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Homeland Security joins weather radio network
Emergency alerts for everything from tornadoes to missing children and terror warnings will get out to the public through an expanded weather radio network, the government announced Thursday. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's network already makes emergency weather warnings available to 97% of the country and has added alerts for missing children and other hazards in recent years. The addition of the Homeland Security Department to the system will allow terror alerts and warnings to be distributed automatically through the same way. "This agreement is an example of interagency cooperation that ... can be applied to protect the homeland from both man-made and natural disasters," said Frank Libutti, undersecretary for information analysis and infrastructure protection at Homeland Security. Added NOAA Administrator Conrad C. Lautenbacher: "Today, radios, televisions and other devices are equipped to sound the alarm when danger threatens. Warnings and alerts can also be sent to cell phones, pagers and computers, ensuring that these vital messages can reach every corner of America."
www.usatoday.com
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Homeland Security To Remain In District
The Department of Homeland Security will keep its permanent headquarters in Northwest Washington for at least five years and possibly longer while it consolidates operations now spread across 5 million square feet of office space throughout the region, Bush administration officials said yesterday. District officials hailed the decision and related legislation as an economic victory that will keep thousands of federal jobs in the city. Real estate analysts said the department's plans will shape the market across the Washington area, particularly in areas where large commercial spaces are available, such as Silver Spring and Dulles. Homeland Security, which has 180,000 workers across the country, plans to roughly double the number of top employees -- currently about 2,000 people -- who are based at the Nebraska Avenue Naval Complex, and spend $75 million on technological upgrades over five years. The Navy will move out 1,147 workers by January, many to sites in Virginia, Maryland and the District, said a spokesman for the Naval District of Washington. "We are pleased that Congress appears ready to meet our requirements to have the Department of Homeland Security headquarters located at the Nebraska Avenue Complex for the foreseeable future," said Brian Roehrkasse, spokesman for Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge.
www.washingtonpost.com
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Blimp shaped like beach ball to fly skies of Southern Md.
A Georgia company plans to fly its 60-foot, round airship in St. Mary's County in Southern Maryland this month to demonstrate the potential of using modern airships for homeland security, national defense and wireless communications. Backers of the airships say they are cheaper than satellites and manned reconnaissance aircraft and would fill a gap between the two. They also say the ability of airships to maintain a stationary orbit over a target provides more persistent surveillance than unmanned spy planes that have to move over their targets. Techsphere Systems International LLC of Atlanta will produce its Aerosphere in Columbus, Ga., near Fort Benning. It plans to demonstrate the airship to Washington lawmakers and government and military representatives from June 28 to July 2.
www.baltimoresun.com
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Electronic jihad: Web sites featuring calls to arms,video of attacks
Web sites featuring videos of the beheading of Americans or captives pleading for their lives have become part of an electronic war of incitement, humiliation and terrorist outreach, experts say, providing a window into the minds of militant Muslims who hate the West. The latest dramatic Web posting came Saturday, a short video that showed no faces but included a voice yelling in English: "No, no, please!" The video showed a shot fired, then the scene of the falling body of what appeared to be a Western man -- identified as Robert Jacobs, an American killed by suspected al-Qaida militants in Saudi Arabia last week. Two gunmen then fired at least 10 more shots, before one of them kneeled and motioned as if he was beheading the fallen man. An earlier video showed the beheading of American Nicholas Berg in Iraq. The CIA has said the black-clad militant shown on the video decapitating Berg was Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a former commander for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden now believed to be leading resistance to Iraq's U.S. occupation. "The aim is really to spread as much terror as possible and make it available to as many people as possible, especially in the West," where Internet use is more common, said Dia'a Rashwan, a Cairo expert on Islamic militants. In what Rashwan calls a a war of "ideology, images and perception," the Web is a place for militants and their sympathizers to exchange the latest news, debate their definition of Islam, share how-to manuals, extoll their heroes and vilify their enemies.
www.detnews.com
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Homeland Department seeks technology to detect suicide bombers
The Homeland Security Department within the "next few weeks" plans to solicit companies for technology designed to detect suicide bombers near railways, buildings and other critical infrastructure, a top official said Monday. "I'd be very surprised if that's not an area that we won't experience," Charles McQueary, the undersecretary for Homeland Security's science and technology division, said at the Brookings Institution. He said the department does not have any intelligence information that suggests terrorists are planning such an attack but added, "It's an easy thing to do." McQueary said the department seeks devices capable of detecting explosives on an individual 100 yards away. "It's not an easy problem to solve," he said. "I'm confident we can make scientific progress in the area."
www.govexec.com
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Demand for terrorism insurance rises
Demand for terrorism coverage by businesses is rising again, according to a new study by Marsh, the US broker. In the first quarter of this year, more than 44 per cent of US businesses took out insurance to cover terrorism risk. That is the highest pick-up rate seen for this coverage since 2002 when the government passed the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act (TRIA), which provides a federal back-stop to cover insurers' losses. As the cost of property insurance has started to drop, demand for terrorism coverage has jumped. Insurers are offering more affordable rates and many have expanded coverage to include risks outside the US, according to Marsh. The broker surveyed more than 600 businesses. On Capitol Hill, insurers are pressing Congress to extend TRIA as concerns grow that the industry might collapse without it. The bill, passed by Congress in the wake of the September 11 attacks, specifies that the government must pay all insured losses greater than $12.5bn in the aftermath of a nuclear, biological or chemical attack by non-Americans. In exchange, the government forced insurers to stop stripping terrorism coverage from their policies. But TRIA guarantees its support only until the end of next year. It must be reapproved by the US Treasury and fears are growing that its passage could be derailed.
news.ft.com
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Farmers take steps in fighting terrorism
Farmers, ranchers and veterinarians are working regularly with state and local officials to prepare for a terrorist strike that could claim more victims than the Sept. 11 attacks. But the talk isn't of bombs. The focus is on how the most productive agricultural nation on Earth can shield its livestock, crops and food-processing plants from a terror attack that could cripple the nation's economy. "The threat is real," said Dr. Debbie Seymour, a Jackson County, Ky., veterinarian who said agro-terrorism is on her checklist now whenever she visits farms on her rounds. "I think the veterinary community in general is on the front lines." Terrorists have used diseases and poisons in this country before, most recently 20 years ago in Oregon when a cult group sickened about 750 people by tainting a salad bar with salmonella. Beyond the efforts of individual states, the country's readiness to respond is a matter of dispute. Congress is divided over how much money to commit to protecting against terrorism in rural America. The RAND Corp., the federal General Accounting Office and the Center for Science in the Public Interest, among other groups, point to numerous shortcomings in efforts to keep the nation's sprawling food production and supply network safe.
www.chillicothegazette.com
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US extends biometric passports deadline
The US House of Representatives has voted for a year-long extension to the deadline for countries to introduce biometric passports for their citizens. This is a year less than Colin Powell asked for, and many countries (including the UK) will be unable to meet it. On Tuesday, Maura Harty, Assistant Secretary of State for consular affairs, told the Senate Judiciary committee that the technological challenges involved in introducing biometric features to passports are too great for nations to meet the October 2004 deadline set by Congress in the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002. More than 10 million visitors enter the U.S. every year from members of the visa waiver program, established for nations whose citizens are thought unlikely to pose a security threat or to overstay the 90-day limit. But under the new system envisaged, such visitors would only be allowed in without a visa if they had biometrics on their passports. Harty argued that manufacturers have only just begun to make the necessary chips, and that neither the US nor any other nations, have been able to begin testing. The US plans to have biometrics passports by the end of 2005, but technical standards are still being developed for both the biometrics, and the machines that will read them. Judiciary Committee Chairman Senator Orrin Hatch said that a delay of just one year would be acceptable. He was concerned that borders were still vulnerable, and said it was important that the security be stepped up quickly.
www.theregister.co.uk
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CDC issues bioterrorism-response guidebook for coroners
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has published a guidebook to help medical examiners and coroners detect and respond to bioterrorism. "Medical examiners and coroners (ME/Cs) are essential public health partners for terrorism preparedness and response," the CDC says in its summary of the 27-page booklet. "Medicolegal autopsies are essential for making organism-specific diagnoses in deaths caused by biologic terrorism." Besides providing detailed guidance for medical examiners and coroners, the report is designed to help other public health officials understand the role of medical examiners in bioterrorism preparedness and response. The document includes a description of the pathologic findings and diagnostic specimens and tests for each of the Category A (high-risk) bioterrorism agents: those that cause smallpox, anthrax, plague, tularemia, botulism, and viral hemorrhagic fevers.
www.cidrap.umn.edu
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Officials eager to get advanced technologies at borders
Advanced technologies would help law enforcement agencies combat illegal immigration, drug smuggling and potential terrorists from entering America along the nation's borders, senators and Homeland Security Department officials agreed Thursday. "Without better technology, there is just no possible way to secure our borders," Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz., said during a hearing of his panel. McCain also repeatedly called for comprehensive immigration reform to help law enforcement officials combat the estimated 1 million people who enter the country illegally every year. Sen. Jon Kyl and Rep. Jim Kolbe, fellow Arizona Republicans who testified at the hearing, agreed with the chairman's comments. "We cannot assure our citizens today that our borders are secure," said Kolbe, adding that the country needs "good law enforcement combined with comprehensive immigration reform."
www.govexec.com
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