Legion of Angels News Archive

SYDNEY (AFP) – The world is on the brink of an avalanche in the spread of devastating weaponry, a new global non-proliferation group warned Tuesday, saying that a nuclear incident would dwarf the September 11 attacks.

The Middle East, particularly Iran, is a potential tipping point, according to Gareth Evans, co-chair of the newly formed International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament.

Evans, a former Australia foreign minister, said the world had been “sleepwalking” on the issue of atomic weapons for a decade.

“The devastation that could be wreaked by one major nuclear weapons incident alone puts 9/11 and almost everything else (in) to the category of the insignificant,” he said, referring to the attacks inflicted on the United States in 2001.

Evans was speaking as the commission, which was first proposed by Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd after a visit to the Japanese city of Hiroshima in June, entered the second and final day of its inaugural meeting in Sydney.

The group, chaired by Evans and Japan’s former top diplomat Yoriko Kawaguchi, is tasked with reinvigorating the global debate on the spread of nuclear weapons and disarmament.

Evans told reporters there were between 13,000 and 16,000 nuclear warheads actively deployed around the world and that it was “really a bit of a miracle” that a nuclear catastrophe had not occurred during the Cold War or afterwards.

“But unless we energise ourselves, unless we re-invigorate a high level political debate which is then accompanied by effective action, we potentially have very alarming consequences staring us in the face,” he said.

“We are on the brink of… an avalanche or a cascade of proliferation unless we are very, very careful indeed and find ways collectively to hold the line.”

Evans, Australia’s foreign minister from 1988 to 1996, said the world had failed to address the rise of nuclear-armed India and Pakistan and the assumption that Israel also possesses such weapons.

But he pointed to the Middle East as a key area of concern.

“If there is a breakout by Iran, or a perceived breakout by Iran, the Middle East alone is the cockpit in which we can anticipate such a cascade of proliferation by a number of other countries,” he said.

A change in leadership in the US, however, may provide a breakthrough in international talks, before comparing possible changes under Republican candidate John McCain and Democratic candidate Barack Obama.

“An Obama administration would, on the face of it… be one that’s likely to be more substantially focused on this but even with an McCain administration, it would be an improvement,” said Evans. “There’s not much to beat frankly.”

He said if the US were to sign up to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty the implications would be “quite profound” and could lead to China finding itself under “irresistable pressure” to do likewise.

“That in turn would, I think, have ripple effects right throughout the international community,” he added.

The commission, whose members include former US secretary of defence William Perry and Norway’s former prime minister Gro Harlem Brundtland, is working towards building consensus ahead of a 2010 conference on the 40-year-old Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Source — Yahoo!

NEW YORK - Presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama made ground zero their common ground for one rare day, free of politics and infused with memory. Putting their partisan contest on a respectful hold, they walked together Thursday into the great pit where the World Trade Center towers once stood and, as one, honored the dead from the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

They walked down a long ramp flanked with the flags of countries, chatting at times, silent other times, and sharing a quick laugh at one point. Right behind them, Cindy McCain clutched Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s arm — Michelle Obama was with her daughters in Chicago.

At the bottom of the ramp, the two rivals stopped to talk with a small group of relatives of the attacks’ victims of seven years ago. They laid flowers at the pit’s commemorative reflecting pool — a pink rose from Obama, a yellow rose from McCain — bowed their heads and walked off to speak with fire and police personnel. There were no speeches.

“Thanks, we’ll see ya,” McCain told Obama as the Democrat patted the Republican’s back and they shook hands and parted.

Earlier, McCain spoke briefly at a simple ceremony in remote, rural western Pennsylvania, held on a large hilly field close to where United Airlines Flight 93, the third of four airliners commandeered by terrorists, crashed. Investigators believe some of the 40 passengers and crew rushed the cockpit and thwarted terrorists’ plans to use that plane as a weapon like the ones that hit the World Trade Center and Pentagon. All aboard all planes died.

The Arizona senator said those on the flight might have saved his own life, as some believe the terrorists wanted to slam that plane into the U.S. Capitol. He said the only way to thank those who died on the flight is to “be as good an American as they were.”

“We might fall well short of their standard, but there’s honor in the effort,” McCain said.

Obama, in a statement, said that on Sept. 11, 2001, “Americans across our great country came together to stand with the families of the victims, to donate blood, to give to charity, and to say a prayer for our country. Let us renew that.”

The Illinois senator added: “Let us remember that the terrorists responsible for 9/11 are still at large, and must be brought to justice.”

Left unsaid by both was their sharp disagreement over the Iraq war, which McCain supported and Obama opposed as a distraction from the Afghanistan war and broader fight against terrorism.

It was not a day for spelling out differences but rather a respectful time-out in an otherwise heated campaign with 54 days to go. Both agreed to suspend TV ads critical of each other.

In Pennsylvania, grieving family members and a few dignitaries sat in front of a chain-link fence adorned with flags and mementos that serves as a temporary memorial while a permanent one is built. Bells were rung as each victim’s name was read. McCain and others laid wreaths at the foot of two flagpoles and a large wooden cross.

The political truce was evident in remarks thanking McCain for traveling to Shanksville by Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a Democrat who occasionally speaks against the Republican nominee as an Obama campaign surrogate. “It’s an honor to have him here, not just as a presidential candidate but as a great American patriot,” Rendell said.

Another display came near the ground zero pit, as McCain adviser Mark Salter huddled with Obama spokeswoman Linda Douglass, a former ABC News correspondent, to discuss Sarah Palin’s interview Thursday with the network.

Obama and McCain were intersecting again later, at a Columbia University forum on public service in the evening. Their sessions at the forum were separate, joined only by a handshake.

At the Twin Towers site, Bloomberg told them time was running out to touch the bedrock at the base of the pit. “This is the last year because the ramp goes away for the rebuilding,” he said.

Officials said the family members Obama and McCain talked with were Mary Fetchet, whose son Brad worked on the 89th floor of the South Tower; Michael Henry, brother of firefighter Joseph Henry; Joanne Langone, widow of policeman Tom Langone; and Maggie Lemagne, sister of Port Authority officer David Lemagne. Brian Cichetti, a World Trade Center site safety manager who is working on construction of the memorial and museum, also was with them.

At the top of the ramp on the way out, McCain and Obama shook hands with police officers.

“Appreciate everything you do,” Obama said. “God bless you all. We think about you this day and every day.”

Obama’s running mate, Joe Biden, visited an American Legion post in suburban Cleveland for an invitation-only gathering of area police, firefighters and other first responders.

“Part of today is reminding Americans that every single day there are acts that are both ordinary and profound,” Biden said in recalling the attacks. “You suit up, head out on that vehicle not knowing what you’re going to find. If, God forbid, anything remotely close to that happens, it’s going to be you guys trying to save all of us.”

Palin, the Republican vice presidential candidate, was in her home state of Alaska to attend an Army ceremony to send her eldest son, Track, off to duty in Iraq.

Obama and McCain last appeared together in August when they shook hands at minister Rick Warren’s megachurch in Orange County, Calif., and spoke separately about faith and values. In June, they attended the funeral of NBC newsman Tim Russert, sitting next to each other at the family’s request.

Source — Yahoo!

Adults who were near the World Trade Center around the time it was attacked in 2001 have been twice as likely to develop asthma as the general population, a new analysis of public health registry data has found.

The study of data from the World Trade Center Health Registry, released on Wednesday by the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, tracks health effects two to three years after the attack. It suggests that 3 percent of adult residents and workers in the area on the morning of the attack and soon afterward have developed asthma, twice the rate of newly diagnosed asthma in the general population for the same period.

Asthma was more prevalent among adult residents who did not leave the area on 9/11 or who returned home within two days — nearly 4 percent — and less prevalent, at 2 percent, among those who were away until December.

The study estimates that 3,800 to 12,600 adults exposed to the World Trade Center disaster site developed asthma, and that 35,000 to 70,000 adults developed post-traumatic stress syndrome. Women, members of minorities and people with low incomes have higher rates of both physical and mental problems, the study says.

Linda Thorpe, a deputy commissioner for epidemiology in the health department, said on Wednesday that the analysis provided high and low estimates to account for the possibility that people who were feeling sick or who had had more intense exposure to the disaster site might have been more motivated to sign up for the study. The numbers were based on telephone interviews.

Officials say that the analysis provides the most complete picture yet of the health of 71,437 people, including rescue workers, area workers, passers-by and residents, who agreed to be tracked for up to 20 years after the attack. They represent 17.4 percent of the 410,000 people most intensely exposed to the disaster site. The registry is run by the city’s health department and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Also on Wednesday, the New York State Workers’ Compensation Board announced that 31,543 workers and volunteers who said they performed rescue, recovery or cleanup work at the World Trade Center had filed notices preserving their right to file for workers’ compensation claims arising from those efforts. These workers did not file formal workers’ compensation claims, but preserved their right to do so if they concluded in the future that an illness stemmed from their work at ground zero.

Normally workers have two years after suffering an injury to file for workers’ compensation claims, but special provisions were made for those who worked at ground zero. Under new legislation, Sept. 11, 2010, is the deadline for submitting notices preserving the right to file such claims.

The workers’ compensation board said that 12,234 cases had resulted from the 9/11 attack.

Source — The New York Times