Piekarski pleads not guilty

Piekarski is scheduled to appear in court again Dec. 15.

Insurgents may be coordinated

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -– The Iraqi insurgency in Baghdad appears to have a central leadership that finances attacks in the capital and gives broad orders to eight to 12 rebel bands – some with as many as 100 guerrillas, U.S. Army generals said Monday.

Decisions on individual attacks against U.S. occupation forces in the capital, however, are left up to the men who carry them out, said Brig. Gen. Martin Dempsey.

There is still no sign of a military-style command structure in the city or in Iraq as a whole, Dempsey told a group of reporters in an unusually detailed account of the Iraqi insurgency.

"I'm increasingly of the belief that there's central financial control and central communications," said Dempsey, who commands the Army's 1st Armored Division, which controls Baghdad and the surrounding region.

The division's picture of the insurgency has grown clearer as its intelligence gathering has improved, he said. Last month, the Army rounded up what Dempsey believes is one of the guerrilla cells blamed for attacks in Baghdad, including the Oct. 26 rocket strike on the Al-Rasheed Hotel that occurred during the stay of Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz.

Although Dempsey spoke about the Baghdad operation, an ambush Sunday in the town of Samarra north of the capital also showed heightened coordination. U.S. forces successfully routed a group of about 50 fighters who laid in wait at banks and ambushed two American convoys carrying Iraqi currency, killing dozens of Iraqis.

Multiple registrations ditched

WASHINGTON (AP) — The government is scrapping a rule imposed after the Sept. 11 attacks that required men and boys from countries with suspected links to terrorism to register multiple times with U.S. officials.

The rule forced tens of thousands of Middle Easterners and others visiting America to provide personal information to government officials.

Asa Hutchinson, the Homeland Security Department's undersecretary for border and transportation security, said a new registration system that will apply to more foreigners will be in place next month, making the current program unnecessary.

The program will end Tuesday when a notice is published in the Federal Register. Hutchinson said it could be used again if there is another terrorist attack linked to a foreign country.

Critics who contend the rule infringed on the rights of law-abiding citizens welcomed its end. But they tempered their response with warnings that the requirement already had caused damage in Arab and Muslim communities and that the government still has rules in place that discriminate against those groups.

"There's more that would have to be done to right this wrong, but it is one step toward making the program less discriminatory in the future," said Tim Edgar, American Civil Liberties Union legislative counsel.