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| Sunday, 11 September 2005 |
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Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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Four years after 9/11 :
Terror by Aditha Dissanayake
Described as 9/11 or 9-11 (which is the U.S style of writing short dates) read as "nine-eleven" or called "Nine-one-one" which is the same as the telephone number for emergency services in the U.S (9-1-1) many eye-witnesses still remember what it was like to have been near Ground Zero on that fateful day. As the photographs on "The day the Towers Fell" reveal, most of the survivors who managed to escape had a faraway look on their faces. "They were there, but they were also just not there". "It was like a tornado, but a warm, hot tornado, made of stones. It was as though someone was hitting me with handfuls of stone", recalls David. That was when he had given up taking photographs and begun to run. But soon he had no control of his feet and he found himself flying. When he gained consciousness on the floor of a Delicatessen, he says he woke up to the sound of people "screaming with the desire to live". Another photographer with a foreign accent says she "Hid" behind a car before total darkness enveloped her even though the time was somewhere a round nine in the morning. Another recalls the silence which followed the first attack. "It was as if someone had pushed the mute button". According to the Official 9/11 Commission Report, nineteen members affiliated with the net-work of militant Islamist organisations, known as al-Qaeda, had hijacked four American airliners to stage ariel attacks on the two New York skyscrapers and the Pentagon, the U.S Department of Defence headquarters in Arlington County, Virginia. American airlines flight 11, crashed into the North Side of the North tower of the World Trade Centre at 8.46 am, on September 11 2001, while United Airline flight 175 crashed into the South Tower at 9.03am. United Airline flight 93 crashed into a rural field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, 80 miles east of Pittsburgh probably following passenger resistance. Thirty-eight-year-old Tom Burnett on board Flight 93 called his wife Deena four times from his mobile phone after the hijackers took control of the plane. Tom, who was obviously one of the passengers who had decided to fight the high-jackers hand-to-hand told Deena "We are all going to die, but three of us are going to do something... His last words to her were, "I love you honey". It is not clear whether the crash in Pennisylvania was deliberate or was due to the hijackers losing the control of the aircraft as a result of passenger resistance. It is believed that if the plan had worked Flight 93 would have crashed into the White House or Camp David. None of the passengers on the four planes, a total of 265 survived. Records reveal a total of 2,595 deaths at the World Trade Centre and 125 at the Pentagon totalling to at least 2,985 altogether. Faced with the desperate situation of smoke and burning heat from the jet fuel, an estimated 200 people had jumped to their deaths from the burning towers. As one witness said " Some decided if their life was going to end, it will end the way they chose". Others remained watching the buildings fall, helpless, but not wanting to move away. " On Manhattan Island, 25 buildings were damaged including four subway-stations taking several months to complete rescue and recovery operations. Arriving at the scene a few minutes after the attack one fireman recalls "There was no water to fight the fire". It had taken a week to put out the fires burning in the rubble of the WTC and the clean up was not completed till May 2002. Four years after the harrowing event, visitors to New York find it impossible not to notice the sharp gap in the skyline where the WTC once stood in all its majesty. But standing on Lower Manhattan's West street it is heart-warming to note a remarkable resurgence of residences in the buildings surrounding Ground Zero and the elegant new condominiums that have come up along the river. What a way to have begun the 21st Century! Not only for the Americans but for the whole world. Remembering the event every year on a day like today is surely similar to taking a "field trip through hell" as described by one of the survivors who feels he is lucky to have come home to his wife and daughter when so many others could not make it. But it is important to remember because in remembrance lies the beginning of the healing process. Horror no end by Lionel Yodhasinghe While remembering the death and destruction at the gruesome 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington in the past four years, it seemed that terrorism has gained momentum by similar attacks in the Bali Islands, Spain and in London. The recent statement by an Al Quaeda leader to Al Jazeera television has further hinted that such terror is to continue, threatening the entire world with more destruction to life and property. So when will the horror of horrors end? Al Quaeda has conveyed a message to the world leaders especially to the powerful nations such as the USA and Britain, to stop their eye for an eye attitude if they want Al Quaeda to respond equally. This is worth giving deep consideration by any elected Government, provided their supreme responsibility is the safety of the people, and they humbly want to work to end terrorism and make the globe a safer place to live. They are still not too late to change their stance from pursuing punitive action, to talking with the respective terrorist groups which is their advice to Third World governments such as ours. President Bush's vow to punish the perpetrators of 9/11 attack has not yet been realized, and it is not that simple as President Bush has failed to catch the culprit even after four years. Though he named the axis of evil to be crushed, such stimulus just brought him only temporary popularity. The first attack he launched on Iraq on the heat of 9/11 and getting Sadam gained him a political mileage only, the current situation in Iraq with the rising death toll of American soldiers and the absence of the so called chemical weapons in Sadam's possession has changed the mindset of the American voters. When such political mistakes brew with his failure to handle Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, circumstances would force the Americans to doubt President Bush's ability power and competency to govern America and the people's judgment could be adversely negative for President Bush's future, if he does not soften his stubborn policies even at this stage. Allowing countries such as Cuba, Venezuela and Iran, though they were considered as arch rivals for generations, to provide assistance to the victims in this hour of need would reduce the dignity of the Bush administration. And American citizens are furious over such blockades and lethargy towards New Orleans victims, according to the American press. As certain American doctors told the BBC the problem was not the lack of resources but the stumbling block of administrative red tape. Eyewitnesses said that they never expected such long delays to provide relief to hurricane victims in a country such as America. It was a pity, as no one in the world expected Americans to starve for four to five days under any circumstances, whatever the dimension of the catastrophe. Their guess was that the negligence could be deliberate because New Orleans is predominantly an African-American city. This contradicts America's policy of equality. The value of friendly relations with countries, especially with the neighbouring ones, would come to the forefront in a natural disaster like Katrina, which had proved that people of even a mighty nation like the USA would need the assistance of others, and emphasized the value of unity and friendship among different nations. It is a good start for any administration to resort to 'forget and forgive' and renew relations with the neighbours.Katrina with a death toll believed to be running to thousands, on the fourth anniversary of 9/11 has made a stronger call to the Government to mark a decisive turning point in its counter-terrorism strategies. Their already reduced campaign on attacking the axis of evil is one such lesson they have learnt. In the USA, in London or anywhere else in the world, terrorism brings horror, destruction and agony to human beings irrespective of their communal or geographical differences, so the entire world should speak with one voice against terrorism. The democratic and peace loving peoples and governments of the entire world should have that voice in unison to fight against terrorism. There cannot be different treatment when terror hits America and when it attacks Colombo. The world leaders should reconsider their stance, and the best forum they could find to discuss the matter in depth is the forthcoming 60th UN anniversary in New York. However, it is the general opinion in the world that inequality, social injustice and other differences mainly when it comes to sharing the limited resources, economic benefits and power have been the root cause of terrorism, and without addressing such causes eliminating terrorism would not be a reality. So it is up to the world powers including America to play a leading role
in finding solutions while marking the fourth anniversary of the WTC attack,
which brought much loss and pain particularly to the Americans and generally
to every human being in the world on September 11, 2001. |
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| Produced by Lake House |
"A voice said RUN.RUN.RUN. I have never run away from an assignment in my
life. Never run away from taking a photograph. But on September 11th I ran"
recalls David Handschuh, New York Daily News' staff photographer who was at
the World Trade Centre when two commercial airlines turned into incendiary
bombs bringing the two skyscrapers down, and who survived to give an
intensely intimate narration, four years later in the documentary "When the
Towers Fell". 
