Making Ports Secure, More or Less

By J. Michael Sharman, 26 March, 2006

Making ports secure, more or less<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
J. Michael Sharman

The U.S. Government currently wants to give a no-bid contract to a foreign company to detect any possible nuclear materials which might be inside cargo containers passing through the Freeport Container Port in the <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Bahamas.
Advertisements for the port say, "Freeport Container Port is an up-and-coming center in the world of shipping. Strategically located 65 miles from Miami, it is at the crossroads of the Americas and on the trade lanes to European, Mediterranean, Far Eastern and Australian destinations."[1]
Increased security at the port is a good idea. A year ago, the Bahama News reported on a marijuana seizure and a prior seizure of 1,116 pounds of cocaine at the Port, and queried whether chemical weapons could also be smuggled there.[2]
Hiring foreign companies to do our port security has not proven popular. Recently, the U.S. planned to allow operations at six American ports to be operated by DP World, a company wholly owned by the government of Dubai[3] one of our main allies in the Arab world.
The deal dissolved, though, under withering public criticism that began when The Jerusalem Post reported DP World was participating in an Arab boycott of Israel.[4] When the deal collapsed it wound up being a domestic and international embarrassment for the Bush administration.
Even Hillary Clinton railed against foreign control of our ports in a speech to the Jewish Community Relations Council: "You know, we have the Chinese running the Panama Canal. We have other government-controlled entities controlling our ports. Well, just because it's been happening doesn't mean we should let it continue."[5]
The Chinese running the Panama Canal is Li Ka Shing and his Hong Kong based companies, Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. and the Cheung Kong Group. Li Ka Shing is the tenth wealthiest man in the world[6] and Hutchison Whampoa is ranked by Forbes magazine as the 347th largest company in the world with 182,000 employees.
Li Ka Shing's Park'n Shop superstores are the Wal-Mart of Hong Kong and mainland China. His Hutchison Telecom is to China like Verizon is to us. His TOM Online internet service counts more than 163 million registered mainland China users. Li Ka Shing controls television, film production, roads, toll bridges, power plants, and oil and gas ventures in Mainland China. Just about everything Chinese is touched in some way by Li Ka Shing and his Cheung Kong and Hutchison Whampoa companies.
Li Ka Shing's Hutchison Port Holdings runs or owns 42 ports in twenty countries with 13 ports in Communist mainland China. [7] It was during the Clinton Administration that Hutchison Port Holdings took over the Port of Balboa and the Port of Cristobal, which are the Pacific and Atlantic entrances to the Panama Canal.
Hutchison Port Holdings, the world's largest port operator, is the company which operates the Freeport Container Port and owns the Grand Bahama International Airport.
It is also the company the U.S. wants to hire as our security force to screen for nuclear materials being smuggled through the Freeport Container Port.
Back in 1999, a U.S. military intelligence report (now declassified) said Hutchison's port operations in the Bahamas and Panama "could provide a conduit for illegal shipments of technology or prohibited items from the West to the PRC (People's Republic of China), or facilitate the movement of arms and other prohibited items into the Americas."[8]
"If a port operator has been identified as posing a potential threat to national security, it is only common sense that Americans should be working on site to assure U.S. security is taken seriously," said Rep. Bennie Thompson, (D. Miss.).[9]
Republican Senator Norm Coleman said, "We must not allow an unwarranted fear of foreign ownership or involvement in offshore operations to impair our ability to protect against nuclear weapons being smuggled into this country. We must work with these foreign companies."[10]
Maybe so, but three years ago, the Bush administration, citing national security, blocked Li Ka Shing from buying up the bankrupt U.S telecom company Global Crossing Ltd,.[11] If that was the case then, what is different now?

Correction: You have to watch out for assumptions. Sometimes they're just plain wrong.For example, just because a man and a woman live together as a couple and have the same last name doesn't mean they're married. I found that out after I wrote in a previous column that Howard and Amy Settle were "a young married couple". Nope, they were young, they were a couple, and they have the same last name, but my editor says they're not married. Mea culpa.

[1] "Freeport Container Port Continues to Expand to Meet Global Business Demands" A Special International Report Prepared by The Washington Times Advertising Department - March 29, 2000

[2] "Freeport Container Port Threatens US Security", Bahamas Headline News, December 09, 2005 http://www.bahamasb2b.com/news/wmview.php?ArtID=6544

[3] DP World actually has a number of solid U.S. ties. It was formed in September, 2005 when the Dubai Ports Authority merged with DPI Terminals. Earlier, in January of 2005, DPI had bought CSX World Terminals, the international port business of the CSX Corporation in the United States. U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow headed CSX before he became a member of the President's Cabinet in 2003 . ("Dubai Company Agrees to Delay Takeover of U.S. Port Operations" VOICE OF AMERICA , 23 February 2006 http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/2006-02-23-voa4.cfm) DP World's CEO is Mohammed Sharaf, a graduate of the University of Arizona, Tucson. ("Bidding war for P&O Ports?" World Cargo News, 31 October 2005 http://www.worldcargonews.com/htm/w20051031.798632.htm) In fact, DP World's Director of Operations for Europe and Latin America is David Sanborn, a graduate of the United States Merchant Marine Academy who is from Smithfield, Virginia. Sanborn was nominated on January 24th, 2006 by President Bush to be the Maritime Administrator for the U.S. Department of Transportation ("Inside the Beltway", The Washington Times, Feb. 23, 2006) Senator Bill Nelson (D. Fla.) has put a hold on Sanborn's nomination. (Marine Log, NY - Mar 17, 2006)