While the Islamic regime ruling Sudan from the northern capital of Khartoum continues its jihad against Christians and animists in the country's south - a bloody campaign that has already killed some 2 million - President George W. Bush has decided, without explanation, not to enact new sanctions on Sudan, says a scholar and activist.

The Sudan Peace Act, passed by Congress last fall, required the president to certify by April 21 that Khartoum is negotiating in good faith with southern rebels in Machakos, Kenya, to end the 20-year civil war. A cease-fire was signed last October, but the northern regime has hit civilian targets since then, and a military buildup is underway, according to independent monitors.

"While the president cited 'significant progress' in peace negotiations; unsurprisingly, no specifics are provided," said Eric Reeves, a professor at Smith College in Massachusetts.

Bush said Monday he informed Congress "the government of Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement are negotiating in good faith and that negotiations should continue. Both sides have made significant progress negotiating a just and comprehensive peace for the people of Sudan. There is still much work remaining."

The congressional measure gave the president authority to block oil revenues and loans through international financial institutions or downgrade diplomatic ties if he determined the government was not acting in good faith.

"The president is conspicuously silent in both his certification and his statement on the issue of whether Khartoum's National Islamic Front Regime has 'unreasonably interfered with humanitarian efforts' despite the explicit language of Section 6(b)(1)(B) of the Sudan Peace Act," Reeves said.

Bush's report describes military activities as "sporadic," Reeves notes, "despite the various reports from the U.S.-led Civilian Protection Monitoring Team that suggest a very different picture."

In a letter last week to Secretary of State Colin Powell, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom noted the civilian team, established by the peace process, has been grounded by Khartoum since March 7.

The team issued a report in February stating the government has continued to attack, kill and maim civilians despite signing a cease-fire accord with the Sudan People's Liberation Movement.

The United Nations special rapporteur on Sudan said in his 2003 report "in spite of the commitments made, the overall human-rights situation has not improved."

Sudan's cleric-backed National Islamic Front regime in the Arab and Muslim north declared a jihad on the south in 1989. Since 1983, an estimated 2 million people have died from war and related famine. About 5 million have become refugees.

In the president's report, Reeves, said, "no mention is made of massive offensive military redeployments by Khartoum's forces, despite clear and compelling evidence of such."

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom had urged the Bush administration in the report required by the Sudan Peace Act to "frankly address the violations of [Sudan's] cease-fire commitments and clearly state consequences for non-compliance that will result from any violations that might occur in the future."

The USCIRF letter to Powell said the Civilian Protection Monitoring Team reports indicate the Islamic government "may be using this period during the cease-fire to rearm and build-up garrison towns in the south from which it could launch devastating offensives should the peace talks end in failure."

Sudan welcomes decision

Yesterday, Khartoum welcomed Bush's decision, calling it "balanced" and containing "a positive assessment of the peace process."

Sudanese charge d'affaires Khidir Haroun told the state-run SUNA news agency Bush's view was the one needed from the outset because "it is based on objectivity and neutrality and constitutes a significant contribution to the process of reaching a lasting and just peace in Sudan."

The decision, he said, "offers evidence of American sincerity toward peace in Sudan and encourages serious negotiation by both parties for ending the suffering of the Sudanese, both in the north and south, irrespective of religious or ethnic considerations."

Bush said in his statement "there is still much work remaining. It is now time to move the peace process to a new level where the actions of both parties replace promises as the measure of their commitment to peace."

'Diplomatic dithering'

The president's decision was not unexpected, said Nina Shea, a member of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom and director of the Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House in Washington, D.C.

"Very few people are willing to concede that negotiations have failed, and people want to give it more time," she told WorldNetDaily, noting the Sudan Peace Act was "designed to end the diplomatic dithering that has gone on for years now."

The cease-fire agreement signed in Machakos last October provides for a six-year period of autonomy for the south ahead of a referendum on the region's political future.

"I think there is a sense that they really have to make some breakthroughs in the next period or the game will be up," she said.

Over the next six months she expects the process to reveal whether there will be a peace deal or a return to war.

"I'm troubled that there has been no progress at the same time Khartoum is in a military buildup," said Shea. "That's a clue they may not be negotiating in good faith."

Last week, the Libya-chaired U.N. Human Rights Commission rejected a resolution that would have kept the Khartoum regime under another year of scrutiny by the special rapporteur.

A coalition of "no compromise" gun-rights groups are drawing a line in the sand and putting federal politicians on notice: Any lawmaker who votes to reauthorize the current ban against so-called "assault weapons" risks losing gun owners' votes forever.

The White House has yet to comment further on the reauthorization of the ban.

From Wednesday, all passengers departing from Singapore's Changi Airport will be thermally screened for fever in a bid to stop the spread of SARS.

Singapore was the first country to introduce thermal scanners to screen air travellers about two weeks ago.

For the third straight day, hundreds of nervous customers lined up outside branches of a Chinatown bank to withdraw their money or to make sure their possessions were safe.

Sung said the bank was trying to process people quickly, adding that everyone's money and personal items were in good keeping.

(KFWB) 4.22.03, 2:55a -- California could completely run out of money soon.

Back from the holiday break, state lawmakers have a tall order as they are charged with coming up with a fiscal budget or the state could technically go completely broke.

In fact, financial conditions are such that the state controller could begin the budget process by issuing 'IOU's' to vendors doing business with the state.That notion of IOU's is not sitting too well with LA County Supervisor Zev Yarohslaviski who told KFWB that there is no existing budget and that issuing deferred payment notices to vendors is equivalent to a "handshake with a pauper."

"Where's the light at the end of the tunnel and how will we redeem these IOU's?" Yarohslaviski said, adding that the controller's possible contingency plan is irresponsible.

Other critics call the idea a "job killer" and say it's ridiculous to essentially tell vendors 'We'll pay you later.'

Vital services in the state that could be affected by the crisis include hospitals and jails as well as state food Inspection and prosecutorial offices.

Four months of wrangling have produced an impasse between Democrats and Republicans in the State Assembly.

Meanwhile, as the state's fiscal crisis grows worse, Californians' confidence in state leaders wanes, a new Field Poll shows.

The Field Poll released Tuesday found the majority of Californians are skeptical about whether Gov. Gray Davis or the Legislature will do what's needed to fix the problem.

By a ratio of nearly 2-to-1, poll participants also said higher taxes will be part of a solution to fill a budget gap that could hit $34.6 billion. Sixty-one percent of Californians -- including 54 percent of Republicans -- believe taxes will have to be raised. Republic lawmakers, however, have said they will not vote for a budget plan that includes tax hikes.

"I think the public has already absorbed the bad news," said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll. "They are expecting tax increases and large budget cuts from what they are hearing coming out of Sacramento."

Californians, however, largely reject plans to borrow money to be paid back during the next fiscal year. Sixty percent don't like the idea of putting off part of the problem until next year and only 26 percent said it is a good idea.

Meanwhile, confidence in California lawmakers has waned. Only 9 percent of Californians say they have a great deal of confidence that Davis will do what's right to resolve this year's state budget deficit. Thirty percent say they have some confidence, while the majority -- 58 percent -- doesn't have much confidence in him at all.

Confidence in Davis mimics that of 10 years ago, during the last budget crisis when Republican Pete Wilson was governor.

The news comes just a week after the San Francisco-based pollsters found that Davis' approval rating had reached the lowest point of any California governor in 55 years. Nearly half of the voters said they would toss him from office if a recall bid makes it to the ballot later this year.

The state's opinion of its Legislature is also bad. Only 7 percent of the poll respondents say they have confidence that the Legislature will do what's right, while 42 percent have very little confidence.

The results of the latest poll are based on a statewide survey of 502 California adults conducted April 1-6. There's a sampling error of plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.

Questions of conflict of interest have been raised for Sen. Dianne Feinstein, after her husband's company was awarded an Army contract worth $600 million, reports the San Francisco Chronicle.

According to the paper, the award to help with troop mobilization, weapons systems training and anti-terrorism efforts is the latest in a string of defense contracts given to URS Corp., a Bay area engineering firm partially owned by Richard Blum, the spouse of California Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

Blum serves on the company's board of directors and controls about 24 percent of the firm's stock, according to Hoover's Inc. research firm.

A Feinstein spokesman declined to comment on the contract.

Blum and URS representatives could not be reached for comment.

"We are very pleased with this important win, which further expands our strong relationship with the Army and demonstrates our ability to provide a full spectrum of support services to ensure that our troops remain combat ready and capable of quickly mobilizing to address threats around the world," said George R. Melton, president of the URS Corp.'s EG&G division, in a company press release.

The Chronicle reports URS has a long history of government work, but has focused more on those activities since acquiring EG&G from the Carlyle Group investment firm last year for about $500 million.

EG&G works with the military, NASA, and several federal departments, and specializes in transportation infrastructure and training people to dismantle weapons of mass destruction.

Feinstein is the ranking member of the Technology and Terrorism subcommittee and a member of the Select Committee on Intelligence, where she helps oversee U.S. counterterrorism programs.

She also serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee where she is ranking member of the Subcommittee on Military Construction.

Iraqi intelligence documents recovered in the looted foreign ministry in Baghdad suggest a high-profile figure in Britain's opposition to the war in Iraq was on the take, according to the Daily Telegraph.

China's top genomics institute discovered that the Sars virus was mutating rapidly when it independently sequenced its genetic blueprint, raising new fears about developing a vaccine to combat it.

"A few nucleotide differences among individual genomes were detected, as the virus is expected to mutate very fast and easily," said the Beijing Genomics Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in a statement on the internet.

The institute says the mutations will need to be studied further to find an accurate diagnostic test and effective treatment for the fast-spreading and sometimes lethal viral infection.

Chinese health and propaganda authorities, which have tightly controlled all information about Sars, initially refused to allow the institute to make a public announcement of its findings when it completed the sequencing on April 16.

The institute, one of China's most respected research bodies, circumvented the restriction by posting its findings without fanfare on an academic website.

Similar institutes in Canada and the US that have also sequenced samples of the Sars virus in the last fortnight had won praise from their governments.

But the tide turned against the health and political establishment in China with the dismissal of senior officials on Sunday over their handling of the crisis, and in favour of experts such as the scientists at the institute.

The institute has now received official backing from Hu Jintao, China's president, who visited researchers at the weekend to compliment them on their work.

The institute collaborated with the Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences in Beijing to decipher the code of two viruses collected from samples in China.

One was isolated from a lung autopsy in Guangzhou, southern China, near to where the virus is believed to have originated. The second was from a mixture of autopsy tissues from the liver and lymph nodes of a Sars victim in Beijing, according to the web posting.

The sequencing allowed the development of a much-needed diagnostic test which can detect the presence of the Sars virus within one hour, the Chinese media reported on Monday.

The test detects the presence of an antibody produced by the body in response to infection with the virus.

The Beijing Genomics Institute is best known for recently sequencing the DNA of the rice genome and is also involved in the international human genome project.

April 16 — Augusta National chairman Hootie Johnson said in an interview that his club “never” will admit a female member, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reported Wednesday.

“THERE NEVER WILL be a female member, six months after the Masters, a year, 10 years, or ever,” Johnson told the newspaper, days after adversary Martha Burk’s protest at the Masters failed to garner much support for her fight against Augusta’s all-male membership policy.
Johnson told the newspaper said Augusta members are solidly behind his position.
“Shortly after that fellow Thomas Wyman withdrew his membership in sympathy with the women,” Johnson said, “we got out a letter to every member of the club, offering them the privilege of withdrawing if the issue bothered them. We didn’t have one acceptance. Not one.”
On Sunday, Burk said she was ready for the next phase of her mission to get a female member into Augusta National.
Burk hopes to resume her campaign within two weeks, targeting corporate leaders who are members of the all-male golf club that hosts the Masters, she said Sunday from Atlanta.

Burk, head of the National Council of Women’s Organizations, hopes to set up individual meetings to urge them to take a stand against what she considers sex discrimination at Augusta National.
“The club needs to open its doors to women, but the larger goal, and it has been for months, has always been to make sex discrimination as unacceptable in the halls of power as race discrimination is,” Burk said.
“If it were a race issue, the corporations would not have stonewalled for eight months. We have to elevate sex discrimination to the same level of scrutiny.”
Burk called her protest at Augusta National on Saturday a success because “the American people heard our message,” even though the turnout was small and protesters were confined to a vacant lot where club members could not see them.

Burk said the next phase is a “corporate accountability campaign,” which she insists could be even more effective now that it appears the club doesn’t plan to admit a female member any time soon.
“I don’t think they can remain silent any longer,” she said, referring to club members. “The choice is too stark.”
And Burk plans to keep fighting, no matter how long it takes to achieve her goal.
“We’re prepared to not only keep going but to expand this to a much larger discussion of corporate America’s treatment of women overall,” she said.

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration's plans to expand a post-Sept. 11 anti-terrorism law face resistance from a powerful House Republican who says he's not even sure he wants the government to keep its new powers.

A Southwest Airlines flight attendant's use of a popular children's rhyme - "Eenie, meenie, minie, moe" - has resulted in a federal racial discrimination lawsuit against the airline filed by two African American women asking for unspecified financial damages.

After a city employee complained that the calendar was racially offensive, the city reprinted all 18,000 copies of the calendar with the photo deleted, according to the Kansas City Star.

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - American Airlines flight attendants reversed themselves and approved $340 million in labor concessions Wednesday, pulling the world's largest carrier back from the brink of bankruptcy. American welcomed the reprieve but warned that its troubles may not be over.

The Association of Professional Flight Attendants said 10,761 votes were cast for the concessions package and 9,652 against, a 1,642-vote swing from just one day earlier, when flight attendants narrowly rejected the package of layoffs, wage cuts and reduced benefits.

After the initial rejection, the union and company had extended the balloting, saying some workers had encountered difficulty in voting and that it was a last shot at avoiding bankruptcy.

"This is not a day for rejoicing," said a union spokeswoman, Lori Bassani. "Tough times lie ahead for our airline and our members. By ratifying this agreement, we will be giving up a great deal to try to keep our airline out of bankruptcy."

Unlike pilots and ground workers, who approved concessions Tuesday, flight attendants weren't allowed to change their votes once cast. During the voting period, American sweetened the original deal by offering one-time bonuses of up to 4.5 percent in 2006 or later if the company's credit ratings improve sharply.

"The people of American Airlines have together made history," said Donald J. Carty, American chairman and CEO. "These agreements represent the most ambitious effort to consensually restructure costs ever, not only in airline history but in U.S. history."

American asked its three main unions to approve the bulk of $1.8 billion in annual labor cuts sought.

The board of directors of American's parent, AMR Corp., had been prepared to meet by teleconference Wednesday night and approve a bankruptcy filing if flight attendants had rejected the labor cuts, a company spokesman said.

The spokesman, Bruce Hicks, said the company faced credit payments of at least $50 million Wednesday and would have filed for bankruptcy to avoid those payments and conserve cash.

Airlines have been reeling for months, hurt by the sluggish economy, fallout from the Sept. 11 attacks, fears over the SARS virus and the war in Iraq. United Airlines is already in bankruptcy; US Airways only recently emerged from it.

American has struggled against low-cost competition and AMR has lost nearly $5.3 billion in the past two years. To stay afloat, the airline asked its three biggest unions to approve $1.8 billion in labor cuts, including the layoffs of 2,500 pilots, 2,000 flight attendants and up to 1,400 ground workers.

Union leaders reluctantly backed the plan, saying cuts could be even worse in bankruptcy.

In voting that closed Tuesday, unionized pilots and ground workers approved their share of the concessions, saying they feared even deeper cuts if they forced the company into bankruptcy. But by the Tuesday deadline, the airline's 24,000 attendants had rejected the deal, which would cut their pay by 15.6 percent on May 1, by fewer than 500 votes out of 19,000 cast.

Altogether, American got sought $660 million in annual concessions from its 12,000 pilots, $620 million from 34,000 ground workers and $340 million from the flight attendants.

Fitch ratings service said the concessions would bring American's unit labor costs in line with rivals Continental, US Airways and United.

Even with the cuts, AMR said in a statement, American's financial condition is weak and its prospects remain uncertain.

Carty said, "Given the hostile financial and business environment we find ourselves in and its inherent risks, the success of our efforts is not assured."

In Wednesday trading on the New York Stock Exchange, AMR shares rose 83 cents, or 24 percent, to $4.23 in anticipation the flight attendants would reconsider. In after-hours trading, the shares surged another 13 percent.

The Frenchman has been inundated by more than 2,000 e-mails from American customers, ranging in tone from apologetic to impolite, but all carrying the message put succinctly by a man from Illinois: "We no longer buy French products."

Many American gourmets seem to be putting politics over palates, and, although they haven't released any numbers, French suppliers say their bottom lines are being hurt by the French government's refusal to back military action.

"I wish we could just invite people to have some cheese and wine and relax, but that wouldn't appear to be the solution for now," said Refabert, co-founder of the Internet retailer www.fromages.com, which grossed $500,000 last year, mostly on sales to the United States.

An anti-France reaction that started with "freedom fries" has taken on sprawling dimensions: Some U.S. lawmakers are urging American companies to skip the Paris Air Show. A U.S.-based Web site took advertising space in The New York Times urging consumers not to fly Air France, eat Yoplait yogurt or buy a long list of other French goods.

While brie and Bordeaux are unlikely to become permanent casualties, there is little doubt these and other products have become popular targets as Americans turn up their noses at the French.

For Refabert, the influx of nasty e-mails has declined from a peak at the start of the war, but sales at his Tours-based business have not recovered. He's hopeful U.S. demand for French cheese will pick up around Easter, normally one of his busiest periods.

On the other side of the Atlantic, vendors of French goods hold little optimism for a change soon.

Murray's Cheese Shop in New York, known for its extensive French variety, is running a sale of almost exclusively French cheeses.

"People are buying less French cheese, there's no question about it. And I don't believe its subsiding," said Robert Kaufelt, the shop's owner. "It's going to mean better bargains for the customers who do want to buy it."

Kaufelt feels anti-French sentiment has entered a new phase. Initially — after France's prewar threat to use its U.N. veto to block Security Council support for military action — customers berated Kaufelt for carrying French cheeses.

"We don't get any comments or remarks anymore. We're in the unspoken phase — where they're just not buying it," he said.

The anti-French tide has some vendors scrambling for more pro-American suppliers — like the British.

Kaufelt was one of five American foodbuyers who traveled to Yorkshire in northern England in late March looking for British cheeses that could substitute for his French offerings.

Several British newspapers chronicled the visit, reveling in the idea that the delights from Wensleydale and Thirsk could someday replace those from Camembert and Roquefort.

At Wensleydale Dairy, sales director Phil Jones welcomed the new interest in its cheese: "We're cheesemakers and we try not to get too involved with politics. But if politics helps us, well, we'll take advantage of that."

French wine and cheese exporters say it's too soon for precise figures on recent sales to the United States, but few expect those numbers to be positive.

Even once statistics are tabulated, it will be difficult to measure the true impact of a boycott on French business, which is already suffering from economic gloom and a depreciated dollar that makes French products pricier for Americans.

What's not in question is the importance of the American market. The United States was the world's largest consumer of French wines and spirits last year, accounting for nearly a quarter — $1.8 billion — of total French exports.

"It definitely is a bit more challenging to sell French wine these days," said Jacques Thebault of SOPEXA, a branch of the French Agriculture Ministry that markets French food products in the United States. "We believe we're going to have a short-term impact on sales."

Retailers and chain stores in several parts of the United States have put off planned promotions of French wines and delayed new orders, Thebault said.

At the Syndicale des Negotiants de Beaune, which represents 70 producers of Burgundy and Beaujolais wines, they're taking a low profile.

"We're not looking to actively sell French wines in the United States," spokesman Denis Deveau said. "It wouldn't be the politically correct thing to do."