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Major holes in the security of the air cargo industry, which could potentially threaten the lives of passengers, have been revealed in a BBC investigation.

It found cargo on passenger flights is being sent without being subjected to checks or X-rays.

The security gaps emerged following a court case over drug smugglers.

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Under a system called “known shipper” or “known consignor” companies which have been security vetted by government appointed agents can send parcels by air, which do not have to be subjected to any further security checks.

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“There are approx 1.5 million known shippers in the US. There are thousands of freight forwarders. Anywhere down the line packages can be intercepted at these organisations,” he said.

“Even reliable respectable organisations, you really don’t know who is in the warehouse, who is tampering with packages, putting parcels together.”

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In June this year a Nigerian student called Olumwaseum Adeyemi was sentenced to 11 years at Kingston Crown Court for importing cocaine into the UK.

Mr Adeyemi brought pounds of cocaine into Britain unchecked by air cargo, transported from the US by the Federal Express courier company. He did not have to pay the postage.

This was made possible because he managed to illegally buy the confidential Fed Ex account numbers of reputable and security cleared companies from a former employee.

An accomplice in the US was able to put the account numbers on drugs parcels which, as they appeared to have been sent by known shippers, arrived unchecked at Stansted Airport.

When police later contacted the companies whose accounts and security clearance had been so abused they discovered they had suspected nothing.

Meanwhile you cannot take a bottle of water with you when you fly.

Do you feel safer yet?

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Warner Bros. stands accused of making empty promises to provide prosthetic limbs to orphaned African amputees and then reneging so that the studio’s movie “Blood Diamond” could get extra publicity.

During filming of the flick, which stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly and Djimon Hounsou, producers shipped in 27 teenage and child amputees – victims of tribal warfare – from surrounding hospitals to appear as extras.

In addition to paying the children day rates for their work, the producers – touched by the kids’ tragic circumstances – promised to fit all of them with prosthetic limbs after shooting wrapped in June. But they’re still waiting.

Young Nkululo Mnisi – whose arms and legs were cut off by machete-wielding rebels – used to be taunted by cruel classmates as “baboon” because of the way he ran on his stumps and crutches. Mnisi told a South African newspaper that the dream that kept him going was the promise of getting artificial limbs so he’d be able to play soccer like a normal child.

But months after filming ended, Mnisi and his fellow amputees were still waiting. When they asked Warner Bros. about the promised prosthetics, they were allegedly told, “You will have to wait for December, when the movie comes out, so we can get some publicity out of it.”

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No matter what President Bush says, the question is not whether America can win in Iraq. The only question is whether the United States can extricate itself without leaving behind an unending civil war that will spread more chaos and suffering throughout the Middle East, while spawning terrorism across the globe.

The prospect of what happens after an American pullout haunts the debate on Iraq. The administration, for all its hints about new strategies and timetables, is obviously hoping to slog along for two more years and dump the problem on Mr. Bush’s successor. This fall’s election debates have educated very few voters because neither side is prepared to be honest about the terrible consequences of military withdrawal and the very long odds against success if American troops remain.

[..]

Today we want to describe a strategy for containing the disaster as much as humanly possible. It is hardly a recipe for triumph.

Read the whole thing… I doubt this plan will work, but at least it “Acknowledge Reality” is part of it.

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The oldest company in the world, which was founded in 578 in Japan by a group of people from the ancient Korean kingdom of Baekje, will go into liquidation in January. Kongo Gumi dates its foundation from the year when carpenter Shigemitsu Kongo built Shitennoji. Kongo had been invited to the island country by Prince Shotoku. His descendants continuously maintained the family business, and the construction firm was named the world’s oldest company by the Economist monthly.

The operation of Kongo Gumi will be handed over to a subsidiary of the Takamatsu Corporation of the same name that was established last month. But with the retirement of Masakazu Kongo, the firm’s 40th president, its 1,400 years of history as a family firm are effectively at an end.

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More than half a billion dollars earmarked to fight the insurgency in Iraq was stolen by people the U.S. had entrusted to run the country’s Ministry of Defense before the 2005 elections, according to Iraqi investigators.

Iraq’s former minister of finance says coalition members like the U.S. and Britain are doing little to help recover the money or catch suspects, most of whom fled the country. The 60 Minutes investigation also turned up audio recordings of a suspect who seems to be discussing the transfer of $45 million to the account of a top political adviser to the interim defense minister.

“We have not been given any serious, official support from either the United States or the U.K. or any of the surrounding Arab countries,�?” says Ali Allawi, who was confronted with the missing funds when he took over as Iraq’s finance minister last year.

He thinks he knows why Iraqi investigators have gotten little help. “The only explanation I can come up with is that too many people in positions of power and authority in the new Iraq have been, in one way or another, found with their hands inside the cookie jar,” says Allawi, who left his post when a new Iraqi government was formed earlier this year. “And if they are brought to trial, it will cast a very disparaging light on those people who had supported them and brought them to this position of power and authority,” he tells Kroft.

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As if there weren’t enough concerns about the integrity of the vote, a non-partisan civic organization today claimed it had hacked into the voter database for the 1.35 million voters in the city of Chicago.

Bob Wilson, an official with the Illinois Ballot Integrity Project — which bills itself as a not-for-profit civic organization dedicated to the correction of election system deficiencies — tells ABC News that last week his organization hacked the database, which contains detailed information about hundreds of thousands of Chicago voters, including their Social Security numbers, and dates of birth.

“It was a serious identity theft problem, but also a problem that could potentially create problems with the election,” Wilson said.

A nefarious hacker could have changed every voter’s status from active to inactive, which would have prevented them from voting, he said.