Two U.S. Senators Held at Siberian Airport

[Judi Lynn]

Two U.S. Senators Held at Siberian Airport

By JIM HEINTZ
Associated Press Writer

August 28, 2005, 1:07 PM EDT


MOSCOW -- Two U.S. senators visiting sites where weapons of mass destruction are being stored were held for several hours Sunday at a Siberian airport while trying to leave Russia, a U.S. Embassy spokesperson said.

Sens. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., were held at the airport in Perm but allowed to leave after discussions between U.S. and Russian officials, the embassy spokesperson said on condition of anonymity.

Lugar, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Obama spent three days in Russia visiting sites where warheads are stored before destruction under the U.S.-funded Comprehensive Threat Reduction program.

The spokesperson did not have information on the nature of the dispute that resulted in the senators being held. Telephone calls to the Russian border guard service and Foreign Ministry were not answered Sunday evening.
(snip/...)

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-russia-us-senators,0,808863.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines

[Cocoa]

1. they had time to get to know one another

what an odd couple.

[MidwestTransplant]

15. Lugar is not such a bad politician as Republicans go

he is not a NeoCon and is genuinely untested in a foreign policy not driven by ideology.

[MaineDem]

2. Yikes!

An international incident or a misunderstanding? Hmmmm

[Cocoa]

4. misunderstanding

oh, it's Obama! Never mind... :blush:

[dogday]

3. Obama and Luger

Sitting in a tree
Gone to Russia
To See What they
Could See.......

What in the world?

[mbperrin]

5. Little tit for tat over Homeland Security holdups at US airports?

Yes, senators, many ordinary people experience the same thing DAILY here, thanks to you and your colleagues. Don't like it? Change it.

[napi21]

6. I'll be interested in hearing what THIS was all about!

Actually both Luger and Obama seem to be pretty straight forward guys, so I'm sure we'll hear something on Monday.

[donsu]

7. Obama turns up in the oddest places with the oddest people

whose side is he on anyway

[Copperred]

12. wake up

he will end up being fully and totally assimilated.

i said it the day i saw him.........about 3 years ago...

he is no great hope for anybody...but his own career....GO OBAMA!!!

[Cocoa]

18. it's no secret that Obama was going to be bipartisan

it was central in his campaign.

He promised to look beyond the "R" when it comes to matters as important as this.

Go Obama for keeping your campaign promise! :bounce:

[beetbox]

23. Blind Ambition+Political Aspiration

=Sellout

Will fully assimilate with the program, as you stated.

[karynnj]

30. Obama is on the SFRC which Lugar heads

The non-proliferation work is extremely important. When asked in the debates Kerry picked this as the number one issue. Bush then repeated Kerry's answer, but obviously didn't mean it because he's been dragging him feet. The SFRC had a tradition of doing bi-partisan work that seemed at risk this year.

Obama's work on this will help the country. (One of Kerry's first trips was with Lugar to oversee the Philippine elections. It didn't make him a conservative Republican - it did gain him Lugar's respect.)

[donsu]

32. yeah, and smirk told our black ops to bring the Philippine pres. down

and by jove, they have been trying. last I read she is still hanging on and they haven't murdered her yet.

[Cocoa]

17. not odd at all

they went to the places where the loose nukes are.

He went with Lugar because Lugar is the chairman of the Foreign Relations committee, on which Obama sits as well, and because Lugar is a leader in the nonproliferation problem.

What's odd about it?

[Burma Jones]

8. I am so sick and tired of these cushy "missions" that Senators

seem to always be taking to these and other such luxurious locales. What a waste of Taxpayer dollars.....oh wait.....wrong board......

[salin]

16. I wouldn't count this as one of them. Lugar has been working on

nonproliferation issues - with particular concern of the dangers of the old Soviet era Nukes potentially not being accounted for and ending up elsewhere. This is a legitimate issue - and one he has worked on for years. This is not like Abramoff getting a bunch of congressional folks to asian islands to push for sweat factories (as in give a luxury trip - to get the votes to keep workers enslaved in sweatshops.)

[kodi]

21. true, Nunn-Lugar is the best available thing to stop blackmarket nukes

and bush tried to cut its funding in 2001 to pay for tax cuts to the rich.

[rosesaylavee]

27. And Siberia is not exactly a vacation spot n/t

Appears that he was doing his job.

[Burma Jones]

29. 'Twas a joke

Gotta hand it to Senators that will go off to Siberia......

[qanda]

9. Is this the reason Bush was in his hidey hole?

And I just watched "Thirteen Days" last night. :scared:

[ncrainbowgrrl]

10. further on in the story- Hegel also delayed...

The spokesperson also said Sen. Chuck Hegel, R-Neb., was delayed in departing from another Russian airport Sunday because of documentation problems.

[autorank]

11. Well,now they know what it's like for the rest of us to travel by air.

Not good, WTF. Are all the "petty tyrants" in the world acting up at the same time, blogsphere to stratosphere (and you know what I'm talking about;)

[damntexdem]

13. Maybe they thought that Obama was trying to smuggle ...

a Lugar through airport security.

[Pirate Smile]

14. Two U.S. senators held at Siberian airport

By Jim Heintz, Associated Press Writer | August 28, 2005

MOSCOW --Two U.S. senators visiting sites where weapons of mass destruction are being stored were held for several hours Sunday at a Siberian airport while trying to leave Russia, a U.S. Embassy spokesperson said.

Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., were held at the airport in Perm but allowed to leave after discussions between U.S. and Russian officials, the embassy spokesperson said on condition of anonymity.

Lugar, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Obama spent three days in Russia visiting sites where warheads are stored before destruction under the U.S.-funded Comprehensive Threat Reduction program.

The spokesperson did not have information on the nature of the dispute that resulted in the senators being held. Telephone calls to the Russian border guard service and Foreign Ministry were not answered Sunday evening.

The spokesperson also said Sen. Chuck Hegel, R-Neb., was delayed in departing from another Russian airport Sunday because of documentation problems.

http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/28/two_us_senators_held_at_siberian_airport/

[Bombero1956]

19. well didn't

Lugar and Hegel both say that Bush should've spoken with Cindy? Seems maybe Bush maybe put the word out on them to send a message.

[cal04]

20. Released

A plane carrying two U.S. senators was detained for several hours Sunday while trying to leave Russia, before being permitted to leave the country for Ukraine, according to spokesmen for the lawmakers.

Sens. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., who had been visiting storage sites for weapons of mass destruction, were held at an airport in the Ural Mountain city of Perm for several hours but were allowed to leave after talks between U.S. and Russian officials. "I am in Ukraine with Sen. Lugar," Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Lugar's spokesman, Andy Fisher, said in a message sent from a personal messaging device Sunday afternoon.

He said Russian officials refused to let the plane take off for three hours and insisted on boarding it. "They did not. The border patrol finally got orders to let us go," Fisher said. "We were treated just fine," he said. A spokesman for Obama also confirmed the plane's arrival in Ukraine.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBYJEPQXCE.html

[0007]

22. They can keep Lugar!

[iamjoy]

24. Isn't He One Of The "Better" Republicans

I mean, he doesn't seem blindly partisan, and often seems quite reasonable.

It makes sense to me to be worried about nuclear proliferation, especially all those loose nukes in the former Soviet republics.

If we must have Republicans who aren't RINOs, I would think Lugar is one we would want to keep.

[0007]

26. Luger wanted to ramrod Bolton to the U.N.

Fuck him!

[Rex]

25. They probably met with the local warlord-general

and talked shop. I'm sure the guys in charge of Russia wanted some straight answers, like has Boosh lost his mind?! Maybe they wanted some truth about Iraq.

[MasonJar]

28. Well, now at least two US senators know how it feels.

[TheLastMohican]

31. Probably both chaps

were carrying money to incite another orange revolution either in Russia or Belorus. The Russian counter-intelligence is not that bad as some of you may to believe :)