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President
Bush says U.S. forces are still searching for chemical and biological weapons
in Iraq. The threat that Saddam Hussein could help terrorists use those weapons
was one of the biggest reasons Mr. Bush gave for invading the
country.
The president spoke at his Texas ranch, where he and the Australian Prime Minister discussed the North Korean nuclear threat and efforts to bring peace to the Middle East. They also spoke about curbing terrorist threats in Indonesia. Mr.
Bush thanked Australians for their contribution to the war in Iraq, where 2,000
special forces secured Iraqi missile sites and disrupted Iraqi troop movements,
allowing coalition forces to move on Baghdad.
. Prime Minister Howard thanked Mr. Bush for what he called his
"resolute" leadership during the conflict, and said Australia will continue to
contribute to Iraq's reconstruction. "We think the world is a safer, more
optimistic place as a result of our joint efforts in Iraq, and we think that is
a message, which is resonating around the world," prime minister Howard said.
"We, too, have one aspiration for the Iraqi people that they can live in
freedom and they can run their own affairs and they can benefit from the great
civilization and the great resources which, unhindered, are at their
disposal."
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Prime Minister Howard and President Bush also discussed progress toward a free trade agreement between Australia and the United States. Mr. Bush said he hopes there will be a plan to send to Congress by the end of the year. . .
. End of article 1.
 US space agency (Nasa) officials say
there was probably nothing that could have been done to save the crew of
Columbia, even if mission control had fully realised the jeopardy the
astronauts were in.
A report to be handed to the Columbia Accident Investigation Board next week will say the crew were almost certainly doomed from the moment a chunk of foam from the external fuel tank struck the left wing shortly after launch. Damage to the wing's leading edge that resulted in a "thermal breach" is the most likely candidate for the cause of the shuttle disaster. Plans for carrying out in-orbit repairs to the shuttles during future flights are now being developed. Throw it overboard Next week's report looked into emergency actions that could have been taken had it been realised the shuttle could not re-enter the atmosphere safely. These included jettisoning as much mass as possible, including the Spacehab experimental module in the payload bay, radiators, internal components and excess fuel. By reducing Columbia's weight and adjusting the re-entry trajectory it would have been possible to lower the temperature stress on the vehicle as it raced into the upper atmosphere. But it would probably have made no difference; the temperatures would not have been reduced enough. There were no "Apollo 13-like" solutions that could be devised, the report concludes. Repair job Questions were asked very early on in the investigation concerning the lack of a capability to examine the shuttle for damage whilst in orbit, and the inability to repair damage to the heat-resistant tiles in space. When the space shuttle was being developed
there were ideas for in-orbit repair, but they were not carried forward. Now it
seems they may be.
In recent weeks, a panel of experts has met to see what could be done to inspect and patch up the orbiter whilst on a mission. One suggestion is to use the International Space Station (ISS) as a photographic platform to image the shuttle when it is in its vicinity, and then use the ISS's arm to position astronauts in the right place for a repair job, if needed. A report on "in-orbit repair" will be ready during the summer and hardware tests could be carried out in space next year. Even if it had been recognised that Columbia was damaged, it would not have been possible for the vehicle to get to and dock with the ISS. Columbia was in a different orbit and did not have sufficient fuel to make it to the space platform. How long? One survival strategy is to keep the shuttle aloft until some sort of rescue mission can be raised. In Columbia's case, experts doubt the next
shuttle due for launch, Atlantis, could have been prepared in time.
But for how long could any shuttle limp along in space waiting for a rescue? Engineers say one crucial limiting factor would be the CO2 scrubbers that remove this poisonous gas from an orbiter's atmosphere. No Russian craft could have reached Columbia's orbit but an unmanned rocket from Cape Canaveral or Europe's spaceport at Kourou in South America might be designed to deliver supplies and equipment that would enable future shuttle missions to hang on until a rescue bid could reach them. Many things about the space shuttle system
that were once considered but discarded as the vehicle became operational are
now being re-examined (perhaps along with the question as to why they were
abandoned in the first place). SEE ALSO:
 
RELATED INTERNET LINKS:
TOP SCIENCE/NATURE STORIES NOW
 . End of article 2.
India's Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has reacted cautiously to an invitation from his Pakistani counterpart for talks to resolve the countries' differences. Pakistani Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali's formal invitation arrived in New Delhi Saturday, a day after India said it wants to restore full diplomatic ties with Pakistan. India's foreign ministry says Mr. Vajpayee responded to Mr. Jamali by saying there is a need for careful preparation on the ground to ensure meaningful talks take place at the highest level. Mr. Vajpayee also called for an end to what New Delhi calls cross-border terrorism by Pakistan, to create a positive atmosphere for sustained dialogue. In a telephone conversation earlier Saturday, Mr. Jamali told U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell that Pakistan will soon announce steps to reduce tensions with India. The secretary assured Mr. Jamali that the United States will continue to promote better understanding between India and Pakistan. India and
Pakistan's peace overtures come ahead of U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard
Armitage's trip to South Asia next week.
. End of article 3.
Poland's foreign minister says the first elements of a multinational stabilization force for Iraq should be deployed there by the end of this month. The Polish official, Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz, made the comment in Greece Saturday, one day after a senior U.S. official first revealed plans for the stabilization force. The U.S. official told reporters the plan would divide Iraq into three sectors under U.S., British and Polish command. Reuters news agency quotes the official as saying 10 nations have offered soldiers with expertise in fields such as medicine and mine-clearing for the new force. Britain was the United States' main ally in the war to oust Saddam Hussein from power, while Poland also contributed a small number of troops. Meanwhile, United Nations officials in Iraq are warning of a possible humanitarian disaster unless moves are made to swiftly restore power, clean water and a food supply for all Iraqis. The officials spoke Saturday at the first U.N. news conference in Baghdad since chief humanitarian coordinator Ramiro Lopes de Silva and other officials returned to the Iraqi capital this week. Coalition bombing during the war and rampant looting afterward caused widespread damage to Iraq's basic services. U.S. engineers, working with Iraqis, have been trying to fix the damage, so far with only partial success. Reuters quotes the U.N. officials as saying food rations, which stopped being distributed weeks ago, would resume later this month. Schools reopened in Baghdad Saturday for the first time since the U.S.-led invasion in March. Many students attended class in buildings with broken windows and other damage from post-war looting. Reports say most of the pictures of Saddam that adorned all Iraqi classrooms have been taken down. But teachers say the curriculum will have to be revamped to remove the emphasis on Saddam, his Baath Party and nationalism. Meanwhile, the U.S. appointed police chief of Baghdad has resigned little more than a week after taking the job. Zuhir al-Naimi, who has worked as a police officer for more than 35 years, says he wants to make way for a younger person to fill the position. During the brief time he was in charge of the police, Chief al-Naimi was credited with recovering $380,000 in cash from looters, as well as some gold. Some information for this report provided by Reuters, AP and AFP.
. End of article 4.
Mr. Powell
held more than two hours of meetings with Syrian President Bashar Assad in
Damascus and reported progress in efforts to get Syria to cease its support for
radical Palestinian factions that oppose the regional peace
process.
.
A senior U.S. official said Mr. Powell specifically asked for steps against three groups: Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the PFLP-General Command. . He said Mr. Assad agreed to consider the requests and said that the United States will watch to see if Syria is serious about a new relationship with Washington. . Mr. Powell's main message to Syria was that there is a new strategic equation in the region with the fall of Saddam Hussein and that Syria should accept that reality and act accordingly. .
. End of article 5.
The embryo cell that gave rise to the mouse egg was a stem cell. Stem cells can develop into all other cell types, allowing a fetus to grow into a fully formed mammal with different organs. Scientists have been able to coax stem cells into developing into many types of mammal cells in the laborator, like muscle, but until now they have not been able to do this with reproductive cells. They thought that this could be done only within the body, because of special physical conditions that could not be duplicated in the lab. Now,
researchers have shown differently in a study published in the journal
Science. "Actually, what we saw is that it is so easy that people would
be very surprised how easy it is," said Hans Scholer.
In a laboratory dish culture, the mouse embryo stem cells first gathered into colonies of various sizes. Within two weeks, individual cells broke away and recruited other cells to nurture them. After two more weeks, egg cells developed in the culture. Mr. Scholer says that less an three weeks after that, embyro-like structures arose spontaneously without fertilization by sperm. "When we saw this the first time, we were very surprised. We first didn't think we could carry it on so far," he said. Mr. Scholer says the spontaneous embryos could not be used to reproduce mice, because they contain an incomplete set of genetic material. If this technique can be duplicated with human tissue, if it can produce embryo-like structures that are not true human embryos, the Pennsylvania scientists believe it could provide an artificial means of providing embryo stem cells. Such cells are considered the best hope for providing new tissue to treat many disorders, where old tissue does not function properly. They say their method would overcome the fears of stem cell research opponents, who do not want human embryos aborted as a source of the cells. Bioethicist Thomas Murray of the Hastings Center in New York State suggests one area where the new technique might help. "If it is extended to humans, there will be some therapeutic applications that we will celebrate," he said. "For example, women who cannot make healthy eggs right now, perhaps could benefit by this process." Mr. Murray says the research will cause rethinking of the ethics of stem cell research. But for some opponents of such research, no rethinking is necessary. Daniel McConchie of the Center for Bioethics and Dignity in Chicago says that any human embryo is a life that should not be destroyed, whether it can develop into a fully formed person or not. "We've never asserted that certain members of the human species, just because they can't survive a particular period of time, don't then deserve the rights of other human beings," he said. "In a sense, we're all terminal, and we don't take away the rights of someone just because he is on his deathbed." It is
too early to know how the new study might affect the politics of stem cell
research. Many nations have imposed limits on it. In the United States,
President Bush has prohibited government funding for such research, if the
cells were derived after his edict. Congress is working on a measure to outlaw
cloning human embryos as a source for stem cells.
. End of article 6.
Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon briefing last month that an
Iranian-style government in Iraq would not be permitted. "A vocal minority
clamoring to transform Iraq in Iran's image will not be permitted to do so," he
said. "We will not allow the Iraqi people's democratic transition to be
hijacked by those who might wish to install another form of
dictatorship."
Former
Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle, who currently serves on an
influential Pentagon advisory panel, told the CBS television network recently
that the United States would have to accept a religious government that was
democratically elected. "If we want, as I believe we must, democratic rule in
Iraq, then we will have to accept the consequences of freely chosen leaders by
the Iraqis," said Mr. Perle. "That's where legitimacy lies, not in some
bureaucracy either from New York or elsewhere, but in what the people of Iraq
want for themselves."
Overall, U.S. officials and policy analysts agree that they do
not want to see a religious dictatorship established in Iraq. However, debate
continues over whether a democratically elected religious government would be
acceptable to the United States.
. End of article 7. .
Hamid Karzai is the interim President of Afghanistan. But many Afghans refer to him as the "mayor of Kabul" because outside of Kabul, true power remains solidly in the hands of local tribal, ethnic, or political leaders. When the Taleban government was toppled some 18 months ago, U.S. troops needed the help of local tribal leaders, or sardars, to track down Taleban and al-Qaida remnants. Teresita Schaffer, former U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for South Asia, says the U.S. military looked to anybody with authority locally for help, even though that might have inadvertently undercut the fledgling central government. "I think the tendency of the military at the time the fighting stopped was to deal with anyone who seemed capable of imposing order locally. And that tended to be these local sardars," she said. "It's been a somewhat difficult transition to trying to play a role that is also somewhat supportive of the central authority. I'm not sure they've got the balance exactly right. But certainly the U.S. military has become much more conscious of the importance of transportation, the importance of security on the roads and the importance of creating conditions in which Afghans themselves can work out the balance between local authorities and central ones." Many people call these powerful regional figures, such as Ismail Khan in the west and Abdul Rashid Dostum in the north, warlords who rule by fear and intimidation. Human rights groups have complained about rapes and extrajudicial killings by their private militias. But
Nazif Shahrani, an Afghan who now chairs the department of Near East Languages
and Culture at the University of Indiana at Bloomington, argues that the
warlords are really community leaders guarding local autonomy.
"What they are arguing for is some kind of guarantee for community self-governance by various communities within Afghanistan, and single federal or federated regime where a clear definition of the rights and responsibilities of the central government could be defined," he said. Ed McWilliams, a former U.S. special envoy on Afghanistan, says Mr. Karzai is honest and well-meaning, but lacks the clout for a direct confrontation with the local powers. "There's a
sense that he's an honest man, as I say, something of an Afghan nationalist,
not simply someone pursuing the interests of his own particular ethnic or
tribal group," he said. "But he's not seen as a strong player. Unfortunately,
the international community, and I would say particularly the United States,
has failed to fulfill its commitments to security or to reconstruction
assistance, which would have given him some strength within his own
country." According to Ms. Schaffer, Mr. Karzai will have no choice but to eventually cement some kind of power-sharing deal with the regional leaders. "Governments in Kabul have always had to in effect negotiate their authority when you got out to other parts of the country," she explained. "The challenge before Karzai's government is to make his authority in Kabul relevant to the local government in different parts of the country. He's unlikely to be able to force his will without taking some account of the locally powerful people. But he needs to be in the act in a more dynamic way than he's been so far." Be they
warlords or community leaders, they will have a powerful say when a Loya Jirga,
or Grand Council, convenes in October to adopt a new constitution.
Business
. End of article 8.
Hopes are running high for the resumption of a serious dialogue between India and Pakistan, and some observers say that pressure by Washington has helped push the two toward new talks. Analysts say quick progress should not be expected, especially on the sensitive issue of Kashmir, which is the major cause of military tension in South Asia. It is not clear what led to the sudden diplomatic moves towards a thaw in relations between India and Pakistan. Officials of both countries say no outside pressure was involved. But many observers believe the United States has applied pressure on New Delhi and Islamabad to engage each other.
It started with Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's offer to initiate, what he calls, a "decisive" round of discussions with Pakistan. He has also moved to restore full diplomatic ties with Islamabad. Pakistan's prime minister, Zafarullah Jamali, responded positively to Mr. Vajpayee's gesture, saying he is ready to resume a dialogue about peace and normal relations as soon as possible. Aitizaz Ahsan is an opposition lawmaker in the lower house of the Pakistani parliament, and a former interior minister. He is one of those who sees outside influence behind the recent moves. "I think hard lessons have been learned over the years because we have seen to be getting nowhere, war is not an option for either country. I think the hawks are by and large being gradually marginalized, and I think whether we like to admit or not, there has been some third-party intervention with the United States, the European Union, and other friendly countries wanting to persuade both sides to the rationale of peace," Mr. Ahsan said.
The issue has strained relations between the two nations for more than 50 years and still has the potential to derail any upcoming talks. Analysts say in order to make future talks successful, both sides need to show they are serious about making progress, and are flexible enough to make necessary compromises. "I think what is needed is a strong political commitment on the part of the two leaderships, that it is an initiative which has to keep going on, it is a process which should move forward," said Professor Khalida Ghaus, who teaches international relations at the University of Karachi. "They have to put in a lot, they have to open up the minds and show some sort of a flexibility as far as the issues are concerned." Former Pakistani diplomat Mansoor Alam is a cites a lack of careful preparation for the failure of previous talks, and said the leaders have to learn from past mistakes. "I believe that this time they need to carefully study all the causes and reasons that were responsible for the failure of the previous rounds of negotiations," he said. "It is important to carry out a reality check, and that is that war is no solution, peace is indispensable for both countries' development and progress, that unless we cooperate, the poverty in both countries is going to grow and we will be confronted by some very serious problems like water shortages, population explosion and environmental degradation." The strained relations have led to huge military expenditures on both sides, money the two governments might have used to improve their economies and alleviate poverty. In recent years, the neighbors have equipped their armies with nuclear weapons, raising fears of a nuclear conflict between them. Pakistan and India have fought two of their three wars over Kashmir. The majority Muslim region is split between the two countries, and there is an on-going Muslim insurgency in Indian Kashmir aimed at achieving full independence for the region or annexing it to Pakistan. India alleges that Pakistan is sponsoring the insurgency in Kashmir, which spilled over into a December 2001 armed attack on the Indian parliament building. Following that attack, the two sides rushed a million soldiers to their common border, and a new war was narrowly averted.
. End of article 9.
U.S. President George W. Bush Tuesday named a new presidential envoy for Iraq to help shape the country's transition to democratic rule.
Mr. Bremer, who prefers to be called "Jerry," met with the president in the Oval Office Tuesday where Mr. Bush said he wants to see "an orderly country" that is "free and at peace," where Iraqi civilians have a chance to achieve their dreams. "In selecting Jerry Bremer, our country will be sending one of our best citizens. He is a man with enormous experience. He is a person who knows how to get things done," Mr. Bush said. Mr. Bremer,
61, worked for former Secretaries of State William Rogers and Henry Kissinger.
He served as U.S. ambassador-at-large for counter-terrorism from 1986 to 1989.
. End of article 10.
The three men looked somewhat fatigued but also relaxed as they talked with reporters about their space mission, which ended Sunday. All
three, American astronauts Kenneth Bowersox and Donald Pettit and Russian
cosmonaut Nikolai Budarin, said they were always confident of arriving home
safely, despite the off-target landing. Their craft landed about 500 kilometers
from its intended touchdown site.
Although space officials in Russia and the United States were anxious until the men were finally located, Mr. Pettit said he and his crew mates were not all that upset. "We had been
prepared that the landing site was going to be a bit of a mob scene, with lots
of people and hustle and bustle and everything," he said. "And I was actually
relieved to ooze out of the spacecraft and lay on mother earth and just have a
solitude moment in which to get reacquainted."
An investigation is now under way to determine exactly why this happened. But the crewmembers say there was nothing they recall doing that resulted in the steeper trajectory. The three are now undergoing medical tests and extensive debriefing about their overall mission, which had to be extended by two months after the destruction of the U.S. space shuttle Columbia in February. Columbia disintegrated as it re-entered earth's atmosphere, killing all seven crewmembers. |
