Nation & world briefing
U.S. works to revive Turkish aid for war
Bob Kemper
Chicago Tribune (KRT)
WASHINGTON — The Bush ad
ministration scrambled Monday
to revive a plan to base up to
62,000 military personnel on
Turkish soil in preparation for a
war in Iraq, and officials warned
Turkey that it could lose billions
of dollars in U.S. economic aid if
it didn’t cooperate.
The Turkish parliament over the
weekend rejected, by three votes, a
request to allow U.S. troops access
for a northern invasion of Iraq. It
was a diplomatic and military set
back for the Bush administration
and, if not resolved quickly, could
mean that Turkey, a U.S. ally, ac
complished with a single vote what
France, Germany, Russia and other
nations have so far failed to achieve
in months of negotiation: a delay of
the expected war.
r
Turkish officials may ask parlia
ment to reconsider the issue this
week, but U.S. officials would say
only that they remain in negotia
tions with Turkey after the surprise
rejection.
“Turkey is reviewing its options
and the United States is doing the
same,” White House spokesman Ari
Fleischer said. “It’s unclear, as well,
what the ultimate outcome will be.”
Even while insisting that Penta
gon planners have a so-called Plan
B, an alternative to launching an
attack from Turkey, U.S. officials
also were threatening to deny eco
nomic aid to Turkey if it refuses to
cooperate.
The U.S. had offered Turkey up to
$15 billion in economic grants and
loans in exchange for allowing the
bases. The money was intended to
soften the blow that Turkey’s ailing
economy likely would suffer if war
breaks out in neighboring Iraq.
State Department spokesman
Richard Boucher made clear that
Turkey would forfeit most, if not
all, of the aid if it does not allow
the bases.
“The aid package was predicat
ed on the cost of involvement, the
economic consequences, the di
rect costs of deployments and sup
port,” Boucher said. “If that in
volvement or if that kind of effort
doesn’t occur, then the costs won’t
be incurred.”
The Turkish stock market, react
ing to the prospect of losing the eco
nomic aid, dropped by more than
12 percent Monday. The Turkish
lira dropped by close to 5 percent.
Turkey’s refusal to allow the bases
could delay a war in Iraq for several
weeks — possibly until late March
or early April at the soonest — un
less U.S. and Turkish officials can
negotiate a compromise quickly,
U.S. officials said.
U.S. military planners were
counting on using Turkish bases to
execute a northern invasion of Iraq
using the 4th Infantry Division from
Ft. Hood, Texas. In concert with a
more heavily armored invasion
force from the south, the troops de
ploying from Turkey were intended
to divide the Iraqi army and move
immediately to protect the north
ern Oil fields from Iraqi sabotage.
Fleischer, however, said that
“other approaches are available.”
Bulgaria, for instance, could be
used as a staging ground for air op
erations during a war, a role Turkey
played prominently in the 1991
Persian Gulf War. On Monday, two
U.S. refueling tankers and a cargo
plane landed at an air base in the
Bulgarian Black Sea port city of
Bourgas, according to Reuters.
Boucher said the United States
has “left the politics of this in the
hands of the Turkish government.”
He declined to predict whether the
Turkish parliament would take up
another resolution authorizing the
bases or say whether an alternative
to such an action existed.
Turkish Prime Minister Abdul
lah Gul would not say whether a
second resolution would be intro
duced, telling reporters in Turkey,
“We are analyzing the situation
and we will see what happens in
the next few days.”
© 2003, Chicago Tribune. Distributed
by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information
Services. Chicago Tribune
correspondent Stephen J. Hedges
contributed to this report.
Carnival spinning
Kevin G. Hall (KRT)
Bainas in the Salgueiro samba school, with their arching long dresses, spin down the nearly half-mile parade route during
Sunday night's opening of Carnival competition in Rio. Bainas, who dance and spin for 80 minutes, are one of the
categories in which the samba schools are judged. Carnival runs through Tuesday.
China set for most expansive
leadership overhaul in a decade
Michael Dorgan
Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT)
BEIJING — The most sweeping
political changes in China in more
than a decade will get under way this
week as the nation’s legislature con
venes to approve new top officials.
The new generation is expected to
gradually introduce modest political
reforms while guarding the Commu
nist Party’s dominant role.
Few surprises are expected from
the two-week-long 10th National Peo
ple’s Congress, which convenes
Wednesday. The Congress deputies
will approve top officials—including a
new president— that the Communist
Party already has selected. They also
will sign off on an ambitious restruc
turing of the central government.
It’s likely to remain highly unclear
who really wields power in China
and how much actually will change.
“We will see a lot of old faces with
new positions,” said Wu Guoguang,
a former government adviser who’s
now at the Chinese University of
Hong Kong. “But there may be some
new faces, too.”
The familiar face destined to take
the government’s top job is Vice
President Hu Jintao. The 60-year-old
career politician will replace Jiang
Zemin as president after succeeding
him last November as general secre
tary of the Communist Party, Chi
na’s most powerful position.
Those twin crowns will make Hu
the so-called core of the fourth gener
ation of post-revolutionary leaders. Hu
is a familiar face on the news but has
spoken so seldom in public that he is a
mystery even to the Chinese.
The 76-year-old Jiang, who has
held power since 1989, is expected
to retain China’s third crown, the
chairmanship of the Central Military
Commission.
That will leave him as command
er-in-chief of the military forces,
which will provide him with consid
erable clout. He also is expected to
exert influence behind the scenes
through the numerous supporters he
installed in key party positions.
Hu has given few clues about what
changes he would like to make, if
any. But with Jiang on watch against
any abrupt shifts in direction, the
new generation of leaders is expect
ed to stay the course, deepening the
economic reforms of the past 20
years and speeding China’s integra
tion with the global economy.
Assisting Hu in that effort will be
Vice Premier Wen Jiabao, who is ex
pected to succeed Zhu Rongji as pre
mier, and Wu Bangguo, who is ex
pected to replace Li Peng as head of
the parliament.
“The party has no intention of giv
ing up its monopoly on political pow
er,” said Joseph Cheng, chairman of
the political science department at
the City University of Hong Kong.
© 2003, Knight Ridder/Tribune
Information Services.
Court hears case
of forced drugging
of ill defendant
Stephen Henderson
Knight Ridder Newspapers (KRT)
WASHINGTON — Ranting and
delusional, Dr. Charles Sell once
shouted racial epithets in a court
room and spat in a judge’s face.
No one doubts the St. Louis-area
dentist suffers from a serious mental
illness.
In arguments before the U.S.
Supreme Court on Monday, govern
ment attorneys argued that he
should be forcibly drugged to control
his disorder, so he can be competent
to stand trial on Medicaid fraud
charges first filed in 1997.
Sell’s lawyers said he has a funda
mental right to forgo anti-psychotic
medication that would “permanent
ly alter” his state of mind, and that
the government’s charges aren’t a
compelling enough interest to over
ride that right.
“Dr. Sell has experience with
these drugs, and he does not want
them,” said Barry A. Short, who is
representing Sell. “He must be al
lowed to make that choice.”
If the high court sides with the
government, it could open the door
to other forms of mandated medica
tion — such as federally ordered
vaccinations or school-required
drugs for hyperactive children. The
case also has some death-penalty
implications. More than 300 of the
nation’s approximately 3,700 Death
Row inmates suffer from mental dis
orders, according to the National
Mental Health Association.
The justices appeared split over
the question of whose rights should
take precedence.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy won
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dered aloud several times why the
government thinks it has a right to
force medication on a prisoner.
Kennedy said he had “real prob
lems” with that possibility.
But Justice Antonin Scalia wor
ried that if Sell could not be drugged,
then he could not be tried and jus
tice could not be served.
“What are we supposed to do?”
Scalia asked.
The justices also have asked both
sides to file briefs exploring whether
the court should be addressing this
issue now, before Sell goes on trial,
or whether it is something to be tak
en up later, on appeal.
Sell’s lawyers argued Monday that
the court needed to intervene now,
and that a later appeal would be
pointless because Sell would already
have been drugged. The court could
not undo that outcome, Sell’s
lawyers said.
Sell was arrested in 1997 for Med
icaid and insurance fraud. While out
on bond, he was re-arrested for al
legedly trying to intimidate a wit
ness, and prosecutors later charged
that he tried to have the FBI agent in
his case and the witness killed. The
next time he came to court, he.
screamed racial epithets and spat at
the judge.
A 1999 mental evaluation found
that Sell suffered from a mental ill
ness that subjects him to irrational
beliefs that people are out to get him.
He was declared incompetent to
stand trial, and prosecutors recom
mended that he be administered
anti-psychotic drugs.
© 2003, Knight Ridder/Tribune
Information Services.
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