International News

Obama Seeks ‘New Beginning’ With Muslim World (BBC) “President Barack Obama [yesterday] said the ‘cycle of suspicion and discord’ between the United States and the Muslim world must end,” reports the British Broadcasting Corporation. “In a keynote speech in Cairo [Egypt], Mr Obama called for a ‘new beginning’ in ties. He admitted there had been ‘years of distrust’ and said both sides needed to make a ‘sustained effort … to respect one another and seek common ground’. Mr Obama made a number of references to the Koran and called on all faiths to live together in peace.” The speech echoed some of Obama’s comments in his videotaped message to Iran in March (see the March 27 newsletter). [View article] [View transcript]

Europe Says U.S. Should Take Some Guantanamo Detainees (Washington Post) “The Obama administration’s push to resettle at least 50 Guantanamo Bay prisoners in Europe is meeting fresh resistance as European officials demand that the United States first give asylum to some inmates before they will do the same,” reports the Washington Post. “Rising opposition in the U.S. Congress to allowing Guantanamo prisoners on American soil has not gone over well in Europe. Officials from countries that previously indicated they were willing to accept inmates now say it may be politically impossible for them to do so if the United States does not reciprocate.” [View article]

China’s Aggressive Quarantine Measures Virtually Imprison Healthy Travelers (Washington Post) China is “throwing several thousand foreigners and Chinese nationals into quarantine facilities for having little more than a cough, runny nose or slight temperature and having been in contact with someone with a suspected case of swine flu,” reports the Washington Post. “… In Beijing, more than 650 people have been quarantined since the scare began in April. Many of them were identified at the city’s international airport, where masked technicians inspect each passenger and check for fever with a thermal forehead scanner that emits a beam of light.” [View article]

Plant to Destroy Chemical Weapons Opens in Russia (Washington Post) “Russia and the United States formally opened on [May 29] a plant in Siberia to destroy a huge stockpile of artillery shells filled with deadly nerve agents, more than a decade after alarmed U.S. officials first pledged to help secure and dispose of the weapons,” reports the Washington Post. “The 250-acre facility, built with $1 billion in U.S. aid, is said to be the largest in the world dedicated to destroying chemical munitions. Its debut represents a milestone in Russia’s long, rocky partnership with the United States to safeguard and eliminate the arsenal of chemical, biological and nuclear arms” produced by the Soviet Union. [View article]

British Schoolchildren Taught to Spot Terrorists (London Telegraph) British police “officers are using half-day workshops including animated talking animals to encourage pupils to be on the [lookout] for signs of extremism,” reports the Telegraph. “They hope to make children as much aware of terrorism as the dangers presented by roads, fire, water, strangers and the internet.” [View article]

U.S.-Philippines Partnership May Be Model for Fighting Terrorism Elsewhere (Los Angeles Times) “The small U.S. military mission in the Philippines attracts little attention, but Defense Department officials say it has been surprisingly effective at reducing the havens once used by militants [there]—and that could make the effort a model for other U.S. partnerships with other nations, including Pakistan,” reports the Los Angeles Times. “… There are about 600 U.S. service members in Manila advising Philippine commanders and staff officers—a small force that has been able to reduce the influence of the main Muslim militant group, Abu Sayyaf.” [View article]

Threat Concern Prompts DHS to Halt U.S.–Based Delta Flights Into Kenya (ABC News) “Increased fighting in Somalia and recent threat information indicating possible attacks against U.S. interests in East Africa have prompted the Department of Homeland Security to deny Delta Airlines their first direct flights [from Atlanta] to and from Nairobi, Kenya,” reports ABC News. [View article]

31% of Muslims in Europe Claim Discrimination (Deutsche Welle) “A survey of ethnic minorities in Europe says 31 percent of Muslims across the [European Union] feel they were discriminated against in 2008 and many fail to report racist incidents because of a lack of trust in the authorities,” reports Deutsche Welle (German Radio). “The report compiled by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights” says that “only ten percent of Muslims who experienced prejudice said this was solely due to their religious beliefs while over half of the respondents felt their ethnic origin was the reason for the discrimination.” [View article]

Haqqani Network Is Deadliest U.S. Foe in Afghanistan (Christian Science Monitor) “The Haqqani network, born of the Russian war and nurtured by the CIA [during that 1980s conflict], is behind many spectacular assaults in Afghanistan,” reports the Christian Science Monitor. It is allied with the Taliban and “better connected to Pakistani intelligence and Arab jihadist groups than any other Afghan insurgent group.” It “often works closely with foreign militant groups,” and it “pioneered the use of suicide attacks in Afghanistan.” [View article]

Swine Flu Cases Surge Again As of Wednesday, the United States had 11,054 confirmed and probable cases of swine flu and 17 deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—up from 7,927 cases and 11 deaths as of last week. Worldwide, there have been 19,273 cases with 117 deaths, reports the United Nations World Health Organization—up from 13,398 cases and 95 deaths as of last week. [View CDC page] [View WHO page]

G8 Plans More Antiterror Measures (Window of China) “Justice and interior ministers of the Group of Eight (G8)” industrialized nations on May 30 “agreed on a series of measures to beef up the global fight against terrorism, organized crime and illegal immigration while promoting and respecting human rights,” reports the Xinhua News Agency. Countries will “share sensible data on terrorists and on their channels of communication, specifically the Internet,” act to prevent “terrorists’ recruitment,” and give “‘special attention … to possible connections between organized crime and international terrorism.’” [View article]

Mass-Casualty Exercise Prepares Vancouver for Olympics (Vancouver Sun) “Four dozen doctors, from sports team physicians to members of the Vancouver [British Columbia] Organizing Committee’s medical team” worked for two days this week on a “simulated mass-casualty exercise at the Justice Institute of” British Columbia, reports the Sun. “A bus accident, the collapse of spectator stands, a wipeout by an athlete that takes out several others. All of these have the potential for causing mass casualties during the 2010 Winter Games.” [View article]

DHS News

DHS Recovers $228 Million From Frauds (Federal Computer Week) “The Homeland Security Department’s inspector general has recovered $228 million in fines, restitutions, cost savings and other payments from investigations conducted from March 2003 through September 2008,” reports Federal Computer Week. The Inspector General’s “office received 59,829 complaints of alleged waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer funds … the complaints resulted in 2,014 arrests and 1,458 convictions.… Many of the cases pertained to DHS employees engaging in fraud … There were also cases involving fraudulent activity by DHS contractors and recipients of grants and disaster aid.” [View article] [View report]

FEMA Needs to Turn More Policies Into Plans, Says GAO While most policies such as the National Response Framework (see the Sep. 28, 2007, newsletter) that define roles and responsibilities have been completed, 49 of 72 “plans to implement these policies, including several for catastrophic incidents, are not yet complete,” reports the Government Accountability Office. “As a result, the roles and responsibilities of key officials involved in responding to a catastrophe have not been fully defined and, thus, cannot be tested in exercises.… Having a strategic plan would provide FEMA with a roadmap for addressing the complex task of guiding and building a national preparedness system.” [View GAO summary]

US-VISIT Tests Biometrics on Travelers Departing the U.S. (NextGov) “The Homeland Security Department launched test programs” on May 28 “at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport,” collecting fingerprints “to verify when foreigners and legal permanent residents leave the country,” reports NextGov. DHS “said the airlines refused to participate in the test program.” [View article] [View Focus on US-VISIT]

DHS Scrutinizes Service Contracts (Federal Computer Week) “The Homeland Security Department is conducting mandatory reviews of all new professional services contracts over $1 million in value, including renewals of existing contracts,” reports Federal Computer Week. DHS wants “to ensure that the contracts are not being awarded for inherently governmental functions, the jobs that only federal [employees] should perform.” [View article]

DHS Names Key Cybersecurity Personnel The Homeland Security Department on Monday announced that two key cybersecurity positions were filled: Greg Schaffer as Assistant Secretary for Cybersecurity and Communications, and Bruce McConnell as Counselor to the National Protection and Programs Directorate Deputy Under Secretary, Philip Reitinger. In addition, Reitinger will serve as Director of the National Cybersecurity Center. [View press release]

Katrina Victims Get to Buy Their FEMA Trailers (New York Times) “Hurricane Katrina victims around the Gulf Coast who were told to vacate their temporary trailers by the end of May [see the May 15 newsletter] will instead be allowed to buy them for $5 or less,” reports the New York Times. “… The Department of Housing and Urban Development will also give the 3,450 families still in trailers or temporary housing—including many elderly, poor and disabled people—priority for $50 million in permanent housing vouchers.” [View article]

Other Federal News

GPO Posts Nuclear Site List (New York Times) The Government Printing Office “mistakenly made public a 266-page report, its pages marked ‘highly confidential,’ that gives detailed information about hundreds of the nation’s civilian nuclear sites and programs, including maps showing the precise locations of stockpiles of fuel for nuclear weapons,” reports the New York Times. “… John M. Deutch, a former director of central intelligence and deputy secretary of defense … [said it] ‘doesn’t look like a serious breach.’ But David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, … said [that the] information … ‘can … help [thieves or terrorists] seize the material.’ The document contains no military information about the nation’s stockpile of nuclear arms, or about the facilities and programs that guard such weapons,” but it does show “the exact location of Tube Vault 16” at “Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, which … contains highly enriched uranium.” [View article]

Judge Puts Bagram Cases on Hold (MSNBC) U.S. District Judge John Bates “on Monday put a hold on his groundbreaking order allowing detainees at a U.S. air base in Afghanistan access to U.S. courts until an appeals court can rule on the case involving prisoners held in an active war zone,” reports the Associated press. (See the April 3 and April 17 newsletters.) The “four prisoners … have been held at Bagram for six years or more.” Bates still “believes his decision was correct. But he agreed to a government request to delay his order long enough for the Obama administration to appeal.” [View article]

Judge Denies Telecom Eavesdropping Lawsuits (Wired) On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker “dismissed lawsuits targeting the nation’s telecommunication companies for their participation in President George W. Bush’s once-secret electronic eavesdropping program,” writes Wired “Threat Level” blogger David Kravets. “… Walker upheld summer legislation protecting the companies from the lawsuits. The legislation, which then–Sen. Barack Obama voted for, also granted the government the authority to monitor [Americans’] telecommunications without warrants if the subject was communicating with somebody overseas suspected of terrorism.” [View blog]

Nuclear Forensics Needs Interagency Plan, Says GAO Nuclear forensics—identifying a nuclear bomb’s design, materials, and perpetrators (see the March 28, 2008, and March 20, 2009, newsletters)—requires cooperation from the Defense, Energy, Homeland Security, and State departments, as well as the FBI and the Intelligence Community, notes the Government Accountability Office. Their roles, and that of the National Technical Nuclear Forensics Center within the DHS Domestic Nuclear Detection Office, are established by Congress, and the agencies “face challenges in reducing the time needed to arrive at nuclear forensics conclusions and addressing human capital shortages in key disciplines—such as radiochemistry.” The GAO recommends “a comprehensive interagency plan,” full accounting of indirect costs, and an assessment of the impact of projected budget reductions. [View GAO summary]

CIA Pushes Language Proficiency (Washington Post) The Central Intelligence Agency has “launched an ambitious program to double the number of analysts proficient in languages deemed critical in the fight against America’s enemies,” acknowledging “slow progress in adding employees fluent in languages such as Arabic, Farsi and Urdu,” reports the Washington Post. “… the agency seeks to increase by 50 percent the number of analysts fluent in the dialect of the culture or region to which they are assigned … a small fraction of its overall workforce—about 13 percent—is fluent in a second language.” [View article]

National News

New Homeland Security Research Briefs The Institute for Homeland Security Solutions (see the Website of the Week) has published four new research briefs:

• Building on Clues: Methods to Help State and Local Law Enforcement Detect and Characterize Terrorist Activity
• Methods for Assessing the Social Welfare Implications of U.S. Counterterrorism Policies
• Individual Differences in Vigilance Tasks
• Job Proficiency Work Sample Testing for Critical DHS Jobs and Job Tasks

U.S. Still Not Ready for Pandemic Flu, Says GAO “Pandemic planning and exercising has occurred at the federal, state, and local government levels, but important planning gaps remain at all levels of government,” reports the Government Accountability Office, among other findings. [View GAO summary]

State and Local News

Cleared of Terror Charges, Florida Man Faces Deportation as Terrorist (New York Times) Youssef Samir Megahed, acquitted in April “on charges of transporting explosives”—he and a friend said they were fireworks; the police said they were bombs—has been rearrested, reports the New York Times. “The new charge is that he ‘is engaged in or is likely to engage in’ terrorist activities, a violation of his legal residency in the United States. ‘They just label you a terrorist and that’s it,’ said Mr. Megahed, 23, who moved to Florida from Egypt with his family 11 years ago … Mr. Megahed is at least the third Florida defendant in three years to be brought up on immigration charges after prosecutors failed to win terrorism convictions in federal court.” [View article]

Targeted New York Synagogues Get Security Money (New York Times) Riverdale Jewish Center and Riverdale Temple, targets of a bomb plot last month (see the May 22 newsletter) will each “be awarded $25,000 in federal money to improve its security,” reports the New York Times. “… the Urban Areas Security Initiative, a homeland security grant program, [provides] money to organizations at a high risk of a terrorist attack.” [View article]

Brownsville, TX, Strikes Deal on Mexican Border Fence (Houston Chronicle) “Despite opposition from the mayor [see the Oct. 5, 2007, newsletter], city commissioners have approved a deal with the federal government to allow the U.S.-Mexico border fence to be built on city land downtown but preserve the possibility of redeveloping the riverfront,” reports the Associated Press. “The agreement with the Department of Homeland Security … allows U.S. Customs and Border Protection to erect temporary fencing on some of nearly 16 acres of city property. But if and when the city comes up with money to replace it with something less intrusive but still effective, such as a levee wall, the government will remove the fence.” [View article]

New Upcoming Events (Events are listed for four weeks; after that, they are still on the Upcoming Events page) (July 30-31; Columbia, MO) This conference brings together K-12 and higher education officials and the first responder community to collectively discuss and learn about relevant safety and security issues, such as threat assessment considerations to avoid violence on school and college campuses, dealing with hyper-vigilance, and lessons learned from Israel. [View event website] Northern Border Highway Carrier Conference (August 19; Buffalo, NY) The conference will cover Free and Secure Trade, sealing, the Automated Commercial Environment and E-manifest, highway carrier minimum-security criteria, validation and revalidation of a highway carrier, activities of Partners in Protection and the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism, and more topics specifically for northern border highway carriers. Attendance is limited to people representing highway carriers certified by the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism. [View event website] 2009 Homeland Security Conference (August 31–September 4; Monterey, CA) The theme of the third annual conference and showcase is “mission integration.” Planned panel topics include “Mission Integration Best Practices,” “DHS National Mission Planning and Operations Centers,” “DHS State and Local Mission Planning and Operations Centers,” “Intel/Information Sharing,” and “Border Security.” [View event website]