This may be of interest: >From The Age, Live Breaking News, 14 December; at: http://www.theage.com.au/daily/981214/breaking/ Canada's military on call for Y2K chaos The Canadian government may invoke emergency powers in 2000 in case chaos and panic results from the Y2K computer bug, the Ottawa Citizen reported this week citing an official report. ``Among the activities that must be done to meet the problems resulting from Y2000 failures is development of relevant emergency orders and regulations required for the invocation of emergency provisions under the Emergencies Act,'' the report said. ``In the worst case, we should consider the Emergencies Act a potential source of special powers,'' the Year 2000 Contingency Planning Group of Emergency Preparedness Canada said in the report. It recommended that the legislative procedures needed to implement the Emergencies Act should be ready by the end of March next year. Defence ministry spokesman John Blakely told the paper that invoking special powers was only a prudent contingency the government was considering. ``The question of whether it will be required or not is one that will have to be determined at the time,'' Blakely said. According to the paper Canadian troops have already been advised to prepare for what would be the greatest peacetime deployment of soldiers in case of unrest or other troubles due to the computer bug. The deployment operation, known as ``Abacus,'' foresees the imposition of martial law and soldiers assisting the police, the paper said. Computer experts have predicted many systems, including those controlling banking, power and transportation, could shut down with the advent of the next millennium as their two digit date system fails to distinguish between 2000 and 1900. - AFP Published: Mon Dec 14 08:52:07 EST 1998 end ============== Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List As vilified, slandered and attacked by One Nation mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html
