Who's doing it?

Someone, or some group, is creating an anthrax scare throughout the world. US investigators are working to find out who the culprits are. Gihan Shahine joins the search
"Are you afraid of opening your mail?" This is a frequently asked question these days.
Panic about the possibility of anthrax-contaminated letters crossed the US and spread throughout the world -- to Europe, Israel, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Argentina and Africa. Now, it has reached Asia and the Middle East, having a particularly strong impact in Kuwait, Malaysia, India and Egypt.
For the past three weeks, newspapers around the world carried on their front pages stories about false alarms raised by people who received suspicious letters or packages that they feared might contain anthrax powder.
And this week, the alert was sounded about the possibility of smallpox attacks. On Sunday, the World Health Organisation (WHO) issued an international warning advising governments to take precautionary measures against this possibility. According to the London Observer, WHO urged governments to produce enough vaccinations against the disease which, it said, "could kill millions." Smallpox vaccinations stopped being given in the early 1980s, the Observer added, and most people under 40 in the UK have not been immunised.
"The unthinkable is no longer unthinkable and we need to prepare for that," a spokesman for WHO told the Observer. "There has been a lot of concern about a smallpox outbreak. The numbers it would kill are scary."
At least eight people, including one man who died, have tested positive for anthrax infection since 1 October, and several others have tested positive for exposure to the deadly powder in the US, according to the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.
Every day, however, new suspected cases are reported at diverse locations internationally. Most cases, many of which turned out to be hoaxes, have occurred at establishments with an affiliation to the US.
In France, 600 people were evacuated from the offices of the French Space Agency, and others fled from a financial institution, a school and a tax collection agency after powder arrived in the mail, the Associated Press reported.
A white powder has been found in the mailroom at German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's office. Israeli police were put on the alert and mail offices were evacuated after receiving letters containing white powder and bearing "suspicious signs."
In Australia, a number of government workers were ordered to take decontaminating showers last week after receiving a letter containing white powder. And in England, 200 people were evacuated in a similar scare when a man was seen sprinkling white powder in a chapel attached to a cathedral.
Last week, the anthrax scare reached Cairo. An employee at the local branch of an American bank received a suspicious letter with white powder inside. Investigations proved the powder was not anthrax and the employee was in good health. Earlier this week, another incident was reported in Luxor but investigations have not yet concluded whether the powder sent by mail to a lawyer in the French Rotary club is anthrax.
The Egyptian government said last week it was launching a comprehensive contingency plan to ward off potential anthrax attacks. The plan includes measures of prevention, diagnosis and treatment.
The Egyptian Ministry of Health formed medical teams of epidemic specialists who will be provided with a mobile laboratory. The government also banned the entry of US-imported meat and the Department of Veterinary Medicine is enforcing procedures to ensure that infected animals do not enter the country. A team was also formed to check incoming mail at the airport as a precautionary measure against the entry of contaminated letters.
Sources at the American Embassy told Al-Ahram Weekly that they have been putting warning messages on the embassy's Web site, including an advisory notice on how to handle suspicious mail. The embassy has also been stockpiling Ciprofloxacin, the antibiotic prescribed for anthrax infection. As is the case in many parts of the world, the Egyptian Ministry of Health is also ensuring the availability of the antibiotic in its hospitals.
The question that seems to impose itself everywhere is: who is behind the anthrax terror?
Investigators are still trying to find out who is responsible, but they have not settled on any single theory. Up until last week, most fingers pointed to Osama Bin Laden's Al-Qa'ida group as a prime suspect. But President George W Bush now says that there is no hard evidence of its involvement. Bush told a news conference in Shanghai that he would not rule out the possibility that the mailings are home-grown in the United States -- the same theory held by European intelligence officials.
At variance with Bush's statement, however, US investigators told the New York Times that they suspect that the wave of contaminated letters are related to the 11 September suicide attacks.
Another theory points an accusing finger at Iraq -- a claim that some political analysts fear could be used by the US as an excuse for a military strike against that country. US investigators are saying that Iraq is involved because they claim that converting anthrax into powder spores, to make it an effective weapon, "is an immensely difficult process." Microbiologists explained to the Observer that making powder needs "repeated washings in huge sophisticated centrifuges, followed by intensive drying" -- requiring technology, they say, that would cost millions. The US investigators claims that Iraq "has the technology and supplies of anthrax suitable for terrorist use," the Observer said.
But, as Dr Ken Alibek, president of Advanced Biosystems Inc, puts it, these are no more than "assumptions," and to find out the right answer, work should be done to know whether the anthrax terror was done "professionally or by amateurs." [Alibek defected to the United States from the Soviet Union in 1992, after serving in its biological weapons programme for more than 20 years].
Tests, at any rate, have concluded that the anthrax used in the attacks on the US media and the Senate had not been "weaponised" -- that is, altered to facilitate the spread of the spores by air. Federal scientists, the International Herald Tribune said, have also "tentatively concluded that it [the anthrax] was of a domestic strain that bore no resemblance to strains that Russia and Iraq have turned into biological weapons" -- which may again support the argument that the attacks are US home-grown.
Anthrax spores are considered dangerous for their long life span and resistance to environmental changes. They are odourless, colourless, tasteless, and difficult to detect, according to Dr Magdi El-Nawawi, microbiology professor at Zaqaziq University.
Does the anthrax scare mean that the world is on the verge of a biological war? This appears to be a remote possibility.
A biological war is traditionally defined as the planned use of organisms to wreak mass destruction. Thus, it could be said to occur through the spreading of epidemics, causing massive fatalities.
Anthrax, however, is not contagious among humans. It can be passed from one person to another when, for instance, someone with a sore on their hand touches an infected person. Consequently, disseminating anthrax by letters or packages, Alibek concludes, is likely to result in "a number of casualties and cases of infection." It could have a significant impact on economy and cause delays to postal service, but definitely "not mass casualties," he said.
Mamdouh Attiya, an expert on global strategic matters and weapons of mass destruction, concurs. "The anthrax scare is an organised, biological crime, a psychological war, a mass fear tactic, but not a biological war," Attiya told the Weekly. After all, he adds, many reported cases turned out to be hoaxes.
"I wouldn't rule out the possibility that the terror attacks were home-grown. The US is home to 424 extremist groups," Attiya suggested. "Bin Laden's Al-Qa'ida is a possible suspect, but I would also suggest the involvement of the Israeli Mossad. The scare may be an attempt to shift attention from greater Israeli atrocities in the Palestinian territories."
But whoever the culprits are, Attiya believes they have a message to get across.
"They are declaring their rejection of US hegemony," he asserted.
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