Leaders arrive for NATO summit, terrorism charges announced

Leaders of NATO countries and the security bloc's partner nations on Saturday began to descend on Chicago, where the organization is having its 25th summit on Sunday.

On the same day, local authorities announced terrorism charges against three men linked to protesters of the summit.

The arrivals Saturday included U.S. President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Francois Hollande and dozens of other leaders from the 28-member bloc, as well as from the about two dozen partner nations participating in the International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) summit on Monday.

Previewing the summit on Sunday, NATo's Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Saturday that the summit will be about the alliance's future cooperation with Afghanistan, capabilities of the bloc as well as its cooperation with other partner countries around the world.

Rasmussen said the summit will take stock of progress in Afghanistan, and "make sure it won't be a safe haven for terrorists," and leaders will "align our commitment in Chicago," laying out "how we are going to support Afghanistan and its people beyond that date (2014), a new commitment to train, equip, support Afghan forces."

But NATO is facing severe strains fiscally as member countries roil in debt crisis. Rasmussen said the fiscal issue could loom large in the summit, and how to provide security in a time of economical austerity "could be the theme of the first discussions among heads of state and government tomorrow afternoon."

John Kirton, director of University of Toronto's G8 Research Group, who is monitoring the G8 and NATO summit in Chicago, told Xinhua that the G8 summit, which concluded on Saturday in Camp David, already gave an opportunity to G8 members, which provided bulk of resources to support Afghanistan, to begin a sort of "private fundraiser" for next decade's support to Afghanistan, which is estimated at 4 billion dollars a year, mainly to support the Afghan National Security Forces.

The NATO summit in Chicago is where the allies have to "publicly get more countries to commit, and add it all up" to support Afghanistan, said Kirton.

Kirton also noted that having the NATO summit right after G8 could give the allies more than a chance to align themselves on Afghanistan before going public with it. He said before answering the question of how much money you might have for defense, one should first have a credible strategy for global growth, and the G8 summit could provide just that.

As NATO makes finishing preparations for the gathering, local authorities on Saturday announced terrorism charges against three men, who were netted days before the summit. Prosecutors said they considered hitting Obama's campaign headquarters, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's house and police stations with "incendiary devices," according to court documents.

Cook County prosecutors identified the men as Brian Church, 20, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., Jared Chase, 24, of Keene, N.H., and Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Oakland Park, Fla. According to prosecutors, the three men are self-proclaimed anarchists. The trio were charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism, providing material support for terrorism and possession of an explosive or incendiary device.

Their arrests were the result of an investigation since early May into a group suspected of making Molotov cocktails. They traveled from Florida to the Chicago area ahead of NATO meetings in order to prepare a multi-staged attack.

For Chicagoans, the summit might mean more of security measures than a strategy in Afghanistan or terrorism.

As leaders descend on Chicago, they were brought downtown by motorcade from O'Hare International Airport. Motorists mostly avoided the Kennedy Expressway, which travels from the Chicago Loop to O'Hare, as well as downtown roads, prompting local press to label the downtown as "ghost town".

Chicago put in huge amount of resources to beef up security in the city, closing off areas around the McCormick Place Convention Center, where the summit is to take place. Heavy police presence could be seen all over the city, especially in downtown area. The Metra, a commuter rail system serving the greater Chicago area, also imposed carry-on restrictions on entire system and closed five stations near McCormick Place.

The summit also brought protesters. Around 500 demonstrators gathered outside the home of Mayor Emanuel on Saturday to protest the recent closure of mental health clinics as part of a series of rallies and marches timed to coincide with a NATO summit.

The protest was much smaller than one attended by an estimated 2,500 people at a downtown plaza on Friday. The biggest rally is expected to be on Sunday near the McCormick Place Convention Center.

"We do not want NATO here," said Michael Downs, who took part in Friday's protest. He told Xinhua in an interview he wanted resources and to be spent on Chicago and solve its own problems in this time of economic difficulty, not on the summit.