时间:2019-01-08 作者:英语课 分类:2006年VOA标准英语(六月)


英语课

By Gary Thomas
Washington
20 June 2006


A cable from the U.S. ambassador in Iraq to the State Department says Iraqis employed at the American Embassy in Baghdad live in fear that they will be unmasked as working for Americans.  The message was leaked to the Washington Post newspaper.  The newspaper says the cable is at odds 1 with the more upbeat public assessments 2 by administration officials.


------------------


 
Smoke billows from the scene of an explosion in south central Baghdad
  
The June 6 cable paints a grim picture in which Iraqi employees live in fear and deprivation 3 once they leave the relative safety and comfort of the U.S.-controlled "Green Zone."  One employee is quoted as saying that life outside the Green Zone is, as she put it, "emotionally draining."


The cable, printed in full by The Washington Post, says Iraqi employees of the public affairs section are in dread 4 that their identities as U.S. embassy workers will be discovered.  Of the nine employees in the section, the cable says, only four of them had family members who knew of their embassy job.  It says the embassy has been shredding 5 documents containing the surnames of local staff.


The employees also complained of harassment 6 by Islamist or militia 7 groups in their neighborhoods, especially over Islamic dress.  It says that the quality of life has, as the cable puts it, "visibly deteriorated 8" with continuing power cuts and higher fuel prices, even in upscale neighborhoods.


The cable was prepared by the public affairs section and approved by Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad.  


 
Adam Ereli   
  
State Department spokesman Adam Ereli downplayed the cable, saying there is nothing new in its contents.  He disputed the suggestion that the cable's gloomy portrait is at odds with official Administration pronouncements on Iraq.


"I think our discussion of what is going on in Iraq has consistently been, again, forthright 9, realistic, frank," he said.  "And anything that was in that article is consistent with how we've discussed the reality in Iraq. Yes, there are challenges.  We are working to solve them.  The Iraqi government is working to solve them.  But broadly speaking, you've got some very positive things going on. So we're not seeking to either minimize the difficulties or inflate 10 the successes."


Ellen Laipson, president of the Henry L. Stimson Center, a Washington-based public policy research institute, called the cable "gripping reading," both for its content and its origin.


"I think the impact is that it was coming out of the embassy, and that it is very human-scale reporting," she said.  "So if you were just reading the newspaper normally you wouldn't necessarily have such a granular feel to be an Iraqi that actually supports what the United States is doing, or is at least willing to work for the U.S. government."


Robert Perito, senior program director at the non-governmental U.S. Institute for Peace, says the cable underscores the desperate need for professional police in neighborhoods.


"Well, it certainly tells you that the circumstances in Iraq are getting more desperate for Iraqis," he said.  "It also tells you that the ability of the United States to influence events certainly is not what it was even a year or so ago."


The cable was unclassified but marked sensitive. A senior official, who asked not to be identified, called the leaking of the message "an unprincipled act," but said he did not anticipate any legal action against whoever might have divulged 11 it.



n.让步,机率,可能性,比率;胜败优劣之别
  • The odds are 5 to 1 that she will win.她获胜的机会是五比一。
  • Do you know the odds of winning the lottery once?你知道赢得一次彩票的几率多大吗?
n.评估( assessment的名词复数 );评价;(应偿付金额的)估定;(为征税对财产所作的)估价
  • He was shrewd in his personal assessments. 他总能对人作出精明的评价。 来自《简明英汉词典》
  • Surveys show about two-thirds use such assessments, while half employ personality tests. 调查表明,约有三分之二的公司采用了这种测评;而一半的公司则采用工作人员个人品质测试。 来自百科语句
n.匮乏;丧失;夺去,贫困
  • Many studies make it clear that sleep deprivation is dangerous.多实验都证实了睡眠被剥夺是危险的。
  • Missing the holiday was a great deprivation.错过假日是极大的损失。
vt.担忧,忧虑;惧怕,不敢;n.担忧,畏惧
  • We all dread to think what will happen if the company closes.我们都不敢去想一旦公司关门我们该怎么办。
  • Her heart was relieved of its blankest dread.她极度恐惧的心理消除了。
v.撕碎,切碎( shred的现在分词 );用撕毁机撕毁(文件)
  • Like the Tehran experience, the shredding may be all for naught. 如同德黑兰事件中的情况一样,切碎文件可能是徒劳的。 来自时文部分
  • How shredding began is subject to some guesswork. 粉碎处理行业的起源是个有争议的问题。 来自时文部分
n.骚扰,扰乱,烦恼,烦乱
  • She often got telephone harassment at night these days.这些天她经常在夜晚受到电话骚扰。
  • The company prohibits any form of harassment.公司禁止任何形式的骚扰行为。
n.民兵,民兵组织
  • First came the PLA men,then the people's militia.人民解放军走在前面,其次是民兵。
  • There's a building guarded by the local militia at the corner of the street.街道拐角处有一幢由当地民兵团守卫的大楼。
恶化,变坏( deteriorate的过去式和过去分词 )
  • Her health deteriorated rapidly, and she died shortly afterwards. 她的健康状况急剧恶化,不久便去世了。
  • His condition steadily deteriorated. 他的病情恶化,日甚一日。
adj.直率的,直截了当的 [同]frank
  • It's sometimes difficult to be forthright and not give offence.又直率又不得罪人,这有时很难办到。
  • He told me forthright just why he refused to take my side.他直率地告诉我他不肯站在我这一边的原因。
vt.使膨胀,使骄傲,抬高(物价)
  • The buyers bid against each other and often inflate the prices they pay.买主们竞相投标,往往人为地提高价钱。
  • Stuart jumped into the sea and inflated the liferaft.斯图尔特跳到海里给救生艇充气。
v.吐露,泄露( divulge的过去式和过去分词 )
  • He divulged nothing to him save the terrible handicap of being young. 他想不出个所以然来,只是想到自己年纪尚幼,极端不利。 来自辞典例句
  • The spy divulged the secret plans to the enemy. 那名间谍把秘密计划泄漏给敌人。 来自辞典例句
学英语单词
actuation threshold
adix parasympathetica
affinity
arsonists
assessing capital
assignment problem
asterid dicot family
beggar-my-neighbour policy
box car end
brunett
Busegwe
closing point
Common Audio Formats
counter monitor
Cumuripa
demixture
Des Moinesian
document transfer menu
double angular ball bearing
Dubh, Rubha
Ebetsu
egans
egg yellow reaction
Englified
ergography
farmland water
fermentation kinetics
filter element for lubricating oil accumulator
finishing mill
flange head
for my
forest for protecting slopes from soil erosion
garment section
genus Carduelis
genus rhyncostyliss
glass joint
glomeruli of kidney
glycyltryptophan test
good-class joinery
ham saw
Heisrath's operation
hermannia kanoi
horizon scan
hush hush
I. B. A.
incentive reduction
independent atom model
invariant polynomials
localized energy level
Ma-u
maddoctors
Modified Dietz Method
momence
motor for kicker and doffer
naphthene base oil
Niakaya
nine-iron
nondissident
nonstory
oka-river
Parnate
pedal triangle
peons
petite bourgeoisie
pickins
PIO (process input output)
plumb book
polimyelities
pontine nucleus
pull sb down
quasilinear system
Radix Hedysari
representativeness of sample
reset pressure
resinanchored bolt
scrims
scrub bird
selection principles
sensillae
serpentarin
shat brix
slope transmission
spin-valve
spot needs
spraining
St-Pal-de-Mons
stationary vibration
suckles
suprme
surface shovel
T-plate
talk trash
the mother of
trip cutoff valve gear
ultra low volume aerial application
undersampling
well-tested
whole segment
without scathe
wristle
yellow mercuric oxide