04/15/05

The State Department decided to stop publishing an annual report on international terrorism after the government's top terrorism center concluded that there were more terrorist attacks in 2004 than in any year since 1985, the first year the publication covered. Several U.S. officials defended the abrupt decision, saying the methodology the National Counterterrorism Center used to generate statistics for the report may have been faulty, such as the inclusion of incidents that may not have been terrorism. Last year, the number of incidents in 2003 was undercounted, forcing a revision of the report, 'Patterns of Global Terrorism.' But other current and former officials charged that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's office ordered 'Patterns of Global Terrorism' eliminated several weeks ago because the 2004 statistics raised disturbing questions about the Bush's administration's frequent claims of progress in the war against terrorism...

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/11407689.htm

from Knight Ridder


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp