The Talk Show American

THE TALK SHOW AMERICAN: 08/06/2006 - 08/13/2006

Saturday, August 12, 2006

Court Says Random NYC Subway Searches OK

A federal appeals court said Friday that random bag searches on New York subways are constitutional, agreeing with a lower court that the police tactic is an effective and minimally invasive way to help protect a prime terror target.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected a challenge to the searches by the New York Civil Liberties Union, saying U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman properly concluded in December that the program was "reasonably effective."

Searches on the nation's largest subway system began after the deadly terrorist bombings in London's subways in July 2005. The NYCLU sued, arguing that they were an unprecedented intrusion on privacy that terrorists could easily evade.

The appeals court said Berman properly concluded that preventing a terrorist attack on the subway was important enough to subject subway riders to random searches.

The three-judge panel also noted police have thwarted plans for New York subway attacks at least twice in the last nine years, including a bomb plot in 1997 in Brooklyn and a 2004 plot to bomb the Herald Square subway station. It was "unsurprising and undisputed that terrorists view it as a prime target," the court said in its opinion.

"Common sense prevailed," Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said. "Once again, and at a fitting moment, the court upheld the constitutionality of the bag inspection program, one of our key strategies for deterring a subway attack."


Christopher Dunn, the NYCLU's associate legal director, said the group is considering an appeal.

"Because this program authorizes police searches of all subway riders without any suspicion of wrongdoing, we continue to believe it raises fundamental constitutional questions," he said.


The appeals court said counterterrorism experts and politically accountable officials had undertaken the delicate task of deciding how to use their resources to fight terrorism.

"We will not � and may not � second-guess the minutiae of their considered decisions," the appeals court wrote.


The three-judge panel said expert testimony had established that terrorists seek predictable and vulnerable targets and the subway search program "generates uncertainty that frustrates that goal, which, in turn, deters an attack."

Friday, August 11, 2006

Hezbollah Ties to British Plot ?

NewsMax.com senior correspondent and Middle East expert Kenneth R. Timmerman said Hezbollah might be to blame for the terror plot thwarted by British security agencies Thursday.

Timmerman, appearing as a guest on MSNBC�s "Tucker with Tucker Carlson,� said the plot was reminiscent of one in 1986 that was foiled by French authorities.

"Hezbollah operatives had tried to bring in liquid explosives to launch terrorist attacks,� Timmerman said. "The French caught them and the explosives, which were brought in inside little liquor bottles. This is the kind of thing that has Hezbollah�s fingerprints all over it.�

Terror strikes were planned for August 16

Terrorists were planning to unleash a series of deadly mid-air explosions on flights between London and America on August 16, it has been revealed today.

Members of the terror group, who were arrested in a series of raids by anti-terror police yesterday, were due to mount a dry run today to check if they could smuggle components for liquid explosives through Britain's airports.

United Airline tickets dated next Wednesday were found by police at the home of one of the raided addresses.

One US intelligence official told today's Evening Standard: "The bombers were a couple of days from a test, and a few days from doing it."

The airlines targeted were United, American and Continental, which fly to New York, Washington and California.

Today the Bank of England named and froze the assets of 19 of the 24 air terror suspects arrested. The bank was acting under the instruction of Chancellor Gordon Brown and on the advice of the police and security services.

It acted under powers granted by the United Nations to tackle the financing of terrorism in the wake of the September 11 2001 attacks. Its action means it is a crime to make their money available without a licence from the Treasury.

The oldest of the named suspects is 35 and the youngest 17. Thirteen of them are from east London - nine from Walthamstow, one from Chingford, one from Leyton, one from the Limehouse and Poplar area and one from Clapton.

Four are from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, and the other two are from Birmingham and Stoke Newington, north London.

The imam of Walthamstow mosque, where many of the suspects live, urged the Muslim community to remain calm and assist the police in their inquries. The unnamed imam added: "We'd like to remind people that the suspects are innocent until proven guilty."

Meanwhile, a senior Pakistani government official said today that two British nationals arrested in Pakistan provided information about the alleged UK air terror plot.

Terror Plot resembles 1995 al-Qaida "Operation Bojinka" Plan

The foiled terrorist plot to blow up as many as 10 U.S. airplanes departing the UK using liquid explosives bears striking resemblance to "Operation Bojinka," the failed al-Qaida-financed attack on airliners in 1995 that became a precursor to 9-11, counterterrorism analysts say.

Operation Bojinka � a plot to bomb more than a dozen airliners over the Pacific Ocean simultaneously � was developed in Manila by Ramzi Yousef, a planner of the 1993 World Trade Center attack, and 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, according to Philippines authorities.

The key to the Bojinka plot was the use of liquid chemical bombs and wristwatch timers that could elude airport security.

In the foiled UK scheme, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said today the terrorists planned to use liquid explosives disguised as beverages and other common products and set them off with detonators disguised as electronic devices.

Counterterrorism analyst Evan Kohlmann, writing in the Counterterrorism Blog, notes one of the detained men in the Bojinka plot, trained commercial pilot Abdel Hakim Murad, described Yousef's plans in detail: "The purpose was to train those Muslim brothers thereat, on using a Casio watch as a timing device, chemical mixtures to compound bombs, and to share his expertise in eluding detection on an airport's x-ray machine, and eventually smuggling [onboard] this liquid chemical bombs."

Murad said "these Egyptians and Algerians ha[ve] no experience on making these bombs and [do] not know the basics of smuggling liquid bombs through the airport."

Eleven years later, Kohlman comments, "we once again return to the same threat to commercial aviation posed by liquid explosives."

"Only now, it would appear that the fabrication of such high-tech terrorist weapons by al-Qaida operatives inside Western Europe is no longer an insurmountable challenge."

National Review writer Andy McCarthy, writing in The Corner weblog, also sees the striking similarities between Bojinka and the newly revealed plot, pointing out that in its final report, the 9-11 Commission said Yousef and Mohammed in 1994 "acquired chemicals and other materials necessary to construct bombs and timers."

The report said the two terrorists also "cased target flights to Hong Kong and Seoul that would have onward legs to the United States."

During the fall of 1994, the 9-11 report said, "Yousef returned to Manila and successfully tested the digital watch timer he had invented, bombing a movie theater and a Philippine Airlines flight en route to Tokyo."

"The plot unraveled after the Philippine authorities discovered Yousef's bomb-making operation in Manila; but by that time, [Mohammed] was safely back at his government job in Qatar. Yousef attempted to follow through on the cargo carriers plan, but he was arrested in Islamabad by Pakistani authorities on February 7, 1995, after an accomplice turned him in."

Thursday, August 10, 2006

Half of U.S. still believes Iraq had WMD

Do you believe in Iraqi "WMD"? Did Saddam Hussein's government have weapons of mass destruction in 2003?

Half of America apparently still thinks so, a new poll finds, and experts see a raft of reasons why: a drumbeat of voices from talk radio to die-hard bloggers to the Oval Office, a surprise headline here or there, a rallying around a partisan flag, and a growing need for people, in their own minds, to justify the war in Iraq.

Despite this, a Harris Poll released July 21 found that a full 50 percent of U.S. respondents � up from 36 percent last year � said they believe Iraq did have the forbidden arms when U.S. troops invaded in March 2003, an attack whose stated purpose was elimination of supposed WMD. Other polls also have found an enduring American faith in the WMD story.

"I'm flabbergasted," said Michael Massing, a media critic whose writings dissected the largely unquestioning U.S. news reporting on the Bush administration's shaky WMD claims in 2002-03.

"This finding just has to cause despair among those of us who hope for an informed public able to draw reasonable conclusions based on evidence," Massing said.

Timing may explain some of the poll result. Two weeks before the survey, two Republican lawmakers, Pennsylvania's Sen. Rick Santorum (news, bio, voting record) and Michigan's Rep. Peter Hoekstra (news, bio, voting record), released an intelligence report in Washington saying 500 chemical munitions had been collected in Iraq since the 2003 invasion.

"I think the Harris Poll was measuring people's surprise at hearing this after being told for so long there were no WMD in the country," said Hoekstra spokesman Jamal Ware.

Saudis, Mexico pledge help on US oil

SAUDI Arabia and Mexico have pledged to help fill shortages in the US oil supply due to the Alaska pipeline shutdown, the White House said today.

Spokesman Tony Snow said there did not seem to be a significant supply interruption at this stage, but that talks had been held with Saudi Arabia and Mexico in recent days and that the two governments had pledged to help out with any shortages.

Q&A: Liquid explosives

An alleged plot to blow up planes from the UK mid-flight and cause "mass murder on an unimaginable scale" has been disrupted, Scotland Yard has said.
It is thought the plan was to detonate explosive devices smuggled in hand luggage on to as many as 10 aircraft.

Gordon Corera said the plan "revolved around liquids of some kind".

One theory is that the attack may have involved liquid explosive being carried on to a plane in either drink bottles or cans.

Dr Clifford Jones, an explosives expert from the University of Aberdeen, says even a small amount of liquid explosives carried on to an aircraft would result in a catastrophic explosion.

What are liquid explosives?

The best place to start is with the term "high explosive"; these can be either solid or liquid. Of course, the most famous ones are solid, such as Dynamite and TNT.

One liquid explosive is a general use explosive that is used in quarries.

However, I would not be surprised if it is possible to produce solid explosives in liquid form.

How do they work?

Usually when something burns, it is subsonic and there is very little pressure effect.

With high explosives, the rate of burning is extremely rapid and exceeds the speed of sound. As a result of that there is something called "overpressure" - pressure greater than the surrounding atmospheric pressure.

Massive overpressure is not needed to cause damage. An excess of 1% can break windows, and an overpressure of 10% can harm or kill people and cause structural damage to buildings.

An overpressure of just 2% could break the windows of the aeroplane, and 10% would wreck the aircraft and possibly kill the people in it before it reached the ground.

By the time the damage is caused, the chemistry has finished and physics has taken over.

How are they made?

There are such things as liquid explosives that are high explosives and they behave in exactly the same way as solid explosives, such as TNT.

But there are also explosives that are made by mixing a solid and a liquid - one being the oxidant and the other being the fuel. Unlike most high explosives, they do not contain the fuel and oxidant in the same molecule but they do contain them in sufficiently close contact to cause a blast.

Are the components difficult to get hold of?

No, it is very easy. Ordinary household substances could be used.

Specialist knowledge or equipment needed to make?

If someone wanted to obtain a solid high explosive in a liquid form, it would not be difficult for a trained chemical technologist.

But if someone was using a backyard laboratory it is more likely they would go for the two component approach.

Not a lot of experience is needed, the principles are quite simple but it would be a hazardous process of trial and error.

I would not want to be messing about these things. It has been known for schoolboys to go home and attempt this and blow their house up.

Could an explosive device be carried on to an aeroplane?

The size of a device necessary could be carried in hand baggage. Explosives in a toilet bag, certainly inside a shoulder bag would be enough to meet the terrorists' needs.

They could be quite hard to detect because I do not think any of the things we have mentioned would respond to x-rays. For example, a liquid hydrocarbon fuel could pass as mineral water.

The question is how do you get something packed into a bag so it does not look suspicious?

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

McKinney ousted from Congress

Rep. Cynthia McKinney, known for her conspiracy theories about the Sept. 11 attacks and a scuffle with a U.S. Capitol police officer, conceded the Democratic primary runoff early Wednesday in a speech that blamed the media for her loss and included a song criticizing President Bush.

McKinney, the state's first black congresswoman, said electronic voting machines are "a threat to our democracy" and lashed out a journalists, accusing them of injuring her mother and failing to "tell the whole story."

"My mother was hurt by someone in the press in this room tonight," McKinney said after losing to challenger Hank Johnson Tuesday. "One of my assistants needs stitches because of the press that are in this room tonight."

WXIA-TV said on its Web site that a boom microphone had struck members of McKinney's entourage: "In the confusion, McKinney staffers struck an 11Alive photographer and knocked his camera equipment to the ground." Earlier in the day, the station said a McKinney staffer had scuffled with another 11Alive photojournalist.

Johnson defeated McKinney by more than 12,000 votes, getting 59 percent of the vote to 41 percent for McKinney. The black attorney and former DeKalb County commissioner is now the general-election favorite in the predominantly Democratic district east of Atlanta.

He will face Republican Catherine Davis, a black human resources manager who ran against McKinney in 2004.

"The people in District Four were looking for a change," Johnson said. "And what happened indicated it was time for a change."

In her concession speech, McKinney repeated her criticism of the Bush administration and the war in Iraq, and said electronic voting machines, which have been used in all of Georgia's precincts since "are a threat to our democracy."

"Let the word go out. We aren't going to tolerate any more stolen elections. ... We want our party back!" she said.

Her campaign manager, John Evans, blamed the loss on the ABC _ Anybody But Cynthia _ movement and the Capitol Hill incident.

"It's over," he said. "Folks just beat us. They got a lot of white votes, a lot of Republican votes and they took some of our votes where we have been stable."

McKinney has long been controversial, once suggesting the Bush administration had advance knowledge of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

Tuesday's election was the second time in three election years that she has lost. After 10 years in Congress, the firebrand lawmaker lost in the 2002 primary to political newcomer Denise Majette, who vacated the seat two years later to run for the U.S. Senate. McKinney emerged from a crowded 2004 primary to reclaim the seat.

"I'm getting tired of being embarrassed. She's an embarrassment to the whole state," said James Vining, 72, who said he voted for McKinney's opponent.

Cynthia McKinney alleges voting irregularities

Shortly after the polls opened on Tuesday, allegations of voting irregularities began appearing on U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney�s campaign Web site.

At 8:14 a.m., the first complaint appeared: �Less than an hour into voting, McKinney�s name is not on ballot, opponent�s is,� read an item on her blog.

Other similar allegations would follow throughout the day as 4th Congressional District voters decided whether to send McKinney back to Congress, or give the Democratic nomination to runoff opponent, Hank Johnson, a lawyer and former DeKalb County commissioner.

The McKinney Web site noted voting machines not working or mysteriously casting incorrect ballots, �insecure� voting equipment, police harassment, and poll workers refusing to hand out Democratic ballots.

At one campaign stop Tuesday, McKinney said, �We also had a problem at Midway [elementary school polling place], where my name was not on the ballot,� McKinney said.

�My opponent�s name was on the ballot. � We are disappointed that the secretary of state�s office has not dealt adequately with these electronic voting machines and the deficiencties. Also, polling places have opened up and some of the machines were not zero-counted out. � And that is a problem. That is a serious problem.�

Dana Elder, the precinct manager at the school, said there was a power failure around 2:20 p.m. affecting one machine that lists registered voters in the precinct, but it posed no problem because there was another backup machine. The broken machine was fixed within 10 minutes and did not affect the actual voting machines, Elder said.

�It was really nothing,� Elder said.

The Georgia Secretary of State�s Office kept an eye on the elections, with 15 roving monitors on the ground in the 4th District, said spokeswoman Kara Sinkule.

Sinkule noted that the complaints were only coming from the McKinney campaign. �We are not having voters saying we are having equipment malfunctions,� Sinkule said.


McKinney has always held a distrust of the state�s new touch-screen voting machines. She has appeared at events promoted by activists opposed to electronic voting in Georgia. One of her congressional aides, Richard Searcy, was one of the most outspoken critics of Georgia�s electronic voting platform before taking a job in McKinney�s office.

When McKinney beat out five opponents in the Democratic primary in 2004 to re-claim her congressional seat, she did not question the voting machines� accuracy or the results. On Tuesday, she was anything but silent on the issue.


�Voters should be able to go into the precinct with the assurance that their vote is actually going to be cast, first of all, and counted,� McKinney said Tuesday. �But at this point we have had voters to tell us the voting machines took several tries before they would actually even cast the correct ballots.�

McKinney made other claims about voting problems but did not elaborate or take questions before disappearing into a truck.

Both local and state elections officials said they are taking McKinney�s allegations seriously. But they were also quick to say many of the complaints were unwarranted.

The DeKalb County elections office released a statement addressing complaints from the McKinney campaign.

In answer to an allegation that a voter tried to vote for McKinney, but the machine popped up a vote for Johnson, the office said:

�Upon investigation by the manager, it was determined while the one candidates�s name was touched by the ball of the finger, the fingernail hit the name,� the statement read. �We do not expect voters to cut their nails to vote, but we are cautioning everyone to make certain they are satisfied with their choices before they hit the �cast ballot� button.�

�We don�t have a problem addressing any claims that they have,� said Linda Lattimore, head of elections for DeKalb County, where much of the 4th Congressional District lies. �We�ll investigate and respond to each claim.�

The statement from Lattimore�s office addressed other issues raised by the McKinney campaign, claiming they were immediately rectified when brought to officials� attention.

Lieberman Loses Primary, files to run as independent

Hours after a Democratic primary defeat, Sen. Joe Lieberman filed petitions Wednesday morning to run as an independent in the general election. Senate party leaders in Washington quickly said they'll back the anti-war businessman who beat the three-term senator.

"The Democratic voters of Connecticut have spoken and chosen Ned Lamont as their nominee," Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, the chairman of the party's Senate campaign committee, said in a joint statement. They said they "fully support" Lamont's candidacy and congratulated him on the victory and a "race well run."

Lieberman said his campaign collected more than 18,000 signatures on its petitions, more than twice the number needed to get on the fall ballot under the new party created, called Connecticut for Lieberman. The new party allows him to secure a position higher on the ballot than he would have if he petitioned as an individual.

If the signatures are approved, as expected, it set up a three-way November race with Greenwich businessman Ned Lamont, who won the Democratic primary, and Republican Alan Schlesinger.

"Joe Lieberman has been an effective Democratic Senator for Connecticut and for America. But the perception was that he was too close to George Bush and this election was, in many respects, a referendum on the president more than anything else," Reid and Schumer said. "The results bode well for Democratic victories in November and our efforts to take the country in a new direction."

The two Senate Democrats did not address whether Lieberman should follow through with his plans to run as an independent but it was clear that they do not intend to support him.

"I'm definitely going forward," Lieberman told The Associated Press. "I feel that I closed strong in the primary. I feel we began to get out message across strongly and we're going to keep on going.

"This race is going to be all about who can get more done and who can be a better representative of Connecticut."

In Cleveland, Republican Party chairman Ken Mehlman seized on the results in the Connecticut primary to assail the Democrats on national security and called Lieberman's defeat a "shame."

"Joe Lieberman believed in a strong national defense, and for that, he was purged from his party. It is a sobering moment," Ken Mehlman said.

The Republican National Committee chairman said Lieberman's loss also is a "sign of what the Democratic Party has become in the 21st century. It reflects an unfortunate embrace of isolationism, defeatism and a blame America first attitude by national Democratic leaders at a time when retreating from the world is particularly dangerous."

Iranian cataclysm forecast Aug. 22

A top expert on the Mideast says it is possible Iran could pick Aug. 22, the anniversary of one of Islam's holiest events, for a cataclysm Shiite Muslims believe will forever resolve the battle between "good" and "evil."

Princeton's Bernard Lewis has written an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal advising that the rest of the world would be wise to bear in mind that for those who believe the end of the world is imminent and good, there is no deterrent even to nuclear warfare.

As WorldNetDaily has reported, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has urged his people to prepare for the coming of an Islamic "messiah," raising concerns a nuclear-armed Islamic Republic could trigger the kind of global conflagration he envisions will set the stage for the end of the world.

He's also said, in a WND report, that Islam and its followers must prepare to rule the world, because it is a "universal ideology that leads the world to justice."

Now comes Lewis, who notes that the world must be concerned about a leader for whom the possibility of death is not a deterrent.

"In this context, mutual assured destruction, the deterrent that worked so well during the Cold War, would have no meaning," Lewis wrote. "At the end of time, there will be general destruction anyway. What will matter will be the final destination of the dead � hell for the infidels, and heaven for the believers.

"For people with this mindset, MAD is not a constraint, it is an inducement," he said.

Lewis noted that Ahmadinejad has referred to Aug. 22 several times, including when he rejected � until that date � United Nations requests for nuclear program information.

Lewis, joining several other Mideast experts who have expressed similar concerns, said Aug. 22 corresponds to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427.

"This, by tradition, is the night when many Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet Muhammad on the winged horse Buraq, first to 'the farthest mosque,' usually identified with Jerusalem, and then to heaven and back," Lewis wrote.

In Islam, as in other religious, certain beliefs describe the "cosmic struggle" at the end of time. For Shiite Muslims, Lewis wrote, this will be "the long awaited return of the Hidden Imam, ending in the final victory of the forces of good over evil."

The significance, he said, is that there's a "radical" difference between Iran and other governments with nuclear weapons.

"This difference is expressed in what can only be described as the apocalyptic worldview of Iran's present rulers," he wrote. Iran's leaders now "clearly believe that this time is now, and that the terminal struggle has already begun and is indeed well advanced."

As for intent, a passage from the Ayatollah Khomeini, quoted in an 11th-grade Iranian schoolbook, reveals priorities: "I am decisively announcing to the whole world that if the world-devourers (i.e., the infidel powers) wish to stand against our religion, we will stand against their whole world and will not cease until the annihilation of all them. Either we all become free, or we will go to the greater freedom which is martyrdom."

Lewis wrote, "This might well be deemed an appropriate date for the apocalyptic ending of Israel and if necessary the world. It is far from certain that Mr. Ahmadanejad plans any such cataclysmic events precisely for Aug. 22. But it would be wise to bear the possibility in mind."

Monday, August 07, 2006

Iran Rejects UN Resolution

Iran yesterday rejected a United Nations resolution calling for Tehran to halt its nuclear programme.

Iran said it would expand its efforts to develop nuclear power, which the United States and Europe fear is aimed at making a bomb, and warned that any UN sanctions aimed at halting its uranium enrichment would bring a "painful" response, possibly including a cut in oil exports.

The news came amid reports that Iran had tried to import bomb-making uranium from the African mine that produced the material used to make the Second World War Hiroshima bomb, which killed 140,000 people.

Instead of cutting back, Mr Larijani said, Iran would expand the number of atomic centrifuges it was running. Centrifuges enrich uranium by spinning it at supersonic speeds. Enriched uranium is used in power stations but if it is enriched to a significantly higher degree it can be used in a weapon.

"We will expand nuclear technology at whatever stage it may be necessary and all of Iran's nuclear technology including the [centrifuge] cascades will be expanded," Mr Larijani said.

Iran said in April it had produced enriched uranium from a cascade of 164 centrifuges. It has told the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that it will start installing 3,000 centrifuges later this year, enough to produce material for a nuclear warhead in one year.

Mr Larijani said the expansion of atomic work would be conducted under the supervision of the IAEA, but even that could be in question if Iran felt unfairly treated.

"We do not want to end the supervision of the agency, but you should not do anything to force Iran to do so," he said.

He warned the UN Security Council not to impose sanctions on the world's fourth-biggest exporter of crude oil.

"If they do, we will react in a way that would be painful for them. They should not think that they can hurt us and we would stand still without a reaction," Mr Larijani said.

"We do not want to use the oil weapon, it is they who would impose it upon us. Iran should be allowed to defend its rights in proportion to their stance."

Iranian officials say the UN resolution is illegal and that Tehran has every right to produce fuel from the uranium ore it mines in its central deserts.

Iran's smuggling of uranium from Africa uncovered

Tanzanian customs officials have uncovered an Iranian smuggling operation transporting large quantities of bomb-making uranium from the same mines in the Congo that provided the nuclear material for the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima sixty-one years ago today, reports the London Sunday Times.

A United Nations report, outlining the interception last October, said there is "no doubt" the smuggled uranium-238 came from mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo's mineral-rich Katanga province.


The smuggled uranium discovered by Tanzanian customs agents was hidden in shipment of coltan, a rare mineral used to make chips in mobile telephones. According to the manifest, the coltan was to be smelted in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan after being shipped to Bandar Abbas, Iran's largest port.

"There were several containers due to be shipped and they were all routinely scanned with a Geiger counter," one customs official said.

"This one was very radioactive. When we opened the container it was full of drums of coltan. Each drum contains about 50 kilograms of ore. When the first and second rows were removed, the ones after that were found to be drums of uranium."


Uranium-238, when used in a nuclear reactor, can be used to create plutonium for nuclear weapons.

"The container was put in a secure part of the port and it was later taken away, by the Americans, I think, or at least with their help," he said. "We have all been told not to talk to anyone about this."


According to the U.N. report, which has been submitted to the sanctions committee, Tanzania provided "limited data" on three other shipments of radioactive materials seized over the past ten years.

"In reference to the last shipment from October 2005," the report reads, "the Tanzanian government left no doubt that the uranium was transported from [Katanga province] by road through Zambia to the United Republic of Tanzania."