US president-elect Barack Obama is completing his national security team by announcing his unusual choices for CIA director and a national intelligence director who may face tough Senate confirmation questioning over how he confronted the Indonesian military when civilian massacres were occurring in East Timor.
Obama was to introduce the two men yesterday, four days after their names leaked to reporters. That gave official Washington time to vent its surprise that Leon Panetta, a former White House chief of staff with no direct intelligence experience, had been tapped to head the CIA.
The other appointee is retired Admiral Dennis Blair, a former head of the US Pacific Command who won high marks for countering terrorism in southeast Asia after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. He worked closely with foreign partners to target the Jemaah Islamiyah in Indonesia and Abu Sayyaf in the Philippines, offensives that crippled both terror groups.
Senator Ron Wyden told reporters on Thursday that he planned to question Blair about the role he played 10 years ago in US efforts to rein in the Indonesian military as it brutally cracked down on civilians in East Timor. Staff aides to other members said they would be listening closely to the answers.
Paramilitary groups sponsored by the Indonesian military with US financial and political patronage slaughtered more than 200,000 East Timorese over two decades. In 1999, as civilians were being massacred, Congress and the Clinton administration cut off all military ties.
Blair, then US Pacific Command chief, pushed for renewing relations with the Indonesian army, reasoning that drawing them closer would give the US more leverage. In April 1999 he was sent to Indonesia by President Bill Clinton to meet with the new military leader and offer to restart some military training. The meeting occurred just days after Indonesian-sponsored militias had slaughtered nearly 60 people seeking refuge in a church. Blair has said he only learned of the massacre a few days after the meeting.
The East Timor and Indonesia Action Network, a human rights group, called Blair a poor choice for intelligence director this week.
“Blair offered the Indonesian military in the midst of massacres encouragement for business as usual. He didn’t criticize their behavior,” group spokesman John Miller said.
Panetta’s prospects for a smooth nomination hearing appeared to improve this week. Word he had been selected was greeted by incoming Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein with shock. She said on Monday she had not been consulted on the pick. On Tuesday, she and Senator Jay Rockefeller, the outgoing Democratic intelligence chairman, had spoken to Obama, who apologized for the slight, and to Panetta and US vice president-elect Joe Biden.
Panetta was not their first choice, Rockefeller said. They both had pushed for the promotion of current Deputy CIA Director Steve Kappes, a popular longtime officer.
Rockefeller said in an interview on Thursday that news that Obama had asked Kappes to remain in his job softened his view on Panetta a great deal.
Drug lord Jose Adolfo Macias Villamar, alias “Fito,” was Ecuador’s most-wanted fugitive before his arrest on Wednesday, more than a year after he escaped prison from where he commanded the country’s leading criminal gang. The former taxi driver turned crime boss became the prime target of law enforcement early last year after escaping from a prison in the southwestern port of Guayaquil. Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa’s government released “wanted” posters with images of his face and offered US$1 million for information leading to his capture. In a country plagued by crime, members of Fito’s gang, Los Choneros, have responded with violence, using car
Two former Chilean ministers are among four candidates competing this weekend for the presidential nomination of the left ahead of November elections dominated by rising levels of violent crime. More than 15 million voters are eligible to choose today between former minister of labor Jeannette Jara, former minister of the interior Carolina Toha and two members of parliament, Gonzalo Winter and Jaime Mulet, to represent the left against a resurgent right. The primary is open to members of the parties within Chilean President Gabriel Boric’s ruling left-wing coalition and other voters who are not affiliated with specific parties. A recent poll by the
TENSIONS HIGH: For more than half a year, students have organized protests around the country, while the Serbian presaident said they are part of a foreign plot About 140,000 protesters rallied in Belgrade, the largest turnout over the past few months, as student-led demonstrations mount pressure on the populist government to call early elections. The rally was one of the largest in more than half a year student-led actions, which began in November last year after the roof of a train station collapsed in the northern city of Novi Sad, killing 16 people — a tragedy widely blamed on entrenched corruption. On Saturday, a sea of protesters filled Belgrade’s largest square and poured into several surrounding streets. The independent protest monitor Archive of Public Gatherings estimated the
Irish-language rap group Kneecap on Saturday gave an impassioned performance for tens of thousands of fans at the Glastonbury Festival despite criticism by British politicians and a terror charge for one of the trio. Liam Og O hAnnaidh, who performs under the stage name Mo Chara, has been charged under the UK’s Terrorism Act with supporting a proscribed organization for allegedly waving a Hezbollah flag at a concert in London in November last year. The rapper, who was charged under the anglicized version of his name, Liam O’Hanna, is on unconditional bail before a further court hearing in August. “Glastonbury,
RSS