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<Paper uid="M91-1037">
  <Title>Set list for all incidents except DEATH THREAT, ATTEMPTED MURDER : INJUR Y DEATH NO INJUR Y NO DEATH NO INJURY OR DEATH Set list for KIDNAPPING incidents, in addition to above list : REGAINED FREEDOM Set list for ATTEMPTED MURDER: ESCAPED INJURY NO INJUR Y Set list for DEATH THREAT incidents : INJUR Y NO INJUR Y RESIGNATION (i .e., from job )</Title>
  <Section position="1" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="abstr">
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APPENDIX A:
EVALUATION TASK DESCRIPTION
1 .0 WHAT CONSTITUTES A &amp;quot;RELEVANT&amp;quot; INCIDENT ?
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> Relevant incidents are, in general, violent acts perpetrated with political aim s and a motive of intimidation . These are acts of terrorism . Here is an official , &amp;quot;schoolbook&amp;quot; definition of terrorism : &amp;quot;a sudden, unexpected act of shocking, calculated, and unlawful violence, o r the plausible threat of such violence, by an illegal, subnational, clandestin e group -- usually carried out in a peaceful, civilian environment, be i t urban, rural, in the air or on a body of water -- against certai n noncombatants or targets that represent or symbolize a certain country, bu t sometimes indiscrimately against bystanders or passersby at a particula r location, with the intention of garnering publicity, propagandizing a cause , and intimating as many people as possible in order to attain social, political , or strategic objectives . &amp;quot; -Rex A . Hudson, &amp;quot;Dealing with Internationa l Hostage-Taking : Alternatives to Reactive Counterterrorist Assaults,&amp;quot; Internationa l Terrorism, Vol . 12, 1990.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> This has been turned into more of an operational definition by widening th e schoolbook definition somewhat and making some rather arbitrary distinctions . Your advice on how to improve on this operational definition is welcome .  Terrorist acts may be perpetrated by an &amp;quot;illegal, subnational, clandestin e group,&amp;quot; which includes known guerrilla and drug-traffickin g organizations . Their targets may be just about anything/anybody except (a ) another such group or member of such a group or (b) a military/polic e installation or force (with the same nationality as the perpetrator), or a member of such a force, in which case the incident is presumed to be a purely guerrilla act and is not relevant to the MUC-3 terrorist inciden t database . Thus, killings of drug traffickers will not be included in th e database (by exception a, above), nor will &amp;quot;clashes&amp;quot; between guerrill a groups and the military (by exception b, above) .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> However, if a guerrilla warfare incident happens to affect civilia n personnel or property, whether intentionally or accidentally, the inciden t becomes relevant and should be included in the database . In these cases, th e database should contain information on both the military and the nonmilitary targets.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> Similarly, the database will include incidents of sabotage on a nation' s infrastructure. It will also include incidents perpetrated against individual s who are former members of the military, e .g ., a murder perpetrated against a retired general .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="4"> A--1 Sometimes an article gives mixed reports, e .g., a &amp;quot;terrorist attack&amp;quot; on a bridge guarded by the national (military) police . In a case such as this , which could be interpreted as a case of terrorism (sabotage of the nation' s infrastructure) or of guerrilla warfare (attack on a physical target o f military importance), we will consider the physical target to be nonmilitar y and will include the incident in the database .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="5"> 2) Under certain circumstances, the perpetrator may be a member of th e government, including the military . This is the case when the target i s civilian .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="6"> 3) Sometimes the perpetrator is not identified and no language is used t o indicate that the act is *not* being attributed to &amp;quot;terrorists,&amp;quot; &amp;quot;extremists, &amp;quot; &amp;quot;subversives,&amp;quot; &amp;quot;guerrillas,&amp;quot; etc . In these cases, as long as the act itself is o f one of the expected types and the target(s) is/are not exclusively military , the incident will be presumed to be a possible terrorist act and is to b e included in the database .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="7"> 4) The articles in the MUC-3 corpus originate in many different parts of th e world, but they all emphasize something about one of the nine Lati n American countries of interest (El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras , Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru) . However, only incident s whose perpetrator(s) or target(s) &amp;quot;belong to&amp;quot; one of the nine countries o f interest belong in the MUC-3 database . Thus, an incident perpetrated agains t a human target who is a citizen of one of those countries may belong in th e database even if that person is attacked while he's in a different country . Or an incident perpetrated against the embassy of one of those nine countrie s may belong in the database, no matter where that embassy is located .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="8"> 5) Only terrorist acts (and attempted acts) that are reported as factual are to b e included in the database. An incident is *not* to be recorded in the database if the article discredits the story or cites a source that discredits the story . (However, if the article also cites a source that *supports* the story, tha t version of the story should go in the database .) Rumors are to be excluded . 6) An incident is to be recorded in the database only if it is &amp;quot;recent .&amp;quot; The intent is to include only information that is new or updated . We define &amp;quot;recent&amp;quot; t o mean that either (a) it occurred within two months of the date of the articl e or (b) new information is being provided in the article on an incident tha t occured more than two months prior, such as new suspects being brough t forth as the perpetrators of an old crime . However, there are a number of articles that fail to mention the date of the incidents, some of which are, i n fact, recent. Therefore, if there is no indication that the information is no t recent or if there is no indication that the information is being given onl y to provide historical context (as indicated by phrases such as &amp;quot;Let us recal l that.. .&amp;quot;), the incident should go in the database .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="9"> 7) An incident is to be recorded in the database only if the article's descriptio n of it is &amp;quot;specific .&amp;quot; Generic descriptions of incidents like &amp;quot;terrorist attacks o n the Cano Limon-Covenas oil pipeline&amp;quot; and summary descriptions like &amp;quot;th e total persons kidnapped in Colombia over the last 6 weeks was 85&amp;quot; are to b e excluded .</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="10"> A--2 The articles sometimes give useful information about a specific incident bu t provide very few details . Therefore, as long as all the other criteria are met, w e will include any incident that at least indicates the nature of the target or th e nature of the attack . Thus, an article whose only reference to an incident is &amp;quot;a n attack perpetrated by a subversive group&amp;quot; or &amp;quot;the tragic incident at Uchiza&amp;quot; woul d be excluded, but an article that says &amp;quot;Last night there were fewer attacks on store s and electric towers in the capital&amp;quot; or &amp;quot;a UCR district headquarters in Buenos Aires province was completely destroyed by a bomb explosion&amp;quot; would be included . Here are two further examples of texts that do *not* warrant generation o f templates : &amp;quot;As of 0500 GMT today, the police had received reports of two othe r explosions in two La Paz neighborhoods&amp;quot; (the nature of the explosion isn' t mentioned, and the target isn't mentioned either) ; &amp;quot;the bombing on San Salvador' s neighborhoods&amp;quot; (the prepositional phrase may be interpreted as conveying the target as well as the location, but as a target, it's too general -- any location name that is on the set list cannot serve as a target ID, with the exception of farm names) .</Paragraph>
  </Section>
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