ORIGINAL MATERIAL PRODUCED BY THE GLOBAL BEAT SYNDICATE Mark Burgess: on Madrid's new lessons about terrorism Nigel Chamberlain: on the missile defense debate in Britain Ehsan Ahrari: on the administration's credibility Jerry White: on the need for a global ban on landmines

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Report on Patterns of Global Terrorism for 2002

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A vote against the government that supported the war in Iraq

New bomb rips through Baghdad Hotel The U.S. suspects a car bomb. 25 killed and 40 wounded. The BBC updates with video of carnage.

A YEAR INTO THE WAR IN IRAQ, THE RESULTS ARE MIXED
Although a new ABC poll reports that many Iraqis are more upbeat about their lives and futures, Jonathan Schell notes in the Nation that administration strategies have generally missed their targets. Attacking Iraq was supposed to stop weapons of mass destruction, yet the nuclear centrifuges being sold to Iran and Libya have actually been manufactured in Malaysia and elsewhere while the U.S. was tied down in Iraq. The administration said that it wanted to promote democracy and order, yet it found itself suspending U.S. legal guarantees and circumventing international law.
•An ABC Poll shows Iraqis upbeat about the future, but ambivalent towards the U.S. (NY Times)

U.S. FACES MORE SOPHISTICATED RESISTANCE IN IRAQ
The bombs menacing U.S. soldiers in Iraq face increasingly sophisticated weapons that appear to have been designed somewhere else.
(Thom Shanker and Eric Schmitt, New York Times, March 15, 2004)

RUSSIA'S ELECTION CROWNS VLADIMIR PUTIN'S 4-YEAR STRATEGY TO REBUILD THE KREMLIN'S POWER
Caroline McGregor notes that the landslide victory over the weekend was no accident. Putin brought the Kremlin back from a weak non-entity to be a force to reckon with. In the process he left behind him a slew of shattered careers and humbled organizations. (Caroline McGregor, Moscow Times via Center for Defense Information, March 11, 2004)

NOW THAT HE HAS SWEPT THE ELECTION, PUTIN EMPHASIZES SUPPORT FOR DEMOCRACY
Russia's Vladimir Putin probably would have won reelection without intimidating political opponents, monopolizing Russia's television news, or jailing oligarch's for financing opposition parties. Now that the election is over, Putin insists that he really is a staunch supporter of democracy, although he defends his refusal to take part in televised debates with his opponents, adding "I already know everything they have to say." (Catherine Belton, Moscow Times, March 16, 2004)
•Time to change Russian television. Media critic Alexei Pankin notes that Russian television's tendency to fawn over the politician in power dates back to Boris Yeltsin who understood that he would never be popular. Putin has enough support, Pankin argues, to finally free the airwaves and get on with the program. (Alexei Pankin, Moscow Times, March 16, 2004)

MORE SEPARATIST PROBLEMS IN GEORGIA
Georgia is important because it offers one of the only practical routes for an oil pipeline leading to Western Europe from the immense reserves in the Caspian. Perhaps becaused of that, the country seems doomed to continued instability. Eurasianet reports that Georgia's new president Sakaashvili is already experiencing new separatist strife. (Wojciech Bartuzi, Eurasianet, March 15, 2004)

TOUGH TIMES IN UZBEKISTAN
Uzbekistan, which is strategically located next to the oil-rich Caspian Sea, is a strategically important ally of the United States, but that hasn't stemmed its tradition of political repression or the use of torture, and it hasn't helped the country's stagnant economy. (International Crisis Group, March 11, 2004)

WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE FROM INSIDE THE PENTAGON
U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski was assigned to the Pentagon's Near East And South Asia department in charge of developments in Iraq and the Middle East. She was especially disturbed by the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans, which enabled a small group of neo-conservative radicals to bypass intelligence review procedures and ultimately misled Congress and the public about the administration's true objectives in the Middle East. (Karen Kwiatkowski in Salon, March 10, 2004)

WHITE HOUSE WANTS GREATER INFLUENCE OVER SCIENTIFIC PEER REVIEW
Under the euphemistically named "Data Quality Control Act," the White House would get the authority it needed to standardize and ultimately influence the choice of who gets to peer review government studies. The administration's record for making scientific judgments has not been good. Pressure from the White House Council on Environmental Quality was largely responsible for getting the EPA to tell New York residents that the air quality near Ground Zero, following the collapse of the World Trade Center was safe. It wasn't. By Linda Rothstein, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (March-April, 2004)

LIFE AT GUANTANAMO
The first British prisoners to be released from two years captivity at Guantanamo are beginning to tell their stories. Some verge on the bizarre, including charges that the U.S. military allegedly used buxom prostitutes to try to break down the will of youthful Muslim fanatics. (Gary Prince and Rosa Jones, The Mirror, March 12, 2004)

OUTSOURCING, GOOD OR BAD?
Whether you think outsourcing is a good idea or not, depends a great deal on whether you happen to live in Asia, Latin America or Detroit, Michigan. The Center for International and Strategic Studies recently hosted a day-long seminar which explored the pros and cons of an othwerwise explosive topic. (CSIS, March 10, 2004)

The Security Policy Working Group

Daily News flashes in English on developments in the Republic of Georgia (click on logo)