element of the Delivery Plan for the National Identity Scheme, published in March. Hall suggested the next step with trials could involve services for young people.

“We’re still in the process of thinking through how we might start this with young people,” he said. “One possibility is to start in a geographic area, in which case we might talk with the local authority and get them engaged from day one. But there is nothing in detail yet.”

He said it is an important element of the plan that will do a lot to promote widespread take-up of the card, but draws a distinction between the use of the card and the National Identity Register (NIR).

“We want people to accept the card as proof of identity from day one, and I’m sure many will do so, but for departments’ computer systems to use the NIR as a core source of identification will take years. We’re putting in place a piece of national infrastructure for the 21st century, and the full impact will not be felt for five, 10 or 15 years.”

This article was originally published at Kablenet.

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Clinton pledges: I’ll end war in Iraq

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama yesterday, left Washington for the key state of Pennsylvania and promised to fix America’s stumbling economy, which both Democrats say has been badly undermined by the Iraq war.They were in the US capital on Tuesday along with Republican John McCain to question the US commander in Iraq.

Coming out of the session with General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, Clinton spoke at a high school near Pittsburgh, telling an audience that included retired US military officers that she would end the war. “One candidate is ready to be commander-in-chief, to end the war and rebuild our military while honouring our soldiers and veterans. And you’re looking at her,” Clinton said.

Obama reminded his Pennsylvania audience that he had opposed the Iraq war before it began and said it had “piled up a mountain of debt that has weakened our economy”.

Pennsylvania, holds the next primary contest on April 22, and offers the largest remaining prize of 158 delegates.-AP

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US renews contract with Blackwater

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

By Kate Randall

The US State Department has renewed its contract with Blackwater Worldwide to provide security for American diplomats in Baghdad. The move comes as the FBI is still investigating an incident in September 2007 in which 17 Iraqi civilians were gunned down by guards from the security firm.

Commenting on the contract renewal, Gregory Starr, acting assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security, said, “I’m not going to prejudge what the FBI is going to find in its investigation. It’s complex. I think the US government needs protective services.” He added, “Essentially I think they [Blackwater] do a very good job.”

Blackwater’s five-year contract, begun in 2006, must be renewed every year and was set to expire on May 7. The State Department announced last Friday that it would be extended for another year. The Iraq government, which has faced increasing public pressure to ban the security contractor, was not consulted prior to the decision.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki responded angrily to the news. “They committed a massacre against Iraqis and until now this issue has not been resolved,” he told CNN. “No judicial action has been taken, no compensation has been made.”

He added, “I would say that the US side should not have moved to renew the contract before the outstanding issues with this company are finalized. I feel this decision was taken without the approval of the Iraqi government.”

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack dismissed Maliki’s remarks, and any concept of Iraqi authority to oversee the operations of the security firms. “First of all, it’s fundamentally a decision for us to take, about how we protect our people,” he said. “The authority and responsibility with making those kinds of decisions has to reside with us.”

More than six months after the deadly incident in Baghdad’s Nisoor Square on September 16 none of the security guards involved has been charged in connection with the shootings. Under a provision known as “Order 17,” established in 2004 under the Coalition Provisional Authority, foreign contractors are granted full immunity from prosecution in Iraqi courts, the same protection provided to US military personnel.

This order has been utilized to shield US soldiers and officers involved in atrocities perpetrated against Iraqis—such as the November 2005 massacre of 24 civilians in Haditha—from prosecution in Iraqi courts.

An Iraqi investigation as well as an American military report released in the aftermath of the Nisoor Square incident determined that the killings were unprovoked. Numerous witnesses to the atrocity described a horrifying scene in which vehicles were shot up with bullets and victims were gunned down as they tried to run away.

The FBI, which took over the investigation from Diplomatic Security investigators for the State Department, has yet to release its findings. When it does, it will be up to the US Justice Department to determine whether or not to file any charges. FBI officials speaking to the New York Times last November held open the possibility that at least three of the civilian deaths may have been justified.

It was also revealed late last year that the State Department offered “limited” immunity to the mercenaries involved in the incident in the immediate aftermath of the shootings. This means that any statements they may have made—and any evidence gathered as a result—cannot be used against them in any future prosecutions. As a result, the Justice Department may decide not to charge the security guards, or may be unable to present the evidence needed to convict them.

Also, while the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act permits prosecution of contractors working abroad for the US military, it does not necessarily apply to contractors working for the civilian-led State Department, making it unclear from a legal standpoint whether the mercenaries can be prosecuted in US courts.

In one of the interviews with the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service in the aftermath of the shootings, obtained by ABCNews.com, agent “Paul,” a turret gunner, described numerous instances in which he opened fire and gunned down civilians. “I engaged the individuals and stopped the threat,” he recounted. He claimed he had come under fire from both small arms and an AK-47.

Preliminary reports from the FBI probe, however, have confirmed earlier findings that the shootings were unprovoked. Three witnesses interviewed by the FBI, who spoke to the Los Angeles Times after their questioning, said they told the FBI that they did not see anyone fire on the security guards.

One of those questioned was Mohammed Hafidh Abdul-Razzaq, 37, whose 10-year-old son Ali was killed in the massacre. Hafidh said he never saw anyone fire on the security convoy before his son was shot and killed as he sat in the back seat of his car. He described the shooting rampage to the Christian Science Monitor as “a nightmare. I saw them shoot at people who were dead over and over again.”

While the events of September 16, 2007 are the most well publicized incident involving private security contractors, they are not an aberration. According to the State Department’s own records, Blackwater guards were deployed on at least 1,873 missions in 2007 alone, and fired their weapons in 56 cases.

The behavior of these agents is in line with the US military rules of engagement, which call for “escalation of force” to be used against a perceived threat. Countless thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed at checkpoints, on the streets and in their homes on the basis of this military code of conduct.

The operations of Blackwater and other security contractors are an essential component of the US occupation of Iraq. Blackwater has government contracts totaling at least $800 million to provide security to US State Department officials.

An estimated 20,000 to 30,000 mercenaries from Blackwater Worldwide, DynCorp International and Triple Canopy are presently in Iraq. The decision of the State Department to renew Blackwater’s contract underscores US government plans to grant them continued authority to operate with impunity in the occupied country.

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D.C. police set to monitor 5,000 cameras

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

D.C. officials are giving police access to more than 5,000 closed-circuit TV cameras citywide that monitor traffic, schools and public housing — a move that will give the District one of the largest surveillance networks in the country.
“The primary benefit of what we’re doing is for public health and safety,” said Darrell Darnell, director of the city’s Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency, who announced the initiative along with Mayor Adrian M. Fenty yesterday.
But the announcement left some civil liberties advocates and a key D.C. Council member concerned.
“We’ve been sort of sounding the alarm on this stuff for a long time, saying these little pieces — they grow,” said Art Spitzer, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of the National Capital Area. “You put a camera here, it’s not so bad, you put a camera there, it’s not so bad. But then it turns out all the sudden, we find out there are 5,200 cameras. That’s a big number.”
Council member Phil Mendelson, chairman of the Committee on Public Safety and the Judiciary, said that the proposed move was “breathtaking” and that the initiative “has not been thought through.”
“There is a huge civil liberty implication because they’re talking about a fully [interoperable] system,” said Mr. Mendelson, at-large Democrat. “If it is as big as they are suggesting, this is a major change.”
The Video Interoperability for Public Safety (VIPS) program will consolidate the more than 5,200 cameras operated by D.C. agencies — including D.C. Public Schools and the D.C. Housing Authority — into one network managed by the city’s Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency.
The program will allow agencies to share camera video feeds and provide the city with a network that is actively monitored and that Mr. Darnell said will operate “24 hours a day, 365 days a year.”

Mr. Fenty, a Democrat, said the initiative will enhance the District’s countersurveillance and public-safety capabilities by increasing the number of cameras available for authorities to monitor.

For example, the mayor said the Metropolitan Police Department currently monitors 92 surveillance cameras in high-crime neighborhoods. The number of cameras available for the department’s use in those neighborhoods will increase to 225 under the initiative, although Mr. Fenty said police and other agencies also will have access to 1,388 outside cameras and 3,874 cameras inside buildings throughout the city.

Nearly 3,500 of the cameras are operated by D.C. Public Schools. The city’s transportation department operates 131 of the devices, which are normally trained on streets but can swivel.

“It is important to note, however, that there are many more cameras that are not in high-crime areas that MPD can also use in either the prevention or fighting of crime,” Mr. Fenty said.

Surveillance camera networks have been used throughout the country and around the world by advocates who say the devices are effective tools for crime prevention.

Chicago, widely seen as the U.S. city that has made the most aggressive use of surveillance technology, has installed more than 2,000 cameras and began linking the devices into a single network in 2004. The camera network in London, referred to as the “Ring of Steel,” is thought to be the most extensive in the world, employing about 500,000 cameras.

In the District, police Chief Cathy L. Lanier testified before the D.C. Council last week that her department’s cameras have caused a 19 percent reduction in violent crime within 250 feet of the devices and a 4 percent violent crime reduction within 1,000 feet.

But camera opponents counter that the devices are not an effective crime deterrent and can result in an intrusion on citizens’ privacy.

“When you look at [police] statistics, the first thing you noticed was that they don’t account for displacement, where you put a camera up on one street and the drug dealer goes to the next street,” said Melissa Ngo, senior counsel and director of the Identification and Surveillance Project at the District-based Electronic Privacy Information Center. “That is not cutting down on crime so much as moving it.”

Mr. Fenty and Mr. Darnell said the District’s program will take an “all-hazards” approach and be used not only for public safety but emergency and traffic safety needs as well. The District is spending an estimated $1.7 million this year to monitor the separate camera programs and will spend an estimated $885,000 in fiscal 2009 after the consolidation.

Officials also hope to receive some federal funding for the program and plan to begin consolidating camera functions for four agencies by May 1. A second phase of the program — which officials expect to be fully implemented by year’s end — will integrate remaining agencies into a central facility.

When the District first implemented its network of surveillance cameras through emergency legislation in 2006, officials said the devices would be passively monitored by police and required that the police chief provide public notice before the cameras are permanently installed, with some exceptions.

Chief Lanier last year allowed officers to actively monitor the cameras. Officials said the new consolidated network will adhere to existing rules until more comprehensive regulations can be developed.

Mr. Mendelson, who questioned Mr. Darnell about the program at an oversight hearing yesterday, was skeptical that the council’s previous camera regulations would be followed.

“We’re going to go from a system where the council is legislating that the system would be passively monitored to a system where 5,000 cameras can be actively monitored by any one of the … agencies,” he said.

BIG BROTHER

D.C. officials yesterday said they plan to link more than 5,000 cameras to form a surveillance network to help combat crime and terrorism. The following city agencies have cameras:

D.C. Housing Authority: 720

D.C. Public Schools: 3,452

Department of Parks and Recreation: 181

Department of Transportation: 131

Metropolitan Police Department: 92

Department of Corrections: 218

Office of Property Management/Protective Services Division: 468

D.C. Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency: 4

TOTAL: 5,266

Source: D.C. Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency

THE WASHINGTON TIMES

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Superfast internet may replace world wide web

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

By Lewis Carter

The internet could soon be made obsolete by a new “grid” system which is 10,000 times faster than broadband connections.

Web could collapse as video demand soars

Scientists in Switzerland have developed a lightning-fast replacement to the internet that would allow feature films and music catalogues to be downloaded within seconds.

The invention could signal the end of the dreaded ‘frozen screen’, when computers seize up after being asked to process too much information.

The latest spin-off from Cern, the particle physics centre that created the internet, the grid could also provide the power needed to send sophisticated images; allow instant online gaming with hundreds of thousands of players; and offer high-definition video telephony for the price of a local call.

David Britton, professor of physics at Glasgow University and a leading figure in the grid project, believes grid technology could change society.

He said: “With this kind of computing power, future generations will have the ability to collaborate and communicate in ways older people like me cannot even imagine.”

The power of the grid will be unlocked this summer with the switching on of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a new particle accelerator designed to investigate how the universe began.

The grid will be turned on at the same time to store the information it generates, after scientists at Cern, based near Geneva, realised the internet would not have the capacity to capture such huge volumes of data.

The grid has been built with fibre optic cables and modern routing centres, meaning there are no outdated components to slow the deluge of data, unlike the internet.

There are 55,000 grid servers already installed, a figure which is expected to rise to 200,000 within the next two years.

Professor Tony Doyle, technical director of the grid project, said: “We need so much processing power, there would even be an issue about getting enough electricity to run the computers if they were all at Cern.

“The only answer was a new network powerful enough to send the data instantly to research centres in other countries.”

Britain has 8,000 servers on the grid system, meaning access could be available to universities as early as this autumn.

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The Emerging Surveillance State

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

Ron Paul

Last month, the House amended the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to expand the government’s ability to monitor our private communications. This measure, if it becomes law, will result in more warrantless government surveillance of innocent American citizens.

Though some opponents claimed that the only controversial part of this legislation was its grant of immunity to telecommunications companies, there is much more to be wary of in the bill. In the House version, Title II, Section 801, extends immunity from prosecution of civil legal action to people and companies including any provider of an electronic communication service, any provider of a remote computing service, “any other communication service provider who has access to wire or electronic communications,” any “parent, subsidiary, affiliate, successor, or assignee” of such company, any “officer, employee, or agent” of any such company, and any “landlord, custodian, or other person who may be authorized or required to furnish assistance.” The Senate version goes even further by granting retroactive immunity to such entities that may have broken the law in the past.

The new FISA bill allows the federal government to compel many more types of companies and individuals to grant the government access to our communications without a warrant. The provisions in the legislation designed to protect Americans from warrantless surveillance are full of loopholes and ambiguities. There is no blanket prohibition against listening in on all American citizens without a warrant.

We have been told that this power to listen in on communications is legal and only targets terrorists. But if what these companies are being compelled to do is legal, why is it necessary to grant them immunity? If what they did in the past was legal and proper, why is it necessary to grant them retroactive immunity?

In communist East Germany , one in every 100 citizens was an informer for the dreaded secret police, the Stasi. They either volunteered or were compelled by their government to spy on their customers, their neighbors, their families, and their friends. When we think of the evil of totalitarianism, such networks of state spies are usually what comes to mind. Yet, with modern technology, what once took tens of thousands of informants can now be achieved by a few companies being coerced by the government to allow it to listen in to our communications. This surveillance is un-American.

We should remember that former New York governor Eliot Spitzer was brought down by a provision of the PATRIOT Act that required enhanced bank monitoring of certain types of financial transactions. Yet we were told that the PATRIOT Act was needed to catch terrorists, not philanderers. The extraordinary power the government has granted itself to look into our private lives can be used for many purposes unrelated to fighting terrorism. We can even see how expanded federal government surveillance power might be used to do away with political rivals.

The Fourth Amendment to our Constitution requires the government to have a warrant when it wishes to look into the private affairs of individuals. If we are to remain a free society we must defend our rights against any governmental attempt to undermine or bypass the Constitution.

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New Domestic Satellite Surveillance System

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

Plans for the Department of Homeland Security to launch a new satellite surveillance system is coming under new criticism on Capitol Hill. Last week, Secretary Michael Chertoff said the satellite surveillance system would be soon ready to go. But now the Wall Street Journal reports Democrats are threatening to shut down the program unless the department does more to address privacy concerns. The satellite program is designed to provide federal, state and local officials with extensive access to spy satellite imagery to assist with emergency response and other domestic security needs. But critics say the Bush administration hasn’t created legal safeguards to ensure that the program won’t be used for domestic spying. - Democracy Now

Privacy Fears Threaten Satellite Program
Democrats Assail Surveillance System; Issues With Charter

By SIOBHAN GORMAN

WASHINGTON — Homeland Security’s domestic satellite surveillance system is running into fresh opposition from Congress, which is threatening to shut down the program if the department doesn’t more thoroughly address concerns over protecting privacy.

The satellite program, known as the National Applications Office, is designed to provide federal, state and local officials with extensive access to spy satellite imagery to assist with emergency response and other domestic security needs.

Lawmakers said the Department of Homeland Security hasn’t created legal safeguards to ensure that the office won’t be used for domestic spying. They also are asking for assurance that it is legal to use military assets such as spy satellites for domestic security.

Recent classified briefings on the program “did not allay any of our concerns,” said House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat. In a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Monday, written with two colleagues, he wrote: “Should you proceed with the [program] without addressing our concerns, we will take appropriate steps to discontinue it.” (Read the letter.)

Homeland Security spokeswoman Laura Keehner said her department this week will send lawmakers additional documents — a certification that plans for the office to comply with the law, descriptions of how the office will operate, and assessments of the impact on privacy and civil liberties. “These documents, along with the charter we delivered to Congress last week, should answer many of Congress’ remaining questions,” she said in a written statement.

Ms. Keehner said the office hadn’t been launched, but that DHS “continues to take preparatory steps so that we can stand up to the NAO once the congressional requirements have been met.”

The clash is the latest in a series of conflicts between Democrats on Capitol Hill and the administration over privacy issues stemming from intelligence and national-security programs.

As recently as last week, Mr. Chertoff said the program would soon be ready to go. “We’ve fully addressed anybody’s concerns,” he said. The department has already begun to post job openings; one of the first people they are seeking to hire for the satellite program is a lawyer.

The plan ran into resistance on Capitol Hill shortly after it was announced in August, as lawmakers asked for a legal framework and details of how the program would operate to ensure Americans’ privacy. Homeland officials promised not to begin the program until they answered lawmakers’ concerns.

For months, the department worked on a document it called the new program’s charter. That document got hung up within the administration last winter because agencies, including the Director of National Intelligence, expressed concerns that it did not untangle legal issues such as how to ensure that state and local privacy guidelines were followed. Plans to provide imagery from the satellite program to state and local law-enforcement officials have been put on hold until legal and privacy issues are resolved. (See the charter.)

The charter creates a working group to handle policy and legal issues and lists which privacy-related laws will govern the work of the new spy satellite office. It also clarifies that the satellites won’t be used to intercept communications.

Democratic lawmakers said the charter doesn’t address the requirements they have written into law. Congress said it wouldn’t provide money in 2008 for the program until the department certified that it adhered to privacy laws and the Government Accountability Office reviewed it. Homeland Security hasn’t yet sent GAO a certification for review.

Rep. Thompson, along with Democratic Reps. Jane Harman of California and Christopher P. Carney of Pennsylvania, wrote to Mr. Chertoff to ask he stop further work until he addresses their concerns. “We are disappointed by [the department's] continuing pattern of putting the cart before the horse,” they wrote.

Rep. Thompson said he wants to see, in writing, how existing laws will be applied to safeguard civil liberties and privacy. The charter describes at what points in the process lawyers will evaluate the legality of a request for data from the office, but it doesn’t explain how they will make their determinations.

Rep. Harold Rogers of Kentucky, the top Republican on the subcommittee that doles out the Homeland Security department’s money, called the spy satellite program “an important tool for domestic counterterrorism operations” and said he will work to ensure the department will meet congressional requirements.

Homeland Security’s inspector general concluded in a report released last week that the department needs to revise its assessment of the new office’s impact on privacy and civil liberties before launching the spy-satellite program. The department said it has done that.

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Arsenal melt in Anfield furnace

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

James Ducker

England is guaranteed at least one representative in the Champions League final for the fourth successive season after another night on which the Barclays Premier League strengthened its claim to being the best in Europe.

For the third time in four seasons Liverpool will meet Chelsea in the semi-finals of the Continent’s premier club competition after Rafael Benítez’s team produced one of their finest performances of a turbulent campaign to come from behind to beat Arsenal 4-2 at a raucous Anfield for an outstanding 5-3 aggregate victory.

With Chelsea having overturned a 2-1 deficit to beat Fenerbahçe 3-2 on aggregate at Stamford Bridge, Avram Grant, the first-team coach, will try to succeed where José Mourinho twice failed by overcoming a Liverpool team for whom Europe continues to provide a remarkable sanctuary.

But there was no doubting who provided the entertainment — and controversy. Having led 1-0 through Abou Diaby’s early strike only to trail 2-1, Arsenal appeared to have settled the tie on away goals with six minutes left when Theo Walcott raced almost the length of the pitch to set up Emmanuel Adebayor, who made amends for a bad miss moments earlier.

Within two minutes Liverpool, willed on by their magnificent support, had scored a disputed third when Ryan Babel, an inspired substitute, tumbled in the penalty area after tangling with Kolo Touré. Steven Gerrard made no mistake from the spot before Babel added a fourth at the death, but Arsène Wenger was infuriated by the decision of Peter Fröjdfeldt, the referee, to award the penalty.

The Arsenal manager, who insisted that his team should have been awarded a penalty in the first leg, said: “The game was over — it was down to a dodgy decision and to a lack of concentration at 2-2. Over the two games it’s very difficult to swallow. All the big decisions went against us.”

Benítez, who praised “the belief and character of our players”, claimed not to have seen the penalty incident, but Gerrard was not about to moan. “It was probably one of the worst performances I have had in a Liverpool shirt, but I was confident I would score the penalty,” the Liverpool captain said.

“It was a great team performance and when we defend like that, other teams find it impossible. We’ve got some big league games coming up, but we’ll be ready for Chelsea.”

After Chelsea had overcome Fenerbahçe with goals from Michael Ballack and Frank Lampard, Grant said: “I’ve said all along we can do good things. We can win the competition. We’re very close.” But with Petr Cech out for two weeks, Grant’s joy was tempered by a hamstring injury to Carlo Cudicini, who was replaced by Hilário, the third-choice goalkeeper, in the first half. “It doesn’t look so good,” Grant said of Cudicini’s injury.

It means that Rhys Taylor, the youth-team goalkeeper who has not made a first-team appearance and turned 18 on Monday, is likely to be involved in three matches in four days next week: on the bench against Wigan Athletic and Everton on Monday and Thursday and playing in the FA Youth Cup final, second leg away to Manchester City on Wednesday. “He’s a good goalkeeper,” Grant said.

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NSA releases new version of Linux software

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

WASHINGTON, March 24 (UPI) — The U.S. National Security Agency has released its own version of the open-source computer operating system Linux, which offers enhanced security for users.

The new software was rolled out earlier this month to an e-mail list for users of Linux — an operating system that many experts believe provides a more secure alternative to the ubiquitous Microsoft Windows. Linux is open-source, which means the core code is available to programmers to improve, as the NSA has done with its latest version of the so-called Security-Enhanced Linux, or SELinux.

The version provides what experts call Mandatory Access Control, which essentially limits the kind of instructions that software packages and users can issue to the computer, helping guard against hackers compromising it. MAC “confine(s) user programs and system servers to the minimum amount of privilege they require to do their jobs,” says the agency on its Web site.

“This work is not intended as a complete security solution,” said the agency in a March 5 statement about the latest update. “It is simply an example of how mandatory access controls that can confine the actions of any process, including an administrator process, can be added into a system.”

The agency added the security features of the system were limited. “The focus of this work has not been on system assurance or other security features such as security auditing, although these elements are also important for a secure system.”

The release was first reported by Government Computer News. The NSA has been working on SELinux since 2000, and it has been available to Linux users since 2003.

The NSA is also pushing for MAC to be made an option for Internet servers using the Network File System protocol, according to the Dark Reading IT security Web site.

The site said the proposal was discussed at a meeting of the Internet Engineering Task Force in Philadelphia earlier this month.

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Uruguay seeks secret US archives on ‘dirty war’

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

MONTEVIDEO (AFP) — President Tabare Vazquez has asked US President George W. Bush to declassify US documents on Uruguay’s “dirty war” (1973-1985) for possible clues to a 1978 murder and other crimes, his office said Monday.

“My government hopes it can count on the cooperation of the US government in clarifying all disappearances and human rights violations during that painful period in Uruguay’s history,” Vazquez told Bush in a letter already sent to the Whited House.

The letter, Vazquez’ office said, was suggested by the opposition National Party (NP) last month to help an investigaton into the 1978 poison murder of Cecilia Fontana, the wife of then NP leader Mario Heber.

A PN lawyer who pushed for the case to be reopened, last year had requested the US Central Intelligence Agency for classified documents on Fontana’s murder, but was turned down in June, when the CIA told him the papers were classified.

In addition to information on Fontana’s murder — she was poisoned with a bottle of wine intended for her husband, Vazquez also asked Bush to declassify all documents dealing with Uruguay when it was under the military dictatorship.

Meanwhile, Quito on Monday said it would investigate alleged CIA meddling in Ecuador, after Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa at the weekend vowed to put an end to the CIA’s “infiltration” of the nation’s intelligence services.

The Defense Ministry said in a statement that “a top level civilian committee” would be formed to look into the allegations.

The complaints against the CIA follow the sacking Thursday of Army Intelligence chief, Colonel Mario Pazmino, for failing to tell the government about the death of an Ecuadoran during Colombia’s March 1 bombing of a Colombian rebel camp inside Ecuador.

On Saturday, Quito’s El Comercio daily reported that the CIA paid Ecuador’s Army Intelligence 16 million to 18 million dollars a year to “exchange information.”

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Back From Iraq: “I Killed Innocent People”

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

“We forget what war is about, what it does to those who wage it and those who suffer from it. Those who hate war the most, I have often found, are veterans who know it.” — Chris HedgesInterview with Marine Sergeant Jimmy Massey

by Paul Rockwell
Oakland, California

For nearly 12 years, Staff Sergeant Jimmy Massey was a hard-core, some say “gung-ho,” Marine. For three years he trained fellow Marines in one of the most grueling indoctrination rituals in military life — Marine boot camp.

The Iraqi war changed Massey. The brutality, the sheer carnage of the U.S. invasion, touched his conscience and transformed him forever. He was honorably discharged last December 31 and is now back in his hometown, Waynsville, North Carolina. When I talked with Sergeant Massey last week, he expressed his remorse at the civilian loss of life in incidents in which he himself was involved.

Introduction

Paul Rockwell: You spent 12 years in the Marines. When were you sent to Iraq?

Sgt. Massey: I went to Kuwait around January 17th. I was in Iraq from the get-go. And I was involved in the initial invasion.

Paul Rockwell: What does the public need to know about your experiences as a Marine?

Sgt. Massey: The cause of the Iraqi revolt against the American occupation. What they need to know is we killed a lot of innocent people. I think at first the Iraqis had the understanding that casualties are a part of war. But over the course of time, the occupation hurt the Iraqis. And I didn’t see any humanitarian support.

Paul Rockwell: What experiences turned you against the war and made you leave the Marines?

Sgt. Massey: I was in charge of a platoon that consists of machine gunners and missile men. Our job was to go into certain areas of the towns and secure the roadways.

There was this one particular incident — and there’s many more — the one that really pushed me over the edge. It involved a car with Iraqi civilians. From all the intelligence reports we were getting, the cars were loaded down with suicide bombs or material. That’s the rhetoric we received from intelligence. They came upon our checkpoint. We fired some warning shots. They didn’t slow down. So we lit them up.

Paul Rockwell: Lit up? You mean you fired machine guns?

Sgt. Massey: Right. Every car that we lit up we were expecting ammunition to go off. But we never heard any. Well this particular vehicle we didn’t destroy completely, and one gentleman looked up at me and said: ‘Why did you kill my brother? We didn’t do anything wrong.’ That hit me like a ton of bricks.

Paul Rockwell: He spoke English?

Sgt. Massey: Oh, yeah.

Paul Rockwell: Baghdad was being bombed. The civilians were trying to get out, right?

Sgt. Massey: Yes. They received pamphlets, propaganda we dropped on them. It said ‘Just throw up your hands, lay down weapons.’ That’s what they were doing, but we were still lighting them up. They weren’t in uniform. We never found any weapons.

Paul Rockwell: You got to see the bodies and casualties?

Sgt. Massey: Yea, first hand. I helped throw them in a ditch.

Paul Rockwell: Over what period did all this take place?

Sgt. Massey: During the invasion of Baghdad.

Paul Rockwell: How many times were you involved in check-point “light-ups”?

Sgt. Massey: Five times.

“We Lit Him Up Pretty Good”

There was Rekha. The gentleman was driving a stolen work utility van. He didn’t stop. With us being trigger happy, we didn’t really give this guy much of a chance. We lit him up pretty good. Then we inspected the back of the van. We found nothing. No explosives.

Paul Rockwell: The reports said the cars were loaded with explosives. In all the incidents did you find that to be the case?

Sgt. Massey: Never. Not once. There were no secondary explosions. As a matter of fact, we lit up a rally.

Paul Rockwell: A demonstration? Where?

Sgt. Massey: On the outskirts of Baghdad. Near a military compound. There were demonstrators at the end of the street. They were young and they had no weapons. And when we rolled onto the scene, there was already a tank that was parked on the side of the road. If the Iraqis wanted to do something, they could have blown up the tank. But they didn’t. They were only holding a demonstration. Down at the end of the road, we saw some RPGs (rocket–propelled grenades) lined up against the wall. That put us at ease because we thought: ‘Wow, if they were going to blow us up, they would have done it.’

Paul Rockwell: Were the protest signs in English or Arabic?

Sgt. Massey: Both.

Paul Rockwell: Who gave the order to wipe the demonstrators out?

Sgt. Massey: Higher Command. We were told to be on the lookout for civilians because a lot of the Fedayeen and the Republican Guards had tossed away uniforms and put on civilian clothes and were mounting terrorist attacks on American soldiers. The intelligence reports that were given to us were basically known by every member of the chain of command. The rank structure that was implemented in Iraq by the chain of command was evident to every Marine in Iraq. The order to shoot the demonstrators, I believe, came from senior government officials including intelligence communities within the military and the U.S. government?

Paul Rockwell: What kind of firepower was employed?

Sgt. Massey: M-16s, 50-cal.machine guns.

Paul Rockwell: You fired into six or ten kids? Were they all taken out?

Sgt. Massey: Oh, yeah. Well, I had a ‘mercy’ on one guy. When we rolled up, he was hiding behind a concrete pillar. I saw him and raised my weapon up, and he put up his hands. He ran off. I told everybody ‘Don’t shoot.’ Half of his foot was trailing behind him. So he was running with half of his foot cut off.

Paul Rockwell: After you lit up the demonstration, how long before the next incident?

Sgt. Massey: Probably about one or two hours. This is another thing, too. I am so glad I am talking with you, because I suppressed all of this.

Paul Rockwell: Well I appreciate you giving me the information, as hard as it must be to recall the painful details.

Sgt. Massey: That’s all right. It’s kind of therapy for me. Because it’s something that I had repressed for a long time.

Paul Rockwell: And the incident?

Sgt. Massey: There was an incident with one of the cars. We shot an individual with his hands up. He got out of the car. He was badly shot. We lit him up. I don’t know who started shooting first. One of the Marines came running over to where we were and said: ‘You all just shot a guy with his hands up.’ Man, I forgot about this.

Depleted Uranium and Cluster Bombs

Paul Rockwell: You mention missiles and machine guns. What can you tell me about cluster bombs, or depleted uranium?

Sgt. Massey: Depleted uranium. I know what it does. It’s basically like leaving plutonium rods around. I’m 32 years old. I have eighty-percent of my lung capacity. I ache all the time. I don’t feel like a healthy 32-year old.

Paul Rockwell: Were you in the vicinity of of depleted uranium?

Sgt. Massey: Oh, yeah. It’s everywhere. DU is everywhere on the battlefield. If you hit a tank, there’s dust.

Paul Rockwell: Did you breath any dust?

Sgt. Massey: Yeah.

Paul Rockwell: And if DU is affecting you or our troops, it’s impacting Iraqi civilians.

Sgt. Massey: Oh, yeah. They got a big wasteland problem.

Paul Rockwell: Do Marines have any precautions about dealing with DU?

Sgt. Massey: Not that I know of. Well, if a tank gets hit, crews are detained for a little while to make sure there are no signs or symptoms. American tanks have depleted uranium on the sides, and the projectiles have DU in them. If an enemy vehicle gets hit, the area gets contaminated. Dead rounds are in the ground. The civilian populace is just now starting to learn about it. Hell, I didn’t even know about DU until two years ago. You know how I found out about it? I read an article in Rolling Stones magazine. I just started inquiring about it, and I said ‘Holy shit!’

Paul Rockwell: Cluster bombs are also controversial. U.N. commissions have called for a ban. Were you acquainted with cluster bombs?

Sgt. Massey: I had one of my Marines in my battalion who lost his leg from a cluster bomb.

Paul Rockwell: What happened?

Sgt. Massey: He stepped on it. We didn’t get to training about clusters until about a month before I left.

Paul Rockwell: What kind of training?

Sgt. Massey: They told us what they looked like, and not to step on them.

Paul Rockwell: Were you in any areas where they were dropped?

Sgt. Massey: Oh yeah. They were everywhere.

Paul Rockwell: Dropped from the air?

Sgt. Massey: From the air as well as artillery.

Paul Rockwell: Are they dropped far away from cities, or inside the cities?

Sgt. Massey: They are used everywhere. Now if you talked to a Marine artillery officer, he would give you the runaround, the politically correct answer. But for an average grunt, they’re everywhere.

Paul Rockwell: Including inside the towns and cities?

Sgt. Massey: Yes, if you were going into a city, you knew there were going to be cluster bombs.

Paul Rockwell: Cluster bombs are anti-personnel weapons. They are not precise. They don’t injure buildings, or hurt tanks. Only people and living things. There are a lot of undetonated duds and they go off after the battles are over.

Sgt. Massey: Once the round leaves the tube, the cluster bomb has a mind of its own. There’s always human error. I’m going to tell you. The armed forces are in a tight spot over there. It’s starting to leak out about the civilian casualties that are taking place. The Iraqis know. I keep hearing reports from my Marine buddies inside that there were 200-something civilians killed in Fallujah. The military is scrambling right now to keep the raps on that. My understanding is Fallujah is just littered with civilian bodies.

Embedded Reporters

Paul Rockwell: How are the embedded reporters responding?

Sgt. Massey: I had embedded reporters in my unit, not my platoon. One we had was a South African reporter. He was scared shitless. We had an incident where one of them wanted to go home.

Paul Rockwell: Why?

Sgt. Massey: It was when we started going into Baghdad. When he started seeing the civilian casualties, he started wigging out a little bit. It didn’t start until we got on the outskirts of Baghdad and started taking civilian casualties.

“I Killed Innocent People For Our Government”

Paul Rockwell: I would like to go back to the first incident, when the survivor asked why did you kill his brother. Was that the incident that pushed you over the edge, as you put it?

Sgt. Massey: Oh, yeah. Later on I found out that was a typical day. I talked with my commanding officer after the incident. He came up to me and says: ‘Are you o.k?’ I said: ‘No, today is not a good day. We killed a bunch of civilians.’ He goes: ‘No, today was a good day.’ And when he said that, I said ‘oh, my goodness, what the hell am I into?’

Paul Rockwell: Your feelings changed during the invasion. What was your state of mind before the invasion?

Sgt. Massey: I was like every other troop. My president told me they got weapons of mass destruction, that Saddam threatened the free world, that he had all this might and could reach us anywhere. I just bought into the whole thing.

Paul Rockwell: What changed you?

Sgt. Massey: The civilian casualties taking place. That was what made the difference. That was when I changed.

Paul Rockwell: Did the revelations that the government fabricated the evidence for war affect the troops?

Sgt. Massey: Yes. I killed innocent people for our government. For what? What did I do? Where is the good coming out of it? I feel like I’ve had a hand in some sort of evil lie at the hands of our government. I just feel embarrassed, ashamed about it.

Showdown with the Brass

Paul Rockwell: I understand that all the incidents — killing civilians at checkpoints, itchy fingers at the rally — weigh on you. What happened with your commanding officers? How did you deal with them?

Sgt. Massey: There was an incident. It was right after the fall of Baghdad, when we went back down South. On the outskirts of Karbala, we had a morning meeting on the battle plan. I was not in a good mindset. All these things were going through my head — about what we were doing over there. About some of the things my troops were asking. I was holding it all inside. My lieutenant and I got into a conversation. The conversation was striking me wrong. And I lashed out. I looked at him and told him: ‘You know, I honestly feel that what we’re doing is wrong over here. We’re committing genocide. ‘ He asked me something and I said that with the killing of civilians and the depleted uranium we’re leaving over here, we’re not going to have to worry about terrorists. He didn’t like that. He got up and stormed off. And I knew right then and there that my career was over. I was talking to my commanding officer.

Paul Rockwell: What happened then?

Sgt. Massey: After I talked to the top commander, I was kind of scurried away. I was basically put on house arrest. I didn’t talk to other troops, I didn’t want to hurt them. I didn’t want to jeopardize them.

I want to help people. I felt strongly about it. I had to say something. When I was sent back to stateside, I went in front of the regimental Sergeant Major. He’s in charge of 3500-plus Marines. ‘Sir,’ I told him, ‘I don’t want your money. I don’t want your benefits. What you did was wrong.’ It was just a personal conviction with me. I’ve had an impeccable career. I chose to get out. And you know who I blame? I blame the President of the U.S. It’s not the grunt. I blame the president because he said they had weapons of mass destruction. It was a lie.

This interview first appeared in the Sacramento Bee. Paul Rockwell is a writer in the Bay Area. To set up interviews with Sgt. Massey, contact Paul Rockwell at rockyspad@hotmail.com

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The Next Civil Rights Battle Will Be Over the Mind

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

By Clive Thompson
Wired

Trolling down the street in Manhattan, I suddenly hear a woman’s voice.

“Who’s there? Who’s there?” she whispers. I look around but can’t figure out where it’s coming from. It seems to emanate from inside my skull.

Was I going nuts? Nope. I had simply encountered a new advertising medium: hypersonic sound. It broadcasts audio in a focused beam, so that only a person standing directly in its path hears the message. In this case, the cable channel A&E was using the technology to promote a show about, naturally, the paranormal.

I’m a geek, so my first reaction was, “Cool!” But it also felt creepy.

We think of our brains as the ultimate private sanctuary, a zone where other people can’t intrude without our knowledge or permission. But its boundaries are gradually eroding. Hypersonic sound is just a portent of what’s coming, one of a host of emerging technologies aimed at tapping into our heads. These tools raise a fascinating, and queasy, new ethical question: Do we have a right to “mental privacy”?

“We’re going to be facing this question more and more, and nobody is really ready for it,” says Paul Root Wolpe, a bioethicist and board member of the nonprofit Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics. “If the skull is not an absolute domain of privacy, there are no privacy domains left.” He argues that the big personal liberty issues of the 21st century will all be in our heads — the “civil rights of the mind,” he calls it.

It’s true that most of this technology is still gestational. But the early experiments are compelling: Some researchers say that fMRI brain scans can detect surprisingly specific mental acts — like whether you’re entertaining racist thoughts, doing arithmetic, reading, or recognizing something. Entrepreneurs are already pushing dubious forms of the tech into the marketplace: You can now hire a firm, No Lie MRI, to conduct a “truth verification” scan if you’re trying to prove you’re on the level. Give it 10 years, ethicists say, and brain tools will be used regularly — sometimes responsibly, often shoddily.

Both situations scare civil libertarians. What happens when the government starts using brain scans in criminal investigations — to figure out if, say, a suspect is lying about a terrorist plot? Will the Fifth Amendment protect you from self-incrimination by your own brain? Think about your workplace, too: Your boss can already demand that you pee in a cup. Should she also be allowed to stick your head in an MRI tube as part of your performance review?

But this isn’t just about reading minds; it’s also about bombarding them with messages or tweaking their chemistry. Transcranial magnetic stimulation — now used to treat epilepsy — has shown that it can artificially generate states of empathy and euphoria. And you’ve probably heard of propranolol, a drug that can help erase traumatic memories.

Let’s say you’ve been assaulted and you want to take propranolol to delete the memory. The state needs that memory to prosecute the assailant. Can it prevent you from taking the drug? “To a certain extent, memories are societal properties,” says Adam Kolber, a visiting professor at Princeton. “Society has always made claims on your memory, such as subpoenaing you.” Or what if you use transcranial stimulation to increase your empathy. Would you be required to disclose that? Could a judge throw you off a jury? Could the Army turn you away?

I’d love to give you answers. But the truth is no one knows. Privacy rights vary from state to state, and it’s unclear how, or even if, the protections would apply to mental sanctity. “We really need to articulate a moral code that governs all this,” warns Arthur Caplan, a University of Pennsylvania bioethicist.

The good news is that scholars are holding conferences to hash out legal positions. But we’ll need a broad public debate about it, too. Civil liberties thrive only when the public demands them — and understands they’re at risk. That means we need to stop seeing this stuff as science fiction and start thinking about how we’ll react to it. Otherwise, we could all lose our minds.

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Documents prove FBI tracks Internet and phones

Wednesday, April 9th, 2008

FBI also spies on home soil for military, documents show; Much information acquired without court order

John Byrne

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been routinely monitoring the e-mails, instant messages and cell phone calls of suspects across the United States — and has done so, in many cases, without the approval of a court.

Documents released under the Freedom of Information Act and given to the Washington Post — which stuck the story on page three — show that the FBI’s massive dragnet, connected to the backends of telecommunications carriers, “allows authorized FBI agents and analysts, with point-and-click ease, to receive e-mails, instant messages, cellphone calls and other communications that tell them not only what a suspect is saying, but where he is and where he has been, depending on the wording of a court order or a government directive,” the Post says.

But agents don’t need a court order to track to track the senders and recipients names, or how long calls or email exchanges lasted. These can be obtained simply by showing it’s “relevant” to a probe.

RAW STORY has placed a request to the Electronic Frontier Foundation for the new documents, and will post them upon receipt.

Some transactional data is obtained using National Security Letters. The Justice Department says use of these letters has risen from 8,500 in 2000 to 47,000 in 2005, according to the Post.

Last week, the American Civil Liberties Union released letters showing that the Pentagon is using the FBI to skirt legal restrictions on domestic surveillance.

Documents show the FBI has obtained the private records of Americans’ Internet service providers, financial institutions and telephone companies, for the military, according to more than 1,000 Pentagon documents reviewed by the ACLU — also using National Security Letters, without a court order.

The new revelations show definitively that telecommunications companies can transfer “with the click of a mouse, instantly transfer key data along a computer circuit to an FBI technology office in Quantico” upon request.

A telecom whistleblower, in an affidavit, has said he help maintain a high-speed DS-3 digital line referred to in house as the “Quantico circuit,” which allowed an outside organization “unfettered” access to the the carrier’s wireless network.

The network he’s speaking of? Verizon.

Verizon denies the allegations vaguely, saying “no government agency has open access to the company’s networks through electronic circuits.”

The Justice Department downplayed the new documents.

A spokesman told the Post that the US is asking only for “information at the beginning and end of a communication, and for information “reasonably available” by the network.

The FBI’s budget for says the collection system increased from $30 million in 2007 to $40 million in 2008, the paper said.

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