Agency Seeks Greater Surveillance Power Overseas

Citing a "period of heightened threat" to the U.S. homeland, Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell asked Congress to "act immediately" to make changes in current law to permit the interception of messages between terrorist targets overseas, which he said now requires burdensome court orders…At issue is a package of changes that the Bush administration wants in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to facilitate the continuation of its terrorist surveillance program. Congress has delayed amending the program pending further study…….(Washington Post, 28 Jul 07)

FBI calls Chinese espionage 'substantial'

FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III said yesterday that Chinese intelligence operations against the United States are a major problem and that the FBI is stepping up counterespionage efforts against them…“There is substantial concern,” Mr. Mueller said. “China is stealing our secrets in an effort to leap ahead in terms of its military technology, but also the economic capability of China. It is a substantial threat that we are addressing in the sense of building our program to address this threat.” He declined to elaborate but said he would be willing to disclose more in a closed-door meeting. The FBI and other counterintelligence agencies are hiring more agents and analysts who specialize in Chinese affairs to deal with the threat….(Washington Times, 27 Jul 07)

U.K. Official Jailed for Terrorism Leak

A counterterrorism official was sentenced Friday to eight months in prison for leaking an intelligence report about a possible terrorist attack to a British newspaper. Thomas Lund-Lack, 59, was a civilian employee of Scotland Yard's counterterrorism section when he disclosed the contents of a secret intelligence report……(AP, 27 Jul 07)

Bad News Tests China's Propaganda Arm

According to a report circulating among Beijing intellectuals, Li Changchun, China's senior propaganda official, went to President Hu Jintao recently suggesting a ban on the July issue of the magazine Yanhuang Chunqiu. The scholarly monthly had published a long and daring article by a Communist Party professor saying that the party's monopoly on power was the "root cause" of many of the ills afflicting modern-day China, including corruption and peasant unrest…The Yanhuang Chunqiu article, written by Wu Min, a professor in Shanxi province assigned to train up-and-coming party officials, was particularly sensitive because it amounted to a frontal challenge to Hu's ideological leadership…..(Washington Post, 27 Jul 07)

Report Warns Against Too Many 'Net Rules

Kazakhstan and Georgia are among countries imposing excessive restrictions on how people use the Internet, a new report says, warning that regulations are having a chilling effect on freedom of expression. "Governing the Internet," issued Thursday by the 56-nation Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, called the online policing "a bitter reminder of the ease with which some regimes _ democracies and dictatorships alike _ seek to suppress speech that they disapprove of, dislike, or simply fear. Speaking out has never been easier than on the Web. Yet at the same time we are witnessing the spread of Internet censorship," the report said…..(AP, 27 Jul 07)

Rights Court Orders Russia to Pay Damages in Chechnya Killings

The European Court of Human Rights found Russia liable Thursday in the killing of more than 50 civilians in a Chechen village in 2000 and ordered the government to pay a total of about $200,000 to five relatives of those who died. The court castigated the Russian authorities for failing to seriously investigate the "cold-blooded execution of more than 50 civilians" in the village of Novye Aldy….(Washington Post, 27 Jul 07)

Putin To Expand Russia's Spy Network

… Russia's relations with America are strained over the plan to base 10 missile interceptors in Poland and radar installations in the Czech Republic. Mr. Putin, who rejects Mr. Bush's assertion that the system is aimed at defending Europe from a nuclear-armed Iran, earlier this month suspended Russian participation in the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe…..(Bloomberg, 27 Jul 07)

NASA reports computer sabotage

A space program worker deliberately damaged a computer that is supposed to fly aboard the shuttle Endeavour in less than two weeks, an act of sabotage that was caught before the equipment was loaded onto the spaceship, NASA said Thursday. The unidentified employee, who works for a NASA subcontractor, cut wires inside the computer that is supposed to be delivered to the international space station by Endeavour, said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA’s space operations chief. The worker also damaged a similar computer that was not meant to fly to space…Gerstenmaier declined to identify the subcontractor or where the damage took place, citing an investigation by NASA's inspector general. He also declined to speculate on whether the sabotage was motivated by a workplace dispute or other factors — but he stressed that the tampering had nothing to do with a continuing strike at NASA's Kennedy Space Center by a machinists union...The damage is believed to be the first act of sabotage of flight equipment NASA has discovered….(MSNBC, 27 Jul 07)

Interactive: Shuttle Timeline History

Study: DoD secret spending hits $31.9 billion

…The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments estimates that classified, or "black" programs, will account for $31.9 billion in Defense Department spending this year. The total includes $14.4 billion in weapon procurement and $17.5 billion in research and development programs, the group said in a study released Wednesday (July 25). While the total amount of secret DoD spending has declined in inflation-adjusted dollars over the last two years, the group nevertheless noted that classified DoD acquisition programs have more than doubled in real terms since fiscal 1995…..(EE Times, 27 Jul 07)

US, EU Sign Deal on Air Passenger Data

The United States and the European Union signed an agreement Thursday that reduces the amount of information provided U.S. authorities about airline passengers before they arrive from Europe…The new deal limits covers 19 pieces of data, including passenger names, addresses, seat numbers, credit card information and travel details. The information is to be provided within 15 minutes of a flight's departure for the U.S. The data can be kept for seven years in an active file, then for eight more years in a dormant file accessible for specific, limited uses…..(AP, 27 Jul 07)

Darfur: CIA accused of weapons smuggling

Sudan is now blaming the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency(CIA), accusing the body of fuelling conflicts in troubled southern region of Darfur. Sudanese Interior Minister, Zubair Bashir Taha, spilled the beans by accusing CIA for smuggling weapons into the region…..(AFROL, 27 Jul 07)

Now what will North Korea's nuclear scientists do?

International monitors confirmed last week that North Korea had shut key facilities at its Yongbyon nuclear complex. More monitors arrived in Beijing on Friday, passing through to the site, which is the focus of a February disarmament pact. But for these steps to mature into lasting disarmament, negotiators must run a minefield of complexities -- including the future of the North's atomic scientists, who could restart an arms push or sell secrets to other aspiring nuclear states…..(Reuters, 27 Jul 07)

F.B.I. Chief Gives Account at Odds With Gonzales’s

…The director, Robert S. Mueller III, told the House Judiciary Committee that the confrontation was about the National Security Agency’s counterterrorist eavesdropping program, describing it as “an N.S.A. program that has been much discussed.”….(New York Times, 27 Jul 07)

FBI Chief Disputes Gonzales On Spying

…Mueller's testimony appears to mark the first public confirmation from a Bush administration official that the National Security Agency's Terrorist Surveillance Program was at issue in an unusual nighttime visit by Gonzales to the hospital bedside of then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft, who was under sedation and recovering from surgery. Mueller's remarks to the House Judiciary Committee differed from testimony earlier in the week from Gonzales, who told a Senate panel that a legal disagreement aired at the hospital did not concern the NSA program….(Washington Post, 27 Jul 07)

Today in History - July 26

1947: President Truman signed the National Security Act, creating the Department of Defense, the National Security Council, the CIA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

McLaren cleared of spying

Formula 1 team McLaren have been cleared by the sport's governing body, the FIA, from any wrongdoing in the espionage affair that has engulfed the sport this season. An extraordinary hearing of the 25-strong World Motor Sports Council, the sport's highest body, found the British team had not benefited from the confidential Ferrari documents that were found in the possession of their chief designer…..(Daily Telegraph, 26 Jul 07)

Former Spanish spy arrested for selling intelligence secrets

Spain has arrested a former intelligence officer on charges he acted as a doubleagent, selling other agents' secret identities and counterintelligence data to a foreign government…An official at the National Intelligence Center said Florez Garcia had been a midlevel officer in the Civil Guard, a paramilitary police force that answers to the Interior Ministry but also has intelligence units involved in such tasks as fighting Basque separatist violence and Islamic terrorism. Florez Garcia quit the Civil Guard in March 2004…..(Taipei Times, 26 Jul 07)

Government Computer Expert Irving Luckom, 87

Irving Luckom, 87, who did seminal work in developing automated data processing and data communications for government agencies, died of cancer June 26…His honors included an Air Force Meritorious Service Award in 1957 for his civilian service and accomplishments in the Air Force Finance Center and an Outstanding Contribution Award from IBM in 1976 for his management in developing operational aspects of the World Wide Military Command and Control System architecture….(Washington Post, 26 Jul 07)

House votes to tighten terror, spy record probes

The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation on Thursday aimed at clamping down on the government's collection of telephone and financial records of people it suspects of terrorism or spying. By a vote of 281-142, the House approved a law enforcement spending bill for the fiscal year starting on October 1, which the Senate has not yet debated…..(Reuters, 26 Jul 07)

Spy fever gets hotter

On Tuesday, the Russian president met with senior military and security officers in the Kremlin. His comments on strengthening Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (The Foreign Intelligence Service is a successor agency to the KGB) in order to increase national security are making waves in the Western media. During the meeting Vladimir Putin praised the FIS's efforts: “Foreign Intelligence Service works hard to identify threats from the outside to our national security and to boost Russia’s position in the world. The situation in the world and internal political interests require the FIS to permanently increase its capabilities, primarily in the field of information and analytical support for the country’s leadership,” the Russian leader said. Some western media agencies interpreted his comments as a sign that Russia is intensifying its spying operations abroad…..(Russia Today, 26 Jul 07)

Russia accused over Spanish spy

…Roberto Flórez García, 41, a former employee of Spain's National Intelligence Centre (CNI), was arrested on Tenerife. Sources told the Europa Press news agency that the other country involved in the affair was Russia, though there was no formal confirmation…Mr Flórez was richly rewarded for handing over the identities of agents and information on the CNI's activities, he said. "This, logically, has caused internal damage ... to our internal structure, to the identities of some people and to some of our counterintelligence activities at the time,"......(Guardian, 25 Jul 07)

Spaniards Unmasked Russia’s Spy

Spain’s secret services have detained a double agent that was passing information to Russia, El Pais reported with reference to Alberto Saiz, chief of national intelligence in Spain.  Certain Roberto Florez Garcia was arrested in Tenerife late Monday. For sizeable remuneration, Garcia had been in contact with Russia’s intelligence from December 2001 to February 2004, when employed in the Center of National Intelligence of Spain…..(Kommersant, 25  Jul 07)

Putin Orders Boost in Military, Spying

…Putin did not identify specific nations as targets, but officials in the United States and Britain have said recently that Moscow has intensified its spying in those countries. Putin said U.S. plans to station troops in Eastern Europe and Washington's intention to base missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic pose security challenges for Russia. Washington says the facilities are necessary to protect the U.S. and Europe from missiles launched by Iran or other rogue states…..(AP, 25 Jul 07)

The spy files tormenting Poland

Two decades after the collapse of communism, government plans to throw open the secret police archives could, say some Poles, turn into a witch hunt.  "They said you'll die in jail, you animal, and your family will starve to death, and then I agreed to work with them." ….(BBC, 26 Jul 07)

Russia expelled top British trade official: paper

Russia has expelled Britain's top commercial and trade diplomat as part of its retaliation in a continuing row over the extradition of a murder suspect…The English-language daily reported that Andrew Levi, minister counselor for economic affairs at the British Embassy in Moscow, was the highest ranking of the four British diplomats asked to leave by the Foreign Ministry last week…..(Reuters, 26 Jul 07)

The fly that's also a spy

A life size robotic fly which defense chiefs plan to use in military surveillance operations has been developed by scientists. The mechanical insect weighs as little as a pin head and has a wingspan of just 1.18in (3cm)…Harvard University researchers spent seven years developing the device with funding from the U.S. military…..(Daily Mail, 26 Jul 07)

CIA honors Reno pilot for role in 'secret war'

A Reno pilot and other veterans of Air America are scheduled to gather Friday at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., to unveil a painting of an unusual air battle and honor the memory of a war that never was. The painting by British aviation artist Keith Woodcock memorializes an encounter between an Air America helicopter and two North Vietnamese biplanes over Laos in 1968. Air America was a CIA-owned company that supported American intelligence agents. The copter shot down the two enemy planes -- the only time that gunfire from a helicopter shot down a fixed-wing plane. The pilot, Reno stockbroker Ted Moore, 68, said he's honored that he had a part in a battle chosen to commemorate the work of Air America…..(Reno Gazette-Journal, 26 Jul 07)

Here Is Your Pen Scanner, Mr. Bond

…Take pen scanners, for example. Here are machines not much thicker than a Sharpie. You can slip one out of your shirt pocket to scan a book, article, magazine, catalog, receipt or top-secret enemy dossier. Then, you can dump the results, as fully editable typed text, into your computer through a U.S.B. cable…..(New York Times, 26 Jul 07)

Today in History - July 25

1917: Mata Hari, the archetype of the seductive female spy, was sentenced to death in France as a German spy.

1986: Former Navy radioman Jerry Whitworth was convicted of selling U.S. military secrets to the Soviets through the John Walker spy ring. The government called it the most damaging espionage case since World War II.

Renewed arrests in Iran in connection with US think tanks

…Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejeie told Fars news agency that 'local elements' connected to the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars and the George Soros' Open Society Institute had been arrested but he refused to give further details until the end of investigations. Tehran has already detained two members of the two US think tanks - Haleh Esfandiari and Kian Tajbakhsh - on charges of espionage…..(Monsters & Critics, 25 Jul 07)

Suspected Spanish double agent arrested

Police have arrested a former employee of the Spanish secret service CNI for spying for another country, CNI director Alberto Saiz said Tuesday in Madrid. The suspected double agent is believed to have earned a lot of money from selling sensitive information to a foreign spy service between 2001 and 2004, Saiz said. The suspect's actions revealed the identities of several Spanish agents….(Earth Times, 25 Jul 07)

At DHS, risk assessment backlog looms

The Homeland Security Department’s Privacy Office faces a huge backlog in informing the public of privacy risks related to more than 200 departmental systems, according to congressional testimony given this week by a top official at the Government Accountability Office…..(Washington Technology, 25 Jul 07)

Counterterrorism centers in USA

Here are the locations of the 42 criminal intelligence fusion centers set up to help in the war on terrorism…..(USA Today, 25 Jul 07)

FBI Seeks To Pay Telecoms For Data
The FBI wants to pay the major telecommunications companies to retain their customers' Internet and phone call information for at least two years for the agency's use in counterterrorism investigations and is asking Congress for $5 million a year to defray the cost, according to FBI officials and budget documents. The FBI would not have direct access to the records. It would need to present a subpoena or an administrative warrant, known as a national security letter, to obtain the information that the companies would keep in a database….(Washington Post, 25 Jul 07)

Judge: Spying Lawsuits Can Proceed

A federal judge on Tuesday declined to dismiss lawsuits filed by five states seeking information on a federal government warrantless wiretap program, keeping the cases alive pending an appeals court decision. U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker declined to address the federal government's main argument that the cases should be tossed out because sensitive homeland security secrets could be exposed……(AP, 25 Jul 07)

US 'ignored' UK rendition protest

British concerns did not appear to "materially" affect US actions in its "war on terror", the UK's intelligence and security committee has said. The committee, which reports to the prime minister, was probing possible UK involvement in rendition flights. It said America's "lack of regard" for UK concerns had "serious implications" for future intelligence relations…..(BBC, 25 Jul 07)

Outsourcing National Intelligence

The unprecedented involvement of private corporations in the Iraq War has been well documented. Private soldiers working for Blackwater USA, Triple Canopy and others provide security services against military-level threats, and they regularly engage in combat. But what is not generally known is that the secret side of the Iraq War and the larger "war on terror" is also conducted by private corporations, fielding private spies. The reach of these corporations has extended into the Oval Office. Corporations are heavily involved in creating the analytical products that underlie the nation's most important and most sensitive national security document, the President's Daily Brief (PDB)…..(The Nation, 25 Jul 07)

French intelligence penetrated PMO in 1980s: Ex-RAW official

A former top official of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) has claimed the Prime Minister's Office was penetrated by the French intelligence while the CIA had a mole in an office of India's spy agency during the early 1980s. "The French intelligence penetrated the PMO and shared with its West European and American counterparts the intelligence and documents collected by it. "The greatest damage was caused by the French intelligence agency's penetration of the PMO….(Times of India, 25 Jul 07)

Espionage Difficulties May Spread to Spain

Spain has arrested a former intelligence officer on charges he acted as a double agent, selling other agents' secret identities and counterintelligence data to a foreign government, the country's spy chief said Tuesday. The intelligence chief, Alberto Saiz, did not identify the country doing the buying, but Cadena Ser radio said it was Russia. Saiz said the alleged espionage occurred from late 2001 to early 2004. He identified the former Spanish agent as Roberto Florez Garcia and said he was arrested Monday on Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands.....(Moscow Times, 25 Jul 07)

U.S., Canadian Citizens Imprisoned in Iran 'Confess' on Iranian TV

The following are excerpts from interviews with two U.S. citizens of Iranian origin, academics Dr. Haleh Esfandiari, Dr. Kian Tajbaksh, who were arrested in May 2007 in Iran, and Iranian-Canadian academic Ramin Jahanbaglou, who was arrested in May 2006 in Iran. The interviews were aired on Iranian Channel 1 on July 18 and 19, 2007….(MEMRI, 25 Jul 07)

'Democracy': The Meltdown Of a Conflicted Cold War Spy

The political and psychological divisions are monumental in "Democracy," Michael Frayn's absorbing study of early-'70s West German Chancellor Willy Brandt and the spy (East German Gunter Guillaume) who brought him to ruin…..(Washington Post, 25 Jul 07)

Cuban spy jailed in U.S. pins hope on appeal

A Cuban spy serving two life sentences in a U.S. high-security prison hopes an appeals court will annul convictions by a Miami jury he says was too scared to acquit him in a highly charged anti-Castro setting. Gerardo Hernandez told Reuters by telephone from prison that he was spying on paramilitary exile groups in Miami, not the United States, when he and four members of his so-called Wasp Network were arrested by the FBI in 1998…..(Reuters, 24 Jul 07)

Israeli-Arab Hizbullah agent arrested

An Israeli Arab was arrested last month by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) after she was allegedly recruited by the Hizbullah in Jordan… The suspect said that as a Hizbullah agent, she was to be given cell phone memory chips and disk on key memory cards which she was to transfer to Hizbullah operatives in Israel. A number of weeks after her initial recruitment, the suspect completed her studies in Jordan and prepared to return to Israel…..(Jerusalem Post, 24 Jul 07)

Israel's Shin Bet internal security agency arrests woman suspected of aiding Hezbollah

…The agency, known by its Hebrew acronym Shin Bet, said it arrested the woman June 30 at the Allenby border crossing between Jordan and Israel. The woman, whose name was kept secret by court order, told interrogators she was recruited by Hezbollah while she was a university student in Jordan, the agency said in a statement. She allegedly confessed to having received a computer memory card to pass to a Hezbollah operative in the West Bank…..(AP, 24 Jul 07)

U.S.-China joint probe nets fake software

Pirated software worth $500 million, including counterfeit Microsoft and Symantec products, has been seized in a long-running joint probe by Chinese police and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, officials from both countries said on Tuesday….(Reuters, 24 Jul 07)

FBI goes on offensive against China's tech spies

Michigan auto-parts maker Metaldyne was one of just two companies in the world that could turn powdered metal into high-performance engine components — until one of its engineers handed "hundreds of confidential" computer files to potential Chinese competitors, the Justice Department says. A federal grand jury last year indicted the engineer, Michael Haehnel, 51; his wife, Anne Lockwood, 53, Metaldyne's former vice president for sales; and their Chinese partner Fuping Liu, 42, a former company metallurgist, on 64 counts of stealing trade secrets and related crimes. The three pleaded not guilty and are scheduled to face trial starting Oct. 9…..(USA Today, 24 Jul 07)

Researchers Seek Cash for Software Flaws

…A black market has long existed for trading information about vulnerabilities in software from Microsoft Corp., Cisco Systems Inc. and other vendors of products crucial to running computers and sending data over the Internet…Experts say government agencies also have been buying such knowledge _ not to warn the public but potentially to break into computers for national security or criminal investigations. Charlie Miller, a former National Security Agency employee, said one agency he wouldn't name paid him $50,000 in September…...(AP, 24 Jul 07)

Double agent 'sold names to Russia'

…The suspect, Robert Flores Garcia, was arrested Monday morning at his home on Tenerife Island in Spain's Canary Islands. He passed secrets in exchange for hefty payments from December 2001 to February 2004, said the spy chief, Alberto Saiz, head of the National Intelligence Agency (known by its Spanish initials CNI). Saiz, at a news conference, refused to publicly identify the recipient country, but Spain's SER Radio, said it was Russia, citing unnamed sources. Flores, a Spanish Civil Guard assigned to spy agency headquarters for internal matters, had been a suspect under surveillance by Spanish intelligence since July 2005…The suspect allegedly revealed the names of dozens of Spanish spies, possibly including the seven Spanish spies killed in an ambush south of Baghdad in November 2003…..(CNN, 24 Jul 07)

Ex-sailor charged in terror case discussed attacking military personnel, prosecutor says

…(Hassan) Abujihaad (aka. Paul R. Hall) is charged in the same case as Babar Ahmad, a British computer specialist arrested in 2004 and accused of running Web sites to raise money for terrorism. Investigators found information about the location of U.S. Navy ships on a computer belonging to Ahmad, who is to be extradited to the U.S. Abujihaad exchanged e-mails with Ahmad while serving on the USS Benfold, a guided missile destroyer, in 2000 and 2001, according to an FBI affidavit. In those e-mails, Abujihaad discussed naval briefings and praised Osama bin Laden and those who attacked the USS Cole in 2000….(AP, 24 Jul 07)

Ex-Sailor Faces New Claims

A former Navy sailor charged with supporting terrorism by disclosing secret information about the location of Navy ships and the best ways to attack them also discussed attacking military personnel and recruiting stations, prosecutors disclosed Monday. Hassan Abujihaad discussed sniper attacks on military personnel last year and in 2003 or 2004 discussed attacking military recruitment sites…Abujihaad, 31, of Phoenix, pleaded not guilty in April to charges he provided material support to terrorists with intent to kill U.S. citizens and disclosed classified information relating to the national defense…..(AP, 24 Jul 07)

Spain says it has arrested double agent who sold classified data to foreign country

Spain has arrested an ex-intelligence officer on charges he acted as a double-agent, selling other agents' secret identities and counterintelligence data to a foreign government, the country's spy chief said Tuesday. The intelligence chief, Alberto Saiz, did not identify the country doing the buying, but Cadena Ser radio said it was Russia. He said the alleged espionage occurred between the end of 2001 and early 2004. Saiz identified the former Spanish agent as Roberto Florez Garcia and said he was arrested Monday on Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands……(AP, 24 Jul 07)

Spain arrests suspected double agent

Spain has arrested a suspected double agent believed to have sold state secrets to a foreign intelligence agency between 2001 and 2004, the National Intelligence Agency (CNI) said on Tuesday…Roberto Florez Garcia, arrested in Tenerife, the Canary Islands, on Monday, sold the identity of Spanish spies and other information about the intelligence agency from 2001 until he left the service in 2004……(Reuters, 24 Jul 07)

New book on the biography of Mata Hari to be featured on the BBC

Mata Hari was the prototype of the beautiful but unscrupulous female who uses sexual allure to gain access to secrets. In 1917, the notorious dancer was arrested, tried, and executed for espionage… In a new biography, "Femme Fatal; Love, Lies and the Unknown Life of Mata Hari," award-winning author Pat Shipman addresses Mata Hari's guilt and motivation with new evidence……(State College, 23 Jul 07)

Raman's Book on R&AW may Stir Controversy

…rediff.com columnist B Raman's memoir, The Kaoboys of R&AW -- Down Memory Lane (Lancers Publishers), will be the first-ever look at the triumphs and defeats at the Research and Analysis Wing, India's external intelligence agency. The Kao in the title refers to Rameshwar Nath Kao, the legendary Indian spymaster who set up R&AW on then prime minister Indira Gandhi's [Images] instructions in 1968 as an entity separate from the Intelligence Bureau……(Daiji World, 23 Jul 07)

ASIO takes on Russian spooks

Russia has boosted the number of spies in Australia to near Cold War levels -- forcing ASIO to respond by training a new generation of counter-espionage officers. The growing Russian threat comes on top of an even larger rise in the number of Chinese agents operating in Australia in recent years, as a booming economy and record defense spending provide a wealth of new opportunities for traditional espionage….(Australian, 23 Jul 07)

Bomb by Bomb, Japan Sheds Military Restraints

… Japan is acquiring weapons that blur the lines between defensive and offensive. For the Guam bombing run, Japan deployed its newest fighter jets, the F-2’s, the first developed jointly by Japan and the United States, on their maiden trip here… The exercise would have been unremarkable for almost any other military, but it was highly significant for Japan, a country still restrained by a Constitution that renounces war and allows forces only for its defense…..(New York Times, 23 Jul 07)

Brown: 'Hand over Litvinenko murder suspect'

Gordon Brown has renewed his demand for Russia to hand over the prime suspect in the Litvinenko murder, describing the situation as "intolerable".The Prime Minister today insisted Russia had a "responsibility" to extradite Andrei Lugovoi so he can stand trial for the killing of former KGB spy Alexander Litvinenko in the UK….(Telegraph, 23 Jul 07)

Britain’s envoy challenges Moscow over extradition

…Sir Anthony Brenton, the British Ambassador in Moscow, said yesterday that Russia could get around the prohibition if it wanted to cooperate in bringing Andrei Lugovoy to trial. Mr Lugovoy is accused of poisoning Litvinenko with radioactive polonium210 at a London hotel in November, but insists that he is innocent…Russia says that Article 61 of its Constitution forbids extradition of citizens to face trial abroad. It has offered to try Mr Lugovoy in Moscow if Britain presents sufficient evidence, but the Crown Prosecution Service has insisted that the trial should take place in London….(Times Online, 23 Jul 07)