............................................

http://www.msnbc.com/news/914527.asp

U.S. military units have been breaking Saddam supporters with long sessions in which they’re forced to listen to heavy-metal and children’s songs. “Trust me, it works,” says one U.S. operative... The songs that are being played include “Bodies” from the Vin Diesel “XXX” movie soundtrack and Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.” ...[Other] selections include the “Sesame Street” theme and some of purple dinosaur Barney’s crooning.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/05/18/1053196477179.html

At least 1700 Iraqi civilians died and more than 8000 were injured in the battle for the capital, says a Los Angeles Times survey of records from 27 hospitals in Baghdad and its outlying districts. And undocumented civilian deaths in Baghdad could reach up to 1000, according to Islamic burial societies and humanitarian groups that are trying to trace the hundreds of missing....The United States administration in Iraq said it has no plans to try to tally up the civilian dead.

...Amnesty International says that Iraqi civilians and soldiers have accused British and US troops of torturing them for information during the war. Said Boumedouha, an Amnesty researcher, said the group had so far interviewed about 20 people who said they were tortured - mostly by beatings but at least one by electric shock - after being detained as prisoners of war.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A4450-2003May17?language=printer

The low stucco structure... was the 17th target of the war for Army Lt. Col. Charles Allison and the special weapons hunters under his command. Heavy crossbars sealed the doors... U.S. intelligence called this place "Possible SSO Facility Al Hayat," after the Special Security Organization of President Saddam Hussein. It ranked No. 26 on a U.S. Central Command priority search list.

...The men checked for booby traps as they felt their way by flashlight from room to room. They reached a murky stone passage, smelling of mold. Cement covered its windows. Steel doors, a dull orange, lined the hall... One last bolt snapped. The door creaked open and Deal stepped through. There, in the innermost chamber, he found a cache of vacuum cleaners.

So it goes for Site Survey Team 3, which today begins its ninth week in the hunt for illegal weapons.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A4348-2003May17?language=printer

Alarmed by rampant crime and remnants of Iraq's vanquished leadership, the United States has signaled its intention in recent days to use a firmer hand in directing this country's political future and filling a worrisome security vacuum... The number of U.S. troops in Baghdad has risen from 16,000 to 25,000 over the past monyh.

...Replacing Jay M. Garner as the chief civilian administrator in U.S.-occupied Iraq this past week, L. Paul Bremer III... signed a decree purging senior members of Hussein's Baath Party from important public positions, while warning opposition leaders jockeying for a share of Iraq's first democratic government that they will not be running the country anytime soon... Bremer said it would be more than a year before an interim Iraqi government would be formed... There seems to be a difference between the Iraqi opposition vision and the coalition vision about the government of this country," said an opposition party official, normally supportive of Washington's point of view, who attended the meeting.

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http://www.msnbc.com/news/914505.asp?0cl=c1

There used to be a whole lot of radioactive material at Tuwaitha. United Nations inspectors identified it, stored it, sealed it. There were roughly 500 tons of uranium, of which about 1.8 tons was low-enriched stuff. There was also cobalt 60 and strontium 90. All in all, the inspectors found some 228 sources of radioactivity. Then the United States came along.

...The IAEA, the single organization with an inventory and experience on the site, is one of the U.N. agencies that isn’t being allowed back in by the Americans. Nor is the agency being told what the U.S. military on the scene has or has not found.

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http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=406655

The continuing failure to discover any evidence of Iraq's alleged chemical, germ and nuclear weapons, more than a month after the fall of Baghdad, is thus far a very minor embarrassment for the Bush administration... Complaint here at the failure to find the illegal weapons... has been mainly confined to liberal columnists and editorials in liberal newspapers... All but forgotten are the bloodcurdling pre-war assertions of top Bush officials.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1346-2003May16.html

A chaotic city filled with soldiers, thieves and carjackers, Baghdad often appears to be inhabited only by men. Alarmed by the lawlessness and now without jobs, most Iraqi women refuse to step outside their homes. The absence of women in public view is striking in a country where women have for decades held professional jobs and lived with a measure of independence unusual in Arab countries, fostered by the Baath Party philosophy of modern Arab nationalism.

Since the war, women have been missing from the markets, where men now shop for food. Nor can women be seen in the long lines that begin forming overnight at gas stations. Most significantly, an interim government and scores of political parties are being formed with little to no input from women. Without television news or readily available newspapers, women have no way of knowing which parties are addressing their concerns. The only permitted women's organization was an arm of the defunct Baath Party, so women have no natural networks to turn to outside of friends, family and co-workers.

...Even among themselves, Iraqi women are not discussing power-sharing or the potential for an Islamic government that could dictate their movements and their dress. They say their immediate concern is not with getting a seat in parliament, but with getting a reliable supply of electricity to their homes and a police car patrolling their neighborhoods.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A4484-2003May17?language=printer

MEYMANEH, Afghanistan -- Assassins with their turbans wrapped to hide their faces ambushed a convoy on a main street in the middle of an April afternoon, executing Rasul Beg, a mid-level local militia commander, and igniting one of the fiercest battles between rival warlords ever waged in this northern town. The gunfight lasted 20 hours, killed 13 people, including an 8-year-old boy, trapped international aid workers and left President Hamid Karzai's administration struggling... The battle of Meymaneh and its aftermath, as recounted in interviews with witnesses and participants, is in many ways the woeful tale of all of Afghanistan 18 months after the fall of the Taliban and the installation of Karzai's interim administration. Despite military and financial support from the United States and its allies, the Afghan government has been unable to assert its authority.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/18/weekinreview/18BAMF.html?ex=1053835200&en=afbf9e2309015f72&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE

Satellite imagery similar to that collected by the Central Intelligence Agency is available to anyone with a credit card... Reconnaissance satellite images have become as easy to obtain as a novel from Amazon. In fact, much of them are free for the taking from the Internet.

Last week, in an effort to increase satellite intelligence coverage of high-priority targets, President Bush ordered spy agencies to begin buying as much imagery as possible from private companies... The high quality and wide availability of such imagery is also raising questions... [because] the lenses are also being trained on American citizens.

...Under a program known as Future Imagery Architecture, the intelligence agencies plan to launch nearly a dozen imagery satellites to replace the four or five currently in orbit. Although smaller than their predecessors, these models, because of their increased numbers, will allow more continuous coverage of targets.

...Consider the constellation of global-positioning satellites that provide precise tracking information to hand-held receivers... The sheriff of Spokane County, Washington... hoping to discover where a suspected murderer hid his victim... planted a satellite tracking device on the suspect's car... Allowing the police to plant such devices on suspects without a warrant troubles many... On Tuesday, the Washington Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether a warrant should be required to secretly track a person's movements using a G.P.S. device.

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http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/margie_boule/index.ssf?/base/living/1051877124142830.xml

Since the horrific attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the federal Transportation Security Administration has, without any public announcement, created a two-tiered list of names "to protect our aviation system," says Nico Melendez, the agency spokesman for the West Coast, who is based in Los Angeles. The name David Nelson apparently is on one of those lists. "There is a 'no-fly' list," he says. "That's people who cannot fly, period," because they've been determined to be or are suspected of being "a threat to civil aviation or to national security." Details about the list are "considered sensitive security information and cannot be released to the public," Nico says, but the Wall Street Journal suggests there are about 300 names on the "no-fly" list.

...There's another list that Nico calls the "selectees list." Might as well call them "suspectees." This is a much larger list of names, accumulated, Nico says, from information obtained from intelligence agencies and the airlines. These folks may be allowed to fly but only after they're intensely scrutinized... This week 18 men named David Nelson, all residents of Oregon, confirmed they have been repeatedly delayed at airport counters and security checkpoints in the last year or so.

Take the February experience of Dave Nelson of Salem, a lobbyist whose largest client is the Oregon Seed Council. Dave often travels for business, sometimes accompanying the governor on trade missions... Dave was asked for I.D. and turned over his driver's license. "They called downtown and ran a criminal check, and I was clean. Then the counter clerk had to call national Delta and get permission for me to go on the airplane. We were now pretty close to takeoff time." Dave and his wife were issued tickets, but again at the gate Dave was thoroughly frisked, searched and identified. At the airport in Atlanta on the way back, the same thing happened. "The woman punched in my name and said, 'Oh, no, Mr. Nelson--' "

One after another, local David Nelsons tell the same story: At airports their bags are put through bomb detectors; they are delayed, searched, questioned. David Nelson of Gresham says he was searched and screened three times at the Portland airport, then again at the gates of Dallas and Atlanta airports before arriving in Savannah, Ga., last month. "It's as if they think you've been transformed into a terrorist en route. You'd think one screening was enough, when you haven't left a secure area the entire trip."

...Oregon state Sen. David Nelson, from Pendleton, also had no idea why he was being delayed at airports. "Then we flew into the Medford airport on Horizon, and one of the agents said, 'Your name is on the list. You're going to be checked every place you go.' That was a shock." As David Nelsons all over the country have learned, once your name is on the list, there's no way you can get it removed. Every time you go to an airport, you're assumed to be guilty until you can prove yourself innocent.

...Somewhere in the world there's an actual terrorist suspect named David Nelson who started all this mess. Several David Nelsons have been told by security or airline personnel that he's from Nashville... David Nelson is a common name. "My dentist has a couple of them in his practice," says David Nelson of Aloha, "and my boss is actually named David Nelson. He's had the same thing happen to him."

Nico Melendez of the Transportation Security Administration will not confirm that the name David Nelson is on the "no-fly" or "selectees" list.

...Remember Ozzie and Harriet's son, David Nelson? "I got stopped at the John Wayne Airport" in Orange County, Calif., he said by phone from Los Angeles this week. "Two police officers knew who I was and tried to explain to the guy behind the security desk. It didn't faze him at all." Even as another officer was saying he had once met David's mother, Harriet, David was being instructed to remove his shoes, he says. "I asked, 'Does the guy on the list have a middle name of Ozzie?' He said, 'It just says David Nelson.' "

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http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/030517/2003051716.html

It was announced in London on Friday that the British government has actually pulled out is forces from Saudi Arabia... The BBC quoted British defense forces as saying that this step was basically taken in April before the terrorist explosions in Riyadh.

...The US defense secretary said by the end of April that the American army will end its permanent presence in Saudi Arabia.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/18/international/middleeast/18SAUD.html?ex=1054221184&ei=1&en=e2d021a09f234c95

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, May 17 — A team of 60 American investigators today scoured three charred blast sites here where terrorists detonated car bombs on Monday night... But in a sign that the Saudis may be displeased with the presence of the large American contingent, composed mainly of F.B.I. agents, the Saudi interior minister has declared that the investigators will be limited to observer roles in the kingdom's terrorism inquiry.

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http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EE17Ak02.html

Few people had ever heard of the Vinnell corporation before the recent bombings in Riyadh. The company, which is a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman of the US, has always kept a low profile.... However, for members of the Saudi royal family, Vinnell is well known since in many ways the company represents the last line of defense between the crown and those that might seek to bring it down.

...At present, Vinnell holds a five-year contract worth more than $800,000,000.00, employing more than 1,000 employees plus almost 300 US government personnel training the Royal Saudi Air Force, Saudi land forces and other elements of the Saudi military. The contract is financed by the Saudi government and run by the US Army Materiel Command.

The SANG [Saudi Arabian National Guard] is not part of the regular armed forces, but functions as a rough equivalent of Saddam Hussein's Royal Guard, slated specifically with the task of protecting the royal family... It was the very forces that Vinnell was in the process of training which were in charge of security on the compound. If this event was any indication of Vinnell's quality control, then the House of Saud may want to begin looking elsewhere for security assistance.

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http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/spages/294089.html

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon convened a special cabinet meeting Sunday evening to discuss the latest wave of suicide bombings that claimed an Israeli couple in Hebron late Saturday and seven bus passengers in Jerusalem the following morning... In response to the bombings, the security establishment decided to impose a complete closure on the territories, as of Sunday night. Palestinians will also be forbidden from traveling between cities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

...Sharon decided that Israeli officials will not be allowed to meet with any foreign figures that will meet with Yasser Arafat... [but] "I do not support Arafat's expulsion at the moment," Sharon [said]. "It is better he stay here than be received with red carpets abroad."

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http://observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,958289,00.html

Two journalists have been gunned down by Israeli troops, but their families' pleas for an investigation are met with silence... Their families believe they were targeted by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF), as part of a deliberate strategy of suppressing foreign eyewitnesses in the Occupied Territories.

IDF killings in the Gaza are not new. Since September 2000, 2,300 Palestinians have been killed in the Occupied Territories, many of them children; 773 Israelis have been killed. Palestinians don't expect justice, but the Hurndall and Miller families did... To some, it looks like the IDF is running a 'shoot to kill' policy in Gaza. The IDF insist they do not target civilians, but they refuse to release independent eyewitness statements or CCTV and night vision footage.

...IDF spokeswoman Major Sharon Feingold said: 'I don't believe that the Israeli army has to be holier than the Pope in trying to prove that what we are doing is just. You will have to take my word when I say we are fired at and we return fire.'

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/05/18/wnato18.xml&sSheet=/portal/2003/05/18/ixportal.html

America's top military officer has warned that Nato may have to move from its Brussels headquarters after an attempt to bring war crimes charges against General Tommy Franks, the commander of coalition forces in Iraq, in the Belgian courts... The suit... was lodged last week under Belgium's 1993 legislation on war crimes and genocide. Its laws of "universal competence" allow prosecution of nationals of any country for war crimes or genocide, no matter where the crime was allegedly committed.

...A Nato official said: "The US expects the Belgian government to take the necessary action to dismiss the law suit." ...[Lawyer] Fermon, who is based in Brussels, launched the action on behalf of 17 Iraqis and two Jordanians who were said to have been injured or bereaved by US attacks. He said that the accusations against Gen Franks focused on the bombing of civilian areas, "indiscriminate shooting" by US troops when they entered Baghdad, and the failure to prevent the looting of hospitals. Mr Fermon has also charged a colonel in the US Marines with ordering troops to fire on ambulances bearing the Red Crescent symbol.

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http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=259948

NAHA — A three-day march marking the 31st anniversary of Okinawa's reversion to Japanese control and seeking to have the U.S. military bases in the prefecture removed began in Okinawa on Thursday. The "5.15 Peace March" is expected to draw around 6,000 people from civic groups and labor unions nationwide, according to the organizer, the Okinawa Peace Action Center, a body of local citizens' groups.

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http://observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,958429,00.html

One of the greatest wonders of civilisation, and probably the world's most ancient structure - the Sumerian city of Ur in southern Iraq - has been vandalised by American soldiers and airmen, according to aid workers in the area. They claim that US forces have spray-painted the remains with graffiti and stolen kiln-baked bricks made millennia ago. As a result, the US military has put the archaeological treasure, which dates back 6,000 years, off-limits to its own troops. Any violations will be punishable in military courts.

...There has been no official response to the allegations of vandalism - reported to The Observer by aid workers and one concerned US officer. Ur is believed by many to be the birthplace of the prophet Abraham. It was the religious seat of the civilisation of Sumer at the dawn of the line of dynasties which ruled Mesopotamia starting about 4000 BC. Long before the rise of the Egyptian, Greek or Roman empires, it was here that the wheel was invented and the first mathematical system developed. Here, the first poetry was written, notably the epic Gilganesh, a classic of ancient literature.

The most prominent monument is the best preserved ziggurat - stepped pyramid - in the Arab world, initially built by the Sumerians around 4000 BC and restored by Nebuchadnezzar II in the sixth century BC. The Pentagon has elected to build its massive and potentially permanent base right alongside the site, so that the view from the peak of the ziggurat - more or less unchanged for 6,000 years - will be radically altered.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/05/17/1052885452242.html

Residents of Casablanca were gripped by fear, anger and disbelief yesterday after a series of deadly bomb attacks scattered debris and splattered blood across this bustling Moroccan city... At least 39 people were killed and dozens more were injured as bombers went on a bloody rampage at the Belgian consulate, a Jewish centre and cemetery, an international hotel and a bustling Spanish restaurant in the economic capital of the overwhelmingly Muslim north African country... Residents in the city centre, who gathered to witness the carnage, were simply stunned, many dumbfounded that such murderous acts could be carried out in their neighbourhood.

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http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=2764694

TOKYO/JAKARTA (Reuters) - Peace talks in Tokyo between Indonesian officials and Aceh rebels collapsed on Sunday, condemning the resource-rich province to a renewed war that could be only hours away... the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) rebels would not give up their demand for independence... [and] they would also appeal to the United Nations to intervene. "The Indonesia government wishes to continue their war on the Acehnese," rebel leader Mahmood Malik told reporters after a gruelling 12-hour session of talks in Tokyo aimed at saving the peace agreement. "We will fight. We are ready. We have been fighting already for 27 years," added Malik, looking worn and close to tears.

...Jakarta had ordered the rebels to drop their demand for independence by Sunday and agree to give up 60 percent of their weapons this month or face one of the country's biggest military assaults since the brutal 1975 invasion of East Timor.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1122-2003May16.html

In what was described as a low-key but serious mission, an undisclosed number of troops were deployed to Kenya from posts in Djibouti and elsewhere around the Horn of Africa. In Nairobi, home to more than 50,000 Westerners, U.S. Marines in plain clothes could be seen in the vicinity of embassies and so-called soft targets, including foreign residences clustered in several upscale neighborhoods and an outdoor shopping center frequented by Westerners. More than 1,800 U.S. troops are operating in the Horn of Africa... Britain on Thursday suspended flights to and from its former colony. "Kenya is in a state of complete and utter lockdown," said a U.S. military source based in East Africa who asked not to be identified. "This threat is very serious and everyone is taking it that way."

Late today, the British government warned of "a clear terrorist threat" in Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Somalia, Eritrea and Djibouti.

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http://www.observer.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,958242,00.html

It is now business as usual for the bad guys. This weekend sees terror alerts covering a great part of the world. The past few days have brought a casualty list running into the hundreds. 'It's dangerous in the world,' President George Bush said on Friday... He believes eliminating al-Qaeda will end the threat of Islamic militant terrorism. Though this is rubbish, as a close analysis of recent terrorist attacks shows, it is the conventional wisdom

...Al-Qaeda, conceived of as a tight-knit terrorist group with cadres and a capability everywhere, does not exist in that form. It barely existed before the war in Afghanistan in 2001... It certainly does not exist now.

... Al-Qaeda can only be understood as an ideology, an agenda and a way of seeing the world that is shared by an increasing number of predominantly young, predominantly male Muslims... Hundreds more will come forward to fill their ranks... The hard core of senior al-Qaeda figures operating in Afghanistan until late 2001 acted as a clearing house for projects that were submitted to them, not vice versa. Most of al-Qaeda's terrorist operations originated in the minds of volunteers... In Algeria, where militants returning from Afghanistan have sparked an upsurge in violence, a locally recruited group fought a gun battle with government security forces... In Yemen... a local group bombed a court where a militant had been convicted a few weeks earlier; in Lebanon, police arrested nine men plotting an attack on the US embassy. They were not linked to al-Qaeda... In Chechnya, well-established militant groups who have no real connection to bin Laden pulled off two suicide bombings that killed scores. The decision to halt British flights to and from Kenya was prompted, intelligence sources say... by reports indicating that... 'local groups' in Mombasa or Nairobi [planned] to attack a British Airways plane.

...The situation has reverted to how things were before bin Laden created his Afghan base. There are lots of local groups fighting their own battles and a number of experienced militants moving from country to country... There are two major differences from the pre-1996 situation, however. First, 11 September, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the crisis in Israel-Palestine, and the actions of governments and Islamic campaigners all over the Muslim and non-Muslim world, have led to an unprecedented wave of anger and resentment that easily translates into violence. The Islamic world is a far more radicalised place than it was previously. That the conflict in Iraq led to a rise in recruitment for radical groups is now so clear that even US officials admit it.

...Second, the militants' targets are not, as they once were, merely the regimes in their own countries. The target now is the so-called 'Crusader-Zionist Alliance' and that means all Westerners are enemies. There are no civilians... This movement is as diverse as the many countries from which its members come. Unless this is understood, and a fundamental change made in the way al-Qaeda is viewed and combated, we will all suffer for a long time to come.

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http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/05/17/1052885447467.html

Almost half of al-Qaeda's leadership has been captured or killed, US President George W Bush said yesterday... "From Pakistan to the Philippines, to the Horn of Africa, we are hunting down al-Qaeda killers," Bush said. "So far, nearly one-half of al-Qaeda's senior operatives have been captured or killed," he said, pledging to "remain on the hunt until they are all brought to justice."

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http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-usiran173290224may17,0,7337836.story?coll=ny-nationalnews-headlines

The United States has developed intelligence indicating that top al-Qaida leaders operating inside Iran directed Monday's bombing attacks in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and have ordered a terrorist strike in East Africa, according to counterterrorism sources.

...A source who received a classified briefing on Friday said... "The subject of Iran harboring senior al-Qaida people has suddenly been pushed to the top of the agenda" in the Bush administration.

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/pakistan/Story/0,2763,956784,00.html

In the months that followed September 11, a tide of Islamic revivalism swept through Pakistan. Anger at American foreign policy is deeply and universally felt. For many it began with the US-led campaign against the Taliban in Afghanistan and the recognition in the months that followed that Washington and London have neglected their promises of reconstruction in the country they bombed. It is being fuelled again by increasingly overt FBI raids across Pakistan in the search for al-Qaida suspects and, inevitably and overwhelmingly, by the war in Iraq. In Pakistani eyes, American foreign policy is targeting the religion of Islam. Will Pakistan be next? It is the question on everybody's lips. Suddenly, the Islamic parties no longer seem to be on the margins of society but triumphantly riding a new wave of national bitterness and frustration.

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http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_18-5-2003_pg7_11

WASHINGTON: Pakistan’s economy suffered a loss of $10,000,000,000.00 as a result of the government’s decision to extend full cooperation to the US-led Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan... According to the US Central Command (CENTCOM), as many as 57,800 “sorties” or air attacks were “generated” either from Pakistan’s air space or soil. These astounding figures, first pointed out by the Washington-based online weekly South Asia Tribune, appear on CENTCOM’s website.

CENTCOM said that the effect of Operation Enduring Freedom “adversely affected the already fragile economy of Pakistan. Major losses were caused to the civil aviation, tourism, investment and shipping due to rise in the rates of insurance. Besides this, Pakistani exports also suffered adversely and foreign investments experienced a visible decline. According to a rough estimate, Pakistan’s economy suffered a loss of over $ 10 billion.”

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http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_18-5-2003_pg7_41

DUBAI: The time has come to “globalise the jihad”, a senior leader of the Islamic fundamentalist Salafi movement in Morocco told a magazine published Friday... “The current tendency is not to let the enemy feel safe anywhere he may be,” Abu Seif added.

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http://www.washtimes.com/national/20030517-010318-7405r.htm

The Department of Homeland Security is investigating whether the French government provided passports to members of Saddam Hussein's regime fleeing Iraq... France's ambassador to the United States accused the Bush administration of starting a disinformation campaign against France. Mr. de Villepin broadened the charge yesterday, saying the British media, too, had carried disinformation... An administration official said the French government's anger appears to be based on worries that its sales of French products in the United States, including wine, are being hurt.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1289-2003May16.html

The U.S. executive selected by the Pentagon to advise Iraq's Ministry of Oil suggested today that the country might best be served by exporting as much oil as it can and disregarding quotas set by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. His comments offered the strongest indication to date that the future Iraqi government may break ranks with the international petroleum cartel... Flows of Iraqi oil to the world market unconstrained by OPEC quotas could further erode the cartel's already limited ability to set prices and might even trigger a price war, eating into the profits of its member countries. Such an outcome would surely delight the Bush administration.

...Among the questions the [U.S.-held Iraqi oil] ministry will confront is whether to break up the state oil empire and put some of its pieces into private hands.

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http://www.abcnews.go.com/wire/World/reuters20030516_642.html

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea will respond with war to any U.S. military strike against it, South Korean television said on Saturday, citing a broadcast in the communist state. "Washington should renounce its hostile policy against us," YTN quoted the North's central television as saying. "We will react with war to a military strike." The North Korean broadcast criticized U.S. national security adviser Condoleezza Rice for raising the possibility of an attack.