Shoe bombs, blunders and Lanka's 15-minute fame

Sri Lanka had its share of both last week when a potential suicide bomber on an American Airlines flight from Paris to Miami was initially misidentified as a Sri Lankan national.

In the world of competitive dog-eat-dog journalism, every major television network picked up the story and ran with it — but without double-checking its veracity.

The story, which was attributed to anonymous sources with the French border police in Paris, was a publicity bonanza for Sri Lanka — but for the wrong reasons.

The result was that Sri Lanka got millions of dollars worth of unwarranted media mileage with every network focusing on the political, economic and cultural history of the country as a background to the breaking news story.

Suddenly, the spotlight was on Sri Lanka's newest export commodity: suicide bombers.

Richard Reid, the 28-year-old potential suicide bomber, was accused of trying to light plastic explosives embedded in his sneaker in an attempt to blow up the plane.

At least one writer saw an element of humour when he said that airport security personnel, who usually grill a passenger to find out whether or not he has packed his own suitcase, would now fire a question that reflects new security concerns: "Did you or did you not tie your own shoe laces?".

Ironically, one of the best known brand of high-priced sneakers carries the rather inappropriate name for travel shoes: Air Turbulence.

But in less than 48 hours, the story of the shoe bomber took a different turn when it was discovered that Reid, also known as Tariq Raja, was a British national with a Jamaican mother and a British father. Sri Lanka vanished from the radar screen after its "15 minutes of fame" in a country pre-occupied with international terrorism.

The Sri Lanka embassy in Washington chipped in with one of the most inane explanations when its media release said that "according to Mr. Reid's appearance and other records with the embassy, Mr. Richard Reid, alias Tariq Raja, is not a Sri Lankan."

As one Sri Lankan said in an email response to the media release: "This must be the first time that any embassy had used 'appearance' as proof of non-citizenship."

And what "records" would the embassy in Washington have on Reid who was a British national and was never identified as an expatriate living in the US?.

Meanwhile, the threat to blow up the plane has resulted in tightened security in all airports, with passengers being asked to remove their shoes for scrutiny through bomb detecting machines.

The safest way to get pass airport security these days would be to walk barefooted into an aircraft — thanks to the misidentified Sri Lankan bomber. The security is so intense that last week that American Airlines removed a Muslim secret service agent from a flight apparently because of religious and racial profiling.

The agent, who was part of President George W. Bush's security detail, had the highest level of security clearance.

But he was kicked off the flight because the captain had concerns about his identity as an Arab-American — despite the fact that the agent's identification had been checked several times by the airlines personnel and the local police in Baltimore, Maryland.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Washington-based advocacy group, wrote a strong letter of protest to the chairman of American Airlines.

"We are concerned that American Airlines would arbitrarily deny boarding to a Muslim passenger, particularly someone who has one of our nation's highest security clearances, merely because of his religion or ethnicity."

"All Americans are concerned about improving safety for the traveling public, but religious and ethnic profiling is not the way to make flying more secure," said CAIR's Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper.

Addressing reporters on Friday, President Bush said he was aware of the incident and had spoken to his secret service agent in whom he had the fullest confidence. If this was a case of racial profiling, he said, he would be "mad as hell". 

Since the terrorist attacks on the US on September 11, CAIR has received more than 160 reports of airport profiling of Muslims or those who are perceived to be of "Middle Eastern" origin.