The agreement gives the U.S. Navy the authority to board and search any ship flying the Liberian flag. All that is required is the assertion by U.S. officials that they believe the cargo may include parts or designs for “weapons of mass destruction,” plus the issuance of two hours’ notice to the Liberian government.

The Liberian regime that signed the agreement was formed last year after opposition armies forced Charles Taylor, the former prime minister, to step down, with U.S. backing.

The February 19 Wall Street Journal said that the new deal had been “little noticed by the media.” It added that “Liberia is the world’s second-largest shipping registry…. One third of the oil the U.S. imports arrives in tankers flying the Liberian flag.

“The U.S. hopes to conclude similar pacts with other flag-of-convenience states,” the Journal continued. “It isn’t saying which ones, but Panama, with the world’s largest registry, is likely on the list.”

The Journal described the deal as “a useful end run around the limitations of current international law. Without the pact, the U.S. would be prohibited from boarding Liberian-flagged ships carrying suspicious goods unless they were first shown to be carrying illegal goods or until they entered U.S. waters. By then in this world of WMD [weapons of mass destruction], it might be too late.”

The accord is part of the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI) that Washington launched last June.

In a related move, U.S. secretary of state Colin Powell has threatened Syria with new sanctions. “Syria has not done what we demanded of it,” he told the Senate foreign relations committee in mid-February.

In a trip to Damascus last May, Powell instructed the government to clamp down on Palestinian organizations and other so-called terrorists within its borders, hand over Iraqi assets allegedly stored there, and stop the flow of men and weapons into Iraq that Powell claimed were aiding those resisting the U.S. occupation.

Syrian chargé d’affaires in Washington Muhammad Khaddam said his government did not have the resources to shut tight its 360-mile border with its eastern neighbor. According to the Financial Times, the Syrian government “claims to have closed down the offices of militant Palestinian groups in Damascus, but Mr. Khaddam said that the expulsion of the militants was hampered by Syrian law and the lack of a destination for extradition.”

Powell told the Senate committee that Washington would give Syria up to six months before imposing additional sanctions spelled out in the Syria Accountability Act, passed by Congress late last year.

“We are at a crossroads with Syria, a country that has never been committed to working with us, even though they throw us a few crumbs now and then,” said U.S. congressman Eliot Engel, the author of the bill. “Libya has changed its tune but Syria does nothing.”  
 
 
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