Ex-Adviser Reportedly Hurt Embassy Aide

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43756-2004Nov11.html

By Glenn Kessler and Al Kamen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, November 12, 2004; Page A06

Robert D. Blackwill, who resigned last week as the White House's top official on Iraq policy, was recently scolded by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told her that Blackwill appeared to have verbally abused and physically hurt a female embassy staffer during a visit to Kuwait in September, administration officials said.

The incident took place as Blackwill was rushing to return home after a visit to Baghdad to join a campaign swing planned by President Bush. As six officials describe the incident, he arrived at the Air France counter at the Kuwait airport and learned he was not on the flight manifest. Blackwill then turned in fury to an embassy secretary who had accompanied him to the airport and demanded that he be given a seat on the flight, grabbing her arm at one point, the officials said.

Powell found out about the incident and informed Rice. He then had staff members gather facts and materials to present to Rice, including photographs of the woman's arm, a State Department official said.

A National Security Council spokesman confirmed that Blackwill's actions in Kuwait raised questions but said he could not comment on the details. He said the incident was not the reason Blackwill quit his job three months before Iraq is to hold its first elections. An official at the lobbying firm Blackwill just joined -- Barbour, Griffith and Rogers -- said yesterday that Blackwill was traveling to Europe.

by the fact that Powell and Rice have the world situation in control well enough that they have free time to devote to such serious internal affairs?

.