Military

SHAPE News Morning Update

18 December 2003

NATO

• The Czech government voted on Wednesday to lease 14 JAS-39 Gripen jet fighters to replace the country’s fleet of Soviet-era planes. Prime Minister Spidla said Defense Minister Kostelka would now negotiate details of the contract with the Swedish government. According to earlier reports, the army will lease the jets for five years and then decide whether to extend the lease, buy the planes or return them to Sweden. (AP 172244 Dec 03)

AFGHANISTAN

• Afghanistan’s constitutional council slipped into chaos on Wednesday, with one delegate denouncing her colleagues as “criminals,” and others threatening to walk out in a dispute over whether to adopt a presidential system. After three days of hopeful speeches and some low-level procedural squabbling, the outbreaks were a sharp reminder of the fractured politics that still dominates Afghanistan after more than two decades of conflict. (AP 171537 Dec 03)

IRAQ

• Amid concerns of international human rights groups, Iraq’s U.S.-appointed Governing Council met for the first time on Wednesday to look into ways of appointing judges to a new war crimes tribunal that could try Saddam Hussein. One council member, Adnan Pachachi, said Iraq’s tribunal would welcome “foreign judges if we feel it’s necessary.” (AP 172110 Dec 03)

WAR ON TERRORISM

• The United States and its allies plan six air, land and sea exercises over the next few months to practice stopping suspected shipments of weapons of mass destruction, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday. The official spoke after a meeting of 16 nations taking part in the Proliferation Security Initiative, a U.S.-inspired effort that aims to prevent transfers of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons around the world but whose legitimacy has been questioned by critics, including the Chinese government. The official said that over the next few months the group would hold Italian-led air and maritime exercises, ground exercises led by Germany and Poland, a French-led air exercise and a U.S.-led maritime exercise in the Arabian sea. Officials from the 16 nations taking part in the effort met in Washington on Tuesday and Wednesday to talk about the nuts and bolts of how to intercept shipments, the official said. (Reuters 172359 GMT Dec 03)
  
  
• Three months after President Bush called for a UN resolution to prevent terrorists from getting weapons of mass destruction, the United States has circulated a draft to key Security Council members. Experts from the five veto-wielding nations were scheduled to discuss the text on Thursday, but diplomats said no action is expected until next year. The U.S. draft incorporates several elements from a Russian resolution circulated in late October and was presented Tuesday to the four other permanent council members as a “consolidated” text. Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Gennady Gatilov said it was “very encouraging” that the United States incorporated Russian ideas in a consolidated text, but Moscow had concerns about how the resolution would be implemented. (AP 172308 Dec 03)
  
  
• Ministers of six Gulf Arab states set an agenda on Wednesday for a regional summit, focusing on fighting terror, including educational reforms. Abdul Rahman al-Attiya, secretary-general of the Gulf Cooperation Council, told a news conference concrete proposals on changing curricula and training for teachers will be put to next week’s annual summit for approval. The Kuwaiti Foreign Affairs Minister said the summit would discuss an agreement on fighting terror attacks. He said educational reforms were the key to stability and security. Saudi reformists say the country has removed from text books intolerant or offensive chapters on Christians and Jews, which had depicted them as infidels and enemies of Islam. The officials said the summit would also discuss Iraq. (Reuters 172117 GMT Dec 03)

OTHER NEWS

• President Bush on Wednesday gave the Pentagon the power to make appointments to military tribunals, taking a further step toward the creation of the controversial panels that may be used to try prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. In a letter notifying the Congress of his plans, he linked the action to the “war on terror” he declared after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Military tribunals have not been used since World War II. Under policies set out by the Pentagon in May, those convicted in the tribunals could face the death penalty and suspects would not be accorded the same rights they would have in a civilian court. (Reuters 180048 GMT Dec 03)