-Caveat Lector- from; http://www.aci.net/kalliste/ Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin Grabbe</A> ----- Information Warfare All US Ports on Alert Over Alleged "Bomb Plot" Where are those defective fuel tanks when you need them? WASHINGTON - The U.S. Customs Service has placed all 301 ports of entry into the United States on high alert following the arrest of an Algerian in Washington state who had crossed the border from Canada in a rental car with more than 100 pounds of bomb-making supplies and a sophisticated detonating device. Ahmed Ressam, 32, a resident of Montreal who had been denied refugee status by Canadian officials because of his alleged links to an Islamic terrorist organization called as the Islamic Armed Group, was arrested Tuesday night by customs officials in Port Angeles, Washington. He was charged Friday in Seattle with transporting explosives into the United States, providing false identification and lying to authorities. Andre Poirer, a spokesman for the Montreal police, said that his department had information possibly linking Mr. Ressam to Karim Said Atmani, who was extradited by Canada to France on charges that he took part in a Paris subway bombing in 1995 that killed four people and wounded 86. Mr. Poirer also said that the authorities in Montreal were investigating whether Mr. Ressam was linked to a theft ring in the city suspected of funneling money to radical Islamic groups around the world. [Pakistan arrested more than 200 people - possibly linked with Osama bin Laden, the terror suspect based in Afghanistan - who they fear may try to attack U.S. citizens in their country, an intelligence official said Sunday.] Montreal police announced Thursday that they had arrested 11 men, most of Algerian origin, over the last four months for thefts during the previous two years that netted more than 5,000 items, including computers, cellular phones, passports and credit cards. Based on information from Interpol and the French police, police in Montreal said they had concluded that the purpose of the ring was to generate cash to help finance Muslim extremist groups. U.S. authorities, meanwhile, intensified efforts to find an accomplice who apparently had been with Mr. Ressam at a motel in British Columbia for three weeks prior to Mr. Ressam's passage into the United States. The FBI is also investigating links that agents believe Mr. Ressam has to other Islamic extremists in the United States, a U.S. official said. Harvey Kushner, a terrorism expert at Long Island University who has close ties to federal law enforcement officials, said Saturday that he had been told by the authorities that the search for Mr. Ressam's accomplice extended from the U.S. West Coast to New York. Mr. Kushner said that the bomb-making equipment and timing device Mr. Ressam had in his possession were virtually identical to those used by associates of Mr. bin Laden, the millionaire Saudi militant who was given refuge in Afghanistan. U.S. officials have yet to establish a definitive link between Mr. Ressam and Mr. bin Laden, but a senior U.S. official said Saturday that there was ''evidence that would lead me to believe that he has associations with bin Laden, or people who have associations with bin Laden.'' Vincent Cannistraro, a former head of counterterrorist operations at the CIA who now works as a security consultant, said that Mr. Ressam's arrest had left law enforcement and intelligence officials deeply concerned about possible terrorist attacks on U.S. territory as millennium celebrations approach. ''It is a little scary, because they weren't looking here,'' Mr. Cannistraro said, ''They were looking abroad.'' He said the detonation device found in Mr. Ressam's rental car - circuit boards linked to a watch and a nine-volt battery - was the method taught in Mr. bin Laden's camps in Afghanistan. International Herald Tribune, December 20, 1999 Diamond Market A Diamond's Just a Pretty Rock, but DeBeers is Forever Come on, buy one for the Millennium. Do it for the 1000-year Reich. A millennium fillip is set to lift diamond sales to record levels this year. De Beers, the South African group that controls about 70 per cent of the rough diamond market through its London-based Central Selling Organisation, is expected to announce on Monday that its sales in 1999 have topped $5bn for the first time. The strength of the US market and tentative recovery in Asia have helped sales rebound from a severe downturn in 1998. But De Beers has also been cashing in on the millennium, both by selling a limited edition of 20,000 diamonds and by promoting diamonds as the ideal millennium gift. Sales in the first half of this year rose 44 per cent to $2.5bn, but a steady improvement in demand in recent months is expected to mean that the second half could be even stronger. Analysts are forecasting that De Beers' sales may be at least 50 per cent up on 1998, at between $5bn and $5.3bn. Jack Jones, an analyst at CIBC World Markets in London, said: "We are expecting very strong diamond sales this year. What we are most interested in now is how sales are going in North America. The initial indications are that trading is encouraging." Eighteen months of poor sales after the Asian crisis of 1997 left 1998 sales 28 per cent down at $3.3bn - the lowest since 1987. That fall was exacerbated by De Beers restricting the supply of diamonds in order to stop prices falling. That meant that the diamond industry was short of stocks at the beginning of this year, although De Beers' own stockpile had swelled to $4.8bn. Roger Chaplin, of T. Hoare Cannacord, who is predicting 1999 sales of $5.1bn and $5.6bn next year, said: "Some analysts are expecting a slight dip in 2000 on the grounds that some of this year's growth comes from re-stocking the pipeline. "I don't think sales will drop. . . . given the buoyant world economy and the millennium campaign." The Financial Times, December 20, 1999 ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, All My Relations. Omnia Bona Bonis, Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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