Will Women Register for Selective Service?

Jan 24, 2013 5:53pm

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta today lifted the ban on women serving in combat positions, opening the door to more than 200,000  new military posts and raising a number of important questions, including: Will women eventually be eligible for the draft?

By law, all male U.S. citizens and permanent residents must register with the Selective Service System within 30 days of their 18th birthday. Registration puts those “male persons” on the list the government uses if ever the draft returns and conscription in the military is deemed necessary in a time of war.

As of a 1994 review, women were still exempt from registering because they did not serve in combat positions. Today’s change in Pentagon policy, however, could ultimately result in a change to the law.

But it will take more than just the stroke of the defense secretary’s pen for the Selective Service Act to include mention of women.

With any change to personnel policies, the Defense Department  is “required to provide an analysis of its impact on the Selective Service Act,” said a senior Pentagon official said on the condition of anonymity.  “So that will be part of the notification to Congress.”

But what comes next is  unclear.

“With regard to what will happen from there, I can’t say,” said the official.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta later admitted to reporters that he, too, did not know the potential impact of the change to the Selective Service Act.

“That’s not our operation,” said Panetta.

Known for his use of colorful language, Panetta then said, “I don’t know who the hell controls Selective Service, if you want to know the truth.”

“But, you know,” Panetta added. “Whoever does, they’re going to have to exercise some judgment based on what we just did.”

The Selective Service System is a federal agency independent of the Department of Defense.

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North Korea to target U.S. with nuclear, rocket tests

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said on Thursday it would carry out further rocket launches and a nuclear test that would target the United States, dramatically stepping up its threats against a country it called its "enemy".

The announcement by the country's top military body came a day after the United Nations Security Council agreed a U.S.-backed resolution to censure and sanction the country for a rocket launch in December that breached U.N. rules.

"We are not disguising the fact that the various satellites and long-range rockets that we will fire and the high-level nuclear test we will carry out are targeted at the United States," North Korea's National Defence Commission said, according to state news agency KCNA.

North Korea is believed by South Korea and other observers to be "technically ready" for a third nuclear test, and the decision to go ahead rests with leader Kim Jong-un who pressed ahead with the December rocket launch in defiance of the U.N. sanctions.

"Whether North Korea tests or not is up to North Korea," Glyn Davies, the top U.S. envoy for North Korean diplomacy, said in the South Korean capital of Seoul as KCNA released its statement.

"We hope they don't do it. We call on them not to do it," Davies said. "This is not a moment to increase tensions on the Korean peninsula."

The North was banned from developing missile and nuclear technology under sanctions dating from its 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests.

The concern now is that Pyongyang, whose only major diplomatic ally, China, endorsed the latest U.N. resolution, could undertake a third nuclear test using highly enriched uranium for the first time, opening a second path to a bomb.

Its previous tests have been viewed as limited successes and used plutonium, of which the North has limited stocks.

North Korea gave no time-frame for the coming test and often employs harsh rhetoric in response to U.N. and U.S. actions.

Its long-range rockets are not seen as capable of reaching the United States mainland and it is not believed to have the technology to mount a nuclear warhead on a long-range missile.

"The UNSC (Security Council) resolution masterminded by the U.S. has brought its hostile policy towards the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (North Korea) to its most dangerous stage," the commission was quoted as saying.

(Writing by David Chance; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

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Taiwanese activists head for Japan-controlled isles

TOKYO: A boatload of Taiwanese activists protected by the island's coastguard was on Thursday heading for Japanese-held islands at the centre of a bitter international wrangle involving Tokyo, Beijing and Taipei.

The seven activists left port in Taiwan on a fishing vessel in the early hours and were expected to arrive in the area around the uninhabited islands about noon (0400 GMT), Taiwanese coastguard spokesman Shih Yi-che said.

A coastguard official in Japan said the vessel was "sailing towards the Senkakus".

The islands in the East China Sea, whose seabed is believed to harbour valuable mineral reserves, are known as Senkaku in Japanese and Diaoyu in Chinese. Both China and Taiwan claim them.

The group said it was on its way to plant a statue of a sea goddess believed by coastal communities in the region to have the power to protect seafarers, but it was not clear if the activists would attempt to land.

It also intended to "maintain sovereignty" against Japan's control, said Hsieh Mang-lin, the Taiwanese chairman of the Chinese Association for Protecting the Diaoyutais (Diaoyu Islands), in a short statement.

Japanese broadcaster NHK reported that Taipei had dispatched six patrol boats to "monitor" the ship, adding it was the same one that had entered waters off the islands in July.

Taiwan's coastguard denied it was an organised flotilla.

"Coastguard ships that patrol the area routinely will protect the boat," said spokesman Shih, who declined to give the number of official Taiwanese vessels in the area.

"The coastguard will protect our people's voluntary actions to defend the Diaoyu islands. Coastguard vessels will go wherever the fishing boat is... to defend our sovereignty and protect our fishing rights," a statement said.

In September, coastguard vessels from Japan and Taiwan duelled with water cannon after dozens of Taiwanese boats were escorted by patrol ships into the islands' waters.

Earlier, Japanese media reports had said there were Hong Kong activists on board the boat, but a spokesman for the southern Chinese territory's main Diaoyu protest group told AFP it was not involved.

Previous activist landings have resulted in the arrest and deportation of those setting foot on what Japan says has been its indisputable territory for more than a century.

The rocky island outposts have been the scene of a diplomatic tussle between Japan and China for months.

Japan's government nationalised three of them in September by taking them out of private Japanese ownership.

Since then, Beijing has repeatedly sent government ships into the waters. In December, a Chinese government plane flew over them, leading Japan to scramble fighter jets.

Earlier this month, both militaries had jets in the area and Japanese newspapers have reported that Tokyo is mulling allowing its pilots to fire warning shots.

While most commentators believe Asia's two largest economies will find some way to work around the problem, which has rattled relations for decades, some are warning that a mis-step could lead to armed confrontation.

- AFP/al

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Amazon's Kindle and Paperwhite available in Canada

The latest generation of Kindle and the Kindle Paperwhite are now available for sale in Canada, according to Amazon.

The company has started selling its e-readers on Amazon.ca, its Canadian site, today. The
Kindle costs 89 Canadian dollars ($88.98). The Paperwhite, which has a lighted, touch screen, starts at 139 Canadian dollars ($138.95) for the 3G version. The Paperwhite with both Wi-Fi and 3G costs 199 Canadian dollars ($198.97).

The devices, which started shipping in the U.S. in September and October, will also be available at over 1,000 retail locations in Canada, including Staples, The Source and Shoppers Drug Mart, according to Amazon.

Although it's been holding out on Canada, the company took the time to highlight the Canada Kindle Store's Canadian selections in its press release. The store has over 1.5 million Kindle book, including 50,000 French-language titles, and Canadian publishers and authors like Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro and Yann Martel.

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Women now equal men in lung cancer deaths

U.S. women who smoke today have a much greater risk of dying from lung cancer than they did decades ago, partly because they are starting younger and smoking more - that is, they are lighting up like men, new research shows.

Men who smoke have long had higher lung cancer death rates, but now women have caught up in their risk of dying from smoking-related illnesses. Lung cancer risk leveled off in the 1980s for men but is still rising for women, the study found.

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"It's a massive failure in prevention," said one study leader, Dr. Michael Thun of the American Cancer Society. And it's likely to repeat itself in places like China and Indonesia where smoking is growing, he said. About 1.3 billion people worldwide smoke.

The research is in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine. It is one of the most comprehensive looks ever at long-term trends in the effects of smoking and includes the first generation of U.S. women who started early in life and continued for decades, long enough for health effects to show up.

The U.S. has more than 35 million smokers - about 20 percent of men and 18 percent of women. The percentage of people who smoke is far lower than it used to be; rates peaked around 1960 in men and two decades later in women.

In 2009, 205,974 people in the United States were diagnosed with lung cancer, including 110,190 men and 95,784 women, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That same year, 87,694 men and 70,387 women passed away from the disease.

Researchers wanted to know if smoking is still as deadly as it was in the 1980s, given that cigarettes have changed (less tar), many smokers have quit, and treatments for many smoking-related diseases have improved.

They also wanted to know more about smoking and women. The famous surgeon general's report in 1964 said smoking could cause lung cancer in men, but evidence was lacking in women at the time since relatively few of them had smoked long enough.

One study, led by Dr. Prabhat Jha of the Center for Global Health Research in Toronto, looked at about 217,000 Americans in federal health surveys between 1997 and 2004.

A second study, led by Thun, tracked smoking-related deaths through three periods - 1959-65, 1982-88 and 2000-10 - using seven large population health surveys covering more than 2.2 million people.

Among the findings:

- The risk of dying of lung cancer was more than 25 times higher for female smokers in recent years than for women who never smoked. In the 1960s, it was only three times higher. One reason: After World War II, women started taking up the habit at a younger age and began smoking more.

-A person who never smoked was about twice as likely as a current smoker to live to age 80. For women, the chances of surviving that long were 70 percent for those who never smoked and 38 percent for smokers. In men, the numbers were 61 percent and 26 percent.

-Smokers in the U.S. are three times more likely to die between ages 25 and 79 than non-smokers are. About 60 percent of those deaths are attributable to smoking.

-Women are far less likely to quit smoking than men are. Among people 65 to 69, the ratio of former to current smokers is 4-to-1 for men and 2-to-1 for women.

-Smoking shaves more than 10 years off the average life span, but quitting at any age buys time. Quitting by age 40 avoids nearly all the excess risk of death from smoking. Men and women who quit when they were 25 to 34 years old gained 10 years; stopping at ages 35 to 44 gained 9 years; at ages 45 to 54, six years; at ages 55 to 64, four years.

-The risk of dying from other lung diseases such as emphysema and chronic bronchitis is rising in men and women, and the rise in men is a surprise because their lung cancer risk leveled off in 1980s.

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Changes in cigarettes since the 1960s are a "plausible explanation" for the rise in non-cancer lung deaths, researchers write. Most smokers switched to cigarettes that were lower in tar and nicotine as measured by tests with machines, "but smokers inhaled more deeply to get the nicotine they were used to," Thun said. Deeper inhalation is consistent with the kind of lung damage seen in the illnesses that are rising, he said.

Scientists have made scant progress against lung cancer compared with other forms of the disease, and it remains the leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide. More than 160,000 people die of it in the U.S. each year.

The federal government, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the cancer society and several universities paid for the new studies. Thun testified against tobacco companies in class-action lawsuits challenging the supposed benefits of cigarettes with reduced tar and nicotine, but he donated his payment to the cancer society.

Smoking needs more attention as a health hazard, Dr. Steven A. Schroeder of the University of California, San Francisco, wrote in a commentary in the journal.

"More women die of lung cancer than of breast cancer. But there is no `race for the cure' for lung cancer, no brown ribbon" or high-profile advocacy groups for lung cancer, he wrote.

Kathy DeJoseph, 62, of suburban Atlanta, finally quit smoking after 40 years - to qualify for lung cancer surgery last year.

"I tried everything that came along, I just never could do it," even while having chemotherapy, she said.

It's a powerful addiction, she said: "I still every day have to resist wanting to go buy a pack."

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Pentagon to Allow Women in Combat

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta will lift a longstanding ban on women serving in combat, according to senior defense officials.

The services have until this May to come up with a plan to implement the change, according to a Defense Department official.

That means the changes could come into effect as early as May. The services will have until January 2016 to complete the implementation of the changes.

The military services will also have until Janurary 2016 to seek waivers for certain jobs -- but those waivers will require a personal approval from the secretary of defense and will have to be based on rationales other than the direct combat exclusion rule.

The move to allow women in combat, first reported by the Associated Press, was not expected this week, although there has been a concerted effort by the Obama administration to further open up the armed forces to women.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff unanimously recommended in January to Secretary Panetta that the direct combat exclusion rule should be lifted.

"I can confirm media reports that the secretary and the chairman are expected to announce the lifting of the direct combat exclusion rule for women in the military," said a senior Defense Department official. "This policy change will initiate a process whereby the services will develop plans to implement this decision, which was made by the secretary of defense upon the recommendation of the Joint Chiefs of Staff."

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Martin Dempsey sent Panetta a memo earlier this month entitled, "Women in Service Implementation Plan."

"The time has come to rescind the direct combat exclusion rule for women and to eliminate all unnecessary gender-based barriers to service," the memo read.

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"To implement these initiatives successfully and without sacrificing our warfighting capability or the trust of the American people, we will need time to get it right," he said in the memo, referring to the 2016 horizon.

Women have been officially prohibited from serving in combat since a 1994 rule that barred them from serving in ground combat units. That does not mean they have been immune from danger or from combat.

As Martha Raddatz reported in 2009, women have served in support positions on and off the frontlines in Iraq and Afghanistan, where war is waged on street corners and in markets, putting them at equal risk. Hundreds of thousands of women deployed with the military to those two war zones over the past decade. Hundreds have died.

READ MORE: Female Warriors Engage in Combat in Iraq, Afghanistan

Woman have been able to fly combat sorties since 1993. In 2010, the Navy allowed them on submarines. But lifting restrictions on service in frontline ground combat units will break a key barrier in the military.

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Panetta's decision will set a January 2016 deadline for the military service branches to argue that there are military roles that should remain closed to women.

In February 2012 the Defense Department opened up 14,500 positions to women that had previously been limited to men and lifted a rule that prohibited women from living with combat units.

Panetta also directed the services to examine ways to open more combat roles to women.

However, the ban on direct combat positions has remained in place.

Advocates for equality in the services will be pleased. On Capitol Hill today, retired Chief Master Sgt. Cindy McNally, a victim of sexual assault in the military, said placing women in combat roles would help equalize the services and actually cut down on sexual assaults, which have emerged as a major problem in the military.

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Netanyahu turns to Iran after narrow election win

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed victory in Israel's parliamentary election, shrugging off surprise losses to centre-left challengers and vowing on Wednesday to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

However, Tuesday's vote, which also disappointed religiously inspired hardliners, may deflect the premier's focus on confronting Tehran and resisting Palestinian demands as Israel's secular, middle-class demanded new attention to domestic issues.

That, in turn, might draw Netanyahu toward a less fractious relationship with his key ally, U.S. President Barack Obama, who himself embarked on a new term this week with great ambitions.

Exit polls showed the Israeli leader's right-wing Likud and the ultra-nationalist Yisrael Beitenu would remain the biggest bloc in the 120-member assembly, but with only 31 seats, 11 fewer than the 42 the two parties held in the last parliament.

If the exit polls compiled by three local broadcasters prove correct - and they normally do in Israel - Netanyahu would be on course for a third term in office, perhaps leading a hardline coalition that would promote Jewish settlement on occupied land.

But his weakened showing in a vote which he had called nine months early in the hope of a strong mandate for his struggle with Iran, could complicate his efforts to forge an alliance with a stable and substantial majority in parliament.

"I am proud to be your prime minister, and I thank you for giving me the opportunity, for the third time, to lead the state of Israel," the 63-year-old leader told a cheering crowd in the early hours of Wednesday at his campaign headquarters.

Netanyahu said he planned to form as broad a governing coalition as possible, suggesting he would seek partners beyond his traditional ultra-nationalist and religious allies. His first call may be to Yair Lapid, a former television anchorman whose centrist, secular party came from nowhere to second place.

"The first challenge was and remains preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons," Netanyahu said.

Iran denies it is planning to build an atomic bomb, and says Israel, widely believed to have the only nuclear arsenal in the Middle East, is the biggest threat to the region.

Netanyahu views Tehran's nuclear program as a threat to Israel's existence and has stoked international concern by hinting at possible Israeli military action to thwart it.

He has shunted Palestinian peacemaking well down the agenda despite Western concern to keep the quest for a solution alive.

The projections showed right-wing parties with a combined strength of 61-62 seats against 58-59 for the centre-left.

Lapid's Yesh Atid (There is a Future) party should have 18 or 19 seats, exit polls showed - a stunning result for a newcomer to politics in a field of 32 contending parties.

Lapid won support amongst middle-class, secular voters by promising to resolve a growing housing shortage, abolish military draft exemptions for Jewish seminary students and seek an overhaul of the failing education system.

He urged Netanyahu "to build as broad a government as possible so that we can bring about real change in Israel".

The once dominant Labor party led by Shelly Yachimovich was projected to take third place with 17 seats. She described Likud victory claims as "ridiculous" before final results were in.

"There is a very good chance, a very good chance, that tomorrow morning Benjamin Netanyahu will not be able to form a government," she declared at her party headquarters.

Reconciling views to build a cabinet will certainly be hard.

"YESH ATID SWEEP"

Some in Netanyahu's party acknowledged that the election had gone somewhat awry. "We anticipated we would lose some votes to Lapid, but not to this extent. This was a Yesh Atid sweep," Likud campaign adviser Ronen Moshe told Reuters.

Lapid said before the election he would consider joining a Netanyahu-led government. If that happens, the ultra-Orthodox religious parties which often hold the balance of power in parliament might lose some of their leverage.

After a lackluster campaign, Israelis voted in droves on a sunny winter day, registering a turnout of 66.6 percent, the highest since 2003. That buoyed centre-left parties which had pinned their hopes on energizing an army of undecided voters against Netanyahu and his nationalist-religious allies.

"A big majority of middle class Israelis have voted strongly against the priorities of the last government," said Dan Avnon, a political science professor at Hebrew University.

"These are the people who pay the taxes and serve in the army," he said. "I don't think they can be ignored."

Opinion polls before the election had predicted an easy win for Netanyahu, although the last ones suggested he would lose some votes to the Jewish Home party, which opposes a Palestinian state and advocates annexing chunks of the occupied West Bank.

The exit polls projected 12 seats for Jewish Home.

The biggest casualty was the centrist Kadima party, which was projected to win no seats at all. It had gained the highest number in the previous election in 2009, although its then leader Tzipi Livni failed to put together a governing coalition.

Full election results are due by Wednesday morning and official ones will be announced on January 30. After that, President Shimon Peres is likely to ask Netanyahu, as leader of the biggest bloc in parliament, to try to form a government.

WESTERN ANXIETY

Whatever permutation finally emerges, a Netanyahu-led government is likely to resist any push for a peace deal with the Palestinians that would come anywhere near satisfying the moderates who seek a viable independent state alongside Israel.

Naftali Bennet, high-tech millionaire son of American immigrants who leads the hard-right, pro-settler Jewish Home party, was projected to win 12 seats - disappointing for him but still making his group a likely member of a coalition.

Bennet, who advocates annexing West Bank land to Israel, told cheering supporters: "There is only one truth and it is simple. The Land of Israel belongs to the people of Israel."

Britain warned Israel on Tuesday it was losing international support, saying Jewish settlement expansion had almost killed off prospects for a two-state solution.

U.S.-brokered peace talks broke down in 2010 amid mutual acrimony. Since then Israel has accelerated construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem - land the Palestinians want for their future state - much to the anger of Western partners.

Netanyahu's relations with Obama have been notably tense and Martin Indyk, former U.S. ambassador to Israel, told the BBC the election was unlikely to change that.

"President Obama doesn't have high expectations that there's going to be a government in Israel committed to making peace and is capable of the kind of very difficult and painful concessions that would be needed to achieve a two-state solution," he said.

But Aaron David Miller, once a senior U.S. adviser on the peace process, said a weakening of the right might improve ties: "The fact is, if (Netanyahu) goes with Lapid and he reaches out to the centre, you're going to end up with an American-Israeli rapprochement to a certain degree," Miller told CNN.

Tuesday's vote was the first in Israel since Arab uprisings swept the region two years ago, reshaping the Middle East.

Netanyahu has said the turbulence, which has brought Islamist governments to power in several countries long ruled by secularist autocrats, including neighboring Egypt, shows the importance of strengthening national security.

Foreign policy issues barely registered during the election campaign, with a poll in Haaretz newspaper on Friday saying 47 percent of Israelis thought social and economic issues were the most pressing concern, against just 10 percent who cited Iran.

A major problem for the next government, which is unlikely to take power before mid-March, is the stuttering economy.

Data last week showed the budget deficit rose to 4.2 percent of gross domestic product in 2012, double the original estimate, meaning spending cuts and tax hikes look certain.

(Reporting by Jerusalem bureau; Editing by Alastair Macdonald)

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US urges Bangladesh to hold free, fair trials

WASHINGTON: The United States urged Bangladesh to hold free and fair trials after a war crimes court sentenced a fugitive TV preacher to death Monday amid allegations the tribunal is politically motivated.

The International Crimes Tribunal, a domestic body with no international oversight, ordered Maolana Abul Kalam Azad to be hanged for genocide and murder during the bloody 1971 liberation war against Pakistan.

"The United States supports bringing to justice those who commit such crimes," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a statement.

"However, we believe that any such trials must be free, fair and transparent, and in accordance with domestic standards and international standards Bangladesh has agreed to uphold through its ratification of international agreements."

Azad, who for years presented a widely watched show on Islam on private and state-run television channels, is a former leading light of Bangladesh's largest opposition Islamic party Jamaat-e-Islami.

The 63-year-old TV host has been on the run for about a year.

In total, 11 top opposition figures -- nine from Jamaat and two from the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) -- stand accused of war crimes.

Both Jamaat and the BNP have called the cases "politically motivated and farcical" and international rights groups have questioned the proceedings and found loopholes in the war crime laws.

The Bangladeshi government says the trials are fair and meet international standards.

"The United States urges the government of Bangladesh to adhere to the due process standards that are part of its treaty obligations, and to fully respect the rule of law" as it addresses atrocities committed during the liberation war, Nuland said.

-AFP/fl

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U.S. government invites hackers to 'Civic Hacking Day'

A coalition of organizations, companies, and government agencies are hosting the National Day of Civic Hacking on June 1 and 2.

(Credit:
hackforchange.org)

The U.S. government is hoping that hackers can help make the nation a better place.

The White House announced today that it will kick off a "National Day of Civic Hacking" on June 1 and 2 and is inviting those with tech know-how to use their coding skills to improve communities across the country.

"Civic Hacking Day is an opportunity for software developers, technologists, and entrepreneurs to unleash their can-do American spirit by collaboratively harnessing publicly-released data and code to create innovative solutions for problems that affect Americans," a statement from the White House said.

The National Day of Civic Hacking was put together by a coalition of organizations, companies, and government agencies, which includes Random Hacks of Kindness, Code for America, NASA, Department of Labor, and the U.S. Census Bureau.

On Civic Hacking Day, different activities such as block parties, hackathons, and brigade meetups will commence across the country.

From Augusta, Ga. to Denver, Colo. to Detroit, Mich., the participating agencies will give hackers government data with coding challenges that are specifically targeted for helping local neighborhoods, cities, and states. Despite the government asking for the help of techies, anyone is invited to participate.

According to the event organizers, here are some of the benefits of getting involved:

Demonstrate a commitment to the principles of transparency, participation, and collaboration.

Exercise a government's interest in using open data and technology, in partnership with others, to address your local community's felt needs.

Liberate open data that can inform better problem solving in every community.

Continue to collectively map a national innovation ecosystem and create new access points to that system.

Engage citizens in cities with little technology infrastructure to contribute to changing their community through open source, open data, entrepreneurship and code development.

Promote Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education by encouraging students to utilize open technology for solutions to real challenges.

Encourage large scale partnership and mutual understanding.

"This is an opportunity for citizens in every town and city across the Nation to roll up their sleeves, get involved, and work together to improve our society by cultivating an ecosystem for innovation and change," the White House statement said.

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Evidence shows bold L.A. priest abuse cover-up

(CBS News) LOS ANGELES - There is new evidence that leaders of the Catholic Church in Los Angeles maneuvered secretly to shield priests accused of sexually abusing children.

Documents just released indicate they never told parishioners -- or the police -- what they knew.

"What we're seeing in these files is but a glimpse into a very, very dark, and endless tunnel of secrecy, of abuse, of silence," said Raymond Boucher, a former altar boy and current lead attorney, representing some 500 victims of sex abuse by priests in the archdiocese of Los Angeles.

Files show L.A. archdiocese manipulation in abuse cases

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Ten years after revelations of massive sex abuse cover-ups, many victims never get their day in court

Raymond Boucher

/

CBS News

The documents offer the strongest evidence yet of a cover-up that reached to the very top of Los Angeles clergy: Then-archbishop, now-retired Cardinal Roger Mahony.

"That has always been paramount for the church for decades: Protect itself from scandal," Boucher said.

Many of the documents are correspondence between Mahony and Monsignor Thomas Curry, his chief adviser on sex abuse. One concerns whether to allow Monsignor Peter Garcia to return to his duties in L.A. He had secretly been sent away for treatment in New Mexico for sexually abusing as many as 17 youngsters.

No one in the church hierarchy alerted authorities.

Mahony wrote on July 22, 1986: "I believe if Monsignor Garcia were to reappear here within the archdiocese we might very well have some type of legal action filed in both the criminal and civil sectors. Signed, sincerely yours in Christ, most reverend Roger Mahony."

Monsignor Curry concurred: "There are numerous - maybe 20 - adolescents or young adults that Peter Garcia was involved with in a first degree felony manner. The possibility of one of these seeing him is simply too great."

Cardinal Mahony issued this statement Tuesday to the victims: "I pray for them every single day."

It ends simply: "I'm sorry."

Victims held a press conference Tuesday. Manny Vega says was abused from age 10 to 15.

"Conscious, clear decisions were made to hide these priests and move them around and never, never did they consider the well-being of the children that they destroyed and left behind," Vega said.

Monsignor Garcia has passed away, and Monsignor Curry did not respond to requests for comment from CBS News.

As many as 30,000 more documents from the archdiocese sex abuse settlement are to be released in the coming weeks.

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