Written By: CISU
Posted: 2/19/2003
ISSUE NO. 384 - 7 FEBRUARY 2003
by the Italian Center for UFO Studies
(Centro Italiano Studi Ufologici, CISU)
Contents:
Once again, sensational news reports have exploded in the Italian mass media pertaining to the revelation of secret Soviet documents on UFOs.
This time around, it’s about the publication, beginning in "Komsomolskaja Pravda" on 5 February, of the documents released in 1991 by the KGB (the infamous Soviet agency for internal security) to the astronaut Pavel Popovich, who had requested them in his capacity as president of a UFO association: they amount to a little more than 120 pages concerning 18 reports about sightings, these having occurred in great part at military bases and installations, or else at strategic locations in the Soviet Union, between the years of 1982 and 1990.
On the heels of the newswires, great emphasis (and some correspondences from Moscow) was given these documents by almost all newspaper, radio and TV stations, but practically in Italy alone.
In reality, there was no "scoop," especially not in our country, given that such documents had already been known and distributed as early as 7 years ago. In particular, these were integrally translated and published in 1995 as an appendix to Roberto Pinotti’s book, "UFO: Top Secret", whose author had obtained them from Russian ufologist Boris Shurinov and then had even turned them over to Italian political and military authorities.
[Komsomolskaja Pravda, 5 February; ANSA, 5 February; La Stampa and other Italian dailies, 6 February; UFO-Italia, 5-6 February; Chucara2000, 5-7 February; collaboration by Paolo Fiorino and Gildo Person=E8]
With the completion of the third volume of the Operazione Origini ("Operation Origins") book series dedicated this time around to the year of the "ghost rockets" (e.g., 1946), Giuseppe Stilo has begun the work on his planned next tome concentrating on the great wave of sightings in 1954.
In conjunction with these activities, the Italian Center for UFO Studies (CISU) has proposed that foreign colleagues participate in an international project of in-depth research, for the purpose of sharing archival resources and study capacities by each national organization and numerous scholars around the world.
Thus was born "Project 1954", an Internet-based, coordinated effort onto which fifty or so researchers from over twenty-five countries have signed on, in the last few weeks. There are three objectives in mind, each respectively focused on the following: the heavy caseload of sightings from that year; the gathering and systematic analysis of the documentation of that era; and the re-examination of all studies and the subsequent body of work relative to the subject.
[Communications by Giuseppe Stilo]
The Italian Committee for Project Hessdalen (CIPH) has announced the launch of its 2003 Campaign for the raising of funds destined for research activities in the Norwegian valley where, for years, systematic campaigns of instrumental observation have been conducted on the renowned, recurring luminous phenomena.
But the CIPH program for 2003 does not limit itself to the organization, financing and management of a mission in Norway, where the Committee has sent researchers and technicians over the last few years from both the CNR and other scientific institutions.
Among the activities slated for this year, there are also the following: the development and installation of instrumentation equipment, some specially designed, and the transfer of research bases (e.g., radio, radar, optic, witness-based) to Italy, with a further improvement in both organizational and economic quality, for which an appeal is thus being made for contributions and donations.
Already available at the Committee’s Website are various articles and reports relative to the 2002 Mission, as well as reference materials for participating in or contributing to Project 2003.
[Press release by Renzo Cabassi; www.itacomm.net]
Collaborators on this edition were: Renzo Cabassi, Paolo Fiorino, Gildo Person=E8 and Giuseppe Stilo.
