Some legal experts are criticizing the decision announced Thursday by Attorney General John Ashcroft to modify existing guidelines that govern FBI intelligence, foreign counter-intelligence investigations and domestic security terrorism investigations. Among those available for interviews: MICHAEL RATNER President of the Center for Constitutional Rights, Ratner said today: “The current Guidelines were established in the ’70s and early ’80s after it was demonstrated that the FBI was spying upon and disrupting groups and individuals engaged in lawful dissent. Apparently, Attorney General Ashcroft wants to get the FBI back in the business of spying on religious and political organizations. That alone would…

COLMAN McCARTHY A former Washington Post columnist, McCarthy is founder and director of the Center for Teaching Peace in Washington, D.C. and the author of I’d Rather Teach Peace. He said today: “I don’t imagine that the meeting will lead to anything meaningful, because both Bush and the Pope believe in the ‘just war’ theory. The Papal comments on war are little more than cosmetic generalizations while the U.S. spends $900 million on the military every day. The Pope has yet to tell Catholics for example to stop giving their tax money to the Pentagon, in the way that he…

VICTOR SIDEL Past president of the American Public Health Association, author of the recent article “Bioterrorism Preparedness: Cooptation of Public Health?” and co-editor of War and Public Health and the forthcoming Terrorism and Public Health, Sidel said today: “The bill adopted Thursday by the Senate is likely to divert funds from essential public health services. At a time when public health programs in the U.S. are being sharply reduced in many states, this bill will divert $4.6 billion to preparation for unsubstantiated threats. The U.S. would be better protected if it worked to strengthen the Biological Weapons Convention, which prohibits…

ZIA MIAN Mian is co-editor of the book Out of the Nuclear Shadow and a researcher on South Asian security issues with the Program on Science and Global Security at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He said today: “I’m very disturbed by the Indian prime minister’s speech and his talk of a ‘decisive fight.’ …. There is no end in sight to the nuclear danger in South Asia, especially since the U.S. and Russia have shown with their new nuclear treaty that they have no intention of putting their nuclear weapons behind them, even though…

U.S. Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill and rock star Bono have started a 10-day tour of Africa. The following policy analysts are available for interviews: SALIH BOOKER Executive director of Africa Action, Booker said today: “African governments are being held liable for the cost of failed and often grandiose development projects pushed by creditors. Now Africa’s people are expected to repay huge debts that were largely incurred before their time and that did not benefit them. For example, South Africa’s white minority regime accumulated more than $18 billion in foreign debt in the 15 years before apartheid fell. South Africa’s neighbors…

MARTIN LEE Author of The Beast Reawakens, a book that explores relations between U.S. intelligence and right-wing extremist groups, Lee said today: “There is abundant evidence that Bush administration officials engaged in a post-9/11 cover-up to avoid acknowledging what we now know to be true — that the FBI, CIA, and several foreign intelligence sources had picked up signs of an impending terrorist attack in the United States by bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network. Such revelations underscore the need for a full-fledged Congressional investigation to explain how and why the U.S. government did not prevent the atrocities of Sept. 11…. Incompetence,…

Former president Bill Clinton, at the request of the Bush administration, is leading the U.S. delegation to East Timor’s independence celebrations this weekend. The following are in the U.S. and East Timor: JOHN M. MILLER Media and outreach coordinator for the East Timor Action Network, Miller said today: When President Clinton cut military ties between the U.S. and Indonesia, the Indonesian military quickly agreed to withdraw and allow in peacekeepers. If Clinton had been more assertive throughout 1999, the violent destruction following East Timor’s referendum might have been prevented. If President Ford and Secretary of State Kissinger had not given…

GREG PALAST Palast is co-author of the forthcoming book Democracy and Regulation. He said today: “The U.S. Senate is recoiling in phony shock and horror at the games Enron played to manipulate the California power market. The rip-offs, which Enron traders called ‘Get Shorty,’ ‘Deathstar,’ ‘Fat Boy,’ are simply variants on games Enron has been practicing in Britain for a decade, there known as ‘stacking,’ ‘cramming,’ and ‘false scheduling.’ None of this should come as a surprise to the U.S. Congress, which had full knowledge and warning about the ease of ‘gaming’ the power market when both parties voted to…

ANYA LANDAU, WAYNE SMITH Landau is a research associate with the Center for International Policy (based in Washington, D.C.). Smith is a senior analyst with the group. They are authors of the recent report “CIP Challenges Bolton on Cuba Bio-Terror Charges.” Landau is going to Cuba on Wednesday. More Information MARLENE ARZOLA Outreach coordinator for the Cuban Committee for Democracy (based in Miami), Arzola said today: “We need engagement with Cuba, and to shift away from the politics of isolation towards more openness and dialogue. It’s hypocritical of the U.S. government to talk about democracy in Cuba and not other…

TYSON SLOCUM On a release by the Institute for Public Accuracy on January 24, 2001, Slocum (the research director of the Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program at Public Citizen) said: “What we’re seeing in California is price manipulation by the handful of power producers who exert total market control over the wholesale market. … George W. Bush has said that the crisis is a state, not a federal, issue. He couldn’t be more wrong. The federal government, through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, has the authority to set cost-based rates on California power producers.” Today Slocum said: “In light…