
##3000650 <p> Two years ago , in the weeks before the National Football League draft , Bill Polian found himself immersed in a great debate : Who was the better quarterback , Peyton Manning or Ryan Leaf ? Now the choice seems laughable , but at the time N.F.L. executives argued the point ferociously . In the offices of the Indianapolis Colts , something about Leaf 's lack of seasoning compared to Manning 's maturity struck the master architect Polian . Manning became his choice , and Leaf went to San Diego . <p> Soon after Manning donned his blue and white Colts jersey , completing the move by Polian that would change the Colts ' fortunes and even help revitalize the league itself , Polian was speaking to an N.F.L. executive . He asked Polian a simple question : What was the final thing that propelled him toward Manning and away from Leaf ? <p> " I looked at Manning and I knew I was getting a leader who could put this team on his back for 15 years , " the executive recalled Polian as saying . @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more immature player . In my gut I was n't sure how long Ryan would last in the N.F.L. It could be 10 years , but it could be one year . " <p> Recently Polian denied making those exact remarks . " I 've said all along I felt both guys were exceptionally talented , " he said . " To me , Peyton was ahead going in and coming out but I still do think that Ryan has the talent to succeed in the league . " <p> In the end it was about a choice . Manning or Leaf . Leaf or Manning . It is the kind of decision that can change the course of a franchise , make a career , or ruin one . Polian , as he did while building the Buffalo Bills into a four-time Super Bowl contender , made the right choice . <p> Manning has led the Colts to a surprising 6-2 record heading into Sunday 's game against the Giants at the Meadowlands , and is one of the most exciting players in the game . He is surrounded by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Harrison and running back Edgerrin James . <p> Meanwhile , in San Diego , Leaf was benched midway through his rookie year and was recently suspended for four weeks after cursing out Bobby Beathard , the general manager who drafted him , for refusing to complete a workout . <p> Manning is n't the golly-gee guy he is often portrayed to be in the news media ; like most football players , he has been known to occasionally use a spicy word to get a teammate focused . But Manning is always professional and would never show his general manager , or his dry cleaner for that matter , such disrespect . <p> The Giants will get to see firsthand on Sunday exactly how exceptional Manning is . His intelligence , poise , arm strength and leadership all point to his developing into the next superstar quarterback . In fact , he may already be that . <p> " If I was starting a franchise today and had my choice , " Miami Coach Jimmy Johnson said , " I 'd give strong consideration to picking Peyton Manning first . He @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ number of reasons why , and they go beyond Manning being a highly accurate passer , who has completed more than 60 percent of his throws and this year became only the 12th quarterback in league history to throw a touchdown pass in 21 consecutive games . <p> It is Manning 's off-the-field habits that distinguish him from many of his peers . Manning watches more game film than the coaching staff , and has been known to lock himself in a room for hours , staring at the moving figures on the screen . It is a habit that goes back to Manning 's days at the University of Tennessee . There , the quarterback watched so much film that he sometimes instructed the scout team , which simulated that week 's opponent , where to line up because he knew things that even the coaches had missed . <p> In the off-season , Manning does not disappear for six months . He spends inordinate amounts of time working out at the Colts ' training complex , especially with his primary offensive outlet , Harrison , who has drawn comparisons @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ n't think you can play football , and then at the end of the season , just go to the Bahamas and not come back until training camp , " Manning said . " All the great players think about football year-round . " <p> Manning is the core of one of the league 's most feared offenses , with the threesome of Manning , Harrison and James earning comparisons to a younger Troy Aikman , Irvin and Emmitt Smith . On Oct. 31 , Indianapolis beat the Cowboys , 34-24 . In that game , the Colts showed why they are such a complete offense , and how they are on the way to replacing the crumbling Dallas dynasty . <p> Polian drafted James over the more popular choice , Ricky Williams , because he thought James 's better pass-catching skills would fit more snugly in the Colts ' system . In that Dallas game , James ran for 113 yards but caught an impressive 7 passes for 92 more . <p> Cornerback Deion Sanders became so fixated on James that when the back received a fake handoff , Sanders @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ball , while Harrison ran right by the perennial All-Pro defender . Manning tossed a perfect pass for the touchdown . <p> With their 25-17 victory over Kansas City on Sunday , the Colts were winners of their fourth straight game , and now have as many victories as they did the past two years combined . Indianapolis is off to its best start since the team was called the Baltimore Colts and began 1977 with a 9-1 record . <p> Of all the young Colts stars , Manning is the one who has watched his life slowly become less private . He is living the real-life " Truman Show " in Indianapolis . But he deals with all of the publicity well . He learned how to from his father , Archie , who quarterbacked the New Orleans Saints . <p> " I still do what I want to do , " Manning said . " I go on dates . I go out to eat . If I 'm eating dinner and someone wants an autograph , that 's O.K. I watched my dad handle all that stuff with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ " <p> Still , there are times when Manning will go to the grocery store at 11 o'clock at night so he can shop for food in peace . Shopping for his breakfast cereal at bedtime aside , Manning never has second thoughts about trading his busy life for one of anonymity . <p> It is unfair , but Manning and Leaf may forever be linked by that draft , Manning the success and Leaf , at least so far , the failure . " Ryan and I stay in touch from time to time , " said Manning . " The fact we will always be compared is true . But I do n't get into that . I just play the game . I only hope Ryan is able to rebound from his problems . " <p> Polian said : " No one could anticipate that things would go this poorly for Ryan . I think it 's unfair to judge any young player against Peyton because Peyton is so exceptional . " <p> So were Polian 's instincts on that April day two years ago , and the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : //www.nytimes.com 
##3000653 <p> Tiger Woods was simply too good . Too good to be daunted by a controversial triple-bogey on the 17th hole . Too good to be rattled when fans cheered against him . Too good to be beaten by a field featuring most of the world 's best players . Too good to be intimidated by a diabolical golf course that frustrated many of his opponents . <p> The world 's No. 1 player showed his greatness in memorable fashion today , winning the American Express Championship and becoming the first PGA Tour player to win four consecutive starts since Ben Hogan in 1953 . Woods did it the hard way , prevailing in a one-hole playoff against Spain 's Miguel Angel Jimenez , and persevering through a final round that featured terrific golf , drama and heated emotions . <p> By the time Woods ( 71-69-70-68 -- 278 , six under par ) birdied the first playoff hole to defeat Jimenez ( 72-68-69-69 -- 278 ) , darkness was falling at Valderrama Golf Club , and Woods had put an exclamation point on one of the superb @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ worldwide this year , and for the eighth time on tour , Woods ended the official 1999 season as the first player with eight single-season victories since Johnny Miller in 1974 . <p> Woods is only the eighth player in golf history to win seven times or more in one year , and the $1 million first-place check lifted Woods 's 1999 winnings to more than $6.6 million , making him golf 's first $6 million man for a single season . David Duval had held the money record , winning $2.59 million last year . <p> At 23 , Woods has taken his extraordinary talent to a new level , as he showed today when he shot seven under par through the first 15 holes , a brilliant stretch that displayed the best in Woods 's diverse repertory . The highlights included 15-foot birdie putts at both No. 1 and No. 2 , a chip-in for eagle from 25 feet at No. 11 , an 8-iron shot downwind at No. 12 that carried 196 yards and led to another birdie , then a 6-iron into the wind at No. 14 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for another birdie . On a blustery day when only three players shot in the 60 's , Woods looked as if he might shoot a 64 or better . <p> " If he had shot a 64 , in these conditions , I would have ranked that with the all-time great rounds , " said Nick Price , who played a group behind Woods . <p> Yet , the triple-bogey almost cost Woods the victory . But somehow , as he has done 15 times in his young professional career , he found a way to win . <p> " I played a great round of golf today , " said Woods , who had five birdies and an eagle , including a four-hole stretch from Nos. 9 through 12 when he made birdie , birdie , eagle , birdie . " I 've had a great season , and it 's nice to end it this way . " <p> But the final event of the season did not escape controversy , centering on a questionable pin position at the par-5 , 490-yard No. 17 , and the reaction @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gallery favored Jimenez , playing in a tournament not far from where he grew up . But when Woods 's third shot at No. 17 hit the green , only to roll backward down a slope more than 35 feet into the water , a loud cheer went up from the gallery , and a group of fans standing on a knoll above the green jumped for joy . <p> " I was appalled at the cheering , " said Tom Lehman , who played with Woods today , and who also chipped a ball into the water at No. 17 . " People criticized us at the Ryder Cup , but if you 're going to cheer people hitting balls into the water and missing putts , it kind of takes away your right to criticize . " <p> Price thought the cheer meant that Woods had made an eagle or a birdie . <p> " When I found out that he had hit the ball in the water , I was pretty disgusted , " Price said . " Golf has always been able to separate itself from that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ happened at the Ryder Cup , and it 's not right what happened here . They 're going to have trouble getting guys to come over here if they are going to get that type of treatment . " <p> Asked how he felt about the reaction at No. 17 , Woods said : " That 's unfortunate . It had nothing to do with the Ryder Cup . It had to do with a person from their own country who they wanted to win . When the ball went in the water , it was disappointing to hear , but understandable . " <p> Merely another unpleasant experience for Woods at Valderrama 's unique No. 17 , a hole that has been unkind to him in the past . At the 1997 Ryder Cup , Woods hit a putt at No. 17 that rolled off the green into the water , one of the many momentum swings that led to Europe 's victory . <p> The hole had been remodeled since 1997 , but it remains treacherous . How difficult is it ? Today , 11 of the 61 players @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ today 's pin was in its most dangerous location , front and right , in front of a downhill slope that feeds directly into the water in front of the green . Meanwhile , the wind was blowing from the back of the green toward the front , helping to push balls into the water . <p> When Woods reached No. 17 , he was at nine under par , two strokes ahead of Jimenez who was two groups behind . A good drive and a 6-iron lay-up left Woods only 100 yards from the pin . Then came the trouble shot , a 9-iron that landed in the center of the green . At first , it looked like a great shot , so good that Woods started walking calmly toward the green . But slowly , the ball trickled down the slope and kept going , and going , off the green and into the water . Many players felt the pin position was ridiculous . <p> " That 's not a pin position when the wind is blowing and the greens are fast , " Price said . @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . " <p> " Tiger hit three flawless shots and ended up with a triple-bogey , " Lehman said . " I felt sorry for him . " <p> Assessed a penalty stroke , Woods took his drop in front of the water , pitched his next shot to the back of the green , hit a delicate putt down the slope that ran five feet past the hole , then missed his next putt before his tap-in for a triple-bogey eight . Now Woods was two strokes behind , but Jimenez opened the door with bogeys at both 16 and 18 . After making a nice par at No. 17 , Jimenez could have won the tournament with par at the par-4 18th , but he pulled his 2-iron tee shot into the left rough , hit short of the green , then hit a bad chip from 45 feet that rolled into the back rough . Jimenez then chipped four feet past the hole , but he made the putt for bogey to force the playoff , as Woods warmed up on the driving range . <p> Minutes later @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ first playoff hole . After a good drive by Woods , Jimenez hit another bad tee shot with a driver , putting the ball left of the cart path into the rough . His next shot landed in the front bunker , then Woods hit a nice approach shot to 12 feet below the hole . Jimenez hit his bunker shot 14 feet past the hole to the back fringe , and he almost chipped in for par , barely missing the cup to the left . But after Jimenez tapped in for bogey , Woods ended a bizarre and profitable day by making his birdie putt . <p> Woods will play in Taiwan this week at the Johnnie Walker Classic , but his next official PGA Tour event will be January 's Mercedes Championship in Hawaii . Until then , his streak is safe . And Woods can savor a splendid 1999 , while looking ahead to 2000 . <p> " Hopefully next year I 'll play the same type of golf , " Woods said . " We 'll see if I can continue to improve . " <p> @ @ @ 
##3002357 <p> As the United Nations enters a new century of challenges , we must find new ways to defeat the age-old enemies of peace and prosperity . In fulfilling this task , the Secretary General is accorded a central role -- by the United Nations Charter , by history and by the trust placed in him by member states . <p> I believe , therefore , that it is important for our friends and critics alike to judge the United Nations and my office with what Isaiah Berlin called a " sense of reality . " By this I mean a realistic appreciation of the promise , limitations and responsibilities the organization and the officeholder face . <p> Above all , this means acknowledging that the Secretary General 's office will have the potential to advance the interests of all states only so long as it does not appear to serve the narrow interests of any one state or group of states . This is the precarious balance to which any Secretary General owes his office , his strength , his effectiveness and his moral authority . <p> @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ balance , through more than 50 years of geopolitical change . It is sometimes tempting to give in to one 's feelings of personal outrage at a specific transgression , especially when to do so would win political popularity in some quarters . But that would imperil the Secretary General 's ability to work effectively to prevent aggression and preserve peace . It is a luxury I can not afford . The integrity , impartiality and independence of the office are too important to be so easily sacrificed . <p> The end of the cold war transformed the moral promise of the role of the Secretary General . It allowed him to place the United Nations at the service of the universal values of the charter , without the constraints of ideology or particular interests . In my two years as Secretary General , I have sought to pursue this role in two distinct ways . <p> First , I have sought to speak out in favor of universal human rights and in defense of the victims of aggression or abuse , wherever they may be . For Americans , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ least since the days of Theodore Roosevelt . I have sought to make the Office of Secretary General a pulpit , too . From New York to Teheran to Harare and to Shanghai , I have sought , without attacking specific regimes or individuals , to use it as a vehicle for promoting the values of tolerance , democracy , human rights and good governance that I believe are universal . <p> Second , I have used my office as a bridge between two or more parties wherever I believed an opportunity for the peaceful resolution of disputes existed . To do so , I have embarked on many missions , confronting not only the doubts of others but my own as well . I have at times been as skeptical of a leader 's true intentions as anyone , and I have entered every war zone without any illusions about the prospects for peace or the price of misrule . <p> But I have persisted , because I must deal with the world not as I would wish it to be , but as it is . I must confront @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ leader can be pushed by peaceful means , and how long it will take to bring peace where a state of war exists . <p> Does this make me , or anyone in my position , morally blind ? Can a Secretary General not tell good from evil , or victim from aggressor ? Of course he can , and precisely for that reason he must persist , for it is ultimately the aggressor more often than the victim who will benefit from isolation and abandonment by the international community . Impartiality does not -- and must not -- mean neutrality in the face of evil . It means strict and unbiased adherence to the principles of the charter -- nothing more , nothing less . <p> Of the missions I embarked on last year , none was fraught with as much risk to my office and to the United Nations as the one involving Iraq . Confronted with a crisis in the relations between Iraq and the Security Council , I went to Baghdad last February seeking to break an impasse and to return the United Nations Special Commission -- @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ weapons of mass destruction . Briefly , but significantly , Iraq returned to compliance and Unscom inspectors were able to enter sites to which they had been denied access for more than seven years . I say " briefly " because Iraq subsequently decided to place new obstacles in Unscom 's way -- a flagrant , deeply troubling violation both of the memorandum of understanding that I secured with Baghdad and of Iraq 's longstanding obligations to the Security Council . <p> Since then , we have gone from crisis to crisis , punctuated by fleeting moments of cooperation between Unscom and the Government of Iraq . This back-and-forth culminated in last month 's air strikes . Clearly , we stand at a critical juncture now -- between the use of force and the peaceful compliance I have always sought , between securing the disarmament of Iraq and the threat it would otherwise pose to the region , between looking to a future when Iraq 's long-suffering people can live free and unhindered lives , and continued isolation and impoverishment for civilians who bear no responsibility for their country 's calamities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ engaged in seeking a way forward , a way that can restore the council 's unity while maintaining the disarmament of Iraq and alleviating the suffering of the Iraqi people . For those who still remember the days of the cold war , the unity of the council in such an important matter will be recognized as a signal accomplishment . It is also what makes Iraq such a priority for me as Secretary General -- a divided council can , and has in the past , paralyzed the United Nations . I must and will do all in my power to avoid such a fate . <p> Whatever means I have employed in my efforts in dealing with Iraq , my ends have never been in question : full compliance with all relevant Security Council resolutions ; the disarmament of Iraq ; reintegrating its people into the international community ; securing the stability of the region , and insuring the effectiveness of the United Nations as a guarantor of international peace and security . By precedent , by principle , by charter and by duty , I am bound to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ however , the peace we seek , in Iraq as everywhere , is one that reflects the lessons of our terrible century : that peace is not true or lasting if bought at any cost ; that only peace with justice can honor the victims of war and violence ; that without democracy , tolerance and human rights for all , no peace is truly safe . <p> To apply those lessons wherever and whenever possible is a Secretary General 's highest calling and foremost duty -- to himself , to his office and to the United Nations . My great predecessor , Dag Hammarskjold , once said that it " is a question not of a man , but of an institution . " It is , therefore , for the United Nations itself , and the hopes and aspirations that it has embodied for more than half a century , that we must succeed . <p> http : //www.nytimes.com 
##3002366 <p> Even as cruise missiles rained down on Iraq in mid-December , oil prices scarcely budged from their severely depressed levels of about $11 a barrel . In the past , Middle East tension inevitably spooked the oil markets , provoking panic buying . This time , the December price slump presented us with a stunning paradox : we had waged war against Saddam Hussein precisely to safeguard the Persian Gulf oil fields , yet the market 's blase reaction to the fighting seemed to underscore the marginal status of Mideast oil in the global economy . <p> Is our apprehension about Iraq 's threat to Arabian oil now sadly anachronistic ? In a world brimming with oil -- and with the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries providing only 40 percent of it -- should we finally stop fretting about the Middle East ? <p> In fact , it would be both foolish and premature to gloat over OPEC 's demise . A retrospective glance at the oil industry last year suggests that , far from being liberated from Mideast oil , we may be sliding into a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ <p> In the 1970 's , OPEC was the fearsome bogyman of Western politics , able to quadruple prices and impose a punitive embargo on the United States . The resulting shortage riled many economies , provoking rampant inflation , sluggish growth and plummeting stock markets . Sober analysts predicted that oil might fetch $100 a barrel by century 's end . <p> In the 1990 's , we have seen the movie running in reverse as squabbling OPEC members have failed to curb a glut that has slashed oil prices to their lowest inflation-adjusted levels in a quarter century . The breathtaking price tumble has helped to tame inflation , spur economic growth and buoy stocks . Commentators now deride the once haughty OPEC as a sorry relic , rent by blatant cheating and factional feuds . In a world flooded with oil , it has seemed to surrender its formidable powers to the marketplace . <p> Some factors that have humbled OPEC -- including the sharp contraction in Asian oil demand and balmy weather in North America -- are passing phenomena . The great and most lasting threat to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ oil business . Back in 1972 , the Club of Rome , sounding the apocalyptic note so voguish at the time , warned that world reserves might be exhausted in a little more than a generation . What its analysts failed to foresee was the amazing ability of technology to take a finite resource and convert it into something seemingly infinite . <p> Long a low-tech backwater , the oil industry during the past decade has become an exotic showplace of futuristic technologies . Producers can now find and produce oil with exceptional precision and at lower costs than was ever dreamed possible . Special sensors create three-dimensional maps of deep geological formations . Producers can drill horizontally for long distances , extracting oil trapped beneath towns . With computers guiding drill bits for miles underground , producers have resurrected numberless old fields long thought depleted . <p> The upshot of such innovation is that analysts have radically revised their sense of the earth 's oil-bearing potential . Supplies today are dictated not by the amount discovered but by what can be profitably produced at a given price . In Texas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ oil producer has extended the lives of small , aging fields . Their so-called stripper wells produce 10 barrels or less per day . This might sound insignificant , but they have been furnishing America with about as much oil as imports from Saudi Arabia have . <p> Unfortunately , the strippers are now reeling from a crisis that may prove fatal . They typically break even when oil is in the $12-to-$15-a-barrel range , but as prices have fallen below that barrier they have suffered a disaster . Small companies are going bankrupt almost daily , and thousands of wells are being capped in the continental United States . The oil service industry is another casualty , with only about half of its available rigs searching for oil off American shores . Even our giant energy companies are curtailing exploration budgets , and this will simply deepen American dependence on foreign oil . <p> Bolstered by their networks of refineries and gas stations and their strength in petrochemicals , the big oil companies have n't been as vulnerable as their smaller brethren . Yet the spate of recent megamergers shows @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In early December , the Exxon-Mobil merger reunited the two largest pieces of the Standard Oil trust dismantled by the Supreme Court in 1911 . Antitrust concerns about the combination have been misplaced : the new colossus will refine less than 14 percent of American oil , compared with nearly 90 percent for Standard Oil . <p> The merger testifies as much to the partners ' weakness as to their strength . When John D. Rockefeller formed Standard Oil in 1870 , he aimed to consolidate refiners into a giant cartel that could contain falling prices . In contrast , the Exxon-Mobil and BP-Amoco deals demonstrate that even the biggest companies now accept lower prices as a fait accompli and can sustain their profitability only through stringent cost-cutting and consolidation . <p> The real predicament shadowing the Exxon-Mobil merger resides with the State Department , not with the Justice Department . Exxon has enjoyed the luxury of inexpensive oil from Alaska and other domestic fields but must now replace these bountiful fields with more expensive oil from abroad . In the past 20 years , no giant new American fields have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1900 's or 1930 's or Alaska in the late 1960 's . Because Mobil has lacked a strong base in domestic oil and has been more aggressive in tapping frontiers abroad , it was an attractive partner for Exxon . The major oil companies are too large to bother with tiny stripper wells at home , which means that their future exploration will be largely in the third world . And Big Oil will turn inescapably to the Middle East as the last place left with huge , cheap reserves . <p> While OPEC today accounts for only 40 percent of world production , it possesses 75 percent of known reserves . And its Persian Gulf members can drain these vast reservoirs for less than $2 a barrel . By contrast , it costs the super-efficient Exxon an estimated $7 to produce a barrel of domestic oil and more than $10 a barrel for foreign oil . Given the dramatic cost advantage enjoyed by Saudi Arabia and its neighbors over foreign oil companies and non-OPEC producers , OPEC may be on the threshold of a new hegemony . <p> Now @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ each further dollar decline will bankrupt more high-cost competitors and widen the Arabs ' market share . Might OPEC deliberately boost production and drive down prices to single digits to recapture control of the oil market ? <p> It seems unlikely that it would do so by design . In the short run , this risky strategy would rob it of too much revenue before it won the compensating gain in market share . <p> But if the United States slipped into recession , intensifying the glut and pushing oil down to , say , $5 a barrel , the Persian Gulf states would be back in full control . Production and exploration budgets would be sharply reduced outside the Middle East as prices fell below the cost of extracting oil elsewhere . <p> During the anti-American frenzy of the 1970 's , the Arab states nationalized their oil companies , chasing out the large Western companies that had operated their fields in the early postwar years . In response , big oil companies have turned to places that are geographically remote and politically volatile . The countries rich in new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Indonesia , Russia , Azerbaijan , Kazakhstan , Turkmenistan and Colombia -- are also places steeped in corruption , poverty and violence . The acrimonious dispute over the pipeline route that will carry oil from Baku in Azerbaijan to Western markets illustrates the extreme geopolitical hazards that await American policy makers in the next century . Guaranteeing oil supplies will create security problems that may make the Middle East seem a peaceful oasis in comparison . <p> As chance would have it , the Arab oil states are about to forge an alliance with the Western companies 20 years after most of them lost their concessions in the region . On Sept. 25 , a Saudi crown prince presided over a one-hour " tea party " to explore possible cooperation with chief executives from seven American companies . Prominent among the chieftains was Lucio Noto , the chairman of Mobil . Analysts have speculated that one motive for the Exxon-Mobil merger was to combine Mobil 's Saudi connections with Exxon 's capital to strengthen its bargaining position with the desert kingdom . <p> Why would Saudi Arabia court American investment at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Saudis have watched jealously as Mexico and Venezuela have angled to supplant them as the foremost supplier to the United States , the largest oil consumer . Not only is Saudi Arabia loath to cede the American market with Asia in recession , but it wishes to retain the Defense Department security umbrella that accompanied its former status as America 's largest oil exporter . <p> The Mideast oil states would also like to profit from the new technologies patented by American companies and to enlist their worldwide refining and marketing apparatus to sell oil . It was partly in the hope of providing expensive services , including exploration and pipeline building , to producers in the Middle East that BP merged with Amoco and Exxon with Mobil to form a critical mass of capital and expertise . Faced with the extreme risks and production costs in new areas like the Caspian Sea , the American oil companies will be powerfully attracted by any new partnership offered by the Arab states . Iran , Algeria and the United Arab Emirates have already formed joint ventures with foreign companies . <p> All @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ -- and that is n't certain , especially if Asia revives -- the oil industry of the early 21st century may well resemble that of the 1960 's more than that of the 1990 's . Far from being extricated from the morass of Mideast politics , we may only grow more entangled . <p> The low prices of recent years have produced an extraordinary complacency about energy policy . Profligate Americans have turned to sports utility vehicles , light trucks and other old-fashioned gas guzzlers . At the time of the Arab embargo in 1973 , the United States produced 9.2 million barrels of oil a day ; last year we managed only 6.4 million barrels . Yet nobody talks anymore about our perilous reliance on foreign oil . In fact , energy policy is so seldom discussed in Washington these days that the term has acquired a quaint ring . By focusing solely on deterring Iraqi aggression over the past eight years , we have been diverted from the concern over secure energy supplies that prompted both the gulf war and the recent air strikes in the first place @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in our sex-obsessed capital will care about things as banal as energy conservation , fuel efficiency and the like . But the alternative is to be forever menaced by the future Saddam Husseins who will undoubtedly emerge to challenge the American presence in the Middle East 's oil fields . <p> http : //www.nytimes.com 
##3002367 <p> The euro , the most audacious gamble in the history of currency , has become a reality . What will this crucial step toward unity mean for Europe , the United States and the world ? The Op-Ed page asked several experts in economics and observers of European culture to offer their insights . Laura D'Andrea Tyson was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the first Clinton Administration . <p> The euro is good news for the American economy if it fosters political stability and economic growth in Europe . But this benign outcome is by no means certain . <p> A more dynamic European economy would strengthen European demand for American goods and services and provide more attractive opportunities for American investors . Greater prosperity would enhance Europe 's willingness to cooperate with the United States to further liberalize trade with emerging markets and to strengthen multilateral institutions to combat turbulence in global financial markets . More efficient European producers would mean tougher competition and hence better performance by American companies over time . <p> These gains would far outweigh the expected small rise @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an alternative reserve currency to the dollar . <p> But there are more serious risks . The euro 's adoption makes it impossible for member nations to use currency adjustments as a way to offset inflation . The new European Central Bank will set a common monetary policy , but its effects will differ from country to country . <p> Moreover , with a charter providing insulation from national political leaders and specifying inflation as its sole target , the bank has neither the mandate nor the inclination to stimulate growth or moderate cyclical downturns . <p> In short , the member countries have unilaterally disarmed themselves of important weapons to fight unemployment and recession . This is why many economists like myself remain skeptical about the euro 's success while fervently hoping that such skepticism proves unwarranted . Muriel Spark is the author , most recently , of " Reality and Dreams , " a novel . She lives in Italy . <p> In Italy , where I live , the people are remarkably indifferent to the advent of the euro . They do n't really care about united Europe @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It is true that any price changes here never take notice of fractions ; they are always rounded up to the next zero . <p> Far more excited about the euro are the people of Britain , where I come from , even though they have not yet joined the system . They know that international trade will be affected but are waiting to see the extent . <p> Some years ago , in Chamonix , France , I was waiting in line to change my lire to francs at a bank . The currency prices of all European countries were visible on a big board , changing continually according to the central exchange to which it had a link-up . I got to talking to a man in the line . He said he spent the best part of his day buying and selling currencies from bank to bank . <p> I got so far as to ask him what his job was . <p> " Just this , " he said , " changing my money . " <p> I inquired if he made a good living . " @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ n't pay tax . " <p> I wonder what he will do for a living now ? <p> Everyone is agreed that the euro will be a great convenience for the traveler in Europe . One always needs actual cash . But investment advisers are saying , " Stick to dollars . " <p> The aim of the euro is to further unite Europe . I suppose it will . Europe has for the past 55 years been united for the first time , due to the nuclear deterrent . No commercial advantages , however , could unite different peoples so effectively as language , as in the case of the United States of America and Britain . Robert B. Reich was Secretary of Labor in the first Clinton Administration . <p> Left-of-center politicians now lead every major Western nation , including most of Europe . So what ? Real power is shifting to global businesses , which are merging at a record pace , and to central banks , rapidly consolidating their authority . The euro accelerates both trends . <p> Jurgen Stark , vice president of the Bundesbank , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to combine sound monetary and fiscal policy with more flexibility . " These are code words . <p> " Sound monetary policy " means that the new European Central Bank ( freed from democratic oversight ) will fight inflation , not unemployment . <p> " Sound fiscal policy " means that public spending , already slashed as the price of admission to the euro club , will stay that way . <p> " More flexibility " means that a common currency will push employers to cut costs , especially payrolls . <p> Europeans are willing to go along because these sorts of policies appear to have paid off for the United States . President Clinton 's 72 percent popularity rating , impeachment notwithstanding , exactly matches the record percentage of Americans who think our economy is good . It is no coincidence . <p> What Europeans do n't know is that America 's economic ebullience rests on a house of cards . It 's not " sound " macroeconomics and a " flexible " labor market that have put us in such a good mood . It 's a stock market @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ world commodity prices that have made oil and raw-material imports so cheap that even the Fed has briefly stopped battling inflation . <p> The Dow Jones could come back to earth with a thud when the frenzy abates . Our ballooning trade imbalance will pop at some point . <p> Meanwhile , we are n't saving a dime . And when the going gets rough again , we will notice that the gap between rich and poor has widened into a chasm , nobody has job security , and there is no safety net . Even in these frothy times , more of our children are impoverished than before the expansion started , and fewer Americans ever see a doctor . <p> The euro will surely make Europe more efficient , speeding capital to where it can get the highest return . But the real lesson from America is that people do n't move nearly as fast as capital . <p> Left-of-center governments , here and abroad , used to provide a buffer between the two . Now , capital is running the show everywhere . Michael Portillo is a former @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is n't about economics , but politics : the steady shift of power away from nation-states to an emerging government of Europe . Americans should be concerned because what 's likely to result is a Europe that 's both less democratic and more anti-American . <p> At least since biblical times , when Christ held aloft a coin bearing the image of Caesar , it 's been understood that whoever controls the currency holds political power . Europe can not have a single currency and centralized monetary policy without merging all its economic decision-making , including control over government spending and taxation . <p> The choices that most affect citizens ' lives -- the balance among interest rates , growth and unemployment -- will be made by the European Central Bank , which is completely unaccountable . Voters will elect national governments that have given up the power to govern . <p> European economic policy self-consciously represents an alternative to American laissez-faire . European governments spend and tax heavily , overregulate their labor markets and maintain excessively costly social programs . <p> Those policies have produced high unemployment , but the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ " third way " between old-style socialism and the supposed divisive social consequences of the American way . By creating a new economic bloc more populous than the United States , the European visionaries hope to protect European inefficiency and bureaucracy against attrition from global competition . <p> That 's not all . Europe is planning to have its own defense and foreign policy too , decided by majority voting among the member states . The United States did n't need the latest Iraq crisis to tell it that a European policy based on consensus is n't going to be pro-American . Martin Feldstein was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Reagan Administration . <p> European monetary union is likely to put Europe on a path to higher inflation , reversing 20 years of progress . Before the start of the monetary union , good monetary policy in the major European countries reduced inflation to less than 2 percent because of the dominant leadership of Germany 's independent and fiercely anti-inflationary central bank . With the euro , Germany 's dominance will end and central-bank independence may be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ back in the 1980 's , public sentiment in Germany supported the tough monetary policies needed to keep inflation low . Under the rules adopted then , other European countries had to follow Germany 's lead or accept the destabilizing consequences and political embarrassment of currency devaluations . <p> But in the new order , the making of monetary policy and therefore the determination of inflation passes from individual national central banks to the new European Central Bank where each country has equal weight . Without the tough standard-setting by the German central bank , the process is likely to drift to higher inflation rates . Indeed , some non-German politicians favored monetary union as a way to end Germany 's dominance of European monetary policy , in the mistaken hope that an easier monetary policy would have favorable long-term effects on employment and growth . <p> Leading European politicians are now also calling for political controls over monetary policy , a clear violation of the Maastricht treaty that established the union and an equally clear recipe for higher inflation . Although the new left-of-center Government in Germany supports this move @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in a country in which the majority of voters doubted the advisability of abandoning the German mark for the untried euro . <p> How Germany responds to the conflict caused by rising inflation will be a critical issue in Europe 's political future . Diane Johnson is the author , most recently , of " Le Divorce , " a novel . She lives in Paris . <p> You might suppose that the average European , faced on Jan. 1 with a disconcerting shift to the euro from his local franc or Deutschemark , would be filled with some emotion of elation , exasperation or dread . Just as we 've been thinking in dollars since we were born , or in Swiss francs if we were farsighted , a Frenchman 's familiar francs and centimes are very central to his consciousness -- plenty of people still think in old francs , the currency before the revaluation in 1960 . <p> Europeans have been warned for some time that life is going to change , that soon enough now ( mid-2002 ) their pockets will be filled with new , unfamiliar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ resist this , but instead they seem to be ignoring it . With the Jan. 1 change-over affecting governments and banks , the private citizen , in Paris at least , is paying no attention whatever . <p> Yes , there 's a little kiosk in the bank designed interactively to help you work out your euro situation . No one ever goes near it . Yes , some price tags are now expressed in the two currencies -- the euro price , symbolized by an enigmatic little double-crossed E , is tucked in small print under the " real " price . <p> But you ignore the euro price because it does n't mean anything except , deceptively , if you 've misread it and think for an instant that you are getting a bargain . <p> Who can convert centigrade to Fahrenheit ? The conversion of francs to euros is not a friendly or easy one either : roughly 6.5 to 1 . That is , you thought you had 6,500 francs , but now you only have 1,000 euros . <p> No one has ever seen a euro @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have to start dealing with the new bills and coins ; so they 'll think about that problem tomorrow . <p> Remember the metric system in America , and how they gave people 10 years to get ready for it , optimistically putting up road signs in both miles and kilometers ? As Americans did with centiliters , milligrams and meters , Europeans seem to be hoping the euro will just go away . <p> Some currencies , after all , do n't make it . Whatever happened to the E.C.U. ? Franco Modigliani won the Nobel prize in economics in 1985 and is a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology . <p> The introduction of the euro is a crucial step in Europe 's courageous march toward political union , which may end forever the deleterious nationalism that has ravaged the Continent for centuries . <p> Is the union going to last or will it be pulled apart by centrifugal forces ? Legally , the treaty does not contemplate secession , but in the end durability will depend in large measure not on the legal binds but on economic performance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the extent to which the euro replaces the dollar as a reserve currency . This is a superficial and even dangerous view . The economic advantages of being a reserve currency are questionable ; the danger is that pursuing prestige could result in escalating interest rates , which would prove very damaging for Europe . <p> The relevant test of economic performance will be the ability to cure the plague of unemployment , currently averaging 10 percent and higher in member countries . There is no developed country outside the euro group with unemployment close to two digits . <p> There are many causes , but the recent " Economists ' Manifesto on Unemployment in the European Union , " supported by many leading economists , holds that much of the problem can be traced to misguided and inept economic policies , especially in the monetary area . These missteps resulted in a collapse of investment . <p> The prospects for improved policies , which had looked rather dismal , have taken a turn for the better with the election of new governments in France and Germany over the last @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the European Central Bank has arranged a concerted reduction in interest rates , with its president expressing the hope that the move might help " stimulate investment . " <p> If these recent events are any sign of things to come , we can look with some new hope to a successful and lasting euro . <p> http : //www.nytimes.com 
##3002368 <p> Twenty-four years ago I came to the United States Senate filled with awe , excitement and determination . Despite the occasional victory , the combination of my losses on issues about which I felt strongly and Congress 's unwillingness to confront problems that ca n't be postponed much longer causes me to leave the Senate feeling more dismayed than exhilarated . <p> I came to Washington in 1975 from Arkansas , where I had served four years as Governor . That January , as my wife , Betty , and I drove off the grounds of the Governor 's Mansion , I never felt wiser . I was prepared to serve a short internship in the Senate before running for President . Every political neophyte thought that post-Watergate America would be eager to embrace a Democratic name and face no one had ever heard or seen before . <p> I soon concluded , however , that the vast Federal apparatus was much more complicated than I had anticipated . Eventually scratching the idea of running for President , I immersed myself instead in the arcane rules of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I arrived , the Senate had begun to require all committee votes to be public ( unless a public vote was taken to close them ) . Committee meetings were to be open as well . C-SPAN started televising floor debate in the House in 1979 , and the Senate followed suit in 1986 . <p> That openness has been healthy , but at a price . A good two-minute speech can , and often does , take a half-hour for a politician with a national television audience . <p> Before government was conducted out in the sunshine , senators could vote as they pleased , good or bad , with little voter retribution on individual issues . But in the 1970 's national associations by the dozens were setting up shop in Washington , right down to the beekeepers and mohair producers , and with them came a new threat to the integrity of the legislative process : " single issue " politics . These groups developed very harsh methods of dealing with those who crossed them . Suddenly , every vote began to have political consequences . Congress began @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fence it could n't burrow under . <p> Consequently , Congress is failing to get its work done . We saw the result in the bizarre spectacle that closed the session in October , when eight of the required 13 appropriation bills were folded into a $550 billion omnibus bill that was drafted and agreed to not by Congress itself , but by six or eight senior members and a few White House staffers . I do n't know which was worse : the way the Government was shut down in 1995 or the way we kept it open in 1998 . <p> There are many reasons for all of this chaos , but chief among them is the compulsion to put a partisan bent on every single issue . That , in turn , has led to a mean-spiritedness and total loss of collegiality . There is rarely consensus even on the most practical and ideologically neutral matters . And issues that go to the heart of the values we hold as a nation have become so partisan that the imperative to win subsumes the necessity of governing . Why @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or education be partisan issues ? <p> A senator periodically receives a record showing the number of times , by percentage , that he or she has voted with each of the other 99 senators . When I first came to the Senate , there were Democrats mixed in with Republicans and vice versa . Today , except for procedural votes , or what are often called throwaways , it 's rare for more than two or three senators to cross party lines on a vote . Nothing could more starkly demonstrate the fog of partisanship that has enveloped the Senate . <p> The Christian Coalition claims to represent 13 percent of the electorate . There 's little reason to doubt it . Whatever the number , the group is powerful enough to bring a filibuster on any matter it opposes . That is true to a lesser extent of groups representing the elderly , educators , environmentalists and others . It is n't that the groups do n't have legitimate interests , but they distort the process by wrangling over the smallest issues , leaving Congress paralyzed , the public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what afflicts our democracy so well as this : 94 percent of candidates who spend the most money win . We have all come to reflexively calculate on every vote , significant or insignificant , ( 1 ) what 30-second television spot our next opponent can make of it , ( 2 ) the impact it could have on contributions , and ( 3 ) what interest group it might inflame or please . <p> Democracy is threatened when the candidates we elect and laws we enact hinge on how much money is spent . To claim that campaign spending is a legitimate exercise of free speech is to deny the constitutional principle that each one of us counts . A donor who gives $100,000 gets a lot more free speech than the assembly-line worker , who cares just as deeply about the issues but does n't give because he ca n't afford to and does n't vote because he does n't think his views matter unless his interests happen to coincide with those of the big donors , and they seldom do . <p> My office was next to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for all Americans to see that room and the hallways ( cynically called Gucci Gulch ) packed with lobbyists when the committee considers tax bills . Money does indeed buy access , and that 's when access pays off . <p> Finally , more constitutional amendments have been offered in the past 32 years ( 5,449 ) than in the first 173 years of our history , virtually all of them ill-conceived , trivial and politically driven . To the Senate 's credit , not one has been approved by the required two-thirds vote in the past 24 years . It may seem odd , but I believe this is the Senate 's finest achievement . It dramatically demonstrates that there are still many truly fine people in the Senate who are trying desperately to protect the Constitution . I voted against every constitutional amendment that came to a vote in my 24-year tenure . I 'll be content for that to be my legacy . <p> In a visit with Harry Truman in his home in Missouri in 1971 , he admonished me to always put my trust in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said . It was profound both in its simplicity and because it was Harry Truman talking . The fact that I survived 24 years in the Senate while voting for the Panama Canal treaties and against constitutional amendments on prayer in the schools , desecration of the flag and similar popular proposals proves Truman was right . <p> While I 'm not apocalyptic about our future , I 'm greatly troubled by Congress 's unwillingness to confront our long-range problems , like global warming , population growth , loss of arable land to development and depletion and pollution of our water supplies . If we continue to ignore these problems , or only deal with them superficially , our future will be bleak indeed . <p> Winston Churchill wryly observed , " You can always depend on the American people to do the right thing -- once they 've explored all other possibilities . " But exploring all the other possibilities takes time , a commodity in increasingly short supply . <p> http : //www.nytimes.com 
##3003450 <p> Six years ago , a self-effacing Russian emigre with scant business experience set up a modest New Jersey company that planned to introduce entrepreneurs from the new Russia to American capitalists . <p> Peter Berlin 's venture , Benex International Company , got off to a slow start . But after a few years of arranging shipments of stereos and other electronic products to Russia , Mr. Berlin hit on something simpler and more lucrative to move around the world : money . <p> It proved an inspired choice . Nearly everyone in Russia with any money , from businessmen to gangsters , was searching for ways to hide their cash from onerous taxes or overly inquisitive investigators . Mr. Berlin offered a fast , discreet vehicle for moving dollars offshore -- lots of dollars . <p> Mr. Berlin 's companies opened accounts at the Bank of New York , where his wife , Lucy Edwards , was an executive , and began whisking billions of dollars a year out of Russia . Ms. Edwards was in an ideal position to help . Just as he began @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a prestigious job at the bank in London drumming up commercial clients in Russia . <p> The couple prospered . According to people involved in the investigation , they earned millions of dollars from Benex 's dealings , depositing the money offshore in accounts in the British Channel Islands and elsewhere . Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards , who had previously owned a small home in upstate New York , bought a $500,000 apartment in central London and enrolled her daughter in an expensive private school . <p> Associates say little distinguished them from other Russian immigrants aspiring to upper-middle-class success in the United States . The diminutive Ms. Edwards , who rose from an entry-level job to executive in just eight years at the Bank of New York , was known for her diligence and energy in recruiting clients . Russian businessmen say Mr. Berlin had no obvious links to the titans of Russia 's new market economy . <p> Nonetheless , the couple is now at the center of the biggest Federal money laundering investigation in history as law enforcement officials try to sort out how more than $7 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . Much remains unknown . <p> Federal investigators , for instance , suspect that Mr. Berlin 's transformation from small-time businessman to leader of a widely used company was orchestrated by someone in Russia with ties to business or political leaders . But so far , neither they nor British investigators have been able to figure out who that might be . <p> Ms. Edwards ' role remains equally unclear . British investigators who raided the couple 's apartment in London in August found business cards and stationery for the Benex company that carried the Bank of New York logo . Prosecutors assert that Ms. Edwards was directly involved in expediting at least one transfer through Benex . And Western financiers say she ran financial seminars in Russia in which Benex 's consulting services were promoted using the Bank of New York name . <p> Investigators are still trying to unravel whose money washed through Mr. Berlin 's companies . Some of the more than 87,000 electronic transfers , they say , appear to involve legitimate Russian companies financing the purchase of imported goods and evading taxes . Some have been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ York , which is cooperating with the investigation , has not been accused of doing anything wrong . In an indictment in September that Federal prosecutors said was just the beginning of a far-reaching international inquiry , Mr. Berlin , Ms. Edwards and an associate were charged with illegally operating a money transfer business and taking deposits . <p> The case has already had an impact that few could have foreseen . It has roiled relations between Washington and Moscow , sparked a Congressional inquiry , given new momentum to corruption investigations into the financial dealings of Russia 's business titans and President Boris N. Yeltsin 's family , and become an issue in coming presidential elections here and in Russia . <p> Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards are still living in London , where their apartment is frequented by photographers and journalists seeking interviews . They and their lawyers have declined comment . Ms. Edwards 's London-based lawyer has said that she has done nothing wrong and that the bank had no grounds for firing her . The Beginnings Two Long Roads From Russia <p> Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ depicted as the glue holding together America 's morally bankrupt economic system . <p> Ms. Edwards , born Lyudmila Pritzker in Leningrad , was the first of the two to make her way to the West . In 1977 , Ms. Pritzker married Brad Edwards , a 19-year old American merchant seaman she had met at a club in Leningrad . After a civil wedding at the American consulate in Leningrad , they moved to Illinois , where their daughter , Amy , was born . The couple then settled in Colorado , where Ms. Edwards held a succession of jobs as a bank teller and waitress . <p> After the marriage fell apart in 1988 , Ms. Edwards almost immediately landed an entry-level job handling commercial accounts at the Bank of New York , one of the country 's oldest and most prestigious banks . <p> In 1988 , the Bank of New York took over Irving Trust , which was doing extensive business in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union . Ms. Edwards joined the new Eastern European division in 1992 and became a loan officer two years @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ranks . <p> Ms. Edwards 's bosses in the Eastern European unit were two well-regarded bank officers , Vladimir Galitzine , an American-born Russian with a royal pedigree , and Natasha Gurfinkel , an Ivy League-educated woman who , like Ms. Edwards , was a Russian immigrant to the United States . <p> The bank 's strategy was straightforward . It hoped to become a key overseas player in Russia by making it easier for Russian companies to conduct business overseas . Ms. Edwards 's verve in searching for clients immediately set her apart , associates say . <p> " What distinguished her to everyone was her energy , incredible energy , " said a former colleague of Ms. Edwards . " When others would see four or five clients a day , she would see 10 or 12 . " <p> Peter Berlin 's road to Western success appears to have been less smooth . <p> Records show that a man named Peter Berlin graduated from the Moscow Institute on Physics and Technology in 1978 with a degree in molecular chemical physics . <p> Mr. Berlin left Russia about 10 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ A trim , bearded man who stands about 5 feet 9 inches , Mr. Berlin may have lived inIndiana before he moved to New Jersey . His immigration status when he came to the United States is not clear ; many Russians who travel under such circumstances leave Moscow on a tourist visa and then stay in the United States illegally . He later became an American citizen . <p> In the summer of 1992 , Mr. Berlin married Ms. Edwards , a union that would have solved any immigration problems . A relative would say only that they met and married in the same year . <p> By 1993 , he was trying his hand at business . He founded Benex , which listed his apartment in Cliffside Park , N.J. , as its operating address . After several years , Mr. Berlin hooked up with a major Moscow-based dealer in consumer electronics and began brokering sales of televisions and other items . <p> As Ms. Edwards rose through the ranks at the Bank of New York , the couple 's finances modestly improved . They bought a house in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Berlin has a taste for fine art , particularly Impressionist paintings , but some found him , and his wife , uninspiring . <p> " They were not high-cultured and did n't seem to have much spiritual value , " said Vadim Borshai , a Russian artist and a neighbor who lived near them in Narrowsburg . " There was no poetry in their soul . " <p> The couple also had brushes with local law enforcement . Seven years ago , in a Nordstrom department store in Edison , N.J. , Ms. Edwards tried to steal more than $1,400 worth of clothing . She was arrested and pleaded guilty , only to repeat the offense two years later at a Bloomingdale 's store in Hackensack , N.J. -- this time , with 15-year-old Amy in tow . She was arrested again and later pleaded guilty . <p> The Bank of New York , which was employing her , did not learn of either arrest until after Federal investigators began scrutinizing the Benex accounts . <p> Mr. Berlin was arrested for shoplifting six years ago , records show , when he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ medicine from a local A. &P.; He retained a lawyer , and the charges were later dropped . The Companies Red Flags Ignored By the Bank <p> On a winter day three years ago , Mr. Berlin took a step that would change his life : He strolled into the Bank of New York 's Wall Street headquarters and opened an account in the name of Benex International . Six months later , in July 1996 , he opened an account in the name of Becs International at the same branch . <p> Closer scrutiny by the Bank of New York would have revealed corporate records on file with the State of New Jersey showing that one of its employees , Ms. Edwards , was one of two officers at Benex ( Mr. Berlin was the other ) . The bank 's own records noted that Ms. Edwards had authority to withdraw money from the Becs account . <p> Both of those facts should have been red flags at the bank . Banks typically restrict employees from playing a direct role in customers ' businesses . The Bank of New York @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Ms. Edwards 's formal links to her husband 's ventures , the bank says , did not surface until late 1998 , after the Federal inquiry began . <p> Bank employees knew that Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards were married , but this apparently served only to shield the accounts from scrutiny . In Congressional testimony last month , the bank 's chief executive , Thomas A. Renyi , said the fact that Mr. Berlin was married to " a well-regarded bank officer " had dissuaded bank auditors from looking more closely at the money in the accounts . He described that as " a lapse on the part of the bank . " <p> There was plenty to look at . It is not clear precisely when the companies began moving money out of Russia , but by 1996 they had become one of the more heavily used pipelines for sending out cash . Millions of dollars a day coursed through the network , pouring through the Bank of New York unchecked . <p> Banks do not typically make much profit transferring money from one country to another . They @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ per transaction . <p> But Federal investigators say that in Russia 's volatile economy , Mr. Berlin was able to charge a premium for a service that ran through the reliable , prestigious Bank of New York . His companies , investigators say , were paid a percentage of the total transferred , earning millions of dollars in profits . <p> There were some uniquely Russian forces fueling the demand for Mr. Berlin 's services . Russia 's high taxes and import tariffs give businessmen powerful incentives to hide the true costs of their deals , whether importing goods , buying property , or consummating routine deals . Offshore accounts help hide the volume of trade and commerce . <p> A few months after Mr. Berlin opened his first account at the bank , Ms. Edwards was courted by a Moscow-based bank but was persuaded to stay at Bank of New York with a prestigious promotion . She was sent to London by Ms. Gurfinkel and appointed a vice president , responsible for finding new business among Russian companies . <p> While both Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards wore off-the-rack business @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ weekends in Italy . <p> " Between 1996 and 1998 , there seemed to be more money , " the colleague said . " Peter was doing better , or that is what everyone attributed it to . But there was no ostentation , no high-priced clothing or jewelry . " <p> Mr. Berlin 's companies appear to have transacted much of their business from an office building in Queens , where a handful of people working with computers arranged hundreds of electronic transfers a day . <p> Russian investigators have told their American counterparts they believe that crime groups in Russia exercised some form of control over the operation . American officials say they have no evidence of that , but are still trying to understand how Mr. Berlin corralled so much of the money-moving business so quickly . <p> The customers appear to have covered the entire range of Russian commerce . Some of the money , Federal investigators say , was moved by Russian criminal groups . Italian prosecutors have found that Russian gangs operating out of northern Italy , for instance , used Benex to transfer several @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the $7 billion handled by Mr. Berlin 's companies moved through the accounts before any suspicions arose . But in early 1998 , investigators in two countries , working on different cases , began asking questions about Becs , Benex and Mr. Berlin . <p> The Manhattan District Attorney office , working with British officials on a money laundering and stock manipulation case , found that a Russian emigre they were investigating , Roman Amiragov , was moving $300,000 to $500,000 a week through Benex into the Bank of New York . <p> A few months later , the Russian Government separately asked the Federal Bureau of Investigation for help in tracing the ransom in a kidnapping case . The money , it turned out , had moved through a Benex account at the Bank of New York on its way to Russian organized crime figures , prompting the bureau to open its own inquiry . <p> The inquiry focused more closely on Mr. Berlin in August , 1998 , after Republic Bank told the F.B.I . that $10 million had passed from Russia through an account controlled by one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ continued at full throttle through the fall of 1998 . But something had changed . His companies were being watched . The Investigations Startling Disclosures After Slow Start <p> In its initial phases , the case did not make much of a stir . <p> Federal investigators served a subpoena on the Bank of New York in September of 1998 for account records relating to Mr. Berlin 's companies , among hundreds of such requests the bank receives each year . <p> Bank officials did not alert Mr. Renyi , the bank 's chairman . <p> Federal investigators were startled by what they found . The records showed a dizzying array of transfers out of Russia and to dozens of countries , including in some cases back to Russia . <p> British investigators began electronic surveillance of Mr. Berlin 's and Ms. Edwards 's conversations , and the F.B.I . received transcripts , according to American law enforcement officials . <p> In March , confronted with requests for more information , the Bank of New York officials finally informed Mr. Renyi , the bank 's chief executive , that a problem @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ companies . <p> " The interest of the investigative agencies heated up in March , and that 's when it went to the C.E.O , " said one person with knowledge of the investigation at the bank . " There were people who knew there was a big-time amount of money there after the first subpoenas came in September of ' 98 . But it was n't until six months later that it went to the C.E.O . " <p> There are conflicting views of how actively the F.B.I . pursued the case . <p> Numerous officials , including current and former members of the New York Police Department , the Federal Reserve , the New York State Banking Department and the National Crime Squad of Britain , assert that the bureau moved too slowly . <p> Federal law enforcement officials maintain that they made a choice , at the outset , to investigate the case covertly . Mr. Berlin 's accounts , they say , offered a rare window into Russian financial chicanery , provided that the inquiry could be kept secret . <p> Federal officials were trying to determine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ case to make because the law requires prosecutors to prove that the cash at issue was used in a crime such as drug dealing , extortion or fraud . The F.B.I. , officials said , hoped to infiltrate the organization and find out more about how Russians launder their money . <p> " A lot of people got frustrated because we were trying to do the investigation without letting the targets know we were doing it , " a Federal law enforcement official said . " We were actively investigating the money laundering case , but we restrained ourselves from doing anything that would tip them off . " <p> Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards were surprisingly open about the links between their two careers . For instance , brochures for Mr. Berlin 's companies carried the Bank of New York logo . The couple traveled together to Russia and in 1996 and 1997 , and Mr. Berlin sometimes signed his name to tabs billed to Ms. Edwards 's expense account at the Bank of New York . <p> That discrepancy was eventually noticed by bank auditors in 1998 , before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a closer look at the couple 's financial dealings , according to people close to the bank . <p> Meanwhile , Federal investigators were struggling to understand a case that was largely unfolding in Moscow . The leads , law enforcement officials said , went in myriad , sometimes unfruitful directions . <p> Federal investigators at one point contemplated using an American diplomat in Moscow as an undercover agent . Ms. Edwards and Mr. Berlin had made contract with the diplomat in 1998 in an attempt to secure United States Government backing for their plan to convert a Russian defense factory to civilian uses . <p> Mr. Berlin was later taped by British investigators as he boasted about his ties to the diplomat . The plan was called off after The New York Times disclosed the inquiry in August . <p> Today , with the Federal investigation now a very public event , Ms. Edwards and Mr. Berlin , those investigating them and the Bank of New York all face complicated problems . <p> The F.B.I . can no longer conduct a covert investigation , leaving the bureau with the more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from Russia , or by persuading witnesses to come forward . <p> The Bank of New York has been cooperating with the investigation , but Federal authorities have indicated that they still plan to take a hard look at how the bank handled various issues surrounding Mr. Berlin 's accounts . The Manhattan District Attorney 's Office has its own investigation under way , with uncertain consequences for the bank . <p> And with a Federal indictment hanging over their heads , and their bank accounts frozen , the pressure on Mr. Berlin and Ms. Edwards to cooperate with the Federal investigation has increased . But so far they have remained silent , declining all interview requests from the authorities or the press . <p> Last week , as Ms. Edwards remained holed up in her London apartment , she used her building 's intercom system to decline an interview request . <p> " I wish I could help you , but I ca n't , " she said . <p> http : //www.nytimes.com Chart : " At the Center of an Investigation " -- How the lives of Lucy Edwards @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ question by the F.B.I . and the Bank of New York . 1988 -- Lucy Edwards gets a job at the Bank of New York . 1990 -- Peter Berlin moves from Russia to the United States . 1992 -- Ms. Edwards and Mr. Berlin are married . 1993 -- Benex is founded by Mr. Berlin . 1996 -- American citizenship is granted to Mr. Berlin . Ms. Edwards is promoted to vice president of the Bank of New York 's London office . Mr. Berlin opens a Benex account at Bank of New York and six months later , a Becs International account . 1998 -- Benex International Company goes into business in London . The F.B.I . begins an investigation into money moving through Benex accounts at the Bank of New York . March/1998 -- The chairman of the Bank of New York is told about the investigation . July/1998 -- Beginning January 1996 and ending in July of 1999 , almost $7 billion is funneled through Benex and Becs accounts at the Bank of New York . Aug. /1998 -- Ms. Edwards is fired by the Bank of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ accounts . Sept. /1998 -- Both Ms. Edwards and Mr. Berlin are indicted on charges of operating a money-transferring business without a license . ( pg . A12 ) 
##3003451 <p> Pakistan 's military ruler , saying his nation had " hit rock bottom , " redrew its Government tonight , creating a military and civilian council to run the country and giving no timetable for relinquishing the absolute power he seized five days ago . <p> Pulling back from a confrontation that some feared could lead to nuclear war , Gen. Pervez Musharraf said he would unilaterally withdraw troops from India 's border and pursue peace talks . He said he would restrain nuclear weapons tests , although he did not promise to refrain from them . <p> Appearing on national television for only the second time since the armed forces seized power in a bloodless coup late Tuesday , the general said he would ruthlessly pursue politicians and power brokers " guilty of plundering and looting the national wealth . " And , in a rebuke to extremist Islamic parties , he warned clerics not to stoke fundamentalist fevers for political gain . <p> It was a passionate speech delivered dispassionately by an expressionless soldier in a full-dress uniform . General Musharraf , 58 , was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ week . But his address , given first in English , then in Urdu , promised " revolutionary steps " to revive a near-moribund economy and radical means to achieve them . If he succeeds , he may go down as a hero in the history of a nation weary of politicians and promises . <p> " Fifty-two years ago , we started with a beacon of hope , and today that beacon is no more , " the general said . " We stand in darkness . Our economy has crumbled . Our credibility is lost . State institutions lie demolished . People who once were brothers are now at each others ' throats . " <p> Pakistan had " a label of democracy , not the essence of it , " he said . " Our people were never emancipated from the yoke of despotism . <p> " I shall not allow the people to be taken back to the era of sham democracy , but to a true one . And I promise you I will , if God wills it . " <p> Even his supporters acknowledge @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Tuesday night -- overthrown the Prime Minister , Nawaz Sharif , abolished Parliament , suspended the Constitution and re-created the Government by fiat -- is illegal , unconstitutional and essentially high treason . <p> And some of those same supporters say there is no telling when General Musharraf might give up power . <p> " It took General Zia eight years to get out of this dilemma , " said Ijaz ul-Haq , referring to his father , Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq , Pakistan 's last military dictator . General Zia seized power in 1977 , ruled under martial law until 1985 and died in a plane crash while still in office as President in 1988 . <p> General Musharraf said tonight that Pakistan was on the verge of disintegration , and that he had risked the Constitution to save the nation . " We have hit rock bottom , " he said . " We have no choice but to rise , and rise we shall . " <p> The General said he would replace Parliament with a six-member National Security Council . He said the council would include the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ experts in law , finance , foreign policy and national affairs yet to be selected , supported by a think tank of advisers . Under the council would be a cabinet of ministers , also not yet appointed . <p> " This is not martial law , only another path to democracy , " he said . The only remaining link to the old order will be President Rafik Tarar , who held little power under the constitutional framework and was a staunch ally of Mr. Sharif . <p> To revive Pakistan 's crumbling economy -- a mammoth task , given the nation 's near-insolvency and the pattern of politicians and cronies using the treasury as their personal bank -- the general said he would try to recover " the looted national wealth -- a task that will be ruthlessly pursued . " <p> The recent history of nations like the Philippines and the former Zaire , now Congo , where rulers stole billions and impoverished their people , suggests that this will be a challenge . <p> " All the money has already been siphoned off " to overseas accounts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Muslim League , the party of Mr. Sharif . <p> General Musharraf said that , in addition to prosecuting corrupt politicians , he will force the wealthy to pay their taxes , which will be a new experience for most , and compel businessmen to repay $4 billion in Government loans that are overdue or in default . <p> He gave them an ultimatum : pay up in a month , or go to jail . <p> " My advice to the guilty is to return voluntarily national wealth and bank loans and pay their taxes before the hand of law forces them to do so , " the general said . And he promised to make his own assets and tax returns open to public scrutiny , unheard of in Pakistan . <p> He offered an unexpected olive branch to India , four months after leading troops in skirmishes against the Indian Army in the disputed territory of Kashmir . Mr. Sharif withdrew from the confrontation in July at the urging of President Clinton , which raised tensions between the Pakstani leader and his army to the breaking point . @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dialogue with India , " General Musharraf said , and he announced " a unilateral military de-escalation , " including " the return of all our forces moved to the borders in the recent past . " About 30,000 Pakistani soldiers are stationed at the border with India , in a tense standoff that has raised fears of the fourth war between the nations since 1947 . <p> But General Musharraf did not say that troops would be withdrawn from the Kashmir area , where the border is disputed , and he pledged support for " our Kashmiri brethren . " <p> India reacted cautiously to the announcement , Reuters reported from New Delhi . India 's national security adviser , Brajesh Mishra , asked whether he was satisfied , told the Star News television channel : " I am not going to say I am not satisfied , " adding , " But we will look at what he has said . " <p> Military men , politicians and political analysts said it appeared that General Musharraf , the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff , planned to stay @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in February 2002 -- and perhaps much longer . <p> The former army chief , the retired Gen. Mirza Aslam Beg , who had the opportunity to declare martial law when President Zia died but held elections instead , said General Musharraf was right to seize power in the way he did , but wrong not to say how long he would hold it or the way he would wield it . <p> " If he wants to clean up the mess , he should have a very undoubtful start , " General Beg said in an interview . " He has n't given a good idea of the type of Government he wants to form . " <p> Gauging the reaction of the great mass of Pakistanis tonight was difficult ; most of the nation 's 138 million people are poor , with little real power , and no real voice in politics . <p> Criticism came from Qazi Hussein Ahmed , the leader of Jamaat-i-Islami , the nation 's largest Islamic political party , who said he was " disappointed that the general did not expose the names of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ offer any electoral reforms . " <p> But across the political spectrum of Pakistan 's elite , the people most likely to be hit in the pocketbook by the proposed reforms , reactions ranged from cautious approval to pleasant surprise to pure elation . <p> " I have never heard such a powerful , straightforward and honest speech , " said Sadruddin Hashwani , who owns some of Pakistan 's biggest hotels and an oil company . " It is a turning point , a chance to make a good country of Pakistan . " <p> Mr. ul-Haq , a potential prime minister and the probable new leader of the nation 's most powerful political party , said : " I am both happy and sorry . Sorry because the speech should have been given by someone with the mandate of the people -- that is , Nawaz Sharif . Instead it has been given by an army general . " <p> Javed Amin Kwhara , a landowner and farmer in Lahore , said he worried that " there was no mention of a time frame or a way to go @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ give people more confidence . But there seems to be a consensus in the country that you need a new political system . " <p> Najam Sethi , an outspoken newspaper editor , said : " The general has pulled these words from the agenda of the liberal intellectuals . Most people will say , ' What you say is right ; now let 's see what you do . ' " But , he cautioned : " This is not an interim agenda . This is a two- to five-year agenda . " <p> Mehriyar Pataudi , senior vice president of Askari Commercial Bank , called the peace offering to India " the most intelligent move I 've ever seen a leader make in this country . " He predicted that the general 's laying bare his personal finances would " set an example that might produce a different flock of politicians . " <p> General Musharraf closed his speech with a prayer that he said he had composed . He asked for " the vision to see and perceive the true from the false , the wisdom to comprehend @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do justice and the strength to do right . " <p> http : //www.nytimes.com 
##3003452 <p> Those who only had their houses burned or crops destroyed often apologize because their story is not bad enough . They are sheepish about complaining . <p> And so they lead the way to the worse off , the irretrievably broken or the unbearably sorrowful -- the children of parents who were killed as they watched or the men whose wives were carried off screaming or the old woman whose story no one is sure of , but she has been sobbing for two months now , fingering a red flower embroidered on a pink cloth . <p> Afghanistan 's ruling Taliban militia , along with thousands of Pakistanis lit with the fervor of jihad , went on a destructive spree this summer , killing wantonly , emptying entire towns , machine-gunning livestock , sawing down fruit trees , blasting apart irrigation canals . It was a binge of blood lust and mayhem described in consistent detail by witnesses . <p> Among the survivors are an estimated 65,000 refugees who have escaped to the Panjshir Valley , a nape of land nestled within the rugged Himalayan peaks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from cloth and plastic , relentlessly foraging for firewood , they are free for now from their tormentors but not yet safe from the famously deep snows and furious winds of the winter soon to come . <p> On July 28 , the Taliban began a long-expected summer offensive . The militia , which has been on a largely unstoppable march since 1995 , wanted to take command of the 10 to 20 percent of the country not yet under its control . <p> This time , they attacked in three places , sending their main juggernaut into the Shamali Valley just north of Kabul . More than 6,000 soldiers rolled through towns and villages in what survivors describe as a well-coordinated assault supported by tanks , artillery and aerial bombardments . <p> The onslaught was overpowering , but after a week , as the Taliban celebrated victory , they were stunned by a night-time counterattack . The opposition forces of Ahmad Shah Massoud , their sole remaining nemesis , hit back , springing ambushes and slaying hundreds -- perhaps more than 1,000 -- of the Taliban , who reportedly suffered @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was a military triumph , but much of the land recovered was already ruins and scorched earth . <p> " Why did they have to kill my cows and goats , and why cut down the mulberry trees and stomp through my garden ? " asked Mohammad Kasim , 59 , a refugee who now lives here in the town of Bazarak , his home a tent of thin and porous blankets held up by branches . <p> Mr. Kasim is a man with a long angular face topped by a turban and completed with a thick underhang of beard . He had the anxious , bewildered look of someone terrified by the future . " We have nothing now except for God , " he said . <p> Nafas Jon , 45 , a gaunt , tired woman with six children , has taken sanctuary along with 1,000 others in Bazarak 's small , decrepit school . " The Taliban took my husband out of the house and cut him down , " she said evenly . " They were killing everyone who looked young , thinking they must be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . We have nothing left . " <p> She sat in a space made private by cloths hung from rope , a hovel barely three-feet high . " We returned once to see our house , " Mrs. Jon said , pausing a few seconds to frame the memory in her mind . " The ceiling is now on the ground . " <p> Guldara , Saraykhoja , Bagram , Karabagh : From those and other towns to the north of Kabul , dozens of refugees -- interviewed independently -- had much the same story to tell , of people shot in their homes , fires everywhere , beatings , abductions , mass flight . Taliban 's Purpose -- An Ethnic Operation Or Strictly Military ? <p> To them , the Taliban 's purpose was obvious . Afghanistan , for thousands of years one of the great crossroads of Asia , has endured invasions and migrations that have left it a demanding anthropological puzzle of ethnicities and tribes . The Taliban are largely ethnic Pathans and they wanted not only to rid the area of ethnic Tajiks , whose resistance to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ enemies with nothing . <p> The militia 's leaders have explained their summer rampage differently , calling it a humanitarian act . They insist that Mr. Massoud 's forces , the so-called United Front , have used the towns as redoubts for staging attacks . The populace lived in constant danger . <p> To " save " the citizenry , the Taliban forced most of them to flee ; others were trucked to Kabul , the nation 's capital , or the city of Jalalabad . Some 12,500 displaced people -- more than 8,000 of them children -- are living in the compound of the closed Soviet Embassy in Kabul , according to a United Nations report . More than 2,000 Tajik men are locked within the cramped stone caverns of the Pul-i-Charki Prison in Kabul , a spokesman for Mr. Massoud said . <p> There are an estimated 130,000 refugees in all , the largest concentration of them here in the Panjshir Valley . For two-and-a-half months now , they have been pondering the devastation to their earthly possessions and growing fixated on the icy challenge to their survival that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to mobilize , apparently unsure of whether the refugees could go back home -- or if those homes still stood . The agencies are now swiftly setting up shop , dividing the tasks : shelter , fuel , bread , blankets , medicine . <p> This has not been a high-profile crisis because this is no longer a high-profile place . In the 1980 's , the West lavished attention -- and weapons -- on Afghan warriors charging down from the mountains to match the might of the Soviet Army . These days , few people are watching . <p> Afghanistan is remote , distanced further by 21 years of war that have reversed the course of modernization . Indeed , much of the necessary aid must be carried over a single overland route from Tajikistan . It requires a journey of up to 10 days on a narrow , unpaved road pocked with ruts huge enough to swallow a car . Momentous effort will be needed merely to keep the high-altitude mountain passes from becoming snowbound . <p> " If both sides would agree not to shoot at aircraft , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , who heads the United Nations team in Bazarak . " Or a humanitarian corridor could be opened on some other roads . " <p> The Afghanistan Government -- the one driven out of Kabul in 1996 and still recognized by most of the world -- continues to operate , if feebly , here in the country 's far northeast . Kamaluddin Nasami , its planning director for the refugee crisis , said he was grateful for the help of the aid agencies but frustrated by their delays . <p> " They tell me the road is unsafe , but tell me where , and we will make it safe , " he said . " The fighting is not on the road ; it is to the sides of the road . " <p> The refugees also complain . They are receiving wheat for bread , and some have the use of bright blue plastic tarps courtesy of the United Nations . But the nights are cold , the children undernourished . <p> " Each organization comes and makes a list , and then nothing happens , " said Gulam @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tents along the turbulent current of the Panjshir River . " What shall we do ? Every week , we have two children die . " <p> The air teems with tragedy . The accounts of the refugees here rival those of Kosovo , the horror only lessened by its numbing repetition . <p> With fighting still going on , and the deserted towns still along the front lines , the extent of the death and destruction is impossible to measure . Individual accounts can not be confirmed by first-hand observation . They are supported only by the uniformity of their particulars . <p> People are eager to tell those stories , their personal losses now a vital part of their identity . <p> In one of the many clusters of tents , Mohammad Wali , a round-faced 10-year-old boy , poked his head through a crowd and called out , " They shot my father , and I saw it . " <p> He said there had been a hard knocking on their door . His father nervously walked toward the gate . The men outside fired Kalashnikovs . With @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as he could . His mother , he said , " needed to know about it right away . " <p> Shakar Gul held her arms around her nephew 's waist . The boy , Gules Tan , is 3 . " His father was killed , and his mother was taken away , " the aunt said . <p> She sat on a rock and occasionally lifted the cloth that covered her head , the traditional chador , to conceal her face . " He cries out , ' Where is my mother ? ' " she said . " We tell him she has gone away but will come back soon . In time , God willing , he will forget her . " <p> Lida , 15 , like many Afghans , uses only one name . She was wearing a purple dress with paisley decorations , and while her eyes were moist , she refused to let tears escape to her smooth cheeks . Her younger sisters had designated her to speak for the family . <p> She said , " At first , they took my @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Do not kill my only son , ' and then after they shot Sardar , my father cried so much they shot him too . " <p> People wandered out of the ragged , homemade tents to serve up their grief . A man scavenged through his pockets to find the tiny snapshot of his slain son . A weeping woman , Najila , 20 , said her parents had been killed by a bomb as they drank tea . " They had been discussing how we were going to run away , " she said . <p> Akbar Shah , 50 , said his sister died as their family fled toward the valley , part of a flood of terrified people walking and stumbling on the cramped road . " She was O.K. , she was coming with me , " he said . " Then someone yelled , ' Run , the Taliban are coming ! ' and suddenly she just sat on the dirt , her heart stopped , and she fell over . " <p> The Panjshir Valley was a two-day journey on foot from their ruined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Gulbahar at night , they could not help but jostle each other . Many fell off , grasping at the empty air , going down through the darkness onto the rocks and water below . <p> Zaker , a 12-year-old boy in a torn brown sweater , said he too had lost his father to the Taliban 's busy Kalashnikovs . Then his mother tumbled off the dangerous Gulbahar bridge . <p> " I listened for her voice for a long time , and then went on , " he said . Foreigners -- Some Marauders Called Pakistanis <p> The Tajiks speak a dialect of Persian called Dari . Their attackers , they said , spoke not only Pashto , the tongue of the Pathans , but Urdu and Punjabi , languages more commonly spoken in Pakistan . <p> Mullah Mohammad Omar , the Taliban 's supreme leader , had called upon Muslims in madrasahs , or religious schools , to join the jihad . Thousands of students in neighboring Pakistan share the Taliban 's puritanical interpretation of Islam . They were openly bused across major border crossings and given weapons @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Agha , 28 , a man in a wheelchair , insisted that some of his attackers were foreigners . " I know Afghans , " he said . " They were not Afghans . " <p> Some made other distinctions . Taliban army regulars enforced cultural taboos , smashing TV sets and ripping apart music tapes . Newer recruits , whether Afghans or Pakistanis , were more likely to be thieves , a few refugees said . <p> " They 'd bust into your house , hold a gun to the head of your children and demand either money or guns , " said a woman , a former literature professor , from Kapisa province . She asked for anonymity because she had relatives still in Kabul . " If you complained to the Talibs , they 'd tell you that they did n't control everyone . " <p> All of the refugees here may be poorer than they were , but not all are poor . A few escaped by car , their most valued possessions tethered to the roof with rope . <p> Some families from Bagram , confessing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tent walls , and others to make soft floors atop the stony soil . <p> But there are not many comforts to purchase in the Panjshir Valley . In Bazarak , there is no telephone service . Electrical power comes only from private generators , and the fuel to run them is exorbitantly priced . The river is both a wash basin and a toilet . <p> Basic shelter for the refugee multitude has been left to Acted , a French charity . The agency has a plan : Public buildings will be insulated . Damaged houses will be repaired . Twenty-five hundred " survival cells " will be built -- simple dwellings with walls of stone and mortar , windows of plastic sheeting and roofs of bamboo . Building is just getting started . The planners hope it will be enough . <p> Priority will be given to the hundreds of families now living in mosques , which need to be vacated . With the weather getting cold , men no longer want to say their prayers on the rooftops of their holy places . <p> Bazarak 's mosque is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a green carpet . Fifty-one families are living there . Outside , women feed wood chips into cooking fires , their heads bent to the ground , their breath used to stoke the embers . <p> Nearby is the town 's school . Many of its desks have become the undersized walls for cave-like spaces . Hanging blankets often separate one family from the next . The largest room has the appearance of a multi-colored maze . <p> In one of the small spaces , near an open doorway , a woman named Anita , 35 , spoke of the death of the youngest of her eight children . The girl 's name was Farastha , age 1 . The child began to cry and quiver when the Taliban bombardment began and never seemed to stop . <p> " She died of fear , " the mother said . <p> Twilight had come , and the school was growing dark . Anita pulled close one of her small children and buttoned his sweater . The wind had stirred , sweeping down as it does from the mountains at night , another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ <p> http : //www.nytimes.com Map of Afghanistan highlighting the Panjshir Valley : An estimated 65,000 displaced Afghans have fled to the Panjshir Valley , controlled by the foes of the Taliban. ( pg . A12 ) 