Fugitive army soldiers tried to hijack a U.S.-bound plane before it took off and killed a military officer they took hostage during the failed attempt, the Interior Ministry said. The ministry blamed U.S. policies that the communist government says encourage Cubans to emigrate to the United States and also said it was a result of Washington's tolerance of violence against Cuba. The incident began before dawn when the fugitives commandeered a regular city bus near the airport and forced it to drive inside and onto the tarmac of terminal 2, which services charter flights between the Cuban capital and the United States. The exact destination of the plane in the United States was not known, but most charter flights out of terminal 2 fly to Miami.

A view of the X-ray machine where the drugs were discovered
While working at a Metropolitan Oakland (Calif.) International Airport checkpoint last month, TSOs Richard Lin and Andrew Scott discovered four one-half kilo bricks of cocaine stuffed in two large vases packed in a passenger's luggage. Relying on training and expertise, Lin and Scott pulled passenger Frank Taylor's bags aside after the X-ray machine alarmed. After performing an explosives trace detection test with negative results, the TSOs opened both bags and agreed that things did not appear "normal." After a police K-9 team ruled out explosives, the TSOs removed the vases from Interpol stolen passport database to be used by CBP CBP soon will start using a database of stolen passports maintained by the international police organization Interpol to identify those attempting to gain illegal entry to the country. Recently, stolen passports were used by Iraqis trying to cross into the United States at the U.S.- Mexico border. CBP officers at 225 ports of entry around the nation will have access to the database by the end of 2007. There was a delay of approximately two years between the time the technology was offered and the time it was accepted; during that time, CBP worked through concerns that the database was “slow,” that its terrorist watch lists already in use provided better information, and that the information available on the stolen passports was restricted to number, country of issue, date reported missing and whether it was blank when stolen. The system is still not perfect; based on current bilateral arrangements, the agency only has access to 4.3 million of the 6.8 million stolen passports known to Interpol.

Airport security screeners filed suit to expand the Transportation Security Administration's response to its loss of Social Security numbers, bank data and payroll information for about 100,000 employees. If the data, which was contained on a lost computer hard drive, "were to fall into the wrong hands, false identity badges easily could be created in order to gain access to secure areas," said John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees. "A Department of Homeland Security agency that cannot even shield its own employee data is not reassuring." Gage's union represents security screeners employed at the nation's airports by TSA, a unit of the Homeland Security Department. The union and four screeners filed the class action suit against TSA in U.S. District Court on behalf of all TSA security employees whose personal information was lost. The TSA said there is no evidence yet that the data has been used for any unauthorized purpose and it has taken measures to be alerted if someone uses the hard drive. It has told current and former employees it would give them a year of free credit monitoring, free ID theft insurance up to $25,000 and assistance from identity restoration experts if any theft occurs.