Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Two billion set to see funeral
By Robert Mendick In London And Jeremy Charles In Vatican City, Evening Standard
A worldwide television audience of two billion people - believed to be the biggest ever - is expected to watch the Pope's funeral on Friday.
Today a river of mourners again began the long, slow process of filing through the doors of St Peter's Basilica for their last sighting of Pope John Paul II.
St Peter's reopened at 3am today with a queue stretching nearly a mile from the steps of the Basilica, along Via Della Conciliazione and around to the ancient home of the Popes, St Angelo's Castle.
This morning police estimated it to be at least 200,000 strong, but the number grew as special trains arrived from Milan, Turin and Venice in the north and Naples, Reggio Calabria and Sicily in the south.
Thirty extra services have been laid on and a rail strike planned for Friday has been cancelled. Several international airlines said they would also up the number of flights to Rome after a surge of inquiries.
Two to four million mourners - along with as many as 200 world leaders - are expected in Rome for the funeral, giving police and officials a security nightmare.
Virtually every country will be represented by their heads of state or most senior politicians, with American president George Bush the biggest name. Cuba will be represented by national assembly president Ricardo Alarcon, despite years of persecution of the church which ended only recently.
The latest to confirm they will attend are: King Albert II, Queen Paola and prime minister Guy Verhofstadt of Belgium; Canadian premier Paul Martin; French president Jacques Chirac and his wife; German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and president Horst Koehler; president Vicente Fox of Mexico.
Police leave is expected to be cancelled - there will be 10,000 officers on duty - and the army may be drafted in. Dignitaries could be helicoptered in to the Vatican, said civil defence chief Guido Bertolaso. "The rest of the journey would be made by car but as yet we have not made any decisions."
Mourners waiting in St Peter's Square have kept themselves occupied singing hymns, praying and watching images of Pope John Paul flashing across giant video screens. Student Alessandra Cetro, 17, from Avellino, who came with friends on a special bus, said this morning: "We just had to be here. It's a historic event and we wanted to experience it but above all we wanted to say goodbye to the Pope. He taught us so much so the least we can do is come and give him a final salute."
Sister Lina, a nun from the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, said: "The crowd have been singing and praying but most of the time it's very quiet and people are just thinking and reflecting on what the Pope did for us."
Those leaving the Basilica spoke of a sombre yet serene atmosphere inside. Charlotte Vincent, from Geneva said: "The Pope looked so peaceful. It was such an overwhelming emotion to see him like that."
The surge into Rome prompted local consumer watchdog Codacons to warn businesses against exploiting the pilgrims.
It is estimated they will earn an additional £65million, including £26million on religious artefacts, including rosaries and images and small statues of saints.
Special camps were being set up in on the outskirts of Rome - with campsites at its two main stadia - to accommodate visitors who cannot afford or cannot find hotel rooms.
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XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX TUE APRIL 05, 2005 10:43:02 ET XXXXX
ABCNEWS PETER JENNINGS LUNG CANCER
**Exclusive**
ABCNEWS anchor Peter Jennings and President David Westin sent the following e-mails to their colleagues this morning:
Westin:
This morning, Peter Jennings told his senior staff at World News Tonight that yesterday afternoon he was diagnosed with lung cancer. I include below the full text of Peter?s note to the group of people with whom he works most closely.
He will begin outpatient treatment next week here in New York. It?s both Peter?s and my expectation that he will anchor World News Tonight during the period of treatment to the extent he can do so comfortably; but, we should also expect him to be off the broadcast from time to time, depending on how he feels.
Charlie Gibson, Elizabeth Vargas, and others will be substituting for Peter as necessary and when their other responsibilities permit.
All of us at ABC News have watched over the years as Peter has led us on various assignments with strength and with courage. We?ve done our best to support him in these endeavors. Now, Peter?s been given a tough assignment.
He?s already bringing to this new challenge the courage and strength we?ve seen so often in his reporting from the field and in anchoring ABC News.
I know that all of us will give him every bit of support that he needs and asks for. Peter will once again lead the way, but we will stand with him at every turn.
Peter Jennings:
Dear All - Forgive me the group mailing - but it seems the easiest way to tell a lot of people I care for ?.. about a change in my life.
I have been diagnosed with lung cancer. Yes, it was quite a surprise.
As you all know, this is a challenge. I begin chemo-therapy next week. I will continue to do the broadcast.
There will be good days and bad, which means that some days I may be cranky and some days really cranky! Almost 10 million Americans are living with cancer.
I am sure I will learn from them how to cope with the facts of life that none of us anticipated.
In all the years I have worked here I have had the most outstanding support from this news division.
Hundreds of you have been like family. It feels good to have such a family right now.
Peter
Baby Gorilla, Uganda
In spite of long spells of silence, interrupted only by an occasional Reuters newsline or two, much is happening in Africa. Political events on the continent often have far-reaching effects and are closely related to global issues and affairs. From watching the news in Canada or the USA, nobody will ever arrive at this impression, they?ll never find out why Africa matters. Preoccupied with introverted perspectives on issues of global dimensions, such as the environment, health, education, poverty and democracy, the mainstreamed mainstream media is largely oblivious to and even incapable of capturing essential news in its proper context. News is what sells, entertainment is the way of life and if news and entertainment can be combined, you get the headlines. Best of all, if ?lawyers, guns and money? (1) come together, ideally in a live broadcast from an US courtroom. That is a sure recipe for month-long ?news coverage?, no matter if 50 or 50 000 die in Darfur or Goma. If information about life in Africa, about hopes, needs and realities of an enormous multitude of societies and cultures could be presented in a courtroom setting, Africa would always provide us with primetime news. The public gets what the public wants, so it would seem.(2)
Luckily a lot of folks are actively seeking out genuine news outside of the filtered mainstream info-confines. With regard to Africa there is currently a building momentum to pay deeper and more sustained attention to many of the core problems that keep grinding down developmental progress in Africa. Regrettably this momentum needs to be accompanied with scepticism as too often Africa has been ?on the agenda?, only to soon afterwards fall off an already marginalized spot on the radar screen of international news. Sill, the March 2005 report to the Commission for Africa ?Our Common Interest? is an important and timely major document (http://www.brandt21forum.info/Commission...
a) the argument in favour of increased support and attention to Africa
b) analysis of why action on Africa is needed.
The report certainly points in the right direction and is a welcome high-level effort to push Africa a bit closer into the public spotlight. A deeper discussion of the report should definitely be started, but of course can?t be done in this short article. Suffice to say that the report is based on good will and apparent commitment to improve bad political conditions and socio-economic situations across Africa. However the case made in the report is hardly a new one, but rather commonplace. The recommendations laid out are largely unspectacular and generally fall well short of what is needed to make systematic and structural changes and improvements. Most importantly, the basic rationale of current forms and practices of globalization are never really called into question. If recognised for what it?s worth, free-market globalization under the thumb of a unilateralist neo-imperial power (no need to guess who here), is in effect a major root cause of poverty and the decline of African institutions, livelihoods and natural resources bases.
Perspectives on the ?Economic renewal? of Africa are far from new: already in 1996 it was well recognised that ?For a few decades now, Sub-Saharan Africa has been devastated by a pervasive economic crisis, manifested by stagnant economic growth, declining quality of life for a large majority of its people, and increasing stress on the continent?s political structures.?(3) Nearly a decade later, we have yet to step beyond square one. Likewise, with regard to the practicalities of enhancing aid effectiveness, it seems that donors are treading water. At the recent Paris high-level forum on aid effectiveness of OECD donors, important points were raised and examined.(4) Yet again, apparently nothing particularly new came up and any immediate action still seems remote. Decentralisation, more resources, capacity building, managing for results, while important they are rather mundane issues. It is possible that the OECD-DAC has reached the limit of what it can accomplish as an institutionalized donor-club? Lacking an integral civil society component with a distinctly global outreach, the DAC is constrained by donor preferences and priorities when laying out policy guidelines for development aid.
Internationally, amongst donor and developing countries alike, the smallest common denominators for aid are of course the UN Millennium development goals (
-----------------------------------------------
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are the world's time-bound and quantified targets for addressing extreme poverty in its many dimensions-income poverty, hunger, disease, lack of adequate shelter, and exclusion-while promoting gender equality, education, and environmental sustainability. They are also basic human rights-the rights of each person on the planet to health, education, shelter, and security.
Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women Goal 4: Reduce child mortality Goal 5: Improve maternal health Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development
---------------------------------------------- Meeting them as anticipated by 2015 is getting more unlikely day by day, if no breakthrough is achieved still in 2005. In September at the UN general assembly, a review of progress made to date will take place. Certainly there are many important success stories to report on, but in particular in Africa, there will be far too few. Taken together, the ?Common Interest? report, the DAC aid effectiveness recommendations as well as the discussions and actions taken in working towards the MDGs do constitute positive momentum for new progress in meeting development challenges of Africa.
The momentum needed to break the debilitating shackles of globalization that Africa struggles with more than most other regions, will not be generated at donor clubs or even at the UN general assembly, which remains after all, an assembly of nation states mired in antiquated contests over abstract notions of sovereignty. Events and engagements in movements such as the World Social Forum (this year havening taken place in Brazil, see: http://www.forumsocialmundial.org.br/ind...
END-NOTES ================ (1) The immortal Warren Zevon: http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/warren...
(2) Going Underground, lyrics by Manfred Mann (with HTML code) at: http://www.lyricsdownload.com/manfred-ma...
(3) Agenda for Africa?s Economic Renewal, B.Ndulu and N.v.d.Walle (eds.), ODC policy perspectives no. 21, Washington D.C., 1996
(4) For details consult the EURODAD report on the forum at: http://www.eurodad.org/articles/default....
A river of people, waiting for a glimpse of the pope's body, moved slowly through the streets near the Vatican
Huge Crowds of Pilgrims Converge on the Vatican
By DANIEL J. WAKIN
and IAN FISHER
ROME, April 5 - The public outpouring of mourning for Pope John Paul II blossomed into a grand religious pilgrimage today, with at least one million people flocking to St. Peter's Square by the end of the first full day of public grieving over the pope's body.
The number of visitors was extraordinary and unexpectedly high with three more days still to go before the pope's funeral on Friday, which will be attended by the leaders of more than 100 nations and will attract hundreds of thousand of people.
The huge influx began straining the city's security and emergency services. There was little time to prepare for such numbers, which have both amazed and alarmed Italian and Vatican officials.
"I have been able to measure the depth of emotion that this pope has stirred in people," said Mayor Walter Veltroni of Rome. "I think that nothing else in history compares to this event, and we've had so little time to prepare."
In a city of pilgrimages, this was shaping up as one of the biggest in recent memory. Italian government officials said it even exceeded the huge celebrations connected with the Catholic Church's Jubilee year in 2000.
Today, a mighty river of humanity progressed slowly through the streets near St. Peter's Basilica. The Vatican, citing government officials, said 400,000 people were in St. Peter's Square on Monday, when the pope's body was carried briefly before the crowd and into the basilica. An additional 600,000 paid their respects today, according to government figures, the Vatican said.
The Vatican itself was not counting how many people saw the body, but Italian officials said as many as 18,000 people churned through the cathedral each hour. Some waited up to 10 hours to enter for a fleeting glimpse of the corpse, hustled through by black-suited attendants.
"It might have been only 15 or 20 seconds with the pope," said Nicole Mayfield, 20, of Steubenville, Ohio, who is studying in Austria and arrived today after a 14-hour bus ride with 250 fellow students. "It was definitely worth the entire trip, just to be able to do that."
John Paul died on Saturday evening. The viewing will end Thursday night or early Friday, the day of his funeral.
Such large religious pilgrimages are certainly not unprecedented - millions make the hajj every year to Mecca - but Italian officials were faced with the suddenness of this one. The same lack of preparation time is proving a challenge to security officials preparing for the influx of world leaders for Friday's funeral.
Inside the Vatican, the cardinals into whose hands the church has now been entrusted met for a second day to deal with matters according to a papal transition plan written by John Paul in 1996. They appeared to be operating at a deliberative pace. After making funeral arrangements on Monday, no new actions were reported today. No date for the start of the conclave to elect the pope - which must come 15 to 20 days after his death - was announced, one of the most important of the cardinals' early decisions.
Joaquin Navarro-Valls, the pope's spokesman, said at a news conference that 88 of the 183 living cardinals met in the Apostolic Palace, and the number will increase as more and more arrive for the funeral. They have yet have the pope's will read to them, possibly because it was still being translated from Polish into Italian, as newspapers speculated here.
Only cardinals under 80 can vote for the next pope, and there are 117 in that category. Only three of those have ever taken part in a previous conclave, and many don't know each other. The daily meetings, called general congregations, have therefore become prime get-to-know-you sessions.
"We say to each other, 'Who is that?' and, 'Who is that?' " Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, archbishop of Washington, said, pointing his finger, in an interview. He later told reporters that one of the three with conclave experience, Cardinal Jaime Sin of Manila, may not be able to attend.
Some details of the pope's burial, and the election of his successor, did emerge.
In a departure from ancient ritual, the announcement of a new pope - traditionally signaled by white smoke from the burning of the ballots with a chemical added - would be driven home by the ringing of bells. In the past, a muddled color had caused confusion. "This way even journalists will know," said Archbishop Piero Marini, the master of papal liturgical ceremonies.
Dr. Navarro-Valls confirmed that John Paul would be buried in the earth - which the spokesman said was his wish - beneath where the tomb of John XXIII once stood in the Vatican grotto, where scores of popes are buried. John's body was moved into the basilica in 2000 to accommodate the crowds of visitors after his beatification.
At the news conference, a high-level Vatican official appeared eager to assure the world that the Catholic Church was in firm hands during the period between popes.
"It is a strong, strong period of faith for the church," bolstered by the pope's plan and procedures spelled out by his predecessors, Archbishop Marini said.
The contents of the pope's will were not the only mystery. In 2003, in naming a batch of cardinals, he said one had been given the honor "in pectore," or "close to the heart" - meaning his name would be kept secret, often a practice for a cardinal in a country where Catholics face oppression.
Dr. Navarro-Valls was asked whether the pope had revealed the cardinal's identity, and he said, "We know nothing about this." The spokesman said that if the pope had given permission to release the name in his will, it would be made known.
Dr. Navarro-Valls confirmed that, as is customary, the pope had not been embalmed but prepared for viewing, and that he would be buried with a small bag of commemorative medals and a lead tube containing a brief account of his life.
The number of mourners lining up for the viewing swelled to immense proportions compared to Monday. The line wound through the streets near the Vatican, curved around walls and through arches and filled the grand boulevard, Via Della Conciliazione, leading to St. Peter's Square. Security officials kept open gaps; when enough space opened up with the advance of the line, they allowed a portion to advance. People trotted forward happily. The mood was generally light, almost celebratory.
"For a man like the pope, it's worth it," said Sonia De Luca, 22, who began standing in line at 9:30 a.m. and had only reached the front by 3 p.m.
Nearby pizzerias had their counters swept clean and the souvenir shops selling papal postcards, calendars and rosaries reported their busiest day ever. Forklifts delivered pallets of mineral water. Poles in ceremonial military uniforms marched in groups. Umbrellas, including one with a reproduction of Sistine Chapel cherubs, dotted the crowd against the sun. One woman carried a single red rose. A young man held his guitar aloft.
"I've never seen anything like this in Rome before," said Bianca Maria Ricucci, 66, who lives near the Vatican and sat with three friends on a bench along Via della Conciliazione. "It is his first miracle to have attracted all these people here."
While most of the people around St. Peter's appeared to be Italian and tourists who had been here anyway, a fair number of Poles were on hand and groups of Spaniards, French and others from European countries were arriving. The Polish Foreign Ministry estimated that as many as two million Poles would travel to Rome.
"To most Catholics, it's like traveling to the funeral of your father," said John Mortensen, 30, an American theology teacher living in Austria who flew to Rome with his wife and two children on the first flight that he could get. Thanks to a special lane for strollers and the elderly, it took his family only 15 minutes to enter.
The state railroad has added 43 trains each day to the St. Peter's station from around Italy. Officials were bracing for the funeral's aftermath when huge numbers of people would try to go home.
"If everyone tries to leave from St. Peter's station, it will be the end of the world," said Luigi Irdi, a spokesman for Italy's state railroad.
Logistics were being handled by Guido Bertolaso, the director of Italy's Department of Emergency Relief.
He had a leading role in preparing for the Jubilee, which at its height drew two million people. He said he and his staff had had a year to prepare for that event.
"We knew how many were coming, where they were from, and where to put them," he said. "Here there's been no advance planning and they're coming from around the world. No city in the world can handle two million people coming together in just 48 hours. But we'll manage."
There were plans today to send text messages to the nation's cell phones warning of 10-hour lines, hot days and cool nights.
--
Laurie Goodstein, Elisabetta Povoledo, Jason Horowitz and Elisabeth Rosenthal contributed reporting for this article.
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