Today
Saturday Sunday
High: 58
Low: 37
Precip: 0%
High: 53
Low: 34
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High: 50
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Precip: 40%
IN BRIEF
Ustav celebrates Indian
culture, aids tsunami relief
The Students of the Indian Sub
continent will be hosting Utsav on
Saturday night in the EMU Ballroom.
Last year, about 500 people, includ
ing 100 from the Portland area, at
tended the event, which celebrates
Indian culture with a dinner, skits
and musical performances.
SIS will be accepting donations
for tsunami relief at the event. The
event costs $5 for students and $7
for community members. The din
ner starts at 5:30 p.m., and the show
begins at 8 p.m.
— Jared Pa ben
Semi-formal ball to honor
black leaders, entertainers
The Black Student Union plans to
recreate Harlem, the city where so
many black leaders, musicians and
performers got their start, on a
small scale tonight, BSU member
Patricia Haggerty said.
The semi-formal event is dubbed
“Harlem Nights, A Night Out on the
Town. Celebrating the Journey to the
Big Apple.” The ball will feature back
drops of cultural references important
to the history of Harlem. Haggerty said
she believes this is an important event,
not limited to music and dancing.
“Even though this is a ball, it has a
lot of meaning behind it,” Haggerty
said. “It’s supposed to make us think
of the heritage we come from. ”
According to Gothamcenter.org, a
NYC history Web site, black musicians
called Harlem “The Big Apple,” refer
ring to making it big in music. There
was a club called “The Big Apple” in
1930s Harlem where many early jazz
musicians performed.
The dress code at tonight’s event,
which starts at 10 p.m. and lasts un
til 2 a.m. at the Red Lion Hotel, is
also reminiscent of Harlem night*
clubs of the 1930s and 1940s, BSU
Co-Director LaTina Lewis said.
“Back in the Harlem Renaissance
they dressed up to hear jazz and po
etry,” Lewis said. “The guys wore
zoot suits, and the ladies wore
dresses.” She added that BSU want
ed everything about the evening to
have a Harlem nightclub feel.
This year’s ball will be limited to
students 18 years old and older and
is free to all University students, but
donations will be accepted. The
semi-formal dress code will be
strictly enforced, Lewis said.
— Sheldon Tfaver
Bush discusses benefits
involved in free, fair trade
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Contend
ing that Americans benefit from free
trade, President Bush said Thursday
he would keep pursuing liberaliza
tion agreements around the world,
even as critics say his policies have
resulted in record trade deficits and
millions of lost jobs.
Bush’s pledge came in his annual
economic report to Congress, a 438
page document that argued that his
economic policies, ranging from
making his first-term tax cuts perma
nent to overhauling Social Security,
will lead to greater prosperity.
“I believe that Americans benefit
from open markets and free and fair
trade, and I am working to open up
markets around the world and make
sure that the playing field is level for
our workers, farmers, manufacturers
and other job creators,” Bush said in
his message to Congress.
— The Associated Press
Delays on visa applications decline
BY JUSTIN POPE
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
The State and Homeland Security
departments have reduced from
months to weeks the time it takes
foreign students and scholars trying
to travel to the United States to clear
a key visa review, according to a
new government report.
The findings are welcome news,
for education leaders, though they
have cautioned streamlining the visa
process will not, on its own, reverse
the trend of declining interest
among foreigners in attending
American colleges and universities.
Amid complaints from higher
education groups and major busi
ness leaders, including Bill Gates,
that visa hassles were discouraging
foreign students from attending
American schools, a Government
Accountability Office investigation
last year found average delays
of 67 days for applicants to clear
a security check for scientists
known as Visa Mantis. Some de
lays were considerably longer, and
some applicants waited as long as
12 weeks just to get an interview to
start the process.
In a follow-up report to be re
leased Friday, the GAO finds the av
erage wait following the interview
has now fallen to 15 days, according
to a source who has been briefed on
the findings and spoke on condition
of anonymity.
The report credits the overall im
provement to better technology, coor
dination among agencies and policy
changes, such as priority interviews
for student applicants. It cautions that
problems remain and some scholars
still face considerable delays.
The report comes just a week after
the government announced it would
allow international students to keep
their Visa Mantis clearance for the du
ration of their studies, up to four years
— a change that will likely further re
duce delays. Reapplications from
those who previously had been
cleared were a major bottleneck, and
a source of anxiety for applicants,
who worried they might be unable to
get back to school if forced to return
home in an emergency.
Peggy Blumenthal, vice president
for educational services at the Insti
tute of International Education,
praised U.S. embassies for making
an improved visa process a top
priority. Still, public relations
challenges remain, she said.
“Even more important than the ac
tual wait times, which have im
proved, is combating the perception
abroad by students that the situation
is the same as it was shortly after Sept.
11,” she said. “Students right now are
going on what they heard from then
cousin or friend or neighbor who
applied three years ago.”
About 600,000 foreigners study in
the United States, but international
graduate student applications fell 32
percent last year, according to an HE
survey. Another survey released in
November found the number of
first-time foreign enrollees in Ameri
can graduate schools was down 6
percent — the third straight decline
after a decade of growth.
Universities depend on interna
tional students for teaching and re
search help, particularly in the sci
ences. In some fields, including
engineering, foreigners comprise
more than 50 percent of students.
More than 75 percent of their fund
ing comes from abroad, and they
Student visa application delays reduced
A General Accounting Office
investigation last year found an
average delay of 67 days for
foreign student applicants
pursuing science to clear
security checks. A follow-up
report to be released Friday,
found the average wait
following the interview has
dropped to 15 days.
Non-immigrant students by
region of citizenship, FY 2003
South America 8% ; Unknown
Central America 2% M 1 °/o
Caribbean 4%
Canada and ...
Mexico 8%
Oceania 1%
Africa 3%
Europe
: 18%
Asia 55%
Visa processing durations
from transmission to response
for 67 case applications, 2003*
r
19 aps. 21 7 4 15
1-20 21-40 | j 121-220
Days 41-60 61-120
* Students pursuing science
** One application was resent. It took
more than 420 days based on the
original mailing date.
Non-immigrant students
by class of admission
700 thousand
Fiscal 93 '94 '95 '96 '98 '99 00 '01 '02 '03
year Data for 1997 not available
SOURCES: U S. General Accounting Office; U S. Citizenship and Immigration Services AP
contribute $12 billion annually to
the U.S. economy, according to HE.
Visa delays may prove the most
easily solvable of the challenges
facing U.S. schools. Students from
China and India who have tradi
tionally gone to the United States
are finding better domestic options
and are encountering aggressive
marketing by schools in Britain,
Australia and New Zealand.
“Competition is hot and heavy,”
Blumenthal said.
Gates, the Microsoft founder,
and other business leaders, includ
ing GE Chief Executive Jeff Immelt,
have recently raised the issue,
saying it could harm the ability of
American companies to recruit the
talent they need.
Rep. Sherwood Boehlert, R.-N.Y.,
chairman of the House science com
mittee, which requested the report,
praised the State Department for
moving quickly.
“This is very good news,” he
said. “Particularly in the aftermath of
9/11, we want to separate those who
are interested in coming into the
country to do harm and the vast ma
jority who are coming into the coun
try to study, serve as faculty members
or attend a scientific conferences.
They all enrich the country.”
Israel calls for halt
to destruction of
Palestinians' houses
BY KARIN LAI IB
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
JERUSALEM — Israel’s defense
minister ordered a halt Thursday to
the controversial policy of demolish
ing the homes of Palestinian suicide
bombers and gunmen after an inter
nal army review concluded it has
not deterred attackers but has
inflamed hatred.
Since the 1967 Middle East War,
Israel has razed more than 2,400
Palestinian homes as punishment or
deterrence, leaving thousands of
people homeless, including 675
houses destroyed in the past four
years of fighting, according to the
Israeli human rights group B’tselem.
Human rights groups have con
demned the demolitions as collec
tive punishment and a violation of
international law and long have
demanded that they be halted.
The army review found the prac
tice has inflamed hatred. The
Haaretz newspaper said there were
no more than 20 cases in which
the threat of demolition deterred at
tackers or pushed their families to
turn them in. Militant groups com
pensate families of attackers and
help them rebuild, weakening
possible deterrence.
House demolitions, along with
other army practices, such as
targeted killings of Palestinian mili
tants, were suspended after Israel*
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas
declared a truce last week.
In announcing the halt to house
demolitions, the military said in a
statement that Defense Minister
Shaul Mofaz decided to accept the
recommendation of army Chief of
Staff Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon to “stop
exercising the legal right to demol
ish terrorists’ houses as a means
of deterrence.”
A military official said that while
the practice had a deterrent effect in
some cases, the army “weighed if
the deterrent was strong enough in
order to continue the policy of the
demolition of houses, and the chief
of staff ... concluded especially
when there’s more quiet, it’s not the
time to use this policy.”
B’tselem says the Israeli military
has destroyed a total of more than
4,000 Palestinian homes during
the current conflict, most in opera
tions to clear away buildings used
by militants as cover for attacks
or to widen security roads. Those
practices were not included in
Thursday’s decision.
In the Gaza Strip, 2,991 homes
were destroyed or damaged beyond
repair in the last four years, leaving
some 28,483 people homeless,
according to the U.N. Relief and
Works Agency.
Amnesty International, a leading
human rights group, praised Thurs
day’s decision but said it did not go
far enough.
“The overall number of houses
that have been demolished in the
last four years is in excess of 4,000,
and out of those, the category an
nounced today was a fairly small
category,” said Donatella Rovera, the
human rights group’s researcher on
Israel and the Palestinian territories.
China to dispatch
envoy to N. Korea
to break stalemate
BY ELAINE KURTENBACH
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
BEIJING — China said Thurs
day it will send a top communist
party official to North Korea for
talks with its longtime ally in an
effort to break a stalemate over
the North’s nuclear program,
but Beijing urged patience in its
dealing with the volatile country.
U.S. and South Korean envoys
visited Beijing to seek help in
persuading the isolated North to
rejoin six-nation nuclear talks
that were suspended in June.
Those talks include the United
States, the two Koreas, China,
Russia and Japan.
China, the North’s biggest
backer and a major source of aid
to the impoverished country, has
been wary of openly testing its
influence with Pyongyang.
China urged patience with the
unpredictable North, which has
rejected calls to return to the six
nation talks, accusing Washington
of hostility. Last week, Pyongyang
announced it has produced nu
clear weapons. The claim could
not be independently verified.
“We are of the view that
we should not resort to sanctions
or pressure in international
relations,” Foreign Ministry
spokesman Kong Quan said at
a regular briefing. “Further
complicating the issue will
compromise the safety and
security of the region.”
Kong confirmed that Wang
Jiarui, head of the communist
party’s international department,
would visit North Korea this week,
but he did not give specific dates.
Meanwhile, South Korean
officials said they believed China
could do more to win over
the North.
“I think China has a much
bigger card to play than we ex
pect. The question is whether
it will play it,” South Korea’s
ambassador to China, Kim Ha
joong, said at a news conference
Thursday in Seoul.
China, which hosted three ear
lier rounds of nuclear talks that re
sulted in little progress, has con
sistently said it favors a
nuclear-free Korean peninsula.
Though China helped defend
North Korea in the 1950-53 Kore
an War, Beijing worries that a nu
clear-armed North would raise
tensions in the region and prompt
Japan and South Korea to develop
atomic weapons.
While working to resolve the
standoff, “the Chinese side
requires that the DPRK side and
United States show more flexibili
ty and sincerity,” Kong said, using
the acronym for the North’s
formal name, the Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea.
You’re always close to campus.
* www.dailyemeraid.com