Nearly three years after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, New York was scheduled to begin construction yesterday of a tower that will be the centerpiece of the new World Trade Center.
A 18-tonne granite slab that arrived at New York City's "ground zero" on Thursday will be the cornerstone of the rebuilt center.
Laying the cornerstone of the Freedom Tower will mark the start of construction expected to cost about US$1.5 billion.
PHOTO: NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE
The tower will reach 541m when it is completed in 2009.
The slab was scheduled to be put in place yesterday at a ceremony presided over by New York Governor George Pataki and Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Freedom Tower, the centerpiece of the new World Trade Center, is expected to top Kuala Lumpur's Petronas Towers at 452m and Taipei's 101 Tower at 508m.
The reconstruction will include a permanent memorial to the more than 2,700 people who died at the site.
But no one -- not the governor, the mayor, the developer, the bureaucrats, the planners, and certainly not the reporters -- can say for certain how much of the current vision for the new center will be realized.
Pataki has gone to great lengths to identify himself personally with the rebuilding of the trade center, while Bloomberg's administration has kept itself at some distance.
LarrySilverstein of Silverstein Properties controls the development rights to all the office buildings on the site. But after losing several rounds in a legal battle with his insurers, he lacks the insurance proceeds to pay for much more than the construction of the Freedom Tower.
NO-LIMITS PARTNERSHIP: ‘The bottom line’ is that if the US were to have a conflict with China or Russia it would likely open up a second front with the other, a US senator said Beijing and Moscow could cooperate in a conflict over Taiwan, the top US intelligence chief told the US Senate this week. “We see China and Russia, for the first time, exercising together in relation to Taiwan and recognizing that this is a place where China definitely wants Russia to be working with them, and we see no reason why they wouldn’t,” US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told a US Senate Committee on Armed Services hearing on Thursday. US Senator Mike Rounds asked Haines about such a potential scenario. He also asked US Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse
INSPIRING: Taiwan has been a model in the Asia-Pacific region with its democratic transition, free and fair elections and open society, the vice president-elect said Taiwan can play a leadership role in the Asia-Pacific region, vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) told a forum in Taipei yesterday, highlighting the nation’s resilience in the face of geopolitical challenges. “Not only can Taiwan help, but Taiwan can lead ... not only can Taiwan play a leadership role, but Taiwan’s leadership is important to the world,” Hsiao told the annual forum hosted by the Center for Asia-Pacific Resilience and Innovation think tank. Hsiao thanked Taiwan’s international friends for their long-term support, citing the example of US President Joe Biden last month signing into law a bill to provide aid to Taiwan,
China’s intrusive and territorial claims in the Indo-Pacific region are “illegal, coercive, aggressive and deceptive,” new US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo said on Friday, adding that he would continue working with allies and partners to keep the area free and open. Paparo made the remarks at a change-of-command ceremony at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, where he took over the command from Admiral John Aquilino. “Our world faces a complex problem set in the troubling actions of the People’s Republic of China [PRC] and its rapid buildup of forces. We must be ready to answer the PRC’s increasingly intrusive and
STATE OF THE NATION: The legislature should invite the president to deliver an address every year, the TPP said, adding that Lai should also have to answer legislators’ questions The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday proposed inviting president-elect William Lai (賴清德) to make a historic first state of the nation address at the legislature following his inauguration on May 20. Lai is expected to face many domestic and international challenges, and should clarify his intended policies with the public’s representatives, KMT caucus secretary-general Hung Meng-kai (洪孟楷) said when making the proposal at a meeting of the legislature’s Procedure Committee. The committee voted to add the item to the agenda for Friday, along with another similar proposal put forward by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The invitation is in line with Article 15-2