Report on gains against terror in error
Powell blames new system for data used to laud administrationThe Associated Press
Updated: 4:45 p.m. ET June 10, 2004WASHINGTON - The State Department’s annual report on terrorism mistakenly reported a worldwide decline when both the number of incidents and the toll in victims had actually increased sharply, the agency said Thursday.
Administration officials had used the findings announced last April as evidence President Bush’s campaign to counter terror was succeeding.
Secretary of State Colin Powell said Thursday the errors were the result of new data collection procedures. “I can assure you it had nothing to do with putting out anything but the most honest, accurate information we can,” he said.
Department spokesman Richard Boucher said, “We got the wrong data and did not check it enough.”
He added, “Our preliminary results indicate that the figures for the number of attacks and casualties will be up sharply from what was published.”
“Errors crept in and, frankly, we did not catch them,” Powell said of the report that showed a falloff in the number of attacks worldwide in 2003.
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., said this week the administration had refused to address his allegation that the findings were manipulated for political purposes. Waxman had written Powell asking for an explanation.
Boucher said a reply to Waxman was in preparation.
Errors first noticed in May
He said the errors started to become apparent in early May. The spokesman did not say why an announcement was not made then.
One of Bush’s major foreign policy claims is that his post-Sept. 11 strategy to counter terror was showing success.
When the annual report was issued April 29, senior administration officials held it up as evidence the war against terrorism was being won.
J. Cofer Black, who heads the State Department’s counterterrorism office, cited the existence of only 190 acts of terrorism in 2003 as “good news” and predicted the trend would continue this year.
Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage said at the time, “Indeed, you will find in these pages clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight.”
His office did not respond Thursday to a request for a statement in light of disclosures some of the findings in “Patterns of Global Terrorism” were inaccurate and understated.
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