Democracy Now! January 3, 2003

9:00-9:01 Billboard 9:01-9:06 Headlines 9:06-9:07 One Minute Music Break 9:07-9:20 : As the Bush / Cheney White House prepares for war in Iraq, few companies are set to benefit as much as Halliburton. Yes, that s the same Halliburton that Dick Cheney headed up until the controversial presidential election of 2000. The same Halliburton where Cheney made over $20 million. The same Halliburton that got embroiled in an Enron-like scandal due to questionable accounting practices under Cheney s helm. And the same Halliburton that continued to quietly trade with Iraq long after the Gulf War ended. During the 1990s Halliburton had contracts worth over $70 with Iraq. Today it is set to profit from a war against Iraq as Halliburton has with the so-called war on terror. Since Sept. 11, the Pentagon is increasingly relying on a unit of Halliburton called KBR, sometimes referred to as Kellogg Brown & Root. It has done work from building cells for detainees at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. It feeeds American troops in Uzbekistan. And near the Turkish/Iraqi border Halliburton it helps run three military bases. In July, the New York Times reported, the attacks of Sept. 11 have led to significant additional business. KBR is the exclusive logistics supplier for both the Navy and the Army, providing services like cooking, construction, power generation and fuel transportation. The contract recently won from the Army is for 10 years and has no lid on costs. The Times went on to report that Halliburton is the only company that has a contract with the Amy that has an unlimited budget. This comes despite Halliburton s questionable past performance on government contracts. Halliburton recently paid the government $2 million out of court after the Pentagon accused the company s employees of lying and overcharging the government. We go now to the Turkish/Iraqi border to speak with journalist Pratap Chatterjee who has been closely tracking Halliburton and recently visited a Halliburton-run base. Guest: Pratap Chatterjee, freelance journalist who is now on the Iraq Turkey border. He has reported for Inter Press Service, Third World New Service among other agencies. 9:20-9:21 One Minute Music Break 9:21-9:40: Venezuela Hugo Ch vez said yesterday that he favored the creation of a group of "Friends of Venezuela" to lead an international diplomatic effort to end the month-long general strike. The Venezuelan leader made the announcement in Brazil where he attended the inauguration of Brazil's new president, Luiz In cio Lula da Silva. Chavez said that he expected countries from Latin America, Europe and OPEC, which Venezuela helped found more than 40 years ago, would help his country end the strike. Chavez also proposed forming a Latin American OPEC between Venezuela and Brazil. Chavez said Lula expressed his "total support" and predicted that Brazil and Venezuela would make "great advances together in the coming years" because of the similar views. To relieve economic pressure, Brazil last week sent an oil tanker with 520,000 barrels of gasoline to Venezuela. As for the ongoing strike, Chavez said yesterday, "What is going on in my country is not a strike. It is a coup attempt disguised as a strike," organized by "terrorists who are blocking oil and food distribution and sabotaging refineries." Meanwhile the leaders of the strike called today on the military to join their cause. So far, the military has backed Chavez. Guest: Greg Palast is an investigative reporter for BBC-TV s News Night. He is the author of many books including The Best Democracy Money Can Buy and also a regular contributor to the British newspapers The Guardian and The Observer. Phone Guest: Samuel Moncada, Historian and Director of the School of History at the Central University of Venezuela in Caracas. Guest: Maria Luisa Mendonca, Brazilian grassroots organizer and one of the coordinators of the World Social Forum 9:40-9:41 One Minute Music Break 9:41-9:58 : In Yemen dozens of students have reportedly been detained following the killings of three U.S. missionaries and the assassination of a leading secular politician. Last Saturday Yemeni Socialist Party leader Jarallah Omar was assassinated. Two days later three missionaries were shot dead at a Baptist hospital. Killed in the incident were hospital administrator William Koehn, purchasing agent Kathleen Gariety and doctor Martha Myers. The three hospital workers were members of the Southern Baptist International Mission Board. On Wednesday a memorial service was held for them Sanaa, the capital of Yemen. This is one of the few times Christian missionaries operating in the Muslim world has made it on the radar of the world media. The last time these missionaries made it to the media s radar screen was the fall of 2001. During the US war in Afghanistan, the Taliban detained Dayna Curry and Heather Mercer. They were incarcerated for three months on charges of spreading Christianity. In November, U.S. Special Forces helicopters rescued them from a prison outside Ghazni, Afghanistan. In October of that year, Islamic militants opened fire on a church built by missionaries in Pakistan, killing 16 Christians. Around the same time, Muslim rebels threatened to execute two missionaries kidnapped in the Philippines. Well today we re going to take a look at the phenomenon of Christian proselytizing in the Muslim world. We re joined right now on the telephone by freelance journalist Barry Yeoman. Yeoman wrote an investigative piece for Mother Jones Magazine called The Stealth Crusade. Last year, Yeoman attended a private training session of Frontiers, the largest Christian group in the world that focuses exclusively on proselytizing to Muslims. Guest: Barry Yeoman, freelance journalist and author of the article The Stealth Crusade in the May/June 2002 issue of Mother Jones. The article was subtitled: Inside one Southern university, Christian missionaries are being trained to go undercover in the Muslim world and win converts for Jesus. Their stated goal: to wipe out Islam. Links: http://www.motherjones.com/magazine/MJ02/stealth.html http://www.geocities.com/byeoman 9:58-9:59 Outro and Credits Democracy Now! is produced by Kris Abrams, Mike Burke, Angie Karran, Ana Nogiera and Alex Wolfe. Mike Di Filippo is our engineer and webmaster.