President Clinton and Defense Secretary William Cohen warned
 Saddam Hussein not to retaliate against U-2 spy planes flying
 over Iraq, with Clinton stressing Tuesday that it would be "a big
 mistake" if Saddam takes action to threaten the aircraft.
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      Group calls on FAA to accept independent safety audits
     WASHINGTON - November 4, 1997 2:16 p.m. EST - Safety inspections
 by an independent body should be accepted by the Federal Aviation
 Administration to free its resources for the most pressing areas, an
 air safety group said Tuesday.
     Flight Safety Foundation president Stuart Matthews said the sys-
 tem could be modeled on oversight of publicly held companies by
 certified accountants.
     "The FAA would retain its regulatory responsibilities but a
 recognized body of independent auditors would relieve the FAA of a
 considerable burden and allow it to focus its efforts on those
 areas where they were most needed," he said.
     Matthews made the remarks as he opened the foundation's 50th
 international air safety conference since the Alexandria, Va.-based
 group was established in 1947.
     He acknowledged that such a system would need to be thoroughly
 examined before being implemented but noted that the foundation
 already offered safety audits to air operators.
     Matthews said his group is developing a set of standards for
 ethics, experience and general qualifications needed to become a
 certified safety auditor.
     FAA Administrator Jane Garvey said she was interested in hear-
 ing more about the foundation's proposal.
     "Absolutely an idea that should be explored," she told Reuters
 after giving the keynote address to the conference.
     "The point about using all of the tools at our disposal is a
 good one and this may be one of those tools," she said.
     Matthews said commercial aviation enjoyed an incredibly low
 accident rate compared with other forms of mass transport. But with
 the anticipated increase in traffic over the next decade, that acci-
 dent rate needed to be reduced even further to avoid "an ever-
 increasing number of accidents."
     He said four areas remained the most pressing safety problems
 facing the aviation industry:
     * navigation error or similar disorientation that causes flight
 into terrain, which has resulted in more than half of all fatalities
 over the past 10 years.
     * approach and landing, when about half of all accidents occur.
     * loss of control incidents.
     * and human factors, not only in the cockpit but on the ground
 including mechanics and air traffic controllers.
     "Focusing our full attention on these causes and eliminating
 them, rather than diverting our efforts and resources onto lesser
 problems, will lead to the largest reductions in the overall acci-
 dent rate," Matthews said.
                    * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
      WASHINGTON - The United States has bought 21 nuclear-capable
 MiG-29C warplanes from the former Soviet republic of Moldova to
 prevent the jets from being sold to Iran, U.S. Secretary of Defense
 William Cohen said Tuesday.
     THE PLANES were reportedly being shopped around to a number of
 nations. They will be used to train American pilots to go up against
 enemy aircraft.
     Cohen told reporters at a news conference that "over the last
 two weeks, we have been transporting these MiGs in C-17 transport
 aircraft from Moldova to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio."
     Cohen said that the United States had agreed not to reveal the
 purchase price of the MiGs.
     Asked if Iran had tried to get the nuclear-capable "C" models,
 the first obtained by the United States, Cohen said yes.
     "Our understanding is that such an approach was made. It was on
 their [Iran's] shopping list," he added.
     Cohen said that the United States would reassemble the MiGs and
 test them, but that the main purpose in obtaining them was the keep
 them away from rogue states that might use them to threaten the
 United States and its allies.
    This is the second time in the past three years the United States
 has gone out of its way to buy either arms or critical material bound
 for Iran. And like Tuesday's example, the material was for sale in a
 former Soviet state.
    Three years ago this month, the United States bought a half ton
 of highly enriched uranium, enough for dozens of bombs, from Kazakh-
 stan. The United States feared then that Iran was aware the uranium,
 lying near a fuel fabrication plant in a remote area, could be
 tempting for both potential buyer as well as potential seller.
    After secret negotiations, U.S. officials from the Defense and
 Energy departments as well as the Central Intelligence Agency went
 to Kazakhstan and transferred the material into 1,400 stainless-steel
 containers and shipped them back to Oak Ridge National Laboratory in
 Tennessee in three huge American C-5 transport planes.
    The project, code-named "Sapphire," also involved the United
 States getting approval from both the Russian and Kazakh governments
 - with tens of millions of dollars in additional aid sent to the
 Central Asian nation as compensation.
 4 Nov 1997
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