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_Nation & World_ Infrared used at Waco can detect gunfire, government admits n A if . .r-. .. r~ ' i r~ . Mittelstadt' Associated Press Washington—Government officials now say a type of infrared camera used by the FBI during a siege on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, in 1993 is capable of detecting gunfire — an about-face. Lawyers for Branch Davidian plain tiffs who have filed a wrongful-death law suit against the government called the acknowledgment a “stunning reversal” from prior claims the camera could not capture images of gunfire. The government’s admission comes just weeks before a demonstra tion will test the Branch Davidians’ claim that federal agents fired their weapons. “What we’re seeing is the govern ment can read the handwriting on the wall, so to speak, and their experts have told them, ‘Expect to see gunfire flashes on the (infrared) demonstration tapes that are going to look just like the flashes on the April 1993 tape,”’ the Da vidians’ lead counsel, Michael Caddell, said Thursday. A day earlier, U.S. Attorney Michael Bradford, one of the government’s lead attorneys, said the Forward Looking Infrared camera, or FLER, is capable of detecting gunfire “in some circum stances.” However, he reiterated the gov ernment’s stance that no shots were fired by federal agents on April 19,1993. The court-ordered field test is ex pected to play a key role at trial, due to begin in mid-May. Some 80 Davidians died during the siege, some from the fire, others from gunshot wounds. Federal of ficials say the cult members died by their own hands. The Davidian survivors and relatives of the dead allege that government negligence, and excessive force con tributed to the tragedy. The government has denied wrongdoing, saying the Da vidians set the stage for their own deaths. Three monihs ago, the government was skeptical about FLIR’s ability to de tect gunfire. In a filing in federal court in Waco, the Justice Department pro posed to test the plaintiffs’ “hypothesis” that gunfire can be captured on camera. And the FBI’s own FLIR operators, in more recent depositions, denied the infrared camera could detect muzzle blasts, Caddell and co-counsel Jim Bran non said. “‘Now they see they are going to lose the test, they are shifting gears,” Bran non said. “To diminish the test before you ever run u, mai j> uie ue^i aiegy you could ever follow, isn’t it?” The government has long insisted that no shots were directed at the Davidians during the culmination of the 51-day siege, which ended when the compound was consumed by flames several hours into an FBI tear-gassing operation de signed to flush them out. In an interview Thursday, Bradford denied any shift in the government’s stance. As for statements made during the depositions, he said the plaintiffs’ lawyers interviewed “individual FBI agents that we did not offer as ex perts.” The field test, scheduled to be held at an Army outpost in central Texas in mid-March, is about more than whether FLIR can capture gunfire, Bradford said. Also central to resolving the controver sy is whether the cameras used during the field test will detect people on the ground, he said, noting the 1993 FLIR did not capture any agents stationed out side the compound when the bursts of light appear. People, like bullets, give off heat, so both should appear, the government con tends. “In our opinion, what will show up on that tape will be so starkly different from what is on the April 19th tape that it will be evident that (what occurred) April 19th is not gunfire,” Bradford said. Primary from page 4 Litchfield for a question-and-answer ses sion. One woman asked why so many GOP leaders back him, not McCain. “They’re sick and tired... of the peo ple who simply talk the talk,” Bush said, digging at McCain. “They’re interested in having a leader who knows how to walk the walk.” Behind the scenes, McCain’s staff appeared upbeat, happy to be within strik ing distance of Bush. The governor’s ad visers were clearly more tense, perhaps because they have more to lose. Bush is getting help from all quarters of the GOP establishment. Adjutant General Sutn Spears, com mander of the South Carolina National Guard, signed a glowing letter of en dorsement for distribution by the Bush campaign. Without naming McCain, it also implied that the Arizonan would sac rifice his principles to impress the me dia. McCain said he was shocked that a military commander would engage in po litical activity. Spears said in a telephone inter • view that he is an elected official, not bound by rules against political activity that federal employees in the Guard must abide by. “I don’t answer to anybody,” ho caiH E-mails are being circulated in the Asian-American community criticizing McCain for calling Asians “gooks.” The former Vietnam prisoner of war said he has used the term for his prison guards. There also are taped phone calls going out from Bush, his wife, Laura, and Sen. Strom Thurmond Letters have been sent out signed by former presidential candidite Elizabeth Dole and by Bush s mother, Barbara Bush. With fewer resources, McCain is re lying on volunteer phone banks aiming at 150,000 supporters, including veter ans and independents. Human rights groups allege Russian torture in Chechnya by Andrew Kramer Associated Press Malgobek, Russia—Chechens try ing to leave their war-ravaged republic are being tortured in Russian detention camps and subjected to severe beatings, rapes and other brutality, refugees and human rights groups say. The allegations come on the heels of other complaints of human rights abuses in the Russian offensive in Chechnya, in cluding reports of summary executions of civilians in Grozny, the Chechen cap ital. Russian officials deny the allegations, but Chechens who have fled into neigh boring republics tell similar, grisly ac counts of their detention in camps that Russia says it set up to filter out rebels who are trying to escape disguised as civil ians. A 21 -year-old Chechen, lying in pain in a bed in Malgobek in neighboring North Ossetia, said his ordeal began Jan. 22 when police dragged him off a bus of refugees and took him to a camp in the Chechen village of Chemokozovo. The man, who asked that he be iden tified only by his first name, Ruslan, said he was forced to run a gantlet of masked policemen swinging truncheons, had his clothes tom off and was forced to stand naked in a cold storage room. “I asked what they were detaining me for, but they didn’t answer,” he said He was released only after his moth er paid a bribe to the camp'directors, he said. At least three such camps are oper ating, according to Peter Bouckaert, a re searcher for the Human Rights Watch group in the region. “Russia appears to have declared any Chechen male to be a suspected rebel subject to arbitrary arrest and brutal treat ment,” he said. The allegations were echoed by the Wbrld Oiganization Against Torture, which issued a statement in Geneva on Thurs day, saying, “We cannot ignore that the filtration camps are indeed concentration camps where Russian soldiers are com mitting the worst atrocities, in all im punity, against their prisoners.” In Washington, State Department spokesman James P. Rubin said Thursday that “Russia has a clear obligation to in vestigate the numerous credible reports of civilian killings and alleged miscon duct by its soldiers promptly.” Sergei Yastrzhembsky, who is acting President Vladimir Putin’s aide for Chech nya information, on Thursday reiterat ed denials of torture at Chemokozovo. The allegations are “the No. 1 topic in the information war the Western mass media have unleashed,” he said on Rus sia’s ORT television. “Routine work like in any other detention center is going on there.” He said that European Union observers would be allowed into the camp to see the situation for themselves but gave no date of a possible visit. The Council of Europe’s human rights commissioner, Al varo Gil-Robles, is due to arrive in Moscow Feb. 24, but his office could give no details of the trip. Ruslan, the refugee, told of a routine of torment, in which detainees were of ten beaten in a hallway in the early morn ing, their cries awakening others in their cells. Ruslan saidguards told him “don’t look me in the eyes, yoif black face,” and then one hit him in the spine with a ham mer. He says he has not been able to stand erect since then. An investigator accused him of fight ing on the side of the Islamic rebel groups that have battled Russian soldiers during the six-month war and demanded names and addresses of rebels, Ruslan said. “Those who signed confessions, or said they could identify other men who were fighters, did not come back to the ceils, according 10 anoiner rerugee wnu said he had also been at Chemokozovo. The refugee, Eli, said a masked po liceman once opened a peephole to the cell and said, “Who wants a smoke?” When a prisoner approached the hole, the guard sprayed tear gas into the cell, and those inside reeled and were racked by coughs for minutes, Eli said. Eli said a man from their cell was called out, and he heard guards rape him. Then a guard said he should answer to a woman’s name, Fatima. Other de tainees described similar acts. After this event, when guards rapped on the cell door with a truncheon, the detainees were to call out the number of people in the cell as “fifteen men and one woman,” said Eli. Yastrzhembsky said Thursday there are 16 women among the 235 people cur rently held in Chemokozovo. But he re jected a report by the French newspaper Le Monde that said there were children in the camp. ‘Russia appears to have declared any Chechen male to be a suspected rebel subject to arbitrary arrest and brutal treatment.’ Peter Bouckaert researcher for Human Rights Watch CollegeClub.com it’s all U." No porcupines, living, dead or otherwise, were harmed in the creation of this advertisement. •i y W