Look at this early UAE AP article and WaPo's watered down version

[Oilwellian]

It's hard to believe this issue has been "out there" for 10 days now, yet it's just now become a major bone of contention. This early AP article, posted by a news radio station out of New York on Feb 11th, gives you a really good indepth look at the behind the scenes deal with commentary from a very nefarious organization.

I'm also going to post the WaPo's watered down version of the same article that came out the following day. It's quite clear the WaPo tried to help this administration keep the story under wraps, I believe it's the same article because many of the sentences are exactly the same. But you'll see the WaPo not only changed the title of the AP piece, they also left out key parts of the article that gives us much more insight.

Here are some key parts of the original AP report that you can find here:

Critics of the proposed purchase said a port operator complicit in smuggling or terrorism could manipulate manifests and other records to frustrate Homeland Security's already limited scrutiny of shipping containers and slip contraband past U.S. Customs inspectors.

I believe this is the crux of the entire security issue. If the manifests can be manipulated, how will we ever know for sure the cargo coming into our ports is what they say it is? And look at this from another report I posted earlier...apparently Dubai has had problems with manifest manipulation and following export laws in the past.

October 2003: Five containers of centrifuge components, sent by B.S.A. Tahir and shipped through Dubai, are seized en route to Libya. The items are part of four shipments made by Malaysia's Scomi Precision Engineering (SCOPE) between 2002 and 2003 to Dubai's Aryash Trading Company. One of the four consignments lists the addressee as Gulf Technical Industries, but is diverted to Desert Electrical Equipment Factory, also based in Dubai.

August 2004: The U.S. indicts Khalid Mahmood, of Dubai, for breaking the U.S. embargo to Iran. Mahmood allegedly attempted to arrange the sale of forklift radiators from the U.S. to Iran, by concealing the final destination in the sale.

September 2004: The I.S.G. lists 20 U.A.E. firms that are suspected of having acted as intermediaries or front companies for Saddam Hussein's Iraq, and says that the U.A.E. was a transit location for prohibited goods, with companies using deceptive trade practices. The I.S.G. also concludes that the U.A.E. and Iran were the most frequent destinations for Iraqi smuggled oil and owned the majority of smuggling vessels involved.

Link to that post here.

Now, back to the article...look who else is coming out of the woodwork to back the DPWorld takeover:

``Does this pose a national security risk? I think that's pushing the envelope,'' said Stephen E. Flynn, who studies maritime security at the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations. ``It's not impossible to imagine one could develop an internal conspiracy, but I'd have to assign it a very low probability.''

Changing management over the U.S. ports ``doesn't offer al-Qaida any opportunities it doesn't have now,'' said James Lewis, who worked with the U.S. committee at the State and Commerce departments. ``It's in Dubai's interest to make sure this runs well. There is strong economic incentive to be sure these worries never materialize.''

Flynn and others said even under foreign control, U.S. ports will continue to be run by unionized American employees. ``You're not going have a bunch of UAE citizens working the docks,'' Flynn said. ``They're longshoremen, vested in high-paying jobs. Most of them are Archie Bunker-kind of Americans.''

Council On Foreign Relations eh? Aren't they the ones who coined the phrase "new world order?" That certainly explains Sirota's recent post on this issue having everything to do with world trade at the expense of our national security. I suspect the CFR has played a major role in getting this deal to go through.

This last paragraph I'm going to post is the most curious of all:

Peninsular and Oriental and DP World set approval by the U.S. security committee as a condition for the sale. In regulatory papers, the companies said either the committee must agree not to formally investigate the purchase or Bush must not move to block the sale for national security purposes.

Well no wonder the committee can't have a formal investigation of the deal, and no wonder Bush is threatening to veto any legislation to stop it. It appears the UAE is making specific demands and the Bush crime family is caving to their whims. Why is that?

Now, look at the WaPo's watered down version of the same article. I sent this to Media Matters and hope they do something with it:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/11/AR2006021101112.html

[katmondoo]

1. They also waited until congress was out of session to announce

this as a done deal.

[yodermon]

2. This quote is worth repeating and highlighting:

In regulatory papers, the companies said either the committee must agree not to formally investigate the purchase or Bush must not move to block the sale for national security purposes.

[Oilwellian]

3. Indeed...and,

isn't it interesting that the WaPo left this key paragraph out?