An illegal bulls-eye?

Even if the allegations against U.S.-born Muslim cleric Anwar Awlaki are true, it's still controversial whether the U.S. can legally assassinate a suspected terrorist away from a battlefield.

EDITORIAL

August 7, 2010

May the U.S. government kill one of its own citizens without first convicting him of a crime? A court may have the opportunity to answer that important question. After being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights, the Treasury Department has issued a license allowing the civil liberties groups to provide legal services to the father of Anwar Awlaki, an American-born Muslim cleric who is reportedly on a list of individuals targeted for assassination by the military or the CIA. Awlaki's father insists that his son is not a terrorist.

Initially, the government was not going to allow the groups to weigh in. That would have been a travesty. But the Treasury Department provided a license after the groups challenged a requirement that anyone providing legal services on behalf of a "designated global terrorist" obtain permission from the department. Now they will be permitted to file suit to contest the notion that the United States may engage in "targeted killings" of individuals far from a battlefield.

Awlaki, who is believed to live in Yemen, allegedly has encouraged a series of terrorist attacks, including the attempted Christmas Day bombing of an airliner arriving in Detroit. He was also in communication with Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army major accused of killing 13 people at Ft. Hood, Texas.

The government insists that Awlaki does more than incite acts of terror; he also plays an operational role. Stuart Levey, undersecretary of the Treasury for terrorism, said that Awlaki "has involved himself in every aspect of the supply chain of terrorism — fundraising for terrorist groups, recruiting and training operatives, and planning and ordering attacks on innocents."

Even if those charges are true, it remains controversial whether the United States can legally assassinate a suspected terrorist away from a battlefield. The government obviously believes Awlaki is a legitimate target in a global war on terror. On the other hand, the 5th Amendment of the Constitution says that no person may be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.

We can understand the military's concern that judges not intrude in the prosecution of a war. But the case of Awlaki, an American citizen who lives far from the U.S. combat zones in Iraq and Afghanistan, raises profound legal and moral issues that at the very least ought to be debated in a court of law. That is now a possibility.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-awlaki-20100807,0,5369552,print.story

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From the New York Times

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Tanker Damage Caused by Attack, Inquiry Finds

WASHINGTON — Investigators in the United Arab Emirates said Friday that a terrorist attack caused the mysterious damage a Japanese oil tanker suffered last week as it passed through the Strait of Hormuz, raising fears of future attacks in the narrow channel that serves as a passageway for shipping crude oil from the Middle East to the rest of the world.

The damage to the tanker — which an Emirati official said was caused by “homemade explosives” aboard a dinghy — was not considered serious, and there was little immediate impact on oil markets on Friday.

But the news instantly fanned worries about shipping security. If confirmed, the attack would be the first of its kind in the volatile strait, which has long been a focal point for tensions with Iran, just across the water from the Arabian Peninsula.

About 17 million barrels of oil a day pass through the strait, close to 40 percent of the oil shipped by tankers worldwide.

The account of the attack came in a report published Friday by the state-run Emirates news agency WAM, from an Emirati coast guard official.

Earlier this week, the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, a militant group with ties to Al Qaeda , claimed it had carried out a suicide attack against the tanker, the M. Star.

American officials on Friday would not confirm that the episode was a terror attack, but one intelligence official said that the damage to the tanker — a large square dent on the hull's port side — was “from an external explosion.” The official said it remained unclear whether the group taking credit for bombing the tanker was indeed involved.

Lt. John Fage, a spokesman for the Navy's Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, said that a team of Navy divers had recently traveled to Fujairah to assess the ship's damage.

The Japanese government was conducting its own investigation. Japan 's transportation minister, Seiji Maehara, said at a news conference in Tokyo that the government had obtained samples taken from the damaged portion of the tanker and would “conduct analyses for all possible causes, without prejudice.”

The ship, loaded with two million barrels of oil, was heading toward Japan on July 28 when a sudden force shattered windows, ripped off deck railings and blew off a lifeboat, in addition to punching the dent into its black-and-red hull. One crew member was slightly hurt.

The ship's owner, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, said in a statement that it was still investigating the extent and the cause of the ship's damage. Last week, Mitsui officials said they suspected an attack. Crew members aboard the ship said they had seen a flash and heard an explosion, officials said, but there were no reports of a boat approaching the tanker.

Maritime security experts and port officials in the Middle East had raised the possibility that the tanker had collided with a submarine, hit a degraded sea mine — perhaps left over from the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s — or had even been hit by a “freak wave” — a theory quickly discarded once investigators began to examine the damage to the ship.

Last week, American military officials and security experts were dubious about the possibility the ship had been attacked, suggesting that a collision of some kind was more likely.

Despite the seemingly amateurish nature of the alleged attack, its implications are serious, analysts said.

“Before, the Iranian naval threat was seen as key,” said Mustafa Alani, a security analyst at the Gulf Research Institute in Dubai. “Now, we have the possibility of Qaeda-type groups that appear to be learning from the tactics of pirates .”

One crucial question, Mr. Alani added, was where the presumed attacker would have come from. The coasts in the region are closely watched.

Recently, jihadist Web sites have seen a number of exchanges about attacking tankers in the Persian Gulf to disrupt international oil markets, said Evan F. Kohlmann, a terrorism analyst at Flashpoint Global Partners, a New York security consulting firm.

The Abdullah Azzam Brigades has been known mostly for its claims to have launched missiles at Israel from southern Lebanon, Mr. Kohlmann said. In its claim of responsibility for the tanker attack, the group said it had aimed at wreaking havoc in international markets.

In that sense, the attack failed, analysts said, coming at a time when OPEC producers have large amounts of spare capacity, global oil inventories are high and oil demand remains sluggish. Oil futures barely reacted to the news, with prices actually falling on Friday in New York by about 1 percent to $81.20 a barrel.

“Back in 2008, there might have been a 50-cent blip, but today it is not even making headlines in terms of its impact on the oil market,” said Greg Priddy, an energy analyst at Eurasia Group, a political risk consulting firm. “It is not going to impede the tanker business or the oil market in any significant way.”

The Abdullah Azzam Brigades is unusual among jihadist groups in that it operates as a “patchwork of free-floating militant cells” affiliated with Al Qaeda but not directly controlled by it.

The only previous maritime terrorist attacks in the region have taken place on the coast of Yemen, on the southern side of the Arabian Peninsula. In 2000, an Al Qaeda suicide bomber rammed the American destroyer Cole in the port of Aden, killing 17 American sailors. In 2002, a French tanker, the Limburg, was attacked in a similar way a few miles off the coast of Aden, and one crewman was killed.

While tankers are slow and hard to maneuver, making them easy targets, attacks against tankers have been extremely rare. Modern tankers typically have twin hulls, many separate compartments to store oil, and are sturdy enough to withstand a direct hit from rocket-propelled grenades, for instance.

Aside from the attacks on ships that occurred during the Iran-Iraq war, the attack on the Limburg is the only other instance analysts cite of a tanker being attacked by terrorists. That attack, carried out by a small fishing boat packed with explosives, was believed to have been the work of Al Qaeda operatives in Yemen, and was the group's first successful strike against an oil target.

The Limburg was crippled and leaked some oil, but did not sink.

The damage to the M. Star was even less severe. After a week docked in the Port of Fujairah for repairs and an examination, the tanker departed Friday and began returning to Japan, Emirati and Japanese news agencies reported.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/07/world/middleeast/07tanker.html?_r=1&ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Citizenship as Birthright Challenged on the Right

At a breakfast on Thursday in Washington, Senator Mitch McConnell , the Senate minority leader, tried to tamp down a controversy that started when Senator Lindsey Graham , Republican of South Carolina, questioned the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which grants the right to citizenship to anyone born in the United States.

“I am not aware of anybody who has come out in favor of altering the 14th Amendment,” Mr. McConnell said.

But Mr. Graham, speaking on Fox News last week, said it was “a mistake” to allow American-born children of illegal immigrants to become citizens automatically, a practice known as birthright citizenship. He said that along with a plan to grant legal status to millions of illegal immigrants, he would also amend the 14th Amendment as a way of discouraging future unauthorized immigration .

Throughout the week Mr. Graham stood firm on his proposal. “We can't just have people swimming across the river having children here — that's chaos,” he said Wednesday in another interview with Fox News.

The proposal caught Republican and Democratic lawmakers by surprise, not least because it came from Mr. Graham, who earlier this year was the leading — and almost the only — Republican negotiating with Democrats to create an immigration overhaul bill. Mr. Graham gave new prominence to an issue that has long been a favorite of conservatives advocating reduced immigration, but has been peripheral to the immigration debate in Congress.

Mr. McConnell said Republicans were calling only for hearings on the issue. The debate centers on the first sentence of what is known as the citizenship clause: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.” The amendment was adopted in 1868 to ensure the citizenship of the American-born children of freed slaves.

Opponents of birthright citizenship contend that illegal immigrants are not under United States jurisdiction, therefore their American-born children should not automatically be citizens. They say the amendment could not apply to those immigrants because there was no illegal immigration when it was adopted.

“If you are an illegal immigrant, we clearly have not given you permission to reside here,” said Rosemary Jenks, director of government relations for NumbersUSA, a group that favors decreased immigration. “You are still subject to the jurisdiction of your own country.”

But giving citizenship to everyone born in the United States has been the practice since the 1860s, and was upheld by the Supreme Court on the few occasions when it was tested there, immigration lawyers said. A change to the law to disallow the children of illegal immigrants would vastly increase the undocumented population, lawyers said, rather than reducing it. Babies born to Mexican mothers here illegally, for example, would become illegal Mexican immigrants from the moment of birth.

“You would be perpetuating a large undocumented population, with all these children growing up very much living in the shadows,” said Hiroshi Motomura, an immigration law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles .

Mr. Graham's proposal revived a popular misunderstanding: In the often heated debate over birthright citizenship, pundits refer to the problem of “anchor babies,” and talk show callers express frustration that pregnant women could cross the border from Mexico illegally, then rely on their American citizen newborns to put them immediately on a path to citizenship.

In fact, under immigration law American citizen children must wait until they are 21 years old to apply for legal residency for their parents. Also, most of the illegal immigrants who have children who are American citizens have not recently arrived.

About four million American citizen children have at least one parent who is an illegal immigrant, according to a study last year by the Pew Hispanic Center , a nonpartisan research group in Washington. They usually live in families that have been in the United States for a number of years and very often include both illegal immigrants and American citizens, the study found.

Altering the Constitution — especially an amendment that is dear to black Americans — is such a huge political proposition that few lawmakers thought Mr. Graham's comments would lead to any action before November's midterm elections.

But the episode was a sign of the pressures on Republicans over immigration, after a tough law they passed in Arizona put the party squarely on the side of cracking down on illegal immigrants. Mr. Graham's move helped to shore up his credentials with some conservatives.

But some Republicans worried that the issue could backfire. “This type of position may help you win a few elections,” said Alfonso Aguilar, executive director of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, a group that tries to draw Latinos to the Republican Party . “But you are damaging relations with the Latino community.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/07/us/politics/07fourteenth.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Border Bill Aims at Indian Companies

PHOENIX — Indian high-tech workers do not typically sneak into the United States through Mexico, but beefing up the Southwest border may still make it tougher for them to migrate here.

A Senate bill approved Thursday night by unanimous consent would pay for more security along the Mexico border by raising fees for companies from India that operate in the United States and hire so many Indian workers that they have been criticized for violating the spirit of American immigration law.

The $600 million spending bill would send 1,500 more Border Patrol agents, customs inspectors and other law enforcement officials to the Southwest border, finance additional aerial drones to monitor remote desert regions and build two operating bases close to the border to help reduce illegal immigration and drug smuggling.

“It's just a great package,” Janet Napolitano , the secretary of homeland security, said in a conference call with reporters on Friday. She contends that the Obama administration has made the border more secure than ever but nonetheless hears the frustration of many local politicians, especially those in her home state, Arizona, who say that immigration is out of control.

Republicans had proposed paying for the beefed-up security by tapping into stimulus money. But Senator Charles E. Schumer , Democrat of New York, said his staff had come up with an alternative that would not hurt American workers: raising the visa application fees paid by any companies with more than 50 people in which more than half the work force has H-1B or L visas that are intended for skilled foreign workers.

Senate aides said four Indian companies would qualify for the significantly higher fees: Tata, Infosys, Wipro and Mahindra Satyam, all of which operate in the United States and are criticized as “body shops” because they provide outsourcing of Indian professionals to American companies. Large American high-tech corporations, which bring the bulk of the skilled immigrants into the United States, would not be affected since the vast majority of their work forces are made up of Americans.

India's high-tech industry reacted angrily to the proposal, with the New Delhi-based National Association of Software and Services Companies issuing a statement saying that raising the visa fees by more than $2,000 per application would violate international trade practices and unfairly focus on Indian companies. And Peter McLaughlin, an Infosys spokesman, said, “It is unfortunate that this tax is being levied on a discriminatory basis when the need is to open markets to make companies more competitive in the global marketplace.”

But senators complained that the companies could remedy the situation by hiring more Americans. “I'm thrilled that these companies are complaining about having to hire more Americans,” said Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri. “That is the whipped cream and cherry on top of this sundae.”

The House may take up the bill next week.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/07/us/politics/07border.html?ref=world&pagewanted=print

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Michigan: Serial Killer Is Sought in 13 Knife Attacks in Flint Area

Investigators say a knife-wielding serial killer has been attacking men on Flint-area streets since May, killing five people and wounding eight others in attacks that may be motivated by racial hatred.

Survivors have described the assailant as a muscular young white man, and all but one of the 13 victims was black, Lt. T. P. Johnson of the Flint police said. Investigators are unsure if the attacker was singling out blacks or whether the victims were chosen at random.

The victims were all outside alone at night. Survivors have said the attacker approached them under the pretense of needing directions or help with a broken-down vehicle.

“He then pulls a knife and attacks them without saying anything more,” Lieutenant Johnson said. The state police released a composite sketch of the suspect.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/07/us/07brfs-SERIALKILLER_BRF.html?ref=us

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Congress's Serial Hits on Food Stamps

With some shabby sleight of hand, Congress has begun tapping into the food stamp program for the hungriest Americans to help pay for lawmakers' higher election-year priorities. The Senate approved two important measures this week — the $26 billion state-aid bill and the $4.5 billion school nutrition program — in part by shaving food stamp funds as a target of least resistance.

There is no denying that both of the programs are badly needed. The state aid package, regrettably compromised as it was, helps protect jobs for teachers and other workers facing layoffs. The school nutrition program provides the first improvements in a generation, including an increase in meal reimbursements and the power to set federal nutrition standards for schools.

But treating food stamps as the fungible means to worthy ends is a cowardly blight on Congress. After the Bush years of guilt-free tax cutting and deficit budgeting, lawmakers are self-righteously embracing pay-as-you-go legislation lest they be demagogued at the ballot box. So they resort to fiscal triage.

Originally, school nutrition was slated to be paid for by cuts in a farm conservation program. But Republicans rated this a high priority for the livestock industry. A deal was struck with Democrats to cut back on the scheduled boost in future food stamp benefits that was part of last year's economic stimulus. Food stamps took a second hit as lawmakers turned to it like an all-purpose A.T.M. to help cover the cost of state aid.

Senator Blanche Lincoln, a Democrat of Arkansas who fought hard to get the school nutrition improvements, told Politico.com that the food stamp increase was doomed in any case: “You saw the teachers grab for it.” Her comfort was those dollars would feed children. But this is a pale rationalization that downgrades the hunger of entire families. A companion bill in the House, yet to be paid for, is an opportunity to right this wrong.

In the crunch of the recession, if Congress lacks the guts to meet vital needs with deficit financing, it should have the decency to chisel some less-humane program than food stamps.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/07/opinion/07sat3.html?ref=opinion&pagewanted=print

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From the White House

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In Their Own Words: 2010 Citizens Medal Recipients

For 40 years, the Citizens Medal has recognized men and women who have “performed exemplary deeds of service for their country or their fellow citizens.” In one of his favorite events of the year, President Obama awarded 13 Americans from different backgrounds and every corner of the country the 2010 Citizens Medal.

In a series of video interviews , the honorees share their remarkable stories of service. From Jorge Muñoz, the “Angel of Queens,” who feeds the hungry 365 days a year, rain or shine, to Susan Retik, who, after her own husband was killed on September 11th, started an organization to empower Afghan widows – they each teach us that no matter the challenges, we each have the power to make the world a better place.

Watch these extraordinary citizens share their stories of service in their own words in the Citizens Medal video gallery .

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/08/06/their-own-words-2010-citizens-medal-recipients

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From ICE

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Making 2 systems work as 1

Call it the tale of two automated fingerprint systems.

The FBI has managed the nation's collection of fingerprints since 1924, but the agency went fully electronic in 1999 when it launched the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System, or IAFIS. This national repository of fingerprints and criminal histories enables law enforcement at every level to quickly match up criminal evidence with criminal identities.

On the other hand (so to speak), the Department of Homeland Security's IDENT -- the Automated Biometric Identification System that houses fingerprint records and limited biographic information -- was created in 1994 to help U.S. border and immigration officials keep criminals and terrorists from crossing our borders.

Two different systems...with two different missions...for two different sets of users.

But in this post-9/11, globalized world, those charged with protecting the nation need to be on the same page -- with appropriate access to each other's information. So that's why the Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and the Department of State have worked hard in recent years to establish interoperability between these two fingerprint databases.

Phase one.

In 2006, DHS and DOJ/FBI began a pilot project with a limited number of agencies, making technical enhancements to IAFIS and IDENT that allowed two-way sharing of information. The FBI and DHS exchanged electronic copies of fingerprint images of certain subsets of data from each system, including known or suspected terrorists, subjects with wanted notices, and visa refusals. Authorized users of each system were then able to access those records. We called this IDENT/IAFIS interoperability.

The result: law enforcement and border and immigration officials each gained near real-time access to information from both systems on non-U.S. persons they encounter -- whether at a police booking station, a border crossing, or at a U.S. Embassy visa office abroad.

Phase two.

In 2008, we began expanding the concept, implementing a technological fix that would support a direct search request from authorized users of the full IDENT and IAFIS systems through a single interface.

It was during this second phase that DHS's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Secure Communities started collaborating with US-VISIT and CJIS to use this critical tool to quickly and accurately identify aliens arrested for crimes and in local law enforcement custody in the United States.

Together, ICE, US-VISIT and CJIS worked to deploy this new biometric information sharing capability (IDENT/IAFIS interoperability) to 481 jurisdictions in 27 states across the country with more jurisdictions being added all the time. Eventually, the plan is for every IDENT and IAFIS user -- local, state, tribal, and federal law enforcement and authorized non-criminal justice agencies across the country -- to have this same information sharing capability.

National law enforcement associations, such as the National Sheriffs' and the Major Cities Chiefs' Associations, have applauded ICE for implementing this information sharing technology and acknowledged its success in helping keep communities safe.

The successes we've seen :

In recognition of their innovative solutions to align these automated identification fingerprint systems, members of DHS' U.S.-VISIT (U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology Program) and Secure Communities teams, and the FBI's CJIS team were recently honored with the ICE Assistant Secretary's Protecting the Homeland award.

Congratulations to everyone involved...but the real winners are the American people, who are safer in their cities and neighborhoods.

http://www.ice.gov/pi/nr/1008/100806washingtondc.htm

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From the FBI

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FBI New York and Fordham University Join Together for the Second Annual International Conference on Cyber Security

The International Conference on Cyber Security (ICCS) 2010, a joint effort between the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Fordham University, brought together global leaders and representatives from over 40 countries in emerging cyber threat analysis and enforcement at Fordham University's Lincoln Center campus, August 2-5, 2010. Among the top speakers to present at this event was FBI Director Robert S. Mueller, III.

For the second year in a row, Fordham has partnered with the FBI to sponsor this conference. The working relationships between law enforcement professionals and those in the private sector and academia are instrumental in combating cyber crimes worldwide. Representatives from various law enforcement and government agencies, academic institutions, and private industries enjoyed presentations, exhibitions, and access to networking opportunities. Participants discussed advancements in the field of cyber security and emerging cyber threats, in addition to other related topics.

Speaking at the conference, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller, III said, “No one country, no one company, and no one agency can stop cyber crime. A ‘bar the windows and bolt the doors' mentality will not ensure our collective safety. Fortresses will not hold forever; walls will one day fall down. We must start at the source; we must find those responsible.”

Acting Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI New York Division George Venizelos said, “We are joined today by our domestic associates as well as representatives from many countries throughout the world. In addition to our domestic partnerships, the international partnerships we share provide invaluable contributions and intelligence sharing efforts for use in examining the field of cyber security. ICCS 2010 has served as a perfect venue to advance the fight against cyber crime.”

President of Fordham Joseph McShane, S.J., welcomed participants to the event. "Learning—information—has a privileged place in the academy. Therefore, it is both natural and providential that Fordham join with the FBI to convene experts in law enforcement, academia, and industry on the integrity of the nation's cyber infrastructure. In its second year, this conference, and the close partnership it represents, is a model way forward in protecting what has become a critical component of the global intellectual marketplace."

FBI New York Special Agent in Charge of the Cyber/Special Operations Division Mary Galligan said, “The growth of cyber crime and the impact it has on the world affects not only the United States, but the international community as well. ICCS afforded the FBI and our foreign law enforcement partners an opportunity to share ideas and enhance the already strong bond that exists around the globe. The mitigation of today's complex cyber crime can only be achieved through collaboration between the public and private sector."

http://newyork.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel10/nyfo080610.htm

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