home of the wildlife conservation environmental and freedom activist

As Congress finishes work on the Farm Bill, ask Senate
Majority Leader Tom Daschle to include $21.3 billion
in new funding for USDA conservation programs.

You can take action on this alert either via email
(please see directions below) or via the web at:
http://actionnetwork.org/campaign/dfb/wk8bxn4978x3dk

Visit the web address below and tell your friends to
take action on this important campaign!
http://actionnetwork.org/campaign/dfb/forward/wk8bxn4978x3dk

We encourage you to take action by April 14, 2002

Help Farmers Help the Environment

----------------------

***************************  
Action Network from Environmental Defense
finding the ways that work
***************************

While Congress concludes negotiations on the new Farm
Bill, Senate leaders are calling for far less money
than is needed to adequately support the voluntary
conservation programs. These programs help farmers
protect land, water and wildlife. Environmental Defense
and other conservation organizations believe that effective
federal conservation programs require $21.3 billion
over 5 years - or $4.4 billion annually -to meet the
needs of the backlog of farmers who request this assistance.
Instead, Senator Daschle is supporting only $3.7 billion
annually.  

Take action! Urge Senator Daschle to support fully
fundeding critical farm conservation programs as Congress
negotiates differences between the Senate and House
Farm bills.

MORE:
Since last fall, over 100,000 Environmental Defense
Action Network members have sent messages to Congress
in support of reforming federal farm programs. Such
reforms would make more money available to farmers
for voluntary conservation programs.  

Seventy percent of the American landscape is farmland,
ranchland or private forest, and the Farm Bill presents
the only opportunity for Congress to reward farmers
who act to help the environment. Farm Bill conservation
programs provide farmers with tools to address many
of the nation's most pressing environmental challenges
-- poor water quality, habitat loss, and sprawl.

The Farm Bill also creates a chance to reform farm
programs to meet the economic needs of all farmers
and all regions. Today, only 40 percent of America's
farmers are eligible to receive USDA subsidies that
mainly support production of feed grains, rice and
cotton in a handful of states. Most of these subsidies
are concentrated in the hands of the nation's largest
farmers so that many large farm states receive only
a tiny fraction of annual USDA spending.  

In contrast, conservation payments flow to all ALL
farmers and all ALL regions. Unfortunately, most farmers
who seek USDA financial assistance for restoration
and conservation efforts are turned down rejected due
to inadequate funding. Congress must include $21.3
billion in new funds to make conservation the centerpiece
of the new farm bill, as Senate Agriculture Committee
Chairman Tom Harkin has pledged.  

Urge Senator Daschle to strengthen funding for conservation
programs in the new Farm Bill. By making conservation
the centerpiece of the next Farm Bill, Congress can
reward farmers when they help the environment, while
addressing the income needs of all farmers and all
regions.  

To learn more about Environmental Defense's efforts
to reform federal farm conservation programs, visit
http://www.environmentaldefense.org/system/templates/page/issue.cfm?subnav=4

For more information, contact Scott Faber at sfaber@environmentaldefense.org.

----------------------

INSTRUCTIONS TO RESPOND VIA THE WEB:
If you have access to a web browser, you can take action
on this alert by going to the following URL:

http://actionnetwork.org/campaign/dfb/wk8bxn4978x3dk  

INSTRUCTIONS TO RESPOND VIA EMAIL:
Just choose the "reply to sender" option on your email
program, and edit the letter below as you wish. Do
not delete "-YOU MAY EDIT THE LETTER BELOW-" and "-END
OF LETTER-". Please do not add your name and address
to your letter. Our system automatically does this
for you.  

We STRONGLY encourage you to make edits directly to
our sample letter below, and put the alert talking
points into your own words. An individualized letter
is worth ten computer generated letters. Of course,
hundreds of unedited letters will still create a large
impact, so please reply even if you don't have time
to personalize the letter.

Your letter will be addressed and sent to:
Senator Tom Daschle


-------YOU MAY EDIT THE LETTER BELOW---------

I strongly oppose efforts to reduce new USDA conservation
funding below $21.3 billion, and I urge you to focus
new conservation funding on proven initiatives like
the Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program, Wetland Reserve
Program and the Farmland Protection Program.

The Farm Bill will be the only chance Congress has
to reward farmers when they take steps to help the
environment. Where 70 percent of the American landscape
is farmland, ranchland or private forest, the environmental
significance of Farm Bill conservation programs is
clear. Unless we provide farmers with adequate tools,
many of the nation's most pressing environmental challenges
-- poor water quality, habitat loss, and sprawl --
will be unmet.  

The Farm Bill also creates a chance to reform farm
programs to meet the economic needs of all farmers
and all regions. Today, only 40 percent of America's
farmers are eligible to receive the vast majority of
USDA farm subsidy payments, and most of these subsidies
are concentrated in the hands of the nation's largest
farmers. Consequently, many large farm states receive
a tiny fraction of annual USDA spending.  

In contrast, conservation payments flow to all farmers
and all regions. Unfortunately, most farmers who seek
USDA financial assistance for restoration and conservation
efforts are turned down away rejected due to inadequate
funding. Congress must include $21.3 billion in new
funds to make conservation the centerpiece of the new
farm bill, as Senator Agriculture Committee Chairman
Tom Harkin has pledged.  

Farmers who are willing to do their part to help the
environment cannot be expected to shoulder the burden
alone. By making conservation the centerpiece of the
next Farm Bill, Congress can reward farmers when they
help the environment and help the income needs of all
farmers and all regions.  

-------END OF LETTER-------------------------

March 11-17, 2002

As long as the sun keeps shining the
"Positive Energy" keeps flowing.  Time for Greenpeace's
CLEAN ENERGY NOW! Campaign weekly update.

+++ CLEAN ENERGY NOW! WEBSITE UPDATE: CHECK OUT NEW 2002
CAMPAIGNS!!! +++
The website for Clean Energy Now! has recently been
updated to better inform you about our current goals.  
Find out about some of our campaigns currently underway -  
including: a San Diego bond initiative for solar power;
clean energy goals for buildings in the University of
California system; impeding Sempra's exploitation of
Mexico; and opposing investments by Edison International
in coal-fired power plants in Thailand.  Stop by our
website at http://www.cleanenergynow.org

+++ GREENPEACE ACTIVISTS SEND CLEAR MESSAGE TO CANADA'S
FEDERAL MINISTERS +++
On March 13, Greenpeace activists scaled the Vancouver
Convention and Exhibition Center to address a massive
contradiction in government policy.  "[Environment]
Minister Anderson says Canada wants to ratify Kyoto, while
at the same time [natural resources minister] Dhaliwal says
offshore oil drilling could be an option in BC" explained
Gavin Edwards, a Greenpeace campaigner.  A banner reading
"Keep Kyoto.  No offshore drilling" flew on top of the
Convention Center as an international group of ministers,
industry and renewable energy experts attended Globe 2002,
an environment and energy conference.

To read more click, go to: http://www.greenpeace.ca/e/index.html.

+++ WIND POWER RISES OUT OF A SLUMP +++
The U.S. wind power industry received some good news
this Monday, receiving a two-year extension of a key
federal tax credit after months of delay. The extension
of the wind energy Production Tax Credit, a crucial factor
in financing new wind power projects, should re-kindle the
momentum in the wind power industry.  Unfortunately, the
lack of a consistent US policy for wind energy has already
hurt its growth with delays in project development.  A
repeat of last year's record growth is not likely.  In
2001, 1,700 megawatts of new wind generation equipment
worth $1.7 billion was installed in the US, more than
double the previous record year of 1999.  American Wind
Energy Association projects that wind will provide 6% of
the nation's electricity by 2020; the percentage might
sound low, unless you consider that currently less than
0.5% of the nation's electricity is provided by wind power.

Check out Reuters for the full story:
http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=search&StoryID=687014.

---------------------------------
The "Positive Energy" newsletter and our website,
http://www.cleanenergynow.org, will give you good news about ways to achieve clean air, climate justice, and renewable energy solutions to our ongoing energy crisis

To: All Activists
From: Steve Holmer
Date: March 18, 2002

Subject: Calendar of Upcoming Events

For a complete list of upcoming events please see
http://www.americanlands.org/forestweb/calendar.htm


Congressional Recess March 25 - April 5

Congress will be out of session from March 25 - April 5.  This is an
excellent time to meet with your Representative and Senators to discuss
your forest protection priorities.  With the roadless area conservation
rule under attack and roadless legislation likely to be introduced in
Congress this year, now is a particularly good time to ask your elected
officials to support legislation protecting National Forest roadless
areas.  

Please contact me with any feedback from these meetings so we can keep
track of where your elected officials stand on our issues.  For
additional information about meeting with lawmakers over the
congressional recess, please contact me at 202/547- 9105 or
mailto:wafcdc@americanlands.org    Thanks.


Buffalo Stampede on Washington DC April 4

Activists from the Buffalo Field Campaign, Fund for Animals, the
Endangered Species Coalition and the Humane Society are converging on
Washington April 4 to protest the ongoing slaughter of Yellowstone bison
and to demand that the agencies stop ignoring the public's will and
implement a plan to protect the bison.  There will be a rally at the
Department of Agriculture beginning at noon.  Please contact The Fund
for Animals for more information at 301/585-2591,
mailto:bfc@wildrockies.org or see http://www.wildbison.org


Labor and Environment Alliance Meeting April 6-7 - Portland, Oregon

The third annual membership meeting of the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs
and the Environment (ASJE) will be held on Saturday and Sunday, April
6-7, at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon.  The weekend's
activities will be focused on building cooperation between labor and
environmental activists through presentations and discussions on
economic globalization, toxics, energy policies, economic recovery,
corporate accountability, and more.   Hands-on workshops will also cover
the culture of the labor and environmental movements, skills
development, and building "blue-green" relationships at the community
level.  Please see http://www.asje.org for more information on ASJE and
the annual meeting.


Staples National Day of Action April 11

In recent years Staples has became one of the largest and fastest
growing forest destroyers in the world.  No other industry consumes as
much wood as the paper industry, and few companies have been built
around destructive paper products like Staples.  It's time to end the
destruction, and turn Staples and their paper industry buddies into
sustainable companies.

We've recently seen the power of grassroots action.  Last month, Staples
announced it would begin selling a tree free paper (90% post consumer
recycled, 10% hemp/flax) in over 1000 stores this Spring.  Activists
across the country deserve huge credit for creating the pressure for
change at Staples.

However, Staples needs to make a long-term commitment to our forests --
real change that goes to the core of their business, not efforts that
could be canceled any day.  Most importantly, Staples needs to agree to
the Paper Campaign's Demands: stop selling paper from ancient forests
and U.S. public lands, increase the average post-consumer recycled
content of their paper to 50% and to stop selling products that are 100%
virgin fiber. There lies true environmental stewardship and
sustainability.

On April 11th grab your friends, head to your local Staples store and
let them know that getting over 90% of their paper from trees is not
acceptable.  We need your help! With over 12,000 square miles of forests
heading into pulp mills each year, Staples needs to stop selling our
forests.

Last November, grassroots activists organized over 200 actions across
the country, making it one of the largest protests ever against
corporate forest destruction. If you organized an action in November,
it's time to crank it up a notch. If you didn't, come and join the fun!  
Who wants to be on the sidelines as we win one of the biggest victories
for the forests yet?

For more information, materials, and to let us know you re getting
involved contact:

ForestEthics: mailto:paper@forestethics.org, toll-free 1-866-FEthics
Dogwood Alliance: mailto:kelly@dogwoodalliance.org, 828-251-2053
Free the Planet!: mailto:michelle@freetheplanet.org, 202-547-3656

Eastern Forests Direct Action Camp, May 28 - June 3, Southern Indiana

The National Forest Protection Alliance, Katuah Earth First!, the
Dogwood Alliance, Heartwood, Buckeye Forest Council, and Southern
Appalachian Biodiversity Project are inviting all activists, forest
dwellers, concerned citizens, and others ready and willing to act on
behalf of our forests are invited to attend.  We want to focus on
evolving non-violent direct action tactics.

We are looking for folks from the Northwoods (Great Lakes and New
England), Central Appalachia, Southern Appalachia (Katuah!), the Great
Coastal Swamps, the Piedmont, the Pine Barrens, the Allegheny Plateau,
the Ozarks and the Midwest to join us in southern Indiana as we share
skills, techniques and ideas for defending our forests.  We will be
offering workshops in:  Nonviolence, Climbing, Blockades, Organizing,
Medic Training, Security Culture, Market Campaigns, Forest Watch, Media,
Legal, Street Theatre, Banner Making, and more.  

Please Note:  YOU MUST APPLY TO ATTEND!  For more information contact:  
Susan Curry, Eastern Field Coordinator, National Forest Protection
Alliance, 434-971-5990, 434-970-1806 fax
mailto:scurry@firstva.com, http://www.forestadvocate.org

Steve Holmer
Campaign Coordinator
American Lands
726 7th Street SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
202/547-9105
202/547-9213 fax
mailto:wafcdc@americanlands.org
http://www.americanlands.org

For Immediate Release: March 19, 2002

Contacts:  Brian Vincent, American Lands, 202/547-9098    
Michael Finkelstein, Alaska Rainforest Campaign, 202/550-5613
Gary Macfarlane, Friends of the Clearwater, 208-882-9755

BUSH ADMINISTRATION TAKES WRECKING BALL TO ROADLESS AREA PROTECTIONS

Washington, D.C. - The American Lands Alliance sharply criticized the
Bush Administration today for systematically undermining a plan intended
to protect roadless areas on National Forests.  The roadless area
conservation rule, signed by President Clinton in January 2001, had
banned logging, roadbuilding, and other development activities in nearly
60 million acres of the nation's most wild forests.  Unfortunately, the
Bush White House has worked aggressively to erode that policy, first by
delaying implementation of the rule then issuing directives that have
essentially dismantled the plan.   As a result, timber sales and other
destructive projects are now moving forward, including projects in
Alaska, California, Colorado, Idaho, and other states around the nation.
American Lands called on the Administration to keep its promise to
uphold the roadless rule and to immediately cancel all roadless area
timber sales and projects.

"The Bush Administration has taken a wrecking ball to the roadless area
policy," said Brian Vincent of the American Lands Alliance.  "And the
Forest Service has wasted no time in readying its demolition crew to
level the last of our nation's most wild, untouched forests."

The Forest Service spent three years writing a policy to spare roadless
areas in National Forests from logging, mining, and roadbuilding.  The
agency held 600 public meetings and received 1.6 million comments, which
supported the policy by more than 95 percent.  Despite such an open and
extensive planning process, unprecedented public participation and
support, the Administration claims there wasn't adequate public process.     

"Last May Secretary of Agriculture Anne Veneman promised to support the
roadless rule and earlier last spring Attorney General John Ashcroft
pledged that he would enforce the policy," said Randi Spivak, Executive
Director of American Lands.  "Since then the Administration has broken
both of these promises by undermining the rule and failing to defend the
policy in court when it was challenged by the timber industry."   

Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth has issued a series of directives
that have eviscerated the roadless conservation rule.  For example, the
Chief has eliminated the requirement that there must be a "compelling
need" to build roads in roadless areas; given the Forest Service added
discretion to determine if an environmental impact statement and thereby
weakening protections for roadless areas.

Meanwhile, the Forest Service is preparing destructive projects
throughout the country.  For example, the agency is planning to log 33
roadless areas in Alaska's Tongass National Forest.  The Service is in
the final process on two of the most controversial sales on the Tongass,
the Gravina Island and Threemile sales.  Over the next five years, the
agency plans to cut as much as 1.3 billion board feet of timber from
sensitive areas of the Tongass.   In addition, the Forest Service has
proposed salvage logging in the Duncan Canyon roadless area in
California's Tahoe National Forest.  In Idaho, the Forest Service is
planning to log roadless areas on the Nez Perce and Clearwater National
Forests.  (See attached list for summaries of some of the roadless area
sales and projects from around the country.)

"Its ridiculous - the Bush Administration continues to spend millions of
taxpayer dollars to cut pristine roadless areas of the Tongass," stated
Michael Finkelstein, Campaign Manager for the Alaska Rainforest
Campaign.  "The Bush Administration should listen to the American people
and embrace the Roadless Rule."
ROADLESS AREAS AT RISK

Below are examples of timber sales in roadless areas.  This list
represents only a small sample of the many projects the U.S. Forest
Service is planning.  The conservation community is compiling a
comprehensive list of projects that will be available in the next
several weeks.  We thought this short list would assist you with any
stories you are writing about the roadless area policy.

ALASKA - See http://www.americanlands.org/bush_attacks_on_roadless.htm
for a facthseet on 33 roadless sales on the Tongass National Forest
(scroll down to Alaska).

CALIFORNIA
Duncan Canyon Roadless Area, Tahoe National Forest
Last summer a wildfire swept through part of Duncan Canyon, leaving
large areas completely burned, and other areas with little damage.  As a
result the Forest Service has begun to create a "restoration" plan.  
Among other actions, the Forest Service is proposing to use commercial
helicopter logging to remove large fire-killed trees from over 1,000
acres of the Duncan Canyon Roadless Area.  The rationale for this action
is purely to obtain revenue to use to restore the forest.  This project
is in clear violation of the roadless rule.  The Tahoe National Forest,
east of Sacramento and west of Lake Tahoe, has the second lowest percent
of designated wilderness of all 17 California National Forests.  Most of
the wildness remnants left in the Tahoe are found within remaining
roadless areas.  Duncan Canyon roadless area is one of the area's
jewels.  Blessed with ancient forests and numerous rare old growth
dependent species, including California spotted owl and northern
goshawk.  The area also is suitable habitat for Pacific fisher and
American pine marten.

Contact:  Ed Pandolfino, Sierra Foothills Audubon Society, (916)
652-7315

COLORADO
Salt Creek and Priest Mountain Roadless Areas, Grand
Mesa-Uncompahgre-Gunnison National Forest  
Salt Creek and Priest Mountain Roadless Areas are located in the Sheep
Flats area on the northwest portion of the Grand Mesa, which has no
designated wilderness and very few remaining roadless areas left. The
Sheep Flats area is dominated by old-growth Englemann spruce/subalpine
fir and aspen forests as well as meadows, wetlands, and riparian areas,
which provide historic habitat for many rare and declining species,
including lynx, boreal toad, northern leopard frog, and Colorado river
cutthroat trout.  The large and robust old-growth systems in the Sheep
Flats area are poorly represented within the larger landscape area, and
should be left intact to maintain adequate old growth habitat for
species like lynx, marten, wolverine and goshawk across the landscape.  
The Forest Service has proposed logging within these roadless areas.  
The Sheep Flats Timber Sale originally included four smaller timber
sales. The GMUG approved Phase I of Sheep Flats in October 2001, which
consists of one timber sale outside roadless area boundaries.  The
remaining three Sheep Flats timber sales (the Grove Creek, Valley View
and Leon timber sales) would log nearly 11 million board feet and almost
three square miles of forest within the Salt Creek and Priest Mountain
Roadless Areas, bulldozing 15 miles of new roads.  Some of the most
pristine parts of these roadless areas would be destroyed in the timber
sale, as would over 1,600 acres of old-growth forest.

Contact:  Harlin Savage, American Lands Alliance, 303/473-9525,
hscolorado@indra.com

IDAHO
Mallard/Larkins, Siwash, and Pot Mountain Roadless Areas, Clearwater
River Basin.
The Middle Black project areas includes parts of three roadless areas,
Mallard/Larkins, Siwash, and Pot Mountain all in the Clearwater River
Basin.  The Clearwater Basin includes 6 million acres with four roadless
areas over 200,000 acres each in size.  This is one of the most
important wildland areas left in the lower 48 states.   This pilot
stewardship proposal would cut 7,500 acres total, with 6,500 acres
within three roadless areas.  The biological diversity and the richness
of the area makes this priceless in terms of natural resource values.  
Wolves, elk, moose, goshawks, lynx, bull trout and wolverines are just
some of the wildlife in the area.  This area includes low level inland
rainforests that are rapidly declining in the U.S.

Contact:  Gary Macfarlane, Friends of the Clearwater, 208-882-9755,
gary@wildrockies.org

Steve Holmer
Campaign Coordinator
American Lands
726 7th Street SE
Washington, D.C. 20003
202/547-9105
202/547-9213 fax
mailto:wafcdc@americanlands.org
http://www.americanlands.org

Dump Destructive Energy Plan   

Click here to take action!

IN THIS POST :

1. EMERGENCY COLOMBIA NATIONAL CALL-IN DAYS: March 19-21st : Don’t Let
Bush Lift Human Rights Restrictions on U.S. Aid to Colombia!
2. Come to the Colombia Mobilization in DC April 19-22!
3. LA Times: A Colombian Town Caught in a Cross-Fire – OXY’s Role in the
Imfamous Santo domingo Massace

* * * * *

The slippery slope of US involvement in Colombia is about to get slicker
and deadlier as the Bush administration asks Congress sometime THIS WEEK
to remove restrictions on US military aid to Colombia.  This disturbing
news isn’t mission creep--it’s mission gallop.  Remember when US
military involvement in Colombia was supposed to be about the  ‘war on
drugs’?  Good thing the Bush administration has switched rationales
because recent studies have revealed that Colombia’s coca production has
actually INCREASED 25% since Plan Colombia was implemented.   

If it wasn’t already clear that the main addiction US policy makers are
concerned about in Colombia is America’s fossil fuel addiction then
Bush’s $98 million package to further militarize OXY’s Cano Limon
pipeline should have clarified the real agenda.  Now with this latest
Bush initiative to remove the last remaining restrictions against deeper
US military involvement in counter-insurgency, (against what Washington
now labels “narco-terrorists”) US policy is at the point of no return.  

The latest proposal would mean: no more constraints that military aid
must only be used for counter-narcotics, no more human rights conditions
for the Colombian military, and no more limits on the number of US
military personnel allowed in the country.  This proposal would allow US
money and intelligence to be used for counter-insurgency and would
worsen Colombia already escalating Civil War.   See the Washington Post
article for more background:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29575-2002Mar14.html  
Check out the action alert below to see how you can help stop further US
military involvement in Colombia.  

Colombia’s state oil company, Ecopetrol has taken advantage of  the US
green light for war-mongering  to push a new wave of oil exploration.  
Ecopetrol announced last week that work on NEW EXPLORATORY WELLS IN THE
SIRIRI AND CAPACHOS BLOCKS WILL BEGIN IN 90 DAYS!  The entire Siriri
block falls on U’wa homeland, where last July OXY spent $60 million
looking for oil at the Gibralter 1 test well to no avail.  The Spanish
company Repsol-YPF has already announced results from a test well on the
southern corner of U’wa land which may proceed towards full scale
production soon.

What does it all mean for the U’wa? Tragically, what the U’wa have
always warned—that new oil exploitation in the areas around their
ancestral homeland will bring the violence of Colombia’s civil war to
their doorstep—is rapidly becoming a reality.  The Bush policy shift
towards counter-insurgency combined with the new oil push on U’wa land
are setting the stage for a very dangerous confrontation.  As the U’wa
continue their absolute and non-violent opposition to any oil drilling
on their land, they need the support of activists in the U.S. and around
the world more than ever!

Don’t let the U’wa lands and culture be the next collatoral damage in
Bush’s “War on Terror”.  Stop Bush’s oil war now!

To support the U’wa struggle for survival and the efforts to end U.S.
military aid to Colombia contact Kevin Koenig at Amazon Watch at
510-419-0617 or kevin@amazonwatch.org.  

* * * * *


1. MAJOR SHIFT IN US POLICY TOWARD COLOMBIA PROPOSED!!!
COLOMBIA MOBILIZATION EMERGENCY NATIONAL CALL-IN DAYS: March 19-21st

What we have feared is now becoming reality.  We must all participate in
a major, national response against the Bush administration’s new
proposal to lift restrictions on US aid to Colombia and allow for
US-sponsored counter-insurgency in Colombia (details and talking points
below).  

ACTION
Tuesday, March 19th- Thursday, March 21st have been designated EMERGENCY
NATIONAL CALL-IN DAYS by Witness for Peace and the Colombia
Mobilization.  Every single Senator and Representative must be flooded
with calls and faxes: saying NO to Bush’s proposal to lift restrictions
and YES to the McGovern Dear Colleague letter (talking points below).  
1.      Send this alert to everyone you know.
2.      Call your Senators and Representative on Tuesday (or as       
soon as you receive this).  Even if your Senators/Reps are strong on
this issue, they need your support right now!
3.      Have all your friends and family call on Wednesday.
4.      Make sure all their friends and family call on Thursday.
5.      Anything else you can think of!  E.g. take some cell phones to
the local grocery store or mall, set up a table, and ask people walking
by to make calls or sign letters that you then fax in.
Congressional switchboard: 202-224-3121.  Find out your Rep:
www.house.gov/writerep and Senators www.senate.gov.

BACKGROUND
The Bush administration plans to ask Congress sometime the week of March
18 to remove restrictions on US military aid to Colombia.  This would
mean: no more constraints that military aid must only be used for
counter-narcotics, no more human rights conditions for the Colombian
military, and no more limits on the number of US military personnel
allowed in the country.  This proposal would allow US money and
intelligence to be used for counter-insurgency.  See today’s Washington
Post article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29575-2002Mar14.html

This language will be included in a larger bill that the administration
expects to submit to Congress next week asking for additional funds for
global and domestic anti-terrorism efforts.  This bill will go first to
the appropriations committees in the House and Senate and then to the
full House and Senate.

TALKING POINTS
Many members of Congress have good intentions, and want to support an
end to violence in Colombia.  But adding more military aid is not the
way to do it.  Tell your Senators and Representative that you and
members of your community are against US military involvement in
Colombia and are particularly against this expansion.

1. Representative Jim McGovern will be circulating a Dear Colleague
against the new Bush proposal to lift restrictions.  Ask your
Representative to sign on to that Dear Colleague ASAP.

2. Sending more military aid to Colombia is not going to help protect
civilians.  The Colombian military still maintains close ties with
paramilitary groups, who are on the US terrorist list and who commit
upwards of 70% of civilian killings in Colombia.  Human Rights Watch,
Amnesty International, and the Washington Office on Latin America
released a report in February proving the human rights situation in
Colombia is EVEN WORSE than a year ago.  

3. Sending military aid to Colombia brings the US into another Vietnam
quagmire.  Colombia is the size of 53 El Salvadors, and the amount of
money necessary to defeat the FARC militarily will be tremendous, and
perhaps incalculable.  This civil war has been going on for over
40-years and a political solution is the only way out.  

4. Real solutions.  US support for a negotiated peace process with the
FARC and the ELN, and real pressure on the Colombian government to break
ties with the paramilitaries, will go much further at protecting
civilians than increased military aid will.  Violent actions on the part
of the FARC have a tremendous human cost, but supporting a military that
collaborates with the paramilitaries has a huge human cost as well.

*** GET READY!!!  The Colombia Mobilization starts in one month and is
obviously more important than ever!  This is our best chance to really
show Washington that we oppose continued and increased military aid to
Colombia.  Start getting ready by checking out
www.colombiamobilization.org.


* * * * *
2. JOIN the National Mobilization on Colombia - April 19-22, 2002
Washington, DC (www.colombiamobilization.org)

4/19: School of the Americas Watch (SOAW)Vigil & Lobby Action at the
Capitol
4/20: Colombia Teach-In: Workshops, Strategy Caucuses, Skills &
Nonviolence Training
4/21: Rally, Action Planning, Nonviolence Training
4/22: Colombia Solidarity March & Nonviolent Direct Action

US military aid to Colombia over the last couple of years has violently
inflamed a 40-year-old civil war and poisoned the people and
biodiversity of the Amazon River basin, without reducing the supply or
abuse of illegal drugs in the US one bit. NOW, hawks in Washington want
to increase and expand US involvement in Colombia to direct
counter-insurgency and corporate protection. We can- and must- act to
change these policies! This April we will meet and share, protest and
lobby, reflect and march.  

The National Mobilization on Colombia is a coalition of over 60
organizations and thousands of individuals working to transform US
policy toward Colombia and the Andean region.  

Workshops, Teach-ins, and Panel discussions on:
Labor, Peace process, Women's issues, Afro-colombian, Indigenous/oil,
Refugees and displaced, Plan Colombia connections to FTAA/Plan Puebla
Panama, World Bank/IMF and debt, Nonviolence training, Drug War, War on
Terrorism and Counterinsurgency, Fumigation, Grassroots Media, Human
Rights violations, International Corporate interests

WHAT TO DO IN MARCH!

Start organizing NOW to come to the Mobilization and BRING OTHERS with
you!  The first step is to get an organizing packet at
www.colombiamobilization.org or by calling Witness for Peace at
202-588-1471.  Then…

Promote the Event  SPREAD the WORD!  Post the flyer! E-mail your
networks!

Transportation  It’s never too early to start thinking about how you
will be getting to Washington DC. Many bus and van rental companies are
booked up months in advance.  Call now for reservations.

Sponsor a local Nonviolence Training and Legislative Advocacy Training  
Schedule a training between February and April to prepare your group for
Direct Action and to Lobby effectively. To be connected with a local
trainer or invite a national trainer to your area, contact
elecompte@soaw.org or (202)234-3440.

Where will I stay?  Make arrangements for housing while your group will
be in Washington DC. Check http://www.colombiamobilization.org for some
housing suggestions.

The Colombia Mobilization has the following missions:
1.      We call for an end to U.S. military aid to Colombia and the
Andean region
2.      We call for an end to U.S. funding of counter-narcotic aerial
eradication in Colombia and the Andean region.  
3.      We call for dramatic expansion of drug treatment and prevention
in the United States.  
4.      We call for the United States to support comprehensive
sustainable economic development alternatives throughout the Andean
region, as well as efforts for peace that include the full participation
of civil society.
5.      We call for the United States to help alleviate the conditions
of refugees and those people internally displaced because of the
conflict.
6.      We are committed to nonviolence in our own actions as well as
supporting exclusively nonviolent, negotiated political solutions to the
conflict in Colombia.  We do not support or endorse any armed actor in
the Colombian conflict.

More updates and actions on Colombia can be found at:
www.witnessforpeace.org


* * * * *


3. LA Time: A Colombian Town Caught in a Cross-Fire
See http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-031702swamp.story
for videos, documents, etc.

A Colombian Town Caught in a Cross-Fire
The bombing of Santo Domingo shows how messy U.S. involvement in the
Latin American drug war can be.
By T. CHRISTIAN MILLER
Times Staff Writer

March 17 2002

SANTO DOMINGO, Colombia -- Death came to Santo Domingo as its people
celebrated life.

Villagers were gathering for a street fair that bright December morning,
but a battle had broken out between the Colombian army and leftist
rebels in the nearby jungle.

The villagers heard a military helicopter roar overhead. Seconds later,
an
explosion ripped through this collection of wood huts on the edge of
Colombia's northeastern plain.

Two children were cut down as their grandmother made them breakfast. A
father was eviscerated as his sons watched. A nursing mother was nearly
decapitated, her 3-month-old baby still in her arms.

In all, 11 adults and seven children died in Santo Domingo on Dec. 13,
1998.

On the surface, the attack seems to be another bit of homemade carnage
in Colombia's long, bloody guerrilla war, notable, perhaps, only for the
number of children who died.

But according to Colombian military court records, the U.S. government
helped initiate military operations around Santo Domingo that day, and
two private American companies helped plan and support them.

There is no evidence that the U.S. government or American companies knew
that their aid might lead to the destruction of a village. But more than
three years later, no one has been held accountable for the deaths.
Civilian prosecutors accuse a Colombian air force helicopter crew of
dropping a U.S.-made cluster bomb while supporting the troops engaged in
battle. The military claims that guerrillas accidentally detonated a car
bomb in the town.

The investigation is bogged down in jurisdictional disputes. U.S.
pledges to help have languished.

An examination of the incident by the Los Angeles Times reveals an
alarming picture of the Colombian conflict just as the U.S. prepares to
become more deeply involved.

According to a videotape admitted as evidence in a closed military
tribunal, Colombian court documents and interviews with more than three
dozen military officers, witnesses and experts:

• The events leading to the battle outside Santo Domingo and the
explosion began when a U.S. government surveillance plane detected an
aircraft allegedly carrying weapons for the guerrillas. In doing so, the
plane may have violated rules that restrict American activities in
Colombia to counter-narcotic operations.

• Los Angeles-based Occidental Petroleum, which runs an oil complex 30
miles north of Santo Domingo, provided crucial assistance to the
operation. It supplied, directly or through contractors, troop
transportation, planning facilities and fuel to Colombian military
aircraft, including the helicopter crew accused of dropping the bomb.

• AirScan Inc., a private U.S. company owned by former Air Force
commandos, helped plan and provided surveillance for the attack around
Santo Domingo using a high-tech monitoring plane. The U.S. Coast Guard
is investigating whether the plane was flown by a U.S. military pilot on
active duty. Company employees even suggested targets to the Colombian
helicopter crew that dropped the bomb.

• In a violation of U.S. guidelines, the U.S. military later provided
training to the pilot accused of dropping the bomb, even after a
Colombian prosecutor had charged him with aggravated homicide and
causing personal injury in the Santo Domingo operation.

AirScan officials deny involvement in the incident, saying their plane
was used only to survey Occidental's oil pipeline, and the company is
not accused of any illegal activity. Occidental officials say they
routinely supply nonlethal equipment for military operations in
northeastern Colombia but they could neither confirm nor deny their role
on the day of the explosion.

Regardless, the incident touches on many of the issues that make
Colombia's war so problematic for the United States.

Until now, U.S. involvement was supposed to be black and white: The U.S.
government provided military training and aid to wipe out the vast
fields of coca plants and poppy flowers that produce the majority of
illegal drugs on America's streets.

But leftist rebels have increasingly financed their war with drug
profits, meaning that operations against guerrillas and against
narcotics often blend seamlessly. And since the breakdown of Colombia's
peace process in February, rebels have unleashed a campaign against the
country's infrastructure, including the pipeline that moves Occidental's
oil, bringing private industry ever closer to the war.

The Colombian military brigade that oversaw the operations around Santo
Domingo is in line to receive enhanced training and equipment as part of
the Bush administration's $98-million proposal to help protect oil
facilities in the region.

Events in Santo Domingo also reveal a contradiction in U.S. attitudes.
Even as Washington insists that Colombia vigorously pursue human rights
abuses, it has shown little interest in investigating the possible role
of American citizens.

Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) sponsored amendments to the last two U.S
aid packages to Colombia that require suspension of aid to any military
unit suspected of human rights violations, unless the government is
actively pursuing a case against the accused.

"Three years have passed, and we have yet to see anyone prosecuted for
the needless deaths of 18 people or the flagrant attempts by Colombian
military officers to cover up the crime," said Leahy, now the chairman
of the Foreign Operations subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee.

This is perhaps what is most important to the people of Santo Domingo.
While the war raged around them for years, the town's 200 people mostly
avoided the violence, until Dec. 13, 1998.

Now they are surrounded by it. Early this year, a resident who had been
a key witness against the Colombian military in the case was
assassinated by suspected right-wing paramilitary fighters.

"Nothing can fix what happened," said Margarita Tilano, a 44-year-old
grandmother whose daughter and two grandchildren died in the 1998
attack.  "We want justice, nothing else."

The United States

On Dec. 7, 1998, according to military court records obtained by The
Times, Colombian army intelligence intercepted a scratchy radio
conversation between two commanders of the country's largest rebel army,
the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

Colombian army officers have said that they interpreted the coded
conversation to mean that the FARC high command was sending a small
plane loaded with weapons to land near Santo Domingo. In return for the
weapons, the local rebel commander would hand over 2,200 pounds of
cocaine that his men had recently seized from drug traffickers.

What made the rebel operation particularly important to the Colombian
military was that German Briceño, a top local FARC commander, was
suspected of overseeing it.

Briceño, better known as Grannobles, is the brother of the FARC's
military commander and a vicious, if not adept, leader. Two months after
the Santo Domingo incident, he is believed to have ordered the
kidnapping and killing of three Americans who were working to protect
the rights of indigenous people.

The reported involvement of drugs allowed the Colombian military to call
for help from U.S. Customs P-3 Orion surveillance planes that normally
track clandestine drug flights.

On Dec. 12, at 2:45 p.m., according to court records, a P-3 packed with
high-tech monitoring equipment detected a Cessna 206 heading toward
Santo Domingo.

The Cessna landed north of the village. Men in civilian clothes swarmed
the plane and began unloading boxes.

Within five minutes, the plane was airborne again. The Colombian
military pounced. A company of soldiers from the 18th Brigade was sent
to pursue Grannobles on the ground, while the air force intercepted the
Cessna and forced it to land.

No drugs were found on the plane--not even after prosecutors performed
tests able to detect microscopic traces of cocaine. An internal
Colombian air force control tower log recorded the mission as an attempt
to block an "arms delivery"--there was no mention of narcotics.

Even though it is unclear whether drugs were ever part of the rebels'
operation, current and former U.S. Embassy officials said the United
States was right to aid the mission despite the restrictions limiting
U.S. aid to counter-narcotics operations.

The Cessna was flying from a known drug zone, they said, and they
believe that no drugs were loaded onto the Cessna because the pilot
realized he was being watched.

The search for Grannobles on the ground fared even worse. Helicopters
transporting the 70 soldiers of Dragon Company took heavy fire as they
landed. Then, as the troops fought to cross a bridge about 700 yards
north of Santo Domingo, one soldier was killed and four were wounded.

"We heard [the commander] on the radio. He was desperate. He said,
'They're killing us,' " Lt. Guillermo Olaya, the air force liaison with
the army, said in military court testimony. "Hour after hour, the combat
grew more intense."

Oxy and AirScan

At 9 a.m. the next day, worried air force and army commanders gathered
in a tiny room to plan an operation to rescue Dragon Company, according
to military court testimony and interviews with pilots involved in the
operation.

The location of the meeting was Occidental Petroleum's Cano Limon oil
complex about 30 miles north of Santo Domingo. Occidental has long been
active in Colombia. In 1983, it discovered a billion-barrel oil field.
To develop the site, Occidental and a Spanish oil company with a
minority interest entered into a 50-50 partnership with Colombia's state
oil company, Ecopetrol.

But in discovering oil, Oxy walked into the middle of Colombia's
decades-old internal conflict with two guerrilla armies, the FARC and a
smaller group called the National Liberation Army.

Both made Oxy, its workers and the oil pipeline a target. There have
been more than 900 attacks against the pipeline since 1985.

To stop the attacks, Oxy decided to undertake the unusual mission of
bolstering a foreign military force by strengthening the under-equipped
and underfunded local army unit, the 18th Brigade, current and former
Oxy officials said. In effect, Oxy became the unit's quartermaster.

Oxy or its contractors provided troop transport helicopters, fuel,
uniforms, cars and motorcycles. It even paid for leave tickets and
better rations to improve morale, according to the Oxy officials and
local military commanders.

The company also provided cash to the military, about $150,000 a year,
according to one rough estimate by a top Oxy official. Both the in-kind
and cash aid, a total of about $750,000 a year, was strictly limited to
logistical support. Oxy insisted that its help not be used for arms.

But as a result, the army had more money available to combat the leftist
guerrillas throughout Arauca state, where Santo Domingo is located, as
well as improve security along the pipeline.

The 18th Brigade has been accused of abuses, including cooperation with
violent paramilitary groups in the kidnapping and murder of suspected
guerrilla sympathizers. The recent killing of Angel Riveros, who was a
key witness for the prosecutors in the Santo Domingo attacks, is a case
in point. Local human rights groups say the killers passed through a
military roadblock maintained by the 18th Brigade before the Jan. 24
shooting.  Brigade officials deny responsibility.

"We've had serious problems with the military in Arauca in terms of
human rights and in the way the military deals with paramilitaries,"
said Robin Kirk, a Colombia expert for Human Rights Watch.

Oxy has given classes to military officers on human rights and required
its workers to sign contracts promising to respect international norms.
But it hasn't implemented other steps, such as insisting on an
independent review of the human rights record of the military units they
are supporting.

Oxy officials say they have little control over such matters. They say
relying on the military is better than having their own armed security
service.

"We have military protection because we must have it, because we have no
alternative," said Guimer Dominguez, the president of Oxy's Colombia
operations. "Unfortunately the armed forces are short in some areas, and
in this sense, we give them nonlethal support."

Part of this support, according to interviews and court testimony, was
"Room G" at Oxy's Cano Limon complex, where the military commanders
gathered on the morning of Dec. 13, 1998.

Tucked in a corner of the complex, the room was surrounded by sandbags
and equipped with TV monitors and computers. Room G, according to those
present, served as the planning center for the operation in Santo
Domingo, thanks, in part, to a second U.S. company, an obscure and
low-profile firm called AirScan.

Based in Rockledge, Fla., AirScan came to Colombia in 1997 as a
contractor for Oxy, according to Oxy officials. One of the Colombian
army's deficiencies was that it simply couldn't find the highly mobile
guerrillas.

AirScan owned a fleet of small planes equipped with high-tech monitoring
devices, such as infrared cameras, that could track guerrilla activity
along the pipeline.

The company had a handful of contracts for aerial surveillance and
monitoring, some of them with U.S. Air Force bases such as Vandenberg
and Cape Canaveral.

The founders of AirScan, Walter Holloway and John W. Mansur, both have
backgrounds as air commandos, the Air Force version of Special Forces.
Mansur, 61, the company's chief executive, retired from the Air Force in
1987 as a highly decorated colonel, having served as a military
assistant to the secretary of the Air Force and as the commander of the
Air Force's Eastern Space and Missile Center at Patrick Air Force Base,
near AirScan's headquarters.

Mansur impressed Oxy officials.

The AirScan pilots "were not gung-ho jocks. They were very
professional,"said a former Oxy official. "They were not mercenaries in
the classic sense."

The Switch-Over

The reconnaissance flights didn't stop the guerrillas, who recognized
that being spotted by AirScan didn't mean the army was on its way. They
actually began waving at the AirScan pilots.

Colombian military officials began pressuring Oxy to use AirScan to
conduct intelligence patrols far away from the pipeline, according to
former Oxy and State Department officials.

Toward the middle of 1997, about six months after Oxy's contract with
AirScan began, one top Oxy official approached the U.S. Embassy to ask
what sort of limits should be put on providing intelligence to the
Colombian military. The response was simple: Stick to the pipeline.

"I said, 'Look, you're getting into a dirty area, it's very dangerous,'
"one former State Department official recalled. " 'If you do flights
like mercenaries, then you'll be responsible.' "

To avoid trouble, Oxy officials say, they ended their direct involvement
with AirScan by transferring its contract. Instead of Occidental,
AirScan ended up having a contract with the Colombian air force that was
paid for by Ecopetrol, Oxy's Colombian partner in the pipeline.

For its part, AirScan said it patrolled only the pipeline during the
time of the bombing in Santo Domingo, 30 miles away.

"The focus of AirScan activity was simply pipeline surveillance," Mansur
wrote in a brief statement to The Times. "This was the only activity in
which AirScan crews or aircraft were engaged."

Pilots involved in operations around Santo Domingo disputed that
account, testifying that AirScan played a far larger role that day.

In interviews, pilots also said that AirScan flew missions all over
Arauca, which at 9,000 square miles is about the size of New Hampshire.
It frequently provided intelligence on guerrilla patrols and helped pick
out targets, they said, and even celebrated kills when an air force
pilot successfully blew up a guerrilla squad.

"They would say, 'Good job, you got him,' " said one of the Colombian
military helicopter's crew members who is accused in the Santo Domingo
bombing. In an interview, he said he was on dozens of missions with
American pilots working for AirScan, including one who identified
himself as a Navy SEAL.

AirScan's role became so vital that military forces insisted on a patrol
before almost every battle, according to the crew member. Once, a
low-flying AirScan pilot took ground fire and had to have his fuel tank
replaced when he returned to base.

"If there were confrontations between the army and guerrillas, they were
always there," the crew member said, referring to AirScan. "They were
our eyes."

"They frequently strayed from their missions to help us in operations
against the guerrillas," said another of the accused crew members. "The
plane would go and check and verify [guerrilla] patrols and say, 'Hey,
there are people here.' "

That is exactly what two AirScan crew members did during the Santo
Domingo operation, according to Colombian pilots involved in the
exercise.

The Briefing

The briefing at Oxy's Cano Limon oil complex on the morning of Dec. 13,
1998, was convened so that Colombian military officials from the 18th
Brigade and the air force could figure out how to save Dragon Company,
which had been pinned down since the night before.

Most of the information supplied at the briefing came from AirScan
employees Joe Orta and Charlie Denny, who had been flying since 6:33
a.m. with Colombian air force Capt. Cesar Gomez, according to testimony
and interviews with those present, as well as a flight log obtained by
The Times from military court files.

Gomez was on the AirScan plane to guarantee a Colombian military
presence on a mission flown by Americans. He was also the military's
designated liaison with Oxy, Gomez testified in court.

Although he was supposed to be in control, he testified that he only sat
in the back of the plane and watched the developing operation on a small
monitor.

The AirScan plane, which was flying with Colombian air force markings,
"provided day and night aerial surveillance of [Santo Domingo] and
adjacent villages in support of the counter-guerrilla forces," Orta
wrote in his summary of the Dec. 13 flight.

Orta and Denny used video of the area around Santo Domingo that they had
made earlier in the morning to show nests of guerrilla soldiers to the
Colombian military officers present, according to those who attended the
briefing.

They pointed out guerrillas who they said could be seen in the town,
mingling with civilians, according to one of the accused crew members
present at the briefing.

The AirScan crew never indicated that guerrillas had taken up positions
in the town, but they did suggest attacking a concentration of
guerrillas in a stand of jungle a few hundred meters away, according to
military court testimony and interviews with several pilots present.

After the briefing, Gen. Luis Barbosa, the local army commander, decided
to request air support for a company of troops to land and reinforce
Dragon Company.

"The [AirScan pilots] helped us throughout the operation, taking a
quantity of videos where you could see the town, the movement of the
guerrillas and the movements of the troops," said Olaya, the air force
liaison with the army.

Orta's identity is something of a puzzle. Colombian Foreign Ministry
records show that a man named Barbaro Jose Orta was given a six-month
temporary visa to work in Colombia for AirScan beginning in February
1998. There is no indication that his visa was renewed before December
1998.

U.S. military files also show that in 1998, a man named Barbaro Jose
Orta was an active-duty member of the U.S. Coast Guard's Search and
Rescue team in Miami, assigned to coordinate rescue missions.

A photograph of Orta in those files was picked out of a stack of
photographs by two Colombian military pilots involved in the operation
as the man who called himself "Joe" Orta. And one of Barbaro Jose Orta's
family members, who spoke briefly with The Times, confirmed that Barbaro
Orta usually goes by the name "Joe."

The military records also show that Barbaro Orta was on authorized leave
between Dec. 9 and Dec. 19, 1998. But there is no indication that he
sought permission to work a second job or that he asked permission to go
abroad, both of which were required at the time for active-duty
officers.

Though Barbaro Orta left the service in November 2000, Coast Guard
officials have opened an inquiry into whether Orta was the AirScan
pilot, after being contacted by The Times. Barbaro Orta, still in U.S.
military service as a member of the Puerto Rican Air National Guard, did
not respond to numerous attempts to contact him through his military
postings or through his family.

"If [Barbaro Orta] was on board the aircraft, it was without the
knowledge or authorization of the U.S. Mission in Colombia," said an
embassy official in Colombia.

As for the other American AirScan crewman, neither the Foreign Ministry
nor the Colombian customs agency has a record of anyone named Charlie
Denny entering Colombia.

The Pilot

Once Colombian military commanders gave the go-ahead, Lt. Cesar Romero
and his crew began preparing their Huey helicopter for combat.

Normally, Romero, co-pilot Johan Jimenez and technician Hector Hernandez
flew transport routes, moving food and troops between battles.

But this time, their Huey was mounted with a World War II-era AN-M41
cluster bomb, given to the Colombian military by the United States in
the 1980s, according to Colombian air force officials. Romero, who has
no blemishes on his service record, had twice before dropped such
devices.

The bomb, comprising six bomblets, is mounted on a metal rack. Each
bomblet weighs 20 pounds and is packed with 2.7 pounds of explosives.

The rack attaches to the side of the helicopter. When the target is in
sight, a wire is pulled and the bomb falls out. The individual bomblets
separate, hit the ground, and bounce about an inch and a half high. Then
they explode, sending chunks of metal at 2,800 feet per second in all
directions from a steel coil wrapped around the charge.

The bomb, last used by the U.S. in Vietnam, has an effective diameter of
about 30 yards, meaning anybody within 15 yards of it is likely to be
killed.

About 9:30 a.m., Romero's Huey and four other helicopters, including a
Russian-made MI-17 that military officials say was provided by Oxy
through a contractor--took off for Santo Domingo from Cano Limon. They
carried relief troops, the cluster bomb, Brazilian-made Skyfire rockets
and heavy machine guns.

According to pilots present at the scene and military court records,
they were joined on site by the AirScan plane, which also took off from
Oxy's oil complex and was filming the entire operation. Colombian
military pilots said in court testimony that throughout the day, the
plane and helicopters returned to Cano Limon to refuel and review new
mission plans in Room G.

There is a dispute over the targeting of the cluster bomb. Some say
Romero was supposed to consult with ground troops before dropping it.
But Romero said he talked only with the AirScan pilots and the pilot of
an armed H500 Hughes helicopter also at the scene.

"The coordinates were made directly with the armed helicopters that were
in the area and the Skymaster plane that was crewed by American pilots,"
Romero told a military judge last year. "The troops were communicating
directly with the armed helicopters and the Skymaster."

A Colombian UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter was also airborne. It had been
donated by the U.S. primarily for use in anti-drug missions. It began
firing rockets into the jungle. The Huey pilots have testified that they
heard the AirScan pilots warn the Black Hawk pilot, "Careful, you're
shooting at civilians!"

For his part, Romero said he focused on his target: a thick stand of
jungle 1,000 to 1,200 meters north of Santo Domingo, 200 meters west of
the road where the Cessna had landed the afternoon before.

The Huey circled the area twice to be sure of the target, then Romero
started the countdown: "Three, two, one, now!" he shouted. Hernandez
pulled a steel cable and the bomb fell away.

The Bomb

Neither Romero nor his co-pilot can recall seeing the bomb hit. The
pilots have been consistent with this account for three years.

The only problem: There is no stand of jungle 1,000 to 1,200 meters
north of Santo Domingo, and 200 meters west of the road where the Cessna
landed.  There is only open field.

Santo Domingo is a nothing place, some three dozen wooden shacks hard
against a curve in a two-lane highway. There is no electricity. No
phones.  No running water. Just big sky, open savanna and thick jungle.

Most of the people raise cattle or grow corn. Others have small stores.
The Colombian government has no permanent presence, so FARC guerrillas
move openly through town. Unlike other parts of Colombia, drugs are not
a big part of the economy, though coca is grown and cocaine is produced
in the region. The road where the Cessna touched down is one of the
primary clandestine landing strips.

Once a year, in December, when the crops are harvested and Christmas is
coming, the town holds a two-day street fair to raise money for civic
projects. In 1998, the aim was to put a concrete floor in the two-room
schoolhouse and add doors.

On Dec. 12, family and friends from hamlets throughout the region began
arriving to play in a soccer tournament, watch a beauty contest and eat
barbecue.

But in the afternoon, they began to hear gunfire, then explosions,
coming nearer. Aircraft flew overhead throughout the night, shooting
into the jungle.

Some people decided to stay, fearful they would be caught in the
cross-fire.  Others left. Still others tried to leave but turned back
because of their own fear, or because soldiers stopped them, warning
that it was too dangerous.

The next morning, Dec. 13, the town's community leader and bus driver,
Wilson Garcia, then 44, decided to go to the nearest town that had a
phone, about 15 miles away, to call the Red Cross for help. Before he
left, he told townspeople to wave white rags to show the aircraft above
that they were civilians.

"Just stay calm," he said.

So people remained. There was Nancy Castillo, who'd given birth to a
baby girl just three months before. Salomon Neite, 58, a farmer who was
about to retire and hand over his land to his two sons. Luis Martinez,
25, a soccer fanatic with a wife and child. Edilma Pacheco, 27, was
working at the local store as a clerk. Giovanny Hernandez, 16, had come
from a nearby town for the fair.

When the aircraft appeared about 9:30 a.m., people followed Garcia's
advice.  They began waving white rags above their heads. Some even lay
down on the pavement, hoping to better demonstrate their neutrality.

About 10 a.m., Garcia's daughter Alba, then 16, and many of her friends
were in the street near a broken-down red truck, a 1955 Chevrolet parked
across from the town's drugstore.

They watched as a helicopter came into view, then turned to pass over
Santo Domingo from south to north. As it drew overhead, Alba looked up
and saw about four dark objects falling.

"Look," she said to a friend. "They're throwing rolls of paper at us."

Then, darkness.

Santo Domingo had just been bombed.

A tape of the operation viewed by The Times--identified by those
involved as a tape made by AirScan--does not capture this moment. The
camera is focused on a field less than half a mile away where relief
troops were landing. But the survivors have vivid, slow-motion memories
of what happened.

The front of the red truck was smashed in by a direct hit, its right
front fender falling to the ground. Smoke filled the air. A woman
screamed, "They killed my children!" People began fleeing the town on
foot.

Alba woke to find herself bathed in blood, her arm nearly severed.

Across the street, at the drugstore, Maria Panqueva was knocked flat by
a piece of steel that hit her leg. The woman standing next to her, Nancy
Castillo, was killed while nursing her 3-month-old, the top half of her
head nearly sliced off. The baby was found lying next to her, screaming.

In a nearby house, Margarita Tilano was stunned by the noise. Then she
heard screams. Her daughter, Katherine Cardenas, 7, and granddaughter,
Edna Bello, 5, were dead. Her grandson, Jaime, 4, was wounded and would
die on the way to the hospital.

Down the street from the blast, Amalio Neite, 22, was blown six feet
from where he had been standing. He turned to see his brother holding
his father, Salomon, writhing on the ground, a hand over his abdomen to
keep in his intestines.

Eighteen people died and more than 25 were wounded, some of them
crippled for life. Today, Alba cannot move her left arm above her head.
Its scars resemble the crude stitching on a rag doll.

At the eastern edge of Santo Domingo, Olimpo Cardenas was about 150
yards away with his back to the explosion. When it occurred, he turned
around to see dead and wounded everywhere.

Cardenas jumped on a motorcycle and rode out of town to the home of a
friend who owned a Ford flatbed truck. The two men drove back slowly. At
10:20 a.m. they pulled up in front of the drugstore, where many of the
dead and wounded had been taken.

They loaded up about seven of the victims.

As they left town, they saw another helicopter hovering above them.
About 200 meters, or about 219 yards, away from town, they heard a burst
of gunfire, and saw earth and concrete flinging up next to them. Then
the helicopter flew off.

Cardenas, who had gotten out of the truck, stayed until he was sure
everyone had left town. Then he walked out on foot.

"I was the last one out," he said. "The place was a ghost town."

The Investigation

The dead and wounded began arriving at hospitals in the afternoon. Most
told a similar story: At 10 a.m., a military helicopter had dropped a
bomb on Santo Domingo.

But separate investigations by the Colombian air force and army
concluded that the carnage was not the military's fault. They said that
guerrillas had installed a car bomb inside the red truck, the epicenter
of the damage. They said the plan was to lure Dragon Company into Santo
Domingo, then detonate the bomb. But after troops arrived to reinforce
Dragon Company and save the unit, the bomb went off by mistake, killing
the villagers.

The military said that conclusion was based on both testimony and
forensic proof--both of which were later called into question.

Fragments from the town tested positive for chemicals commonly found in
homemade explosive materials, according to court records. Two FARC
deserters who gave themselves up after the bombing blamed the incident
on their former comrades. Another witness, a local man who reported
seeing the FARC at work on the truck, recently recanted, saying a
military officer from the 18th Brigade had paid him to lie.

Air force officials also said a cluster bomb would have destroyed
structures or left large craters, a puzzling claim since AN-M41s have a
relatively small charge designed to kill people, not destroy buildings.

"I think, and it's only a suspicion . . . that the guerrillas put the
bomb there," Gen. Hector Fabio Velasco, the head of the Colombian air
force, said in an interview last year.

Olaya, the air force's local link to the army, refused to turn over
documents to civilian federal prosecutors when they arrived Dec. 17,
according to military court records.

Velasco continued to insist that no bombs had been used in the
operation, even after air force officials had sent notice to
headquarters about the use of the cluster bomb. Velasco later explained
that the air force classifies cluster bombs as low-power explosives, not
as bombs.

The military's insistence that the combat and the air force bombing
occurred far from town is also in question.

Using a satellite-guided measuring device accurate to within a few
meters, The Times traveled to Santo Domingo several times to measure
distances mentioned in the military's accounts of the incident.

The military has said in interviews and military court testimony that
the fighting began where the Cessna had landed, about 6 kilometers, or a
little more than 3.5 miles, from Santo Domingo.

The actual distance between Santo Domingo and the landing site, based on
the coordinates supplied by the military to the court, is 3 kilometers,
according to a hand-held Global Positioning System that can measure
distances between geographic coordinates.

The pilots indicated on a map that they dropped their bomb in a stand of
jungle 1,000 to 1,200 meters from Santo Domingo, 200 meters west of the
road. But that stand of jungle is at maximum 650 meters away.

As to the testimony of more than 30 survivors, military officials said
they were probably lying--either out of fear or sympathy for the
guerrillas.

Colombian military officials weren't the only ones clouding the story.

Days after the bombing, Leahy fired off a letter from his Senate office
demanding information. Then-Ambassador Curtis Kamman responded with a
detailed note that only further confused matters.

Kamman made no mention of the involvement of the U.S. P-3 plane on the
day before the incident, though he said Colombian air force planes had
done surveillance of the Cessna that landed outside Santo Domingo,
initiating the operation.

He also told Leahy that embassy officials had viewed a five-hour tape of
the incident, which showed that Santo Domingo had remained "intact" at
the time people in the town reported being bombed. The tape "directly
refut[ed]" their claims, he said, and supported the military's story of
a guerrilla car bomb that had exploded at another time.

Kamman said in an interview that he did not know the origin of the tape
and had "no information" on AirScan's involvement in the incident.

But if the tape was the same one viewed by The Times--and there is no
evidence that any other aircraft filmed the operation--it is unclear how
embassy officials missed the wreckage of the red truck and the loading
of bodies on the truck. Both are visible on the tape.

The Breakthrough

By June 1999, almost all the investigations were over or dormant. The
general conclusion: The guerrillas and the people of Santo Domingo had
attempted to pull a fast one, and they had failed.

Still, civilian investigators were not convinced. The first forensic
examinations of Santo Domingo had been done in the days after the
bombing,
when combat was still going on. Two teams of experts had been shot at.
No
team spent more than 90 minutes in the town.

So the investigators--a federal prosecutor and the procuraduria, a sort
of inspector general--requested a more thorough look. Teams went back to
Santo Domingo in June 1999 and February 2000.

In June, they determined that the red truck had been hit from above by
an explosive device. In February, they compared metal fragments that
remained in the town's wooden buildings to fragments of an exploded
AN-M41. The two sets of metal were similar. They also discovered six
craters in and near the town, corresponding with the six bomblets,
according to military court files.

Then, in perhaps the biggest breakthrough, federal prosecutors dug back
through the evidence to find metal fragments taken from the bodies of
two bombing victims.

They sent these fragments, taken from a 42-year-old woman and a
16-year-old boy, to the FBI via the U.S. Embassy. They also sent some of
the fragments they had found in their February hunt.

On May 1, 2000, the FBI produced its report. The fragments were
"consistent" with a U.S.-made AN-M41. One piece had "NO E BOM" stamped
on the side. The phrase "NOSE BOMB FUZE" is printed on AN-M41 cluster
bombs.

The FBI analysis also found that there were no signs that the cluster
bombs had been delivered through an "improvised" delivery system--i.e.,
it had not been modified to be used as a car bomb.

This was enough to convince prosecutors they had a case. They accused
the crew of the Huey of aggravated homicide and aggravated personal
injury, although they left open the question of whether the crew had
bombed the village on purpose or accidentally.

Then, because the act was committed in a military setting, they turned
the case over to the air force to reopen its investigation of the
crew--Romero, Jimenez and Hernandez.

But the military made little progress in the investigation. Velasco, the
air force general, told reporters in Colombia that more than $1 million
had been spent by unknown parties to manipulate evidence to make his
pilots appear responsible.

After nearly a year, fearing that the military was not conducting an
impartial investigation of itself, the civilian prosecutors asked to
regain control. The case has been tied up in jurisdictional wrangling
ever since. The most recent decision places the investigation in the
hands of the military.

"The military was hiding the truth," said one former prosecutor who was
involved with the case. "We knew the investigation wouldn't happen if it
stayed with the military."

Defense lawyers for the men now say they believe that the bomb fragments
were not taken from townspeople, but guerrillas. Under this theory, the
guerrillas were killed after the cluster bomb dropped on them in the
jungle. Their comrades then transported the bodies into Santo Domingo.

They point out that there are no photos of the bodies during the
autopsies, that not much blood was found at the scene and that some of
the bodies arrived nude, perhaps meaning they were stripped to hide
their identity.

"There has been too much international pressure to condemn these men,"
said Ernesto Villamizar, a top Bogota lawyer who represents one of the
pilots. "This is going to be a very long process, and at the end, the
truth will come out that the munitions dropped from this helicopter had
nothing to do with the deaths in Santo Domingo."

Military officials also question whether the fragments analyzed by the
FBI actually came from the explosion in Santo Domingo, citing doubts
over the chain of custody.

"The FBI said, yes, this is a fragment, but that doesn't mean anything,"
Velasco said. "There isn't any proof that these fragments were really
from there."

Despite the charges against him, Romero has advanced in rank to captain.
Jimenez believes that he was denied promotion because of the
investigation.  Nonetheless, both men are now regularly flying combat
missions with the Colombian air force.

Romero continued to receive training in the U.S., despite strict
regulations that prevent instruction when there is even the suspicion of
human rights violations.

The U.S. Embassy said Romero received a refresher flight-simulation
course at Randolph Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, in September
2000--three months after the prosecutor's May ruling ordering an
investigation against him for possibly killing 18 civilians, and only
one month after the military reopened its investigation into the
incident.

Embassy officials said they were unaware of the investigations at the
time of Romero's training. No formal system exists to exchange data
between the embassy and the prosecutor's office on suspected human
rights violators, and embassy officials say there are no plans to
implement one.

An Error?

For all the investigation that has been done, one central question
remains: If the Colombian air force did drop a cluster bomb on Santo
Domingo, was it deliberate or a mistake?

Those who believe the bombing was a war crime point out that visibility
was perfect on Dec. 13, 1998, that the townspeople had clearly signaled
they were civilians, and that at least two helicopter pilots testified
they had seen them.

So even if the pilots believed there were guerrillas in town, they had
to have known that innocent people would be killed if a bomb was
dropped.  Finally, it is difficult to make such a mistake with an
AN-M41, a simple gravity bomb. To have hit Santo Domingo, the bomb had
to have been launched very close to it.

"The military has never said it was an error. If it was a mistake, why
aren't they just admitting it?" said one lawyer monitoring the case who
did not want to be identified because of its sensitivity.

But many of the same facts also argue for the possibility of error.
Romero has always said he dropped the bomb 1,000 to 1,200 meters from
the town. Two other pilots, however, said they believed the bomb was
dropped between 500 and 600 meters from town.

If Romero's helicopter was at the height and speed he said it was, the
bomb would have traveled about 500 meters from where he launched it,
according to an analysis done by the Federation of American Scientists,
using testimony from the case. That means that if Romero was heading in
the direction of the town, something he denies, the bombs easily could
have landed in Santo Domingo.

If it was an error, some believe, the Colombian military is still
culpable.

"There's a pretty fine line between intent and tragic accident," said
David Stahl, a Chicago attorney who is on the advisory board of the
Center for International Human Rights at Northwestern University. "I
think what happened is the Colombian armed forces put themselves in a
situation where a tragic accident was all but certain to happen."

There are still crucial details that could clear up the mystery. For
instance, the Huey pilots said they never flew over Santo Domingo.
Romero said the helicopter was north of the village and flying west. The
co-pilot said they dropped the bomb while heading northwest.

But the pattern of the impacts found by civilian investigators, and the
recollections of survivors, contradicts that testimony.

Survivors say the helicopter that passed over the village just before
the explosion was traveling from south to north. The analysis by the
American scientists indicates the helicopter that dropped the bomb most
likely passed over the town, and was probably headed either northeast or
southwest.

"The key discrepancy is the direction. You can't match [the pilots'
testimony about their direction] with the direction of the bomb," said
Michael Levi, a physicist who did the analysis.

The Americans who worked for AirScan might be able to resolve the
confusion.  But two lawyers involved with the case said AirScan has told
the military court that the men no longer work for the company and that
it has no information on their whereabouts.

Oxy officials, meanwhile, said they have never investigated what role
the company and its facilities might have played. Nonetheless, they
rejected any ties to the disaster.

"We're truly sorry about what happened--though we don't know the
details--but in no way can we feel that we have any responsibility,"
Dominguez said.

Human rights advocates say the U.S. government is duty-bound to conduct
its own investigation into the role played by Orta and Denny.

So far, the U.S. has not done that. After being asked by the
procuraduria's office, embassy officials in Bogota checked their records
and found that one of the men had registered his U.S. home address with
the embassy during a stay in Colombia. They refused to turn over that
information to Colombian authorities.

Embassy officials said they are prevented by the Privacy Act from
releasing any information. But, they said, if they receive a request
from the prosecutor's office, which currently does not have jurisdiction
over the case, they might be able to help by working through existing
treaties.

At least one State Department official has expressed reluctance to
pursue the U.S. pilots. "Our job is to protect Americans, not
investigate Americans," one human rights group quoted the official as
saying.

Nor has the embassy made much progress with promises it has made to have
a copy of the tape its diplomats viewed independently analyzed. In 1998,
Kamman said the tape he had seen would be reviewed for further analysis.
Current Ambassador Anne W. Patterson made that same promise in a letter
to Leahy in July 2001.

Human rights groups find it strange that the United States, which has
urged Colombia for years to investigate possible human rights
violations, is not doing the same.

"If the U.S. government is serious about promoting human rights, we
think they have the legal duty to seriously investigate human rights
violations,"  Stahl said. "So far, we've been disappointed."

Northwestern's human rights center staged a mock trial of the Santo
Domingo incident in 2000. They found the Colombian government
responsible for the bombing.

Conclusion

For most of the three years since the bombing, the people of Santo
Domingo were seen as liars, leftist sympathizers or guerrillas. It was
only in recent years that some government officials came to believe
them.

The tape proved to be an asset for them. The times and events recounted
by the townspeople--who never saw the tape until recently and could not
have known what it contained--are consistent with what the tape shows.
The tape does show people with white material above their heads or in
white clothing wandering the streets during the morning. The red truck
does suffer damage between 9:45 and 10:10 a.m. And people can be seen
loading what appear to be bodies onto a truck about 10:30 a.m.

To be sure, there are inconsistencies among the more than two dozen
witnesses. Some say the bomb that struck Santo Domingo left a trail of
smoke--an accurate description of the Skyfire rockets that other
helicopters were firing at the guerrillas.

The tape does not corroborate the account of machine-gun bursts from a
helicopter as the injured fled town in the flatbed truck. Though there
are small holes in the road where the people said the helicopter fired
at them, the video does not show the truck driver swerving, nor dirt or
concrete being kicked up.

In December, the town held a ceremony to commemorate the third
anniversary.  There was a small parade, and one of the judges of the
informal tribunal at Northwestern University flew in from Chicago.
Victims and human rights workers gave speeches in the main square of
Tame, the biggest nearby town.

Some families have split over the stress of lost children, shattered
lives and the fight for recognition. Margarita Tilano and Olimpo
Cardenas separated, for example, and now live in different towns.

Nancy Castillo's husband left soon after her death, and her baby girl,
now 3, is being cared for by relatives. Alba Garcia lives with her
grandmother in a nearby town.

Most of those who remain in Santo Domingo dismiss the investigations. A
civil suit is inching along, filed by 24 of the families. The average
claim seeks damages of $5,000. The biggest is for $43,000.

"We want there to be justice, for sure," said Maria Panqueva, the
drugstore owner. "But we have lost the most beautiful thing we had: the
trust in what's right."

Still others are worried about the future. For three years now, the
people of Santo Domingo have challenged the Colombian military.

That sort of defiance may be enough to make them targets of Colombia's
violent paramilitary groups, which have recently moved into Arauca,
allegedly with the support of local military officers.

The groups are known for the massacres of civilians they accuse of being
rebel sympathizers. So far, Santo Domingo has not been touched. But in
the surrounding area, more than 60 people have been killed by
paramilitary fighters since August, allegedly including Riveros, the
witness, and a congressional representative.

Those who remain in Santo Domingo worry about what nightmares may come.

"I have talked and talked and talked and talked. I have talked to
investigators, to the military, to the press, to human rights groups.
And I have told everyone the same thing," said Tilano, who lost a child
and two grandchildren in the bombing.

"If you want to do justice, do your work well," she said, "so there will
be no more massacres of children, so defenseless people won't be killed,
so they don't shoot at us anymore."
___


Times special correspondents Ruth Morris, Zoe Selsky and Mauricio Hoyos
contributed to this report.

---------------------
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Dear  (your senators' and representative's names will be inserted
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As a citizen concerned about the plight of some of the planet's most
critically threatened animals-tigers, rhinos, elephants, great apes,
and neotropical migratory birds-I urge you to include funding for the
Multinational Species Conservation Fund in your personal request to
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the FY 2003 appropriation include $2 million each for the Asian
Elephant Fund, the African Elephant Fund, and the Great Ape Fund, $3
million for the combined Rhino-Tiger Fund, and $5 million for the
Neotropical Migratory Bird Fund, for a total of $14 million for
international conservation programs.

These funds are urgently needed.  Tiger, rhino, and elephant
populations continue to be threatened by poaching for body parts, and
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state governments to protect their animals.  While some populations of
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tigers are doing better-thanks to the support of Congress-Asian
elephants are still declining in the wild, four of the five species of
rhino are under severe pressure, and fewer than 6,000 wild tigers
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populations of the world's great apes-gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos,
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as endangered or threatened, due to shrinkage of habitat in Latin
America, North America, and the Caribbean.

The Multinational Species Conservation Fund has been extremely
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and in encouraging local and international matching contributions from
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Dear Friend,

As she roams the wilderness, the tiger is the epitome of majesty and grace. She is resilient, doing everything in her power to survive and care for her young. Unbeknownst to her, she is vulnerable, threatened by a clandestine and powerful predator: humans.

Humans have preyed upon tigers for centuries. Nearly every part of this precious animal is believed to have a prescribed benefit, with cures claimed for ailments ranging from epilepsy to laziness. As a result of this trade and other threats, the world's tiger population has plummeted from 100,000 in 1900 to less than 6,000 today. Sadly, every day, this species is pushed even closer to extinction.

Tigers are not the only ones in danger. Elephants, tortoises, exotic birds and millions of other precious animals and plants are illegally bought and sold each year for use in everything from medicine and food products to jewelry and home furnishings.

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A Bi-weekly Update from Defenders of Wildlife: Working to Save Wildlife and Wild Lands

ENERGY POLICY: 'Americans should be outraged' by Senate vote

SHOOT, SHOVEL AND SHUT UP: Idaho considers law to allow killing of wolves

EVERY OTTER MATTERS: Another sea otter killed by gunshot

COMEBACK CROCODILES: Sightings may signal recovery of endangered species

FOREST CATASTROPHE: Global warming could destroy the boreal

ORCA ORPHAN: Scientists look for ways to take baby whale home

SUCCESS STORIES: DEN helps protect Northwest Hawaiian Islands

ADOPT AN ANIMAL: Help save wildlife for Mother's Day

1. ENERGY POLICY: 'Americans should be outraged' by Senate vote In the first in a series of important votes on national energy policy, the Senate acted to please the auto industry by rejecting stronger auto fuel efficiency standards that would have saved oil and reduced pollution. The New York Times wrote, "Americans should be outraged." Click here http://www.defenders.org/newsroom/fuel.html to learn how your senator voted. Now, Big Oil's political allies are turning up the pressure to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. The fate of America's greatest wildlife sanctuary will be decided soon. To make your voice heard in Congress, go to www.SaveArcticRefuge.org. Tell your senators that you won't tolerate destroying this magnificent wilderness and harming wildlife. To learn how Arctic drilling will affect polar bears, click here for our popular animation: www.SaveArcticRefuge.org/video. 2. SHOOT, SHOVEL AND SHUT UP: Idaho considers law to allow killing of wolves Idaho's anti-wolf extremists are pushing a bill in the state legislature to permit killing the endangered animals "when it is reasonable and necessary and done in defense of privately owned property." Defenders of Wildlife fears the vaguely worded legislation would legitimize "shoot-shovel-and-shut-up" vigilantism. Idaho's gray wolves are the beneficiaries of one of the most successful wildlife recovery programs ever. More than 200 now are roaming freely across a panoramic high-mountain landscape. Defenders of Wildlife pays ranchers for livestock lost to wolves. Go to www.savewolves.org to learn more about threats to wolves. 3. EVERY OTTER MATTERS: Another sea otter killed by gunshot www.saveseaotters.org. 4. COMEBACK CROCODILES: Sightings may signal rebound for endangered species In a possible milestone for endangered species, sightings of American crocodiles are increasing in south Florida's waters. Wildlife scientists are optimistic because it could mean that the endangered cousins of the American alligator are making a comeback, thanks to the efforts of conservationists working to preserve the species' dwindling habitat. The decline of crocodiles was once considered all but inevitable. Their population is now estimated at between 400 and 1,000 adults. To read about efforts to save the Everglades, some of the last remaining habitat of the crocodile, click here http://www.defenders.org/wildlife/eglades/everglades.html. 5. FOREST CATASTROPHE: Global warming could destroy the boreal The latest evidence indicates that global warming could lead to the destruction of more than half the world's boreal forests, according to the World Commission on Forests and Sustainable Development. These northern woodlands make up one-third of the Earth's forests, and a winter temperature rise of as little as 5 degrees Fahrenheit could lead to catastrophic fires, droughts and pest infestations, the commission reported. For more on the boreal forest crisis, click here http://www.defenders.org/magazinenew/Summer2001/canada.pdf. 6. ORCA ORPHAN: Scientists look for ways to take baby whale home Scientists are working to save an orphaned baby whale swimming in the Puget Sound. They're considering using a Hovercraft to ferry the whale home to Canada. The 1 ½-year-old orca was born to a pod that returns each summer to the waters around northern Vancouver Island. But its mother died, the rest of the pod rejected the baby, and it showed up alone in Puget Sound last month. Since then, the whale has been following a ferry, rubbing up against logs and capturing Seattle's heart. To learn about threats to whales, go to www.saveourwhales.org. 7. SUCCESS STORIES: DEN helps protect Northwest Hawaiian Islands Thanks to you, the Bush administration has decided not to roll back protections for the coral reefs and wildlife of the unspoiled Northwest Hawaiian Islands. More than 5,000 DEN members sent e-mails in support of saving this underwater wilderness as a marine reserve. The islands contain nearly 70 percent of all coral reefs within U.S. waters and are home to 7,000 marine species, including the critically endangered Hawaiian monk seal. 8. ADOPT AN ANIMAL: Help save wildlife for Mother's Day With Mother's Day coming up, have you started looking for that perfect gift to tell your mother how much you love and appreciate her? Adopt an animal today for your mother and help save imperiled animals for future generations. Adopt an adorable polar bear, wolf pup, sea otter, whale, dolphin, brown or black bear or "Harry Potter" owl today. Click here: http://www.defenders.org/adopt. HAVE A CERTIFICATE OF DEPOSIT COMING DUE? Special rates are available through MBNA America Bank, N.A., for Certificates of Deposit Accounts, Individual Retirement Accounts, and Money Market Deposit Accounts. All have the full protection of FDIC insurance up to $100,000 per depositor. For more information go to: http://www.mbna.com/goldportfolio/rates/defenders or call MBNA toll free at 1-800-900-6653. If you call, please mention priority code HAO6Q so that they know you are a Defenders' supporter entitled to the special rates. Click here to read the new online issue of our magazine: http://www.defenders.org/defendersmag. Learn about Florida's besieged manatees, sea otters taking a nose dive, killer roads and more. CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO DENLINES   DENlines is a bi-weekly update of Defenders of Wildlife, a leading national conservation organization recognized as one of the nation's most progressive advocates for wildlife and its habitat. It is known for its effective leadership on endangered species issues, particularly predators such as brown bears and gray wolves. Defenders also advocates new approaches to wildlife conservation that protect species before they become endangered. Founded in 1947, Defenders is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization with more than 400,000 members and supporters. Defenders of Wildlife 1101 14th Street, N.W. Suite 1400 Washington, DC 20005 Copyright Defenders of Wildlife 2002