The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight: A summary of the day's news; the latest on the violence in the Middle East, plus some thoughts on how to stop it from Lawrence Eagleburger, Martin Indyk, and Robert Malley; an Afghan war report; a look at cleansing the mail, and an AIDS update.

NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: The federal government issued a new, nationwide terrorist alert today. It's the third one since September 11. The director of homeland security, Tom Ridge, made the announcement at the White House.

TOM RIDGE: Over the last several days, our intelligence and law enforcement agencies have seen an increased volume and level of activity involving threats of terrorist attacks. The information we have does not point to any specific target, either in America or abroad. And it does not outline any specific type of attack. However, the analysts who review this information believe the quantity and level of threats are above the norm and have reached a threshold where we should once again place the public on general alert.

JIM LEHRER: Ridge said, again, Americans should go about their lives, but report any suspicious activity. The violence between Israel and the Palestinians continued to escalate today. Israel launched air raids in Gaza and the West Bank to retaliate for Palestinian suicide bombings. Those weekend attacks killed 26 Israelis and wounded 150. Later, Prime Minister Sharon said Israel would fight its own war on terrorism. In Washington, a White House spokesman was asked about that statement.

ARI FLEISCHER: As the President said yesterday, he believes that Chairman Arafat must do everything in his power to find those who murdered innocent Israelis and bring them to justice. And the President understands that Israel has a right to defend herself. The President also urges that all parties must be cognizant of the fact that they have to consider the consequences of whatever actions they take today for how it impacts events tomorrow.

JIM LEHRER: A spokesman for Arafat said Prime Minister Sharon had declared war on the Palestinian people. We'll have more on this story in a few minutes. In Afghanistan today, heavy U.S. bombing raids hit Tora Bora in the East. It's believed Osama bin Laden may be hiding there. In the South, bombing continued around Kandahar, the last city under Taliban control. In Washington, a senior Pentagon official, Rear Admiral John Stufflebeem, was asked if the campaign was reaching its culmination.

REAR ADMIRAL JOHN STUFFLEBEEM: I'm not sure that any of us have a sense or a feel for how soon before we will know that we have the senior leadership of the Taliban controlled or suppressed or killed or in possession or the same for al-Qaida. And so we're prepared to stay for as long as we have to do that and don't have a sense of time on that.

JIM LEHRER: The Admiral also said opposition forces were gathering firepower outside Kandahar, and were still trying to negotiate the surrender of the city. In Bonn Germany today Afghan factions appeared close to an agreement on a United Nations plan for an interim government. The key issue remaining was who should get which job in the regime. It's to govern for six months until a traditional tribal council is formed. On the anthrax investigation, the Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson said the evidence now indicates tainted mail killed an elderly woman in Connecticut last month. Traces of anthrax have turned up in a nearby postal facility. It received mail from a postal plant in New Jersey that handled anthrax letters sent to Washington. In New York City, postal officials confirmed a letter to a South Bronx business passed through the same New Jersey Post Office. The business is near the home of another anthrax victim. In economic news, consumer spending had a record gain in October. The Commerce Department reported it rose 2.9%, thanks to a surge of car buying. Overall manufacturing activity fell in November, for the 16th month in a row, but the National Association for Purchasing Management said there were also positive signs in some industries. Enron laid off 4,000 U.S. employees today, nearly 20% of its workforce. The giant energy-trading firm filed for Chapter 11 protection Sunday. It's one of the largest corporate bankruptcies in U.S. history. Enron also sued rival company Dynegy for backing out of a merger deal. Dynegy filed a counter-suit today.

FOCUS - MIDEAST MAELSTROM

JIM LEHRER: Now, the escalating violence in the Middle East. We begin with this report from Spencer Michels.

SPENCER MICHELS: Following a bloody weekend, Israel retaliated today, using American-made gunships to fire on Yasser Arafat's headquarters in Gaza City. An underground fuel depot was hit. Palestinian officials said ten injured people were taken to area hospitals. The attack did destroy two of the Palestinian leader's transport helicopters. Arafat himself was reportedly a few miles away at the time of the attack. Also today Israeli F-16's struck a vacant police building in Jenin on the West Bank. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon addressed the nation tonight.

PRIME MINISTER ARIEL SHARON (Translated): The objective of the war of terrorism... The objective is to cause us to arrive in a situation of desperation and absence of hope, to prevent us from being a free people in our country, the land of Zion and Jerusalem. Citizens of Israel, this shall not happen.

SPENCER MICHELS: Sharon was referring to a weekend of terror in which four Palestinian bombings killed at least 26 people. On Saturday night in a Jerusalem cafe district, two Palestinian suicide bombers killed others, within a minute of each themselves and at least ten others, within a minute of each other. (Explosion) 20 minutes later, camera crews captured another attack, a car bombing which injured a dozen people. The militant group Hamas claimed credit for all the incidents. A day after the Jerusalem deaths, another bomb went off in Haifa, along the Israeli coast. A Palestinian man boarded a bus and blew it up. He killed himself and 15 others in the explosion. The attacks came as a new U.S. delegation was on the ground

in the Mid East, trying to re-ignite peace talks. It's led by retired Marine General Anthony Zinni, who visited the site of Saturday's attack.

GEN. ANTHONY ZINNI (Ret.), U.S. Mideast Envoy: This is the lowest form of inhumanity that can be imagined, and I think it's important that we stay together to fight this. Haifa that we don't let it deter us from our goal for peace.

SPENCER MICHELS: In Washington yesterday President Bush spoke just before meeting with the Israeli Prime Minister at the White House.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: This is a moment where the advocates for peace in the Middle East must rise up and fight terror. Chairman Arafat must do everything in his power to find those who murdered innocent Israelis and bring them to justice.

SPENCER MICHELS: Palestinian leaders today condemned the Israeli attacks even as they declared a state of emergency and rounded up more than 100 militants in an effort to quell the violence.

JIBRIL RAJOUB, Palestinian Security Chief: We will take all the necessary measures in order to put an end to this cycle of violence, cycle of bloodshed and killing. (Chanting)

SPENCER MICHELS: But an estimated 1,000 Hamas members defied the crackdown, marching in the West Bank to celebrate the suicide bombings. Late today, Arafat called for an urgent meeting of the 56-nation organization of the Islamic Conference to look into the attacks. Israel's Sharon in his address tonight made it clear that Arafat had to crack down on the terrorists.

ARIEL SHARON (Translated): Anyone who stands up to kill us is subject to death. We know who is responsible. Arafat is responsible for everything that is taking place here. Arafat made the strategic choice. He chose a strategy of terror.

SPENCER MICHELS: Following Sharon's speech, the White House today called on Arafat to rein in the Palestinian terrorists, and reaffirmed Israel's right to defend itself.

JIM LEHRER: Margaret Warner takes it from there.

MARGARET WARNER: For more, we are joined by Lawrence Eagleburger, Secretary of State in the first Bush administration; Martin Indyk, who just finished a tour as U.S. Ambassador to Israel, and previously served as Assistant Secretary of State for the Near East; and Robert Malley, a former National Security Council staff member who participated in the Israeli/Palestinian talks at Camp David last year.

We have seen 14 months of this kind of attack and retaliation. But, Secretary Eagleburger, today both sides talked about war. Each side said that war had been declared on them. Do you think this is basically more of the same or has this conflict entered a new, more dangerous phase?

LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER: I'm inclined to think, given what's going on around them, that this is likely to become a new phase. It's more of the same in terms of what -- the back and forth, perhaps a little bit more strenuously, but what worries me, if worry is the right word, is... What's different, potentially different is here we have a war on terrorism going on at the same time, and if this becomes enmeshed in all of that, that's a problem. And, secondly, I think I have to say that the Prime Minister has laid it on Arafat pretty substantially now, and the question then becomes: What's he going to do about it? There he said that there would be a government meeting before too long and they would examine all of these possibilities; but he's going... Given what he said today, he's going to have a very hard time explaining-- if he doesn't do something very drastic.

MARGARET WARNER: He's been calling on Arafat and so has President Bush for 14 months to quell the violence. Are you saying you read in what he said today or in his actions something more, something that puts him farther over?

LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER: Potentially more. We'll see, but I am inclined to think this went... Well, it certainly has gone farther than anybody in recent years. I am inclined to think he's probably serious, and remember what he said at the beginning. They want us out of here. Now we haven't heard that from an Israeli leader in a long time either. If he really truly believes that the fundamental objective of Palestinians is to destroy the state of Israel, if he believes that, then as Prime Minister he's going to have some very serious things to say about it. Now he may have just used it as propaganda. If he means it, it's also a very serious statement.

MARGARET WARNER: Martin Indyk how do you view what happened in the last 48 hours in terms of how serious, how dangerous?

MARTIN INDYK: I think it's very dangerous. They're really on the edge of the abyss now in a way that they haven't been before. And I say that because not... Not only because of the devastating attacks, which came so close together but they came at a time when the United States had launched a new initiative, one that this administration has not been involved in for all its time in office, with General Zinni on the ground there trying to get a sustained cease-fire and a roadway back on to the path of negotiations. So that the administration is engaged, Prime Minister Sharon has been involved in an effort basically to find some formula that will get Arafat to act. He's tried various different options going in a little bit of going out, but his preferred strategy all along the way has been massive international pressure on Yasser Arafat to confront the terrorists, combined by the massive threat of Israeli force. He would prefer that to work than to the alternative, which he's now confronted with-- and I agree with Secretary Eagleburger that basically he's now in a corner where if Arafat doesn't act, he is going to have to take drastic action. He hasn't been quite in that corner before. And I believe that unless Arafat acts in a very sustained way now, we are going to see that the Israelis have reached the point where they say enough is enough, we cannot tolerate this any more. We've seen the half measures from Arafat and the promises to take action and he never does it seriously, so what's the point? We have terror with Arafat or terror without Arafat. Maybe we're better off without Arafat.

MARGARET WARNER: Robert Malley, your view on the seriousness and do you agree with secretary eager burger and Martin Indyk that it's now in a way it's really up to... It really is up to Arafat this time?

ROBERT MALLEY: I do agree with both Secretary Eagleburger and Ambassador Indyk that this is really a moment truth. We've known many moments of truth or what we've called moments of truth over the past year. I think we'll only know when we've reached one after it's too late and we'll look back and see, well, this was a real one. But the exits are closing every day. And each time something like this happens I think symbolically today the Israelis destroyed Arafat's helicopters, which one could read as a way of saying you're not going to go parade out and go to your Arab League meeting that you've called. You're staying here. Either you act, or there's no other choice for you anymore. You are not going to be on the international stage. I do think that qualitatively this seems different, but again we'll only know it after we've seen it.

MARGARET WARNER: So what are Arafat's options? I mean, as you know, there's a kind of growing body of analysis, even apparently from Israeli intelligence, at least this was reported last week, that he really no longer has at least the political clout or maybe even the physical ability, period, to stop the violence.

ROBERT MALLEY: Well, I think so much of the focus has been on U.S. diplomacy and Palestinian- Israeli relations, the one dimension that really needs to be looked at is the domestic Palestinian one which goes to your question. What has happened on the Palestinian side over the last eight years but especially over the last year has been gradually an erosion of legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority and therefore of Arafat who now finds himself in this choice between cracking down on people who are in some respects as popular as he is--.

MARGARET WARNER: If not more so.

ROBERT MALLEY: If not more so -- Losing domestic legitimacy or not cracking down and losing international legitimacy. And he's facing probably the most difficult choice he's faced in his lifetime.

MARGARET WARNER: Ambassador Indyk, your view on that. You've just recently returned from there. I mean does he have the ability, does he have the will which are two different questions I know.

MARTIN INDYK: Indeed. Let's take the first one. I believe strongly that he does have the capability. It's harder for him now, as Rob says, because killing Israelis is popular in the Palestinian street because of the anger there at the rising death toll on the Palestinian side. But Yasser Arafat has nine security organizations who answer to him directly. He

has at least 30,000 men under arms. It's true that some of them have joined forces with Hamas and Islamic jihad and are engaged in these terrorist activities but most of them are not. And Arafat does have the ability to establish some discipline in the ranks. Thirdly, he has demonstrated in the past in difficult situations an ability to crack down. He did it in 1996 against Hamas, and he did it so effectively that he hasn't had to... He doesn't have to do it so effectively this time. He could as he did after September 11 convince them to stop their activities. Palestine's Islamic Jihad is a small terrorist organization which enjoys funding and direction from Tehran. By the way as a footnote we should be going to Iran and the Europeans should be too and telling them very clearly to call off their dogs at this particular moment. But Arafat can arrest these people. He showed that he could stop the shooting that was coming from Bejala on to the Jerusalem suburb of Gelo. He even dealt with the situation in Rafa in southern Gaza, which was a very hot situation, basically a warlord was running things down there. It was a daily pitched battle against the Israeli forces who were patrolling the border between Gaza and Egypt. And he finally acted. He kicked out the governor. He moved in his police in cooperation with the Israelis and he's established quiet in Rafa. So he does have the capability. Now, the question of intention is really what's at the heart of the matter. Does he have the will power to do it?

MARGARET WARNER: Secretary Eagleburger, take that.

LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER: Well, I'm... I am beginning to think that he does not have the ability. In fact... Well, that's wrong. I shouldn't say it that way because I have believed for some time that it was probable that he didn't have the authority any longer or the ability or the will to really bring this all to an end. And I know you were involved in all of this so you have a better view of it than I do, but the fact of the matter is that the failure to reach an agreement during the latter days of the Clinton administration, which was largely a failure of Arafat -- I think -- demonstrated to me at the time that it was a really very serious question. One, whether he felt he could do it if he had to or whether his people would come out from under him or he'd end up dead, and two, whether he really wanted it or not if for no other reason than-- if I may be Freudian for a minute-- when he became leader of a state he could really manage that state. And I'm inclined to think he felt -- I think there's good evidence that he's correct if he did -- that he couldn't manage it. All I'm really saying to you is I haven't believed for some time that Arafat was really able to do much. I'm inclined to think even more so now.

MARGARET WARNER: But then you have to ask the question and Saab Erekat, a Palestinian official said today, I invite Mr. Sharon to describe to me what the day is like, the day after Arafat is gone. I mean if it's not Arafat -- now I'll go back to where the Israelis sit -- what's the alternative?

LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER: Well, you know, if I may say so, you've asked that now several times. I will tell you just to show you how pessimistic I am about all of this, I don't think there are any alternatives right now. I think that the fact of the matter is that General Zinni can parade around Israel and maybe he'll make some difference. I doubt it. I think that this is now, if not out of control, at least so close to out of control that it's going to be very difficult to pull all of this back. I don't know whether we're going to have war or not. But I do believe that what we're seeing in the way of blow and counterblow is going to continue. I do not think we're going to stop it.

MARGARET WARNER: I want to go quickly around and get to everybody. Starting with you, Rob Malley, where does this leave the U.S., one, does it have any leverage or ability to shape this thing? And what does it do to the anti-terror coalition -- in other words, the U.S.' two imperatives here?

ROBERT MALLEY: Well, what the U.S. needs to do now is and what it wants to do is to put the pressure on Arafat. I think that's certainly the feeling we're getting after the meeting with Prime Minister Sharon, the statements we've heard over the weekend and today. I think combined with that has to be some sense that if Chairman Arafat does do what they're asking him to do, there will be a political prospect because for him to crack down simply for the sake of cracking down will make him look like a collaborator at a time when there is complete national unity on the Palestinian side not in favor of Arafat but against the Israelis. In terms of the anti-terror coalition certainly this complicates matters. If this develops into an all out war, it makes it all the more difficultto sustain the coalition. We know that part of the increased U.S. involvement now is a function of pressure from Arab countries whose support we want in that war. They're going to be putting pressure back on us to save the Palestinian situation.

MARGARET WARNER: Martin Indyk.

MARTIN INDYK: First of all farce putting pressure on us, we should be putting pressure on them to pressure Arafat as well. They got us into this. We responded to their demands that we do something.

MARGARET WARNER: The Arab states as part of the coalition.

MARTIN INDYK: I'm talking about Saudi Arabia and Egypt that insisted that we take a Palestinian initiative. Now they have a responsibility to be partners with us and make it very clear to Arafat that he'd better act. They need to be pressing him to. We need them on our side rather than having them keep on pressing us in this regard. But in terms of what we can do-- and I think what the President and Secretary of State are doing-- is making clear to Arafat something we haven't made clear to him before, which is that there are real consequences this time if he doesn't act. The Israelis are unable to make that so clear to him because I don't think he really believes that Sharon, with all the constraints on him, is really going to act to get rid of him. We need to make it clear to Arafat that either he acts against the terrorists or we will treat him as a harborer of terrorists.

MARGARET WARNER: All right.

MARTIN INDYK: What all of that means in terms of severing our relationship with the Palestinians.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. Secretary Eagleburger, same double question about the U.S. leverage and the terror coalition.

LAWRENCE EAGLEBURGER: With all respect to Ambassador Indyk, we can say all of these things, we can point our finger at him and say we're going to make life miserable for you if you don't do A, B, C and D. I'm not sure if we can, in fact, make life any more miserable for him than he already potentially sees himself. If his situation domestically and within the Palestinian state is as weak as it may well be, we can point to him, bang him on the head, do anything we want, he's not going to do much if he feels that if he does do something, it's going to lead to his downfall. So that's one piece of this thing. Double question, again my point here and throughout the whole issue here is that right now I don't think either side or the United States has many alternatives other than to... we can talk, we can scream, we can try, but most of the alternatives at this stage, I think, relate purely and simply to trying to stop the violence. And I'm not sure it's possible. I think we are likely to see a continuation of the day-to-day banging at each other. I'm not at all sure that anything we can do is going to make a difference. I will agree with the Ambassador, I think the main target here has got to be Arafat. He's the culprit in this basically. But I am not at all confident that we can make him behave.

MARGARET WARNER: All right. On that pessimistic note, we'll leave it there. Thank you, gentlemen.

UPDATE - MILITARY CAMPAIGN

JIM LEHRER: Now, an update on the Afghan campaign, with an odd twist. An American has been captured fighting for the Taliban. We have a report from Julian Rush of Independent Television News.

JULIAN RUSH: John Walker is 20. Originally from America's capital, Washington, DC, he now calls himself Abdul Hamid. He studied Arabic in the Yemen. When he came to Afghanistan six months ago, he told his parents he was to be an aid worker. But he wanted to join the Taliban. He went to Kabul, where the Taliban sent him to Osama bin Laden's training camps for Arab fighters because he didn't speak Pashtun. He says he saw bin Laden many times. It is an odd journey from Washington, DC, to surviving the massacre of Galai Jangee Fort in its dank, flooded tunnels, bombed by his own countrymen.

JOHN WALKER: I was a student in Pakistan, studying Islam. And I came into contact with many people who were connected with the Taliban. I lived in the region, in the northwest frontier province. The people there in general have a great love for the Taliban. So I started to read some of the literature of the scholars and the history of the movement and Islam. My heart became attached to that.

JULIAN RUSH: He saw action first on the front line north of Kabul, then in Tahar Province, East of Kunduz. He was part of the Taliban's disorganized retreat to Kunduz, where he eventually surrendered.

JOHN WALKER: When we withdrew from Tahar, we walked by foot maybe more than a hundred miles. Afterwards, I was very sick for the whole period.

JULIAN RUSH: John walker is one of the lucky ones. He's now in the custody of American special forces, who will want to question him about the times he met Osama bin Laden. This is one of the men John Walker was prepared to die for. Mullah Khaksar is no zealot, though. He was a senior figure in the Taliban. Now he's switched sides. The Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, he says, is under no illusion about his fate.

MULLAH KHAKSAR (Translated): Mullah Omar is going to fight the Americans until the end. He's very committed to that. He knows that even if he surrenders, he will be killed, and some people have promised him serious cooperation if he continues his fight against the United States, but I cannot say who.

JULIAN RUSH: The Americans think Mullah Omar is in Kandahar, leading the Taliban's last stand. The UN says around 2,000 refugees a day are now leaving Kandahar Province. Reports that Afghan Taliban are drifting away seem to be confirmed when we spoke to a resident of the city today.

ABDUL WALI (Translated): There are two or three types of Taliban here: Afghan, Arab, and Pakistan. There are more foreign Taliban than Afghans.

JULIAN RUSH: Around 1,000 U.S. Marines are now in the desert near Kandahar.

SPOKESMAN: Fire!

JULIAN RUSH: They are not yet involved in the fighting around the outskirts of the city.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight: Cleaning the mail, and an AIDS update.

FOCUS - STERLIZING THE MAIL

JIM LEHRER: Now, while the anthrax investigation continues, new steps to keep the mail system safe. Jeffrey Kaye of KCET, Los Angeles reports.

JEFFREY KAYE: In mid-October, as hazardous material specialists scoured Capitol Hill mailrooms for traces of anthrax, postal service officials launched an ambitious effort to sterilize the nation's mail. They signed contracts worth $45 million for irradiation devices, the kinds of systems that use x- rays and electron beams to eliminate harmful bacteria in food and to sterilize medical equipment. Eight of the nine systems to be used to sanitize mail are being provided by the Titan Corporation, based in San Diego, California. Gene Ray is Titan President and CEO.

GENE RAY, Titan Corporation: This takes regular electricity... As you know, electricity is the flow of electrons. We take those electrons; we run them through what's called a linear accelerator. The accelerator accelerates electrons to high speeds. The electrons come out as a beam of energy. That beam of energy then penetrates a package, killing the bacteria that's inside the package.

JEFFREY KAYE: Thomas day, vice President of engineering for the postal service, says the priority is to irradiate East Coast mail that may have been cross-contaminated.

THOMAS DAY, U.S. Postal Service: Longer term, we get into the issue of sanitizing mail in general. In a shorter term, our priority is to do the volume of mail that the law enforcement people think is most at threat.

JEFFREY KAYE: So far, only two of the nine irradiators bought by the post office are up and running-- one at this plant in Lima, Ohio; another in New Jersey. Irradiated mail, most destined for government offices in Washington, DC, represents a tiny fraction of the more-than 200 billion pieces of mail postal workers deliver each year. To address the threat of bioterrorism, the Post Office is considering a multibillion- dollar overhaul of its distribution system, from the collection boxes on the street to sophisticated sorting equipment. But there are major questions about how safe the mail can be, given the costs and limits of technology, and the desire of customers to send what they want by mail, without harm.

THOMAS DAY: The true long-term is, how do you build a system that, nationwide, you can sanitize mail to make all of our employees and the public in general safe from the threat of anthrax?

JEFFREY KAYE: Killing anthrax by irradiation has proved much more complex than zapping foodstuffs, a more common use. After authorities ran tests on packages containing anthrax-like spores, a New Jersey official described some of the challenges in a memo. "After much discussion about the penetration of the electron beam," she wrote, "it was determined that the package would have to be turned over and run through irradiator a second time. The problem is that the spores in the envelopes would presumably fall to the bottom by gravity, thus avoiding the beam for both passes." Scientists also had to account for the possible presence of dense material in the mail that might deflect the beams. To ensure any anthrax is killed, authorities are using massive doses of radiation-- more than 50 times the levels used on fruits; a thousand times more than cancer treatments. But one problem is that irradiation also damages or destroys innocuous items. Edgar Bailey, in charge of radiation protection for the State of California, cites a long list of items susceptible to radiation damage.

EDGAR BAILEY, Department of Health, State of California: There are questions about the radiochemical breakdown of such things as pharmaceuticals, lab specimens being sent through the mails, all of those kinds of things. The other things that could be damaged are a variety of plastics, such things as computer disks, and they would possibly be damaged by these high doses.

JEFFREY KAYE: Bailey says the flavors of food sent by mail could change if irradiated. Certain electronics and magnetic tapes would be damaged, plastics and glass discolored. Mail order seeds would be destroyed by irradiation. And film processors say their customers wouldn't be able to mail in rolls for developing, since irradiation blackens film. The Postal Service is planning to let customers know if their mail has been irradiated.

THOMAS DAY: The introduction of biohazards to the mail is...

JEFFREY KAYE: Thomas Day says he is sympathetic to firms that rely on the mail.

THOMAS DAY: So what we're doing in discussions with those industry trade groups is to talk about ways to strengthen the process by which we accept that mail, so we know that it's clearly from a known mailer, we know what's in it, we know where it's going to, we know where it came from.

JEFFREY KAYE: Day says companies that mail out products susceptible to damage might register at post offices to prevent the products they ship from being irradiated. But segregating mail sent by the general public poses a logistical problem, a major loophole if terrorists know certain mail won't be sanitized.

THOMAS DAY: We're still trying to work through that. I think the reality is there are certain products where there will be impacts, and we're trying to figure out and putting the best minds together to see how we minimize those impacts.

JEFFREY KAYE: Beyond irradiation, the Post Office plans to reengineer its millions of mail boxes. Instead of mail dropping into plastic tubs, it would fall into a lining inside of the mailbox.

THOMAS DAY: It would protect the employees so they would not have direct contact with the mail as they collect it. And then as you close that bag off, you would seal it up so that the first point that it would be opened would be at our distribution centers where we would have detection devices, as well as ultimately we may have sanitation devices.

JEFFREY KAYE: Day wants detection systems in distribution centers nationwide as a first line of defense against anthrax-tainted mail, but experts say it's not that easy to detect small amounts of anthrax. James Greenwood, director of the Office of Health and Safety at the University of California at Los Angeles, recently helped direct a drill on biohazards. He says there's no current technology that will detect anthrax inside envelopes.

JAMES GREENWOOD, UCLA: The most accurate method continues to be a culture of the microorganism. And what you would do is take material into a laboratory, place it into culture, grow the organism, and then use a variety of methods to confirm its identity. And that process usually takes 24 to 48 hours.

JEFFREY KAYE: While the Post Office plans for the future, government and corporate mailrooms around the country are gingerly handling mail. Postal officials hope to spend as much as $4 billion on extra security, and say they are exploring technologies such as radioactive devices and gas to sterilize mail. But they warn there is no way of assuring 100% safety of all the mail sent through the Postal Service.

FOCUS - STARK STATISTICS

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, an AIDS update. World AIDS day was marked around the world on Saturday, as health officials released grim new numbers on the epidemic. Gwen Ifill has the story.

GWEN IFILL: Twenty years have passed since the first cases of Acquired Immuno Deficiency Syndrome or AIDS were reported. Since then AIDS has moved to epidemic status as the leading cause of death in Sub-Saharan Africa and the fourth biggest killer in the world. Worldwide 40 million people are living with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, with 5 million new cases and 3 million deaths reported last year. A new United Nations report shows the disease is not only spreading but at record rates in new areas of the world. The steepest increases are in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. In Russia, reports of new infection have doubled. In Estonia, where only 12 new cases were reported in 1999, 1400 were reported during the past 12 months. In China, reported HIV infections rose by 67 percent and in Sub-Saharan Africa, which has attracted most attention, the rate for new infections has slowed overall from 3.8 million to 3.4 million but the disease is spreading in some places like the populous country of Nigeria.

GWEN IFILL: For more background on the new UNfindings, we're joined by Dr. Desmond Johns, a South African who heads the UN AIDS Office in New York; and Laurie Garrett, science and medical correspondent for Newsday and author of "Betrayal of Trust, the Collapse of Global Public Health."

Dr. Johns one of the most interesting findings in the report is the spread of AIDS in Eastern Europe. What is behind that?

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: Thank you, Gwen. The spread of the infection in Eastern Europe is largely due to young people experimenting with intravenous drug use and with sex.

GWEN IFILL: How about in China? We hear about the great spread in China. Why is it spreading so much there?

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: Like much of the developing world, China has a range of factors which render people more vulnerable to the infection: Large migrating populations, poverty, a degree of gender inequality, which is driving the general epidemic amongst selected populations. In addition, we have had a scandal involving blood transfusion in the Hainan Province in China which has greatly added to the number of infected people.

GWEN IFILL: Laurie Garrett you covered this subject extensively and traveled in a lot of countries which were mentioned in this report. What has contributed to the spread of this disease? Is it the lack of funds, lack of political will? What's driving this?

LAURIE GARRETT: All of the above. And more. I think when you combine sex, death and narcotics, you hit every taboo imaginable, and everybody runs for cover and doesn't want to talk about it. What we're seeing now is that after a momentum had finally been building 20 years into this epidemic for national political leaderships and UN leadership to speak out by HIV/AIDS it's suddenly all gone quiet once again.

GWEN IFILL: Why is that? How much of this had to do with international attention focus focused elsewhere after September 11.

LAURIE GARRETT: Oh, I think that's it in a nutshell. September 11 shifted the entire global radar screen, and we saw our Congress respond by saying, well, we had committed a hefty $750 million to the global fund for AIDS, but now we need to shift our attention to bioterrorism and we're going to lower our commitment to about $120 million.

GWEN IFILL: So what is the status of that global fund for AIDS that was announced with such fanfare?

LAURIE GARRETT: That's a good question what the status of that fund is, because not a lot of information is terribly public but what we hear about the behind-the-scenes negotiations sounds like it's been deeply controversial and it's still mired in some real difficulties. Only one nation has actually given its money to the World Bank and deposited in the bank account. That's Italy, and that's $200 million which is significantly less than the target goal of $7 to $10 billion.

GWEN IFILL: Doctor Johns, we have read extensively about the AIDS epidemic in Sub-Saharan Africa. This reports shows that the rate of infection seems to be decreasing but it's not all good news, is it?

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: Certainly not, Gwen. In the first instance, we revised our methodology to a certain extent which could account for some of the decline that you see. We also believe that the pool of people at risk has been diminished as a national consequence of the epidemic itself. And this in turn has lowered the numbers to a certain extent.

GWEN IFILL: You talk about the way the numbers are being counted. What about... How many of these numbers are accurate? How much underreporting is there of people who suffer from HIV?

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: The question... The answer will actually vary depending on which geographical region we're talking about. Certainly in Sub-Saharan Africa, our reporting is based on sentinel surveillance, anonymous unlinked and therefore fairly credible. However, certain parts of the world such as Russia and Eastern Europe depend on case reporting. Case reporting requires that there is a conscious act of notifying the authorities as to the number of cases. And of course this depends on people testing in the first instance.

GWEN IFILL: So the numbers could be significantly worse than what you're reporting today?

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: Yes. We estimate that it's probably an underestimate by three- to five-fold.

GWEN IFILL: Laurie Garrett, one of the other things which we have all covered is the debate over the use of antiretroviral drugs, which have had such success in the United States, around the world. What does the report tell us about where that debate stands?

LAURIE GARRETT: Where we stand is that there are a number of pilot projects underway on the ground in various African countries and in Latin America trying to do distribution of this very complicated drug regimen in one form or another but none of them are far enough along that one can draw any conclusions. The largest of all the projects, the Botswana Project in which the Gates Foundation has sunk a lot of money, Harvard University's involved, Merck Pharmaceuticals and so on, has yet to really get off the ground. They're still trying to hammer out a lot of the methodological details.

GWEN IFILL: Has the pressure to bring the cost for these drugs down for these countries, has that had an effect?

LAURIE GARRETT: Well, the price has come down but it still is completely out of control for people who live in countries where per capita spending on health is less than $12 a year.

GWEN IFILL: Dr. Johns, what does this report tell us about what should be happening next?

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: Well, it certainly says that we need to bear in mind that this is a global epidemic of enormous proportions. And it's going to require a response on the same scale. It also says that we need to look a lot closer at the success stories that we've seen in diverse sections as Uganda, Senegal, Cambodia, Thailand, extract the lessons that can be learned and applies these with suitable cultural adjustments to places where the epidemic is running out of control.

GWEN IFILL: And, Laurie Garrett, 20 years later, we all in this country presume to know what AIDS is and how it progresses. But around the world that's not necessarily the case. What is your assessment of the state of understanding about what AIDS is and what degree does that drive these numbers?

LAURIE GARRETT: Well, I think there are a lot of people in the United States of America who don't fully understand what AIDS is and certainly don't completely understand how HIV is transmitted. When you get outside of countries where people have a concept of the germ theory of disease and at least a vague notion of what a virus is, understanding drops dramatically. I've been in countries where there's no word in the language for virus. And there's no real concept of a disease being transmitted by a living organism of one kind or another. Then you can get to a place such as Ukraine or Russia where, according to the UN AIDS report today, this week anyway, it's "the" fastest growing epidemic in the world. Yes, there's a sound knowledge of basic biology, good education, and yet no one has really integrated that information into their own life and understood what that means for them. What I've seen in places like Odessa, Ukraine or Moscow or out in, you know, Eastern Siberia are huge numbers of teenagers injecting drugs and sharing needles en masse. In one situation in Odessa I counted 1,000 kids injecting together simultaneously in a single hour. They don't understand, even though they've learned some biology in school, that there is this tremendous risk associated with sharing that needle one to another.

GWEN IFILL: Or that there's any connection between that and HIV/AIDS.

LAURIE GARRETT: The knowledge hasn't connected.

GWEN IFILL: Laurie Garrett and Desmond Johns, thank you very much for joining us.

LAURIE GARRETT: Thank you.

DR. DESMOND JOHNS: Thank you, Gwen.

RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Monday. The government issued another nationwide terror alert, but there was no specific time or target. Israel launched air raids in Gaza and the West Bank to retaliate for Palestinian suicide bombings. We'll see you online, and again here tomorrow evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.