Tuesday, 30 March 2004 - 3:07 PM EST

White House U-turn on 9/11 inquiry


The move is seen as a major change of position
The White House has bowed to pressure to allow National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice to testify in public and under oath to the 9/11 commission.
Previously officials had insisted that Ms Rice could meet the Commission in private for unsworn conversations but not face a full hearing.

President Bush and Ms Rice said that her appearance would contravene the constitutional separation of powers.

The offer has been made on condition that it would set no precedent.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3583639.stm

Wednesday, 31 March 2004 - 9:49 AM EST

More news from the victory in Iraq:

Iraqis Drag Four Corpses Through Streets
44 minutes ago Add Top Stories - AP to My Yahoo!

By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press Writer

FALLUJAH, Iraq - Jubilant residents yanked the bodies of four foreigners ? one a woman, at least one an American ? out of their burning cars Wednesday, dragged the charred corpses through the streets, and hung them from the bridge spanning the Euphrates River. Five American troops died in a roadside bombing nearby.

The brutal treatment of the four corpses came after they were killed in a rebel attack on their SUVs in the Sunni Triangle city about 35 miles west of Baghdad, scene of some of the worst violence on both sides of the conflict since the beginning of the American occupation a year ago.

It was reminiscent of the 1993 scene in Somalia, when a mob dragged the corpse of a U.S. soldier through the streets of Mogadishu, eventually leading to the American withdrawal from the African nation.

In one of the bloodiest days for the U.S. military this year, five American troops died when their military vehicle ran over a bomb in a separate incident 12 miles to the northwest, among the reed-lined roads through some of Iraq (news - web sites)'s richest farmland.

Residents said the bomb attack occurred in Malahma, 12 miles northwest of Fallujah, where anti-U.S. insurgents are active. U.S. Marines operate in the area, but it was unclear whether the slain troops were Marines.

Chanting "Fallujah is the graveyard of Americans," residents cheered after the grisly assault on two four-wheel-drive civilian vehicles, which left both in flames. Others chanted, "We sacrifice our blood and souls for Islam."

Associated Press Television News pictures showed one man beating a charred corpse with a metal pole. Others tied a yellow rope to a body, hooked it to a car and dragged it down the main street of town. Two blackened and mangled corpses were hung from a green iron bridge across the Euphrates.

"The people of Fallujah hanged some of the bodies on the old bridge like slaughtered sheep," resident Abdul Aziz Mohammed said. Some of the corpses were dismembered, he said.

Beneath the bodies, a man held a printed sign with a skull and crossbones and the phrase "Fallujah is the cemetery for Americans."

Rest of story:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=1&u=/ap/20040331/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_5

Thursday, 1 April 2004 - 7:24 PM EST

Feeling Grief Half a World Away
By MARIA NEWMAN

Published: April 1, 2004


he war in Iraq came to roost in tiny Moyock, N.C., today when television footage of four dead Americans, their bodies burned and two of them dangling from a bridge over the Euphrates River, filled television screens there.

The four were employees of Blackwater Security Consulting, an international security company here that is one of the area's largest employers.

Moyock, an unincorporated town in the northeast part of the state, is home to many people with ties to the military. The town is less than an hour's drive from the world's largest Navy base in Norfolk, Va. And Blackwater, as a defense contractor, is one place where the close bonds between the military and the town's economy can be clearly seen.

Many people who work for Blackwater, a company that provides security training and guard services to customers around the world, are former law enforcement personnel in Moyock and nearby communities, or military veterans, or both.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/01/national/01CND-TOWN.html?hp